MMA Fighting - The MMA Hour with Ariel Helwani - Episode 421

Episode Date: February 13, 2018

Ariel Helwani recaps the week in MMA (00:01:00), then speaks to Frankie Edgar (00:26:43), Roy Nelson (00:46:00) in studio, Matt Mitrione (01:32:39) in studio, Tyron Woodley (02:12:59), Rashad Evans (02:39:27), Henry Cejudo (02:59:34), Jose Torres (03:17:54), Mike Goldberg (03:34:15) in studio, and NewYorkRic for The MMA [After] Hour featuring Ric's Picks (04:28:14), a surprise appearance by Yancy Medeiros (04:49:57), and the answers to your questions (05:02:43). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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The Mixed Martial Arts Hour back in your life on this Monday, February 12, 2018. Hello again, everyone. I'm Ariel Halwani back inside our New York City studio. Great to be here with you on another Monday in New York City. Hope you had a lovely weekend. I had a great one. was my son's fourth birthday party yesterday. Walter is four, my second son. And as I've said on this program before, I like a good kid's birthday party. I do it big. And we did it big this time. It was a lot

of fun. Great cake, great loop bags, great balloons, great activities. It was a great time and warm my heart. I'm very happy how it all went down. That was the big news in my life. But of course, in mixed martial arts, big news. UFC 21 happened on Saturday night, technically Sunday morning in Perth, but Saturday night here in North America. And Yoho Romero won in the third round via vicious knockout, but it was almost like that fight was the MMA version of Ball Don't Lie. You know Ball Don't Lie? Rashid Wallace?

Ball don't lie. If you get called for a foul, that's not really a foul, ball don't lie, the guy's missing the free throws. Well, it was a Foucazi belt. It was a fake belt to headline a pay-per-view. and and, and, and, and, you all Romero missed weight. And ball don't lie. There is no interim champion because of the fact that he missed weight.

Rockhold was the only one who was eligible to win the belt. And it was very reminiscent of UFC 206 where we had Anthony Pettis fight, Max Holloway. If you recall, Max Holloway made weight. Anthony Pettis missed weight. And thus going into the fight, only Max Holloway was able to win the interim belt. Well, he won that fight. He becomes an interim champion. on Saturday night, Rockhold made weight.

Yo Romero missed weight. So the belt was only on the line for Rockhold, but Rockhold loses, meaning the interim belt vanishes. And now there is just one middleweight champion. His name is still Robert Whitaker. And now we wonder whether or not the UFC is going to book that rematch. Of course, they just fought. Whitaker's last fight was against Romero in July.

Romero's only fought once, the Rockhold fight since that fight. Solid fight. went five rounds back at UFC 213. That time they fought for the interim belt. This time they would fight for the real championship. But it begs the question, does the UFC, quote unquote, punish

Scho Romero for not making weight? He comes in at 187.7. And this one was different. As you may have noticed, we had the old school weigh-ins, which I sort of missed. I know I've kind of made a thing of broadcasting and doing the play-by-play for the

morning weigh-ins as we call them or the official way-ins. But I sort of missed the pomp and circumstance of, you know, a guy walking up on the stage in front of a crowd and not knowing how much he is going to weigh. And so that was the case for this event. As Alex Volcanovsky told us last week, the Athletic Commission in Western Australia didn't want to do. So what they would have, what they would have done if they were going to do it the American way was have them the night before in Australia. just earlier in the day here on, I know it's a little confusing with the time, but it would have had to have been the night before.

And for whatever reason, they didn't want to do that. So they kept them technically 24 hours in advance. It was the old way. It was in front of a crowd. Romero misses weight, gets two hours to shed three pounds because he came in a 188. He only ended up shedding 0.3 pounds. And then there was a lot of drama. There was a lot of drama.

It was fascinating. I was trying to go to bed. It was Friday night. And I'm following this thing. Everyone just kind of assumes, all right, Rockhold makes weight, Romero misses weight. All right, Rockhold's going to fight for the belt. He's eligible to win the belt. Romero's not.

And that's not the case. There was a moment I was told where this thing was in serious jeopardy. And then who knows what happens to the pay-per-view? I mean, I don't think they'd cancel the card outright. But I don't know if you can go with Curtis Blades versus Mark Hunt on pay-per-view. I mean, I'm not expecting this to do very well. from what I was told, the projections were pretty low internally, you know, just barely, you know, the six figure mark, 100,000 or so. And, you know, very possible this could be the, the,

the lowest selling pay-per-view in UFC history. And that's quite the distinction. But this thing wasn't just a formality. There were negotiations to be had. In the end, they settled on Rockhold getting 30% of Romero's purse and Rockhold was apparently okay with that, goes through with the fight, and once again, the guy who misses weight ends up winning. And this has become a huge trend in MMA,

and in particular in the UFC, it just continues to pay, I'm not saying to cheat, but look, who knows what happened with Romero there, right? I mean, maybe at some point throughout the process, he's like, I'm just not going to make this weight. And you saw the way Rockhold looked, You saw the way, if you saw his pre or post way in interview, you saw the way he, I mean, like,

the way he's, he just, like, he had the glasses on. He could hardly speak. He's completely dehydrated. I used to have to do those interviews when I was working for Fox and I despise them. I hated them. Why are we making these people talk at their worst? I mean, they can hardly speak. They don't have a voice. They're completely spent. They're dehydrated. Why are we doing this? And we saw it. It's been a while since we saw this, but we saw that on, on late Friday night. And who knows, we haven't talked to Romero yet. There was some questions as to whether or not he was injured because of the way he was going down the stairs after the way in. But I'm told that's not the case.

He was not injured going into the fight. He did get injured after the fight. Initially, he thought that he had broken his leg. But I'm told from his team that he suffered a deep shin bruise in his right leg. That's why he couldn't stand and was clearly in a lot of pain because, I mean, that's a pretty strong guy. But what a finish. Fight started maybe a little so he's kind of feeling things out, but what a performance by U.L. Romero,

who continues to defy all kinds of logic when it comes to age. Knocking out someone like Luke Rockhold like that, the double jab, left hand, and then the almost like holding his head and then the boom, right hand to the face as Rockholds on the ground, man, that was vicious. That was absolutely vicious. Props to Luke Rockhold after the fact who didn't make any excuses,

didn't speak to the press, but did say that, your Romero is made of steel. And he looks like he's made of steel. And so now the big question is, does he get the title shot? Because if you look at the middleweight division, there's not much there.

There's Romero. There's Chris Wydenman, who got back on track in July, but prior to that, had lost three in a row, including to Romero, a vicious knockout via flying knee at MSG. There's Kelvin Gaslam,

who got back on track after the loss to Weidman against Michael Bisping, but there doesn't seem to be a ton of momentum. And then there's Jacques-Rae who lost to Romero and also lost to Robert Whitaker. So what do you do? There's no real great answer here.

Does he get punished? Has he been punished enough? It's not like he has a history of this, so it's not like you should be afraid to put him in a title fight in a real title fight. But I just love the irony that they put on this fictitious title fight just to headline a pay-per-view after what happened to Robert Whitaker.

And could you imagine, by the way, I was the one who said, like I still maintain that if you are going to make a title fight after someone vacates a title like GSP did and you have an interim champion, that you should just make it a vacant title fight so that like what happened with 221, where Whitaker moves up,

becomes the official champion, and then gets injured, and now you're back to an interim title fight, you could just have two men fighting for a vacant title, which I feel like is what they're trying to secretly do with the event in Brooklyn on April 7th. Could you imagine, though, if they would have done that and Romero wins but misses weight,

now there's no champion? That would have been a mess. So maybe they knew something that we didn't. What a win for Romero, though. It's amazing. It really is. At his age, to continue to do this. Funny story about you all Romero,

before I get into the show, UFC 134, and I'm not sure if I ever told this on this, program. I feel like I've told the story before, but UFC 134, I'm in Rio for their first event in Rio, right? That's the Anderson Silva-Yushin-Oakami fight. And we were supposed to go home on Sunday after the event. However, there was a big hurricane on the east coast, northeast of the United States, Hurricane Irene. And that wreaked havoc with travel. And I ended up having to stay in Brazil three extra days because we couldn't come home. My wife had to drive back to Montreal. It was a bit of a

frightening time being away. And I know what you'll say, oh, what a travesty you had to, you know, stay in Rio. But at that point, like, you want to go home, right? You've been there for a week. You're not really there on vacation. You're not with any loved ones. So I wanted to go home. Anyway, made the best of the situation. And we ended up going to the Nogara Brothers gym in Rio. And it was a very exciting time for the Nogera family because Antonio Hedrigo Nogera had just defeated Brendan Shob. And I mean, the guy could hardly walk. He was like limping to the cage and somehow knocked out Brendan Shob. And so we went to the gym to talk to him and, you know, just try to get some content because we're there for a few extra days. And at the gym, I ran into Captain Eric

Albarasin, who you know by now is one of the great coaches in MMA. We talked about him being on the short list, at least my short list for a coach of the year, works with the likes of the Noguera brothers, the Pitbull Brothers, Liotr Machita, Henry Sohudo, Paulo Costa. He was in studio. When Paul Costa was in studio, he was his de facto translator. And that was one of the first times, if not the first time that I ever met Eric Albarosin. And he came up to me with a piece of paper in his hand. And on that piece of paper, was the name, Yuel Romero. And he said, take this paper, remember this name,

and remember that I told you in August of 2011 that this is a future champion in the UFC. I kid you not. And at that time, Romero had, I think, I'm looking at his record now, he had four fights on his resume, four pro-MMA fights, he had yet to debut in Strike Force. he debuted just a few weeks later in Strike Force

against Hafejou. He got knocked out, if you recall, by Hafell Fezhou in his Strike Force debut and then ends up going on a crazy run until he was eventually defeated by Robert Whitaker last July. But Eric went up to me and gave me this piece of paper and said, remember the name, Yo Romero, he is going to be a champion.

At that point, I mean, like, we're only talking, you know, six and a half years ago. So he's in his, you know, almost mid-30s at this. point. Of course, former Olympian, Cuban defects to Europe and then eventually finds his way over to the United States. But credit to Eric Albarocene for calling this. Now, I know Yo-O. Romero isn't a champion just yet, but he's pretty darn close. And I think he's ended up, you know, having a pretty damn good career, probably better than most expected, especially after his strike force stamp view went horribly wrong. Eric Albaricin in August of 2011 at the Nogara

Brothers Gym. I got to give props where they are due, came up to me with a piece of paper that said, You Omerer on it and told me that this man is going to be a future champion. How about that? Isn't that incredible? I think it's pretty incredible. And I was thinking about that on Saturday. Like, Luke Rockhold, I said it last week on the show. I still feel like is one of the best middleweights in the world. But now he has stumbled twice in pretty dramatic fashion. Not to say that his career is over.

You wonder what the UFC brass, in particular Dana White, thinks about this result because no secret that they're not the best of friends. So what kind of gauntlet will we have to go through to get back to this point? Middleweight is certainly wide open. So I don't think he has to like fight, you know, seven or eight times, but you never know in this sport. It could be a little crazy. Right now they're kind of faced with a situation where a guy just missed weight, but in my opinion, he's going to get that title shot.

That's what I'm hearing, that he is the guy. Dana White told ESPN that he's the guy. and even Dave Shaw, who's the UFC executive who handles a lot of these international events, a fellow Canadian, a great guy,

also said in the Post-Fi press conference that, you know, it looks like he's the guy. Shaw is not necessarily the kind of person who is making those decisions, but he's certainly not speaking at a turn. You know, he's kind of being told what to say

when it comes to title shots in matchmaking. And if he's saying that, if Dana's saying that, I'm hearing that, it seems like, Romero's the guy, put up a poll, get to that later on, around 20,000 people have already weighed in. And most of you think that

Romero, despite the fact that he missed wait is the guy. You want to see that fight again. The problem is that first fight did not do very well on pay-per-view. So maybe you have to couple it with something else. And it remains to be seen. Of course, we had Robert Whitaker on the show last week, and he's still getting better. By the way, Mazel Tov to the Whitakers, they did have their baby girl. So that is great news. It remains to be seen, you know, when he can return. He said by the summer, great. Remains to be seen how serious Joe Romero's injury is.

It doesn't seem incredibly serious because it's not a broken leg. But, you know, maybe on that card, you know, now that it appears as though Cyborg and Nunes aren't going to fight in July, it appears as though T.J. and DJ, that one's a little bit up in the air. Maybe you put it on that international fight week card. We shall see. But what a win for Y'all Romero. Incredible. Also of note on Saturday, Curtis Blades with a nice victory over Mark Hunt. And I know a lot of people were very upset in Perth in the arena for the way that fight went down,

especially as the beginning of the fight looked to be all Mark Hunt. And it looked like we were going to get a vintage Mark Hunt knockout. Unfortunately, we did not get that. For those fans in attendance, they wanted to see that. Curtis Blades got rocked very early and then adapted and said, you know what the hell with this, to hell with this standing and trading with Mark Hunt. I'm going to take him to the ground. I'm going to take him to the ground. And he did that very well and he ended up winning for unanimous decision. And he says afterwards that he wants to fight in his hometown of Chicago. Tai Tuyvasa ends up

winning another first round knockout for him. And Tyson Pedro looked phenomenal with the first round Kimura. Both of those men are Aussies. They're friends with Mark Hunt. So the fans in attendance were very excited about that. And how about Tuivasa with the shooey afterwards? Something that I've never seen before. Maybe I've seen it in passing. But the guy walks out of the cage, grabs an Adidas with beer in it, and drinks out of it. It's absolutely disgusting. I did some research on the shooey. And this is according to Wikipedia. So, you know, there's a bunch of sources. But this is what they said about the shooey, because it's a very strange thing. I mean, who wants to, it's the most disgusting thing I've ever scene.

Drinking beer out of one's own shoe is a ritual sometimes undertaken at parties and events in Australia where it is referred to as a shoey. Australian MotoGP rider Jack Miller celebrated his first premier class victory by drinking champagne out of his shoe. But this is your own shoes. It's not as bad in this case. At the Dutch circuit of Assen on June 26, 2016, 2016. Since then, Formula One driver Daniel Ricardo, if I'm pronouncing that,

correctly, another Australian, has also performed shooies on the podium. And he actually tweeted about missing out on the event and really wanting to be there. But you can drink champagne out of it. There's also a military tradition. Nominate's a friend's shoe to be used as the vessel. The shoe is tilted and the entire contents of a can of beer are poured into the shoe's opening. Once the beverage has settled, the beer is drunk by tipping the shoe up to the mouth and chugging it. The drink most commonly used for a shooy is beer. However, other alcoholic brevetes are also used. And they talk about the driver. I mean, who does this? It's kind of disgusting. But he did it. And he was very excited about it. So how about that? Congratulations. That's the

way you're going to celebrate? More power too. But I mean, I threw up a little bit of my mouth. loses and I thought that he should have been disqualified in the first round when you eye-gouge your opponent to get out of a submission, that is an immediate instant. 100% no doubt about it, disqualification. That is cheating. That is unequivocally cheating. That is you trying to cheat.

That is you trying to do something that is not allowed by itself. Regardless of the fact that you are in a deep submission choke, using that to get out of said submission choke and what does he get? A warning. Not even a point deduction, a warning. And then how about this? How about this amazingness? They win fight of the night. He gets $50,000 for cheating, right? That fight went the distance. If that fight ends in the first round with the submission, they don't win fight of the night. But he gets $50,000 and your Romero doesn't. If your O'O. Romero doesn't miss weight, he's getting the 50K, right? And I wish they would just abolish the performance of the night because like watching grown men and women beg on national

TV for $50,000 when they're supposed to be fighting in the major leagues of our sport is is cringeworthy. I know why they do it. I don't begrudge them for wanting more money, but it's like you would never see this in any of the sport. Please give me $50,000. I'm broke. I'm living in a basement. It's hard to watch. And this guy gets $50,000 for cheating. Romero misses weight. Ah, no, no, no, no. you misweight 2.7 pounds. Hell no, you are not eligible. Crazy. But enough about all that. We must talk about the star of the show. The one and only the last style bender himself. Holy smokes. Israel, Adisania, who defeats Rob Wilkinson, clinical, precise striking. I mean, just carved him up. He is exciting. He is dynamic. He is entertaining. He's got a great personality.

He's great on the mic. undefeated as a mixed martial artist. He is now 12 and 0 as a mixed martial artist. His kickboxing record is 75, 4 and 0 with 29 KOs has fought. He's also, I believe, like five or six and one as a pro boxer. He's fought for glory. He's fought all over the place. But now he is devoting all his time to mixed martial arts. And it's great to see like all the kickboxing hipsters. You know, we've got one in this group behind the wall over there in New York Creek. And they're like, oh, I knew about this guy. You know, been watching him since he was six years old. He's the men. You know, I love this guy. He's been doing this. Where have you all been? Whatever. He's here in the UFC. Please UFC, don't screw this

one up. You know, I'm seeing people say like, oh, put him in there against Derek Brunson. No, put him in there against like 10 cans. Just let him do this for a couple years. You know, the guy had, like, there was one year where he fought like 20 times in a year. Just let him fight every couple weeks, you know? And I'm like, I saw him say some things about Sean Shelby. Just don't mess this up. All parties involved, don't mess. this up. He is a breath of fresh area. He is exciting. Like I said, he's got a tremendous personality. He's a finisher. He's a high level mixed martial artist. Yes, it remains to be seen how his ground game is. Put him in there against the right kind of opponents. You need this guy.

But you don't need him bad enough to put him in. Like, don't do the thing where he's on Fox in in six weeks fighting Jacques. Please don't do that thing. Because you know they want to do that thing. Please don't do that thing. Just build them up slowly. Please. I mean, we got all excited about Mark J. Casey and we've seen how that turned out. And they didn't necessarily mess that one up, but things can get messed up very quickly. We've seen this before. The guy is very entertaining. He's very talented. He pees in the cage, or at least he pretends to. He tells the middleweights that there's a new dot. I mean, it's just like he's unfiltered. It's great. I reached out to him. I've seen all you people say, like, why did you get him on the show and other fighters as well?

Well, you have to understand there's a massive, like the time difference, it's currently 2121 in Perth right now. That's where he is. I reach out to him after the fight and I said, I'd love to have you on the show. He writes back, I've been expecting you. That's it initially. But then we spoke afterwards. How great is this guy? I'm very excited. I also love the fact that he keeps hashtagging non-John Jones. No, non-Jones. Because everyone wants to compare him to John Jones. And he doesn't want to be compared to John Jones. And that's pretty damn cool as well. So let's see what they do with Izzy, Arisanya. What a revelation he has been for the UFC. Yes, I know he's been doing this for quite some time. But they don't always get these guys. And this is the kind of guy that you want to get behind. This is the kind of guy that you want to book correctly. You don't want to push him too fast.

You want to put him in there with the right kind of opponents. Give him the Connor push. Give him the Dennis Sievers of the world. You don't have to expose him. He doesn't have to be in a number one contender fight tomorrow. It's okay. Take some time, build. Good things will come.

Alex Volkinovsky wins. great performance out of him. Also, how about Giusei Formiga with the amazing spinning back fist and then the rear naked choke and he is oh so close to maybe being in that title picture.

He's only one two in a row but it seems like he's the best guy to have never fought DJ. He always wins two or three max and then loses. We'd love to see him win one or two more to really cement his place has done a more

contender but that is obviously a name to look out for as well. So that's the story with UFC 221. Of course, UFC 221. is the next pay-per-view since we last spoke. They have figured out that mess. The new main event is Chris Cyborg versus Yana Kunitskaya

and it's for the women's featherweight title. And how about Chris Cyborg doing a solid for the UFC? You gotta love that irony. And so Yana Kunizkaya, who's the former Invicta FC, bantamweight chat. And Cyborg is brilliant because Cyborg is the one who keeps like fighting, you know, the bloated bantam weights at 145.

She figured it out. Let me just stay here and have everyone move up. Although what hasn't been reported widely is that Kunitskaya was ready to go up to 145. In fact, she had a non-title 145-pound fight booked for that show on March 3rd. That fight obviously has been scrapped, and now she's getting the opportunity of a lifetime

to fight Chris Cyborg. How about that? Remains to be seen how they're going to actually promote that fight, but Cyborg saves the day, and then Frankie Edgar gets Brian Ortega, which we told you was on the verge of happening last week. Ortega signs a new deal, so he's sticking around. and now they're fighting in this number one contender fight. So those are the changes to UFC 222.

UFC Austin, the Sunday night card in Austin, Texas is the next card for the UFC on February 18th, so six days away. That's the one headlight by Yancey Medeiros versus Cowboys Serrani. We'll talk about that one later on in the program, but let me run down today's lineup and then get to our first guest of the day, who I already spoke about. He is standing by. Let me tell you who's on the show today. At around 5 o'clock, we'll do the M.M.A. after hour, Rick's picks your question. You know the Joe by now. We've got three in studio guests today, my friends. We've got at 415, the one and only Mike Goldberg, the play by playman. Of course, for Bellator. Belator is back on Friday in Connecticut, Beltor 194. And it's the second fight of their Grand Prix. It's Matt Mat Matreone versus Roy Nelson. Goldie will be calling the action. He's in New York today. He'll be in studio at 415. Jose Shorty Torres will stop by at 4 o'clock.

Maybe not a household name, but you're going to hear about this man very, very soon, and why not hear about him on this program? Not first, but a little earlier than expected. He is the Titan FC flyweight and bantamweight champion. He returns to action on Friday, defending his title at 125. He is very close to getting the call up to the UFC. In fact, he's gone on the call,

but for various reasons it hasn't come to fruition just yet. We'll talk to him about all that at 4 o'clock. I'm looking forward to talking to him. Speaking of flywights, Henry Sohudo will stop by. He's in Brazil. He's got some interesting things to say. We'll talk to him at 340. Tyrone Wilde has had a very busy week, an eventful and newsworthy week.

We'll talk to him at 320. 3 o'clock. We'll talk to Rashad Evans about the state of that Michael Bisping fight. So stay tuned for that. 220. Matt Matrione will join us in studio once again. Preview his fight on Friday against Roy Nelson. 140.

Roy Nelson will join us in studio. So how about that? the two opponents stopping by. And first things first, though, let us go to the phone lines and say hello to our first guest of the day. I just spoke about him. He is now fighting Brian Ortega at UFC 222 on March 3rd in Las Vegas. He went from fighting for the belt to now fighting one of the rising stars at 145. That's how it goes. But credit to him for saying, I want to stay on the card. Of course, we're talking about the one and only Frankie Edgar who's joining us right now. Frankie, are you there? I'm here, Ariel. What's up, man?

Good to talk to you, Frankie. So let's start maybe from the beginning of this saga, if you will. What was your reaction, Frankie, when you found out that unfortunately Max Holloway was pulling out of your fight? This is a little over a week ago now. Yeah, I was pissed, man. Obviously, we're supposed to get down in December and I got injured. And now, here we go. He gets injured. So, you know, it's just unfortunate.

So we wait things go. I was bummed for a little bit, a little bit depressed. But, you know, I got over, man. I just want to stay on the court. I mentioned a fight. It's been too long. So here we are. You know,

now we've got to fight Ortega. Were you thinking at all, like maybe this matchup, you know, like we've seen it with Habib and Ferguson, hopefully it comes to fruition. Like maybe this just isn't meant to be you fighting Max Holloway?

I don't believe in stuff like that, meant to be, not meant to be, man. You know, if we're going to get down, we'll get down. You know, it's just got to work out. And so far it hasn't.

But, you know, we'll see. We'll see what happens in the future. So you're, you're, You're oh so close to fighting for the belt, of course. Like you're a month away when this news comes out. Why did you say that you wanted to stay on the card as opposed to waiting for him to return and get healthy? I haven't fought since May.

I just didn't want to wait. You know, time's ticking, man, you know, and I want to get in there. I've been putting it a lot, you know, last time I got, I think three weeks before to fight. So, you know, I have a bunch of camps under myself and then no fight, you know, to have the show for it. So I just want to go in there and, you know,

put my skills to use, man. I mean, I only get paid if I fight, so I definitely want to get in there. Was it ever on the, like, did the UFC ask you what you wanted to do? Like, hey, if you want to wait, you can wait, or we'd love to, like, was it strictly your decision, or were they offering you things initially?

Yeah, no, I know. When Ali called me and told me hurt, I said, I need to fight, so just getting enough another opponent, and that was it. Did you have a preference, or was it truly, like, I know, I saw what you wrote online, but, like, was it truly anyone? yeah I just want to get in there

I mean I'm glad it was Rotega because it makes the most sense he's number three right under me I mean that is the mixed most sense for division but yeah at that point man I was just wanted to make sure I had someone to fight Was anyone other than Ortega discussed

Were there any other options brought to you? Not really Pretty much Rtega was the guy that was talked about right away So you know Made the most sense and you know I was game for him or for anybody really But you know Definitely worked

out that Ortega, you know, jump to it. I feel like you have developed a bit of your reputation as being sort of like a prospect killer, if you will. You know, you did it with Yaya Rodriguez. You've done it throughout your career. There was the Chad Mendes fight, not necessarily a prospect, but, you know, a younger guy, Cubs Swanson. You have a very good ability of, like, halting someone's momentum.

Do you take pride in that, and do you view this fight as a similar situation? I take it pride that I win when people don't think I'm going to, you know. I don't think like, you know, I'm going to ruin this guy's plans or anything like that. And I just want to make sure my plans stay intact. And that's what I do. You know, go out there and just try to win fights. I don't care if I'm fighting a guy that I'm supposed to be,

not supposed to be younger or older. You know, the eject is still the same. I want to go in there and win. Have you been impressed with him as of late? You know, the win over Cup Swanson was the most recent one. But overall, like what he's done in the UFC, what is your take on Brian Ortega? Yeah, he's a game.

He's about his game as a guess, you know. And he's not scared to sit there and throw with the best of them. He's got a very slick, slick guard, dangerous jiu-situ game. So he's a dangerous opponent. And, yeah, you know, I got to give him credit to jump out this fight, you know, short notice. But, you know, I mean, I think he got a new contract. He could, you know, take my spot. So, you know, he has a lot of things, you know, on the table that are going for him, too.

I feel like I know the answer to this, but just to make sure, like, at this stage in your career, you're just kind of, like, preparing, you know, you've done this. enough to where you don't have to drastically change things, but Ortega is a bit of a different fighter than Max Holloway. Do you have to change things drastically as far as your training camp goes in the next few weeks because you're fighting a guy who, of course, is so good off his back

and so good with his jiu-jitsu? Not so much, man. Holloway's no joke either. You know, on his back in his submission game, and their body types are very similar. So, you know, it wasn't too much of a change. And, you know, I got Ricardo Al-Meda, Mark Henry in my corner, always adjusting things, you know, as we go.

So I know I'm confident in my preparation and, you know, what do you guys have to work about? That's, by the way, that's MMA Hour coaches of the year, Ricardo Alameda and Mark Henry, just, you know, for the record. You saw that, right? Yeah, man, absolutely. Deservingly so. Yes.

I mean, I think you should win it every year, but of course, I'm a little biased. Well, they're finally trying, you know, they're getting the respect that they deserve. They had a great year last year. And so I just, you know, I just wanted to make sure that you knew the title that they're, you know, they're kind of the defending champions for 2017. That's big. You go though from fighting for the bell to obviously the co-main event.

How does that work financially? Because you get more money when you fight for the belt, right? Are they taking care of you? I mean, yeah, I get paid pretty good either way. You know, so I'm still making money. You know, I'm not complaining. You know, I'm just happy they got me a fight

and I'm staying on the car, and the car's still going. I know the car was at risk getting canceled together, so I'm glad it all worked out. Did they try to get you to fight in Orlando a week or so before? That wasn't a possibility, too, yeah. You know, I said maybe Orlando, I mean, everything was really, you know, you know, kind of playing by ear and stuff, see how it goes. But I was just like, yes.

I said yes, pretty much anything long as to fight around the same time. Okay. And then what about, what about, like, the title shot? Like, have you been told you win this, you're fighting for the belt? You're getting that spot back? not no but i mean i don't see how i'll make me not get it or a win it would make me not get it you know what i mean so he's the number three guy he's the

guy that would have to say i never had a just title shot against holloway and me and our or take was fight i'd imagine that would be a title limine anyway right um i also heard and correct me if i'm wrong that you're kind of hoping this goes you know relatively smoothly and then you want to return for the atlantic city card is that accurate i mean you know i i've mentioned it you know, it would be nice. You know, I really don't want to lose focus on the task in hand, and, you know, I take it a dangerous dude, and I go in there and make sure I take care of business.

And, you know, it's a lot of ifs going into that, to that fight. You know, who knows how I'll come out of it, whether I'm getting banged up or not. So, yeah, I mean, if it all works out and, you know, timing and health, all that stuff, yeah, it's definitely something I'll consider. But right now I just want to focus on March 3rd. It is a tricky thing,

and I'm wondering if your stance is, is starting to change a little bit because you are 36 now, right? And like this idea of just like waiting around for title shots as we like to talk about as media and fans, at some point you have to provide for your family. You have three children.

You haven't fought in May as you mentioned. Like you can't really do that anymore, right? Like you just have to remain active. You just want to get paid at this point, right? Pretty much, you know. I'm not saying the belt loss of value. I mean, to me, I just still hold it pretty high. You know, it's something that definitely

is one of my goals that I want to check off for them all set and dumb. But, you know, I mean, you got to fight. You know, we're prize fighters. You know, I need to fight for a prize. You know, I don't go paid unless I fight. Probably basketball, baseball, you get some guaranteed money, you know. I only get paid when I'm in the octagon. So I got to get in there and make sure, you know, I get mine.

Do you regret the fact that you sat out from May to December in hindsight? I mean, no, you know, you can't. I'm not going to go back and regret things that happen. it's ready past him, so I just got to worry about making the right system in front of me. Okay. You know, remember when you were last on the show, you got mad at me for putting you and Ortega in the same pole, and now here you are

fighting each other. Isn't that weird? Look it is, man. Look at this. Maybe you fucking mustard this all up, you know? No, no, I promise I didn't. Although I do think it's a phenomenal matchup. Like, if you weren't going to fight Holloway, I feel like this is the next best thing. I wonder, though, do you feel like this is the year fight, like,

where he's not quite at your level just yet, or do you think he's past Yaiyar as far as talent and experience is concerned? I mean, I think, you know, he's beating some bigger names, you know. That win over Cubs is a pretty big win for him. You know, I think he's just maybe he's on the same, you know, kind of, you know, rising scale as Yaira, but I think he's just a totally different fighter. So it's kind of hard to really compare it to. Is the UFC going to miss Frankie Edgar when he's gone?

We were talking last week on the show, like how you're always down anytime, anywhere. there's no BS with you. You're not holding out for money. You're not holding out for super fights. Do you feel like you're kind of the last of a dying breed as you look around the sport these days? I think so a little bit. Everyone wants to kind of use their mouth to get where they want to go

instead of just putting in the work, being a hard worker and doing things the right way. They're seeing instant results. I get why they want to do that. I'm a little old school, I guess. I'm being 36, I guess that makes me old school. But I just kind of do my work and keep my mouth shut and let my results speak,

kind of get me where I want to go. And you're lucky because you have like a 1980s professional wrestling manager and Ali Abdel-Ziz who can talk to snack for you. Last week on the show, I'm still getting text messages about his appearance on the show last week. He like went down a hit list of people who he hates and he continues to believe that, you know,

Conraduct you and that you were given the raw end of the deal. I don't know if you saw that interview, but when you hear him, you know, go off on these people. What do you think? Do you like this or do you wish that he would tone it down a little bit? I think Ollie should be himself You know Just don't hold it against me

That's all Just don't hold it against me So you're cool with it It's all like a kid Like his dad embarrassing him or something No not at all man I mean you know Ollie speaks to himself

You know he cares about his fighters You know And no one could ever say that's not true You know he's not in there Run his mouth to get attention for himself He's running his mouth to get attention for his fighters You know that you don't see that often You know in the manager world

and he's one of a kind, special breed, and I love him for it. The thing that you've got to respect, and it's the same with Mark Henry and Ricardo Almeida, they treat you like the godfather of the team. Like Ali now reps like 40 guys in the UFC, but when it comes to you, like,

don't you dare say anything about Frankie Edgar. You are the patriarch, you're the guy. Do you notice, like, the respect that they give to you is unlike anything I've seen in this sport. They treat you like you are the captain of all captains of this squad. It's pretty amazing. You've obviously noticed this, right? I mean, yeah, you know, I was the first to do it for all of them.

So, you know, I guess that's what comes with that territory when you're the first guy to do it. And, you know, I'm not, I think they talk for me too because they know I'm not much for talking myself. So they want to stick off to me and, you know, say what they think I should be saying at times. How many more years you want to do this for? Yeah, I keep getting this question and I'll keep giving the same answer. I really don't have a timestamp on it, you know, as long as I'm having fun and I'm sick. successful. That's kind of my thing. And so far, you know, I get up to, I get up to go to the gym and it doesn't bother me. I enjoy it. I look forward to it. And my body feels good right now.

And if I go out there and keep winning, I'll keep doing this until that's one of those things go on me. And how is the orbital bone? It's all healed, no, like no restrictions at all? No, no. I was good. I think it was good pretty much end of December. I was cleared. I waited probably until right after New Year's to kind of get hit again. so far been good. So all as well. Last thing, do you kind of view this as like the unofficial, the people's main event,

if you will, of 222? No knock on, you know, the title fight, but it does seem like a lot more people are excited about this fight than that one. Yeah, I think so. You know, you got a guy like myself and young blood like at Ortega,

I think it's just a little more, a little more, more, people are more inclined to get behind that one and then, you know, a brand new girl coming over, you know, fighting flyboard. So, yeah, I'm down with the people's main event. All right. I like it. Wear that title with pride. That's great.

Thank you so much for doing this, Frankie. And thanks for remaining on the card. I think I speak for everyone when I say that. Best of luck with the last few weeks of training. We'll see you out there in Las Vegas. All right. All right. All right.

There he is. The one and only Frankie Edgar said, I don't care who it is. Just keep me on this damn card. Give me another opponent. Let's do it. He's getting Brian Ortega. What a phenomenal fight.

And yes, there is something to be said for, you know, canceling out the two contenders. But, hey, sometimes these things happen. Much better to get this fight. Get Ortega back in there. Give him one more chance to fight a top guy. Give Frankie another chance to get paid, of course. I can't imagine the winner of this fight not getting a title shot. So you would think that, and two fresh opponents, of course, for Max Holloway.

There's not a lot of downsides to this for the UFC. They had to keep the car. Last resort is to. cancel a card. That is the absolute last resort. They never want to do that. I mean, we saw with 228. They do not want to do that. Second to last resort is to change it to a fight night. And they don't like doing that either. You know, historically, they have not done that often. It pisses off the pay-per-view providers. It's just not something that they want to do. However, they need a title fight to headline these pay-per-view. It's very, very, very rare that you don't

have a title fight, the headline of paper view. I mean, unless it's Connor McGregor or Nate Diaz, it's just not going to happen in this current UFC. And so you couldn't have Ortega and Edgar as phenomenal as the fight is headline without a belt on the line. And there's no interim time. I mean, Holloway was super active, just fought in December. It would be absolutely ludicrous. It wouldn't be, you know, it wouldn't be out of the norm, but it would feel very strange to do an interim title fight. And credit to them, they did not consider that from what I'm told. So you pull a rabbit out of your hat. There weren't that many options, as we reported last week.

Cyborg saves the day. Yana Kunitskaya, you know, steps up. Credit to her. We'll see what happened. We've seen crazier things in this sport. And we still get Edgar and Ortega. And by the way, you know, like, this isn't UFC 221. This is actually a pretty darn good card.

There's, like, you know, there's prospects. Sean O'Malley is coming back. Strew Varlovsky. be fun. Zengano hasn't fought in quite some time. She is back. Of course, the debut, the much-anticipated debut of won McKinsey Dern.

That should be good. Bobby Green against B'Neil Darius. The John Dodson, Pedro Munoz, has been rebooked for that card. CB Dahlway against Hector Lombard. There's a lot to like. Brian Carraway is back. It's not the worst card of all time. So,

I know a lot of people were sad when Holloway pulled out, but at least they at least they saved the card. All right. So that's Frankie Edgar's story. Now let's transition to one of our three in studio interviews. Bell Tour is back this Friday on Paramount Network. They're back at Mohegan Sun, which they always draw very well at.

And the real story, there's some interesting names on that card as well. Liam McGeeeey-McGy-Glaxton is back, Heather Hardy is back, Patricie Pitbull is back. But the real draw of the Bain event is, Roy Nelson versus Matt Matrione. This is the second Bellator Heavyweight Grand Prix fight. Let me alert the masses that Roy Nelson is about to join us. This is second Belator Heavyweight Grand Prix fight. We got the first one

in January. That was the fight that Chelsaun won against one, Rampage Jackson. This is the next one. And of course, it's a rematch of a fight that happened back in 2012, December of 2012. They were cast members, of course, on Tough 10. That was the season that was highlighted by the debut of one Kimbo slice. They ended up fighting on short notice in December of 2012. That was a fight that went Roy Nelson's way.

And now they're getting a rematch in Bellator of all places. How about that? And the winner will move on to the next round of the tournament. So in a matter of moments, I do believe he is here. We are going to be joined in studio by the one and only big country himself who did make his Belator debut back at Belator 1.83 in September of 2017. He won that fight against Javier Yala, via unanimous decision. I'm curious to get his take on what transpired there and how he felt about his debut and how it felt fighting for a new organization. I mean, the Mitreil and a fight was five and a half years ago.

He made his UFC debut back in December of 2009 against Brendan Shob in the finals of tough 10, went on a very long run in the UFC, ended up fighting in April of 2017 against Alexander Volkov, lost that fight for unanimous decision, and no one knew going into the fight that he was a free agent. No one really knew he was a free agent until the news broke that he signed with Bellator. He kept this one under wraps. He's had a good relationship, Roy Nelson, with Scott Coker and Mike Hogan over at Belator. So it made a lot of sense for him to go over there, especially with the tournament coming up. And he is one of the true heavyweights competing on this tournament.

We know about the others, Ryan Bader and King Moe. That fight is coming up in May. And then the one in April is Fyodor Mellenko versus Frank Meir. Where's Roy Nelson at? What's he stalling for? All right, he's getting miced up. He's giving us all kinds of problems. Later on, after Roy Nelson,

we're going to be joined in studio by his opponent, Matt McChryon. I don't know if they're both here at the same time, but I hope they're not in the same room. I hope there's no kerfuffles in the green room, in our lavish green room. And then later on, our last guest of the day will be Mike Goldberg,

who will be calling the action alongside John McCarthy, Jimmy Smith made his UFC color commentary debut on Saturday alongside John Annick. I thought they did a phenomenal job. He has called every season of Beltoir except for the first. They were seamless. They're best buds. Well, maybe not best, but they're very good friends. And Anick, once again, was spot on.

And Jimmy Smith was great. Now it's Mike Goldberg and John McCarthy, who could have predicted all of this? Let us say, I mean, everything's changed. Roy Nelson is in Belator, and Matt Matron, too, is happening in Beltero. After it happened in the UFC, the whole world is upside down. And there he is. Speaking of upside down, it's the one and only Roy Nelson. Well, thanks.

How are you? Pretty good, man. Are you recording this, Roy? I am. You know, I got to do the cool stuff. Oh, no. Where are you recording this? Right now, we're doing Instagram.

Okay, hi, everyone. How many people are watching? Right now, only, like, because it took forever. No, yeah, what took so long? I don't know. They're slacking? Well, they let us go the 15th floor first. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.

I like the hat. Is that a new logo? Yeah, you like it? Who designed that? I did. You did? Really? By yourself? Yeah, you like the B? I like the B. Oh, where's the C? Oh, there it is.

That's like the Montreal Canadiens logo. Like the C and there's an H in the middle. And then you have the American flag. Right, all American. I love it. I love it. This is great. It's great to see you, Roy. Good to be here. This is my first time in studio.

In studio. What do you think? I like it. You know, wait. you don't have a big country doll though. Do you have a big country doll? I do. I have one of those round five ones. You do have one.

But I have actually one that I actually got made myself that I got from China. Oh, yourself? Yeah. You commissioned it? Yeah, because I, you know, because, you know, that round five thing, you didn't get paid. You didn't get paid, yeah. This is the thing that's come up now with the video game. You know, Ally Quint is very vocal about this.

Like, oh, great, you have a new video game. Where is my cut? It's crazy, right? He didn't get a cut? you get a $300 check? Why, did you? You always get a check. I always thought you always got a check.

You're not in the game, right? Not the new one. I'm in the past couple. Yeah. I've gotten checks. Really? Yeah. Continuous checks or just one check?

You get, I think you get that like royalty check for the year or whatever. And it's 300 bucks? Yeah. I don't, I don't know 300. You get 300. Yeah. I know Mike Tyson, I know, it gets pretty good cut. Sure, sure, sure.

And he's not even an MMA fighters. Right. So you, so you. , so you. Personally, I think you even. gets a cut. That's right. Well, his estate, probably, right? But you actually got something. Wow. Maybe it's changed. I thought everybody gets a good. Well, not everyone's Roy Nelson. Well, I heard, what's his face? Was it Curtis, Blades wasn't being the... He's very upset about that.

Yeah, but he shouldn't be upset. Why? Because they're not using his likeness? Right, and then get a check for $300? Better than no check for $300. I'd rather have my likeness. Okay, that's fair. I wonder if they just chose, that's gotta be like a real big insult. Like if you did sign away your like this, but they don't put you in the game, they think so little of you? No, I think he'll definitely get a push after his last, his last fight. So you still keep up with those guys? Yeah, why not? I don't know. I'm an MMA fan. I know, but maybe

you're like, yeah, screw the UFC, I don't want to watch them anymore, I don't know. No, you're thinking of like other sports. What do you mean? That's how you feel about other sports? No, like, if that's what it is, it's like, you're either a basketball fan and you're not a basketball fan. Sure, sure. Like, so, like, You know, if you're a hardcore basketball fan, you probably watch WMBA. Right, yeah. You know what I mean? Yeah.

It's just if you're a hardcore, if you're a tennis fan, you're going to watch girls and guys. Right. So if there's a UFC. You're going to watch both sides. Right. So no matter what you are watching. Of course. Yeah.

You enjoy it. Yeah. It's M. I'm an M.A. I'm an M.A. I'm an M.A. What do you think of that fight? The Blades Hunt fight.

The Kahn was a little upset. I think when I think Curtis afterwards said Nagano hit harder than. Mark Hunt. Mark. I don't think so just off the pure fact that I don't think he was ever hurt in the Nagano fight. Yeah, he was hurt. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Bad in the...

Sure. So I'm going to go off of it. He might hit less, not as hard, but he's a lot better, I guess, more accurate and make, you know, knock out. He fought the perfect fight, though, right? Like, why would you stand there with Mark Hunt? No, that was his game plan to begin with, but I think what happened was once he got on, once he, you know, got hurt, he should. shot in and he was like oh I could actually take him down yeah and I think that was a

confidence builder and then after that he was like okay just take him down before he was afraid to even get in there sure sure and then once you feel his power yeah I think I think I was once he found out that he could actually get the take down then he was like okay I'm gonna stay here yeah do you like to sort of like

I know you say you're a fan but when there's heavy weight action are you really making a point to watch it yeah I suppose to any or you don't really care no good good fight's a good fight okay you don't care Mark always brings it, so, you know, he's going to swing for the president. Do you root against him because he beat you? No.

No. I DM marked right after the fight. Oh, really? Yeah, just to kind of tell him, you know, like, keep your head up, man. Like, you just need to work on your underhook. Did you say, what do you reply? He's like, thanks, bro. Did you call you Bruf?

Brough. Oh, yeah, yeah, he's got that lingo. That's nice. That he actually replied? Yeah, no, it's just, I think you always want to see people do, you know, good in the sport. and I think like with Curtis, I think Curtis was, you know, stepped up and I think he's

going to do more, especially he's being so young. Sure. I think he's like 26. Right, yeah, yeah, yeah. No, he's young. They need young heavyweights, right? They need it. Every promotion does. So let's talk about life in Bellator. First fight under your belt? How did it feel? You've been to the UFC since 2009, almost 10 years?

Yeah, no. You kid on the block, so to speak? What was it like in September? You know, it just, it felt good, just to, you know, You know, I mean, I came out here for the massive square garden fight, so, you know, like it, like, so there was a lot of hype that I, I was like, okay, Belder's going doing some big things. So I liked it. But, like, actually going in there, cage, round cage, different kind of. Same thing. Same. Fides a fight.

I fought in a square ring. Sure. I remember that. Roy Jones, right? Literally. Yeah. And then I fought in the IFL. Right.

That was in a ring. What do you like better, cage or a ring? You know what? I think takedowns are easier in the ring. ring. In the ring? In the ring. Why so? Because you can't use the cage? No, you can actually shoot all the way through where the cage is a barrier and see your arms can't go through it.

So you'd prefer to fight in a ring? Yeah, take downs are ten times easier. Wow, it's pretty much been, I mean, other than Risen now, it's pretty much obsolete in MMA, right? Yeah, because before it was, they had to go over the, all reason why everybody preferred the ring over the cage was that you, wouldn't be able to see for the spectators. Right. I think the ring for spectators is way better. Well, that was the whole reason why they were like, oh, we got to do the ring.

Right, right, right. And then it just became obsolete when TV and evolution of cameras. Right, right, right. So no nerves, you didn't feel like the new kid, you know, like it didn't feel different at all because it was your debut, free agent signing, you're looking to make a splash? No, it's a fight. Okay. What about your

performance? Were you happy with it? Yeah, no. I mean, I felt like, I could have pushed the pedal a little bit more, but, you know, but overall... Why didn't you? A W is a W. Okay. Were you just trying to get the W out of the way? Not really like, you know...

I think it was the W, and then also, Beltor was talking about they needed more film footage. Because it can get... He goes, UFC doesn't lease that. So, you know, give them a little... That's why I had to do the whole universal of takedowns and all nine yards. The repertoire. Give them a little bit of everything. Did you, when you signed, did you know about the Grand Prix?

No. I didn't even know there was a Grand Prix in the works. Really? Yeah, it was just one of those fun things. I was like, if there's a Grand Prix, I'm all for it. Okay. Because I had heard that they were like sort of bandying about this idea. Your opponent, Matrione wasn't a huge fan of it because he was like, I just beat Fedor.

Why do I have to go through, you know, three more guys to fight for the belt? You were all for it. Yeah, no, for me coming, you know, the one thing I like about the Grand Prix, it makes fans easy to follow our sport. Yeah. Like when March comes, everybody's going to watch college basketball because it's March Madness. They've never watched college basketball all the way up until March. Right, right, right. So the one thing about the, I like about our Grand Prix is casual fans, hard MMMA fans,

they're going to watch every fight because they're going to go, dude, okay, who's always fight next door? Okay, that guy's on the other bracket if he beats him. They can start analyze it and then they can dictate their life around the fight. Sure. Versus, like, other organizations like, well, who's going to fight? Well, I know he's number one contender. Yeah. But nobody likes him.

So, who do? They like that guy. So then we're just going to make that fight happen. Like, so. This is what they call shade. The kids call that shade, what you were just doing. No, that's called fact. That's called fact.

Okay. There's a difference between shade and fact. All right, all right. So I think there's a, I think that's, I think this allows fans to get back into the sport. I mean, like, we need the shot in the arm because MMA hasn't had this in a while because, I mean, our sport was founded off the tournament. Sure.

So that's... But those are one-night tournaments. This one's really spread out. I wish they were all the first-round fights were on the same night. Now, I mean, that's also something different. I mean, like the IFL, when I did the World Grand Prix and won that, it was spread out over a period,

but it was like literally November, December. It was pretty fast. Yeah. But you got to remember, most of these other heavy weights are, you know, my toe hurts or, like, they don't like to fight quite often. Like, imagine Kane Velasquez doing this. This, it wouldn't happen. Right, right. You'd be like, dude, I'm out.

Yeah, okay, but half of your, half of your fighters, maybe that's why it works, aren't heavyweights in this tournament. How do you feel about that? Who's that? Chale? Chale. Chale's not an, okay. Rampage? Rampage is heavyweight.

Well, I mean, he is technically now, but he's not. If you're over 205 pounds, you're a heavyweight. King Moe? King Moe is... Chale and Moly, probably the... Bader's a heavyweight. He just cuts down to 205. Yeah, but I mean,

he's the light heavyweight champion. And if Joe Rogan says, I'm a 185er. What do you mean? Joe Rogan says, I'm always a 185 if I just cut my weight. That's right. I'm not even heavyweight.

So you're right. This is not even a headway. This is a Grand Prix. Okay. It's a world 10th. It's the heavyweight grand prix, isn't it? It can be heavyweight grand prix. It can be a...

Like, like, if I'm a... Like if I beat Matt, Matt thinks he's number one. Yeah. So then I'll be the belt or heavyweight champion. Yeah. And then my next fight will be the light heavyweight champion. So I'll have two belts. Who is the...

And I'll have three when I win the third one, which will be the World Grand Prix. Who's the favorite in your opinion? In which fight? In the Grand Prix. Like, who's the favorite to win? Bookies or what I think? Your opinion? I'm the...

You're the favorite. I'm the favorite. Why? Just like... Just because of Moran Nelson. But I mean, because I think the two names that I've heard the most are Bader and Mitrione, who the fans think are going to win. Are you offended by this?

I don't know if those are fans. I think those are bookies. But who is the favorite as far as the bookies? I think Matt is. Matt, really? Interesting. Wow. So if I beat mad, the buggies have to go back to go, oh, you know what? We hit that one wrong.

Did Matt turn out to be a better fighter than you originally thought? What do you mean? I feel like he's really, you know, he's not a spring chicken, right? He's not a youngster, so to speak. You beat him back in 2012. You know, he had that fight against Czech Congo. But I feel like as of late, he's really come into his own. Confidence-wise, skill-wise.

Yeah, no, I think-man... Did you think he would turn out to be, like, when you first met him on tough, he was very green. Yeah, I don't, I really, I didn't really... When I went on tough, I was, like, I was just like, I got to just do this just to get where I got to go. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It was kind of... Crazy. It's still crazy that you had to do that to get in.

I didn't have to do that to get in. It was just a PR move. Really? Yeah. You had the option? Yeah. Plenty of times to switch over to the UFC. Really?

When was the first time? The first time I think we were ever, every time when I was mentioned with a couple of other UFC fighters and they were talking back, I think it was when Tank fought Frank. That far back? Yeah. Really?

It's just, I just never, I never really wanted to fight. Period? Yeah, it wasn't, that wasn't, I wasn't my, what did you want to do? I wanted to teach. I mean, martial arts? Like, no, I was, I was an element, like, I, like, teach in school. And then, and then when I started teaching jitsu, then I found out I just loved teaching. And then I found I didn't have to teach at school.

What did you teach in school? Elementary school, like third grade. Just general? Yeah, math, you know, you know. Wow. I never knew that. Yeah, see? You don't dig too deep.

Yeah, well, that's why I like having people in studio. And so when did you stop teaching? Were you a fighter, wild teacher at any point? Yeah, I think maybe my first year, two years. Okay. That's about it. And was there one subject that you were the best at or that you preferred teaching the most?

You know what? I just like the elementary. So I like third grade the best. Why third grade? Because first and second, they're still picking their nose. Okay, yeah, yeah. Fourth and fifth, that's when they're trying to get an attitude. Okay.

Third grade was like where they wanted to take it in and they were happy. Like they learned how to read or like you would show them something in just that aha moment. They're appreciative. Right. But then I learned that I could do that with jihitsu or anything else like business. So that's when I learned that I didn't have to be a school teacher for the, you know, to get that same type of feeling. Did you teach in other classes or other grades? Yeah, I've done high school.

High school is a pain in the butt, right? Well, back when I went to school, high school, like, you didn't go to school unless you wanted to go to school. Okay. You know, and then all of a sudden, you know, the don't leave your kid behind type thing, then that's when they forced everybody to go to school. Okay, okay. So the kids that didn't want to be there.

Okay. Had to be there. Right. Then they in turn make it worse for everybody else. Okay. And which... That was high school. You know what I mean?

Is this in Nevada? Yeah. Okay. So that was one of those things where you would go. I don't, maybe we should have just left him behind. Really? No, just because he didn't want to be there. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Or she, you know, it's just one of those, like, you're just like, because back when I went to school, if you didn't want to go to school, you just didn't go to school, and then you chose, hey, I want to do this. Yeah. Whatever, and, you know, that was your choice, because usually at 16 or 17, you're pretty, your headstrong on what you want to do. Did you go to school to be a teacher? That's what, well, when I first went to school, I wanted to do,

I just went to school just to learn stuff. And then it was to, then it was business. And then after business, then it was, then I studied teaching. Education. Wow. Wow. And then who introduced you to martial arts?

I've been doing martial arts since, uh, Cretty Kid. That's how you were introduced to it? Yeah, Cardi Kid and American Ninja. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, I don't know. I mean, so you watch Mr. Miyagi. Of course.

Wax on, wax on. Yeah. So since you were a little kid. Exactly. That's how I got, that was, that's what got me into martial arts. Which form initially? It started off with a Friday at the local YMCA, you know. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

And you just kept going. And then kept it going. And then I found Kung Fu when I was 15 and a half. Okay. And then I loved Kung Fu and then the history of Kung Fu. Right. And then stuck with that. And then the UFC came out.

Uh-huh. And then I was really good at wrestling. And then one of my friends was, like, did web design for, I think, John Lewis. And then he had freebie. It was like, you know, one of those. trade things. Yeah. I wanted you come over to, you know, come with me to the school.

And then that's how I found Jiu-Jitsu. Wow. And started Jitsu, and then I fell in love with Jitsu and then never looked back. Were you ever with John Lewis while the Fertitas and Dana White were there? All the time. Really? That's how long I've been around this sport. I know.

You've been around a long time. You're no spring chicken either. No. So you were training with them. Did you know who they were? No. You didn't know that these guys were like multimillionaires. When you're a kid, who cares?

I know. But you said you're a UFC fans. You must have heard. Someone must have told you. That was before they were, they were in UFC fan. They weren't. Yeah.

That was Lorenzo going, that UFC thing, I'm a boxing guy. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Commission, yeah. You can't bring that here. I know, crazy. I'm not licensing any of that.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay, wait. Okay, I'm off the board. Yeah. Now that looks good. Did you ever actually roll with them? No, I've never, I've never rolled them.

Because you were younger? Or maybe I did and I don't remember it. Wow. That's incredible. A lot of people I'd roll with. Yeah. If they were, if they were one of the guys that I rolled with,

right. You know, older guys. And so who, like, you make the decision to become a prize by the house of stream going. I can't believe you're still doing this. This is, this is copyright infringement right here, right?

No. Is it not? No. Well, this, I mean, you're taping a show that's owned by another entity. Not really, because I'm copyrighted my own stuff.

Because I print my own stuff. I can't care less. Go, do it, do whatever you want. I'm happy you're here. Oh, I appreciate. When did you get here, by the way, to New York?

Last night. Last night. Or yesterday. Did you come with your wife? I did. Oh, she's right there. Like a ninja. She's always there.

I knew she wouldn't leave. And what about your son? He's back home with grandma. Okay. You don't want to bring him out to these? He's got school. Well, he does have school, but it's only two days a week. No, I just...

Too far. Well, it's too far, and then it's just not one of those headaches, you know? Right. It's a business trip. Business trip. Yeah. Then we go on vacation afterwards. Where are you going?

No, I just saying. Oh, you're just saying. Yeah. Okay. How did you go from just being that guy who likes to train to a prize fighter? Like who kind of convinced you or like how did it happen where you're like, I actually want to do this for a living? You know what? It was one of those like I was beaten, I felt like I was beating up UFC champs. Okay. That's how I felt. Really? And I felt like I was already here. And I was coaching him and teaching them. And then one of them owed me money.

What? And then I was like, I'm going to go out there and just take it money. Who owed you money? I can't tell you. Why? This is like 15 years ago now, probably. Yeah, but it's one of those things. It's in the book. Okay. What book?

Are you writing a book? Yeah, of course. I always writing books. Have you been, like, keeping a journal of your career? Yeah, no, I've definitely, we always jot things down to make sure we. Remember them? Yeah, that's what this is for. Yeah, for the record.

Interesting. So you had like a deal? Was it like a bed or something? No, no, I just done coaching, you know, fighters. Oh, okay. You know what I mean? I'm like, I'm just going to take my money. Like, I didn't even want to fight.

until I fought. My first six fights, I never even trained. I just went out there and just did what I did. Where was your first fight? It was on Indian Reservation. It was a tournament. I had two fights at one night. Wow.

Winner take all? $3,000. You won. Yep, you had to win it. Wow. You weren't making any money. Was it in a ring or a cage? That was a ring.

How many people? It was four. So four men. Yeah, four-man tournament. Okay. Was it in a big venue? A decent size Is an Indian reservation

Yeah yeah Were you nervous? No, because I had nothing to lose I was just one of the If anything I wish I could go Get that same mentality that I had then That I should have now Meaning what?

Oh, like the younger you are The easier it is to fight Right Because like you don't have the care in the world You don't like you don't There's not things that You know like I mean it's same thing with you know

You've had business where it's like you're doing really, really well, and then someone takes something from it, you got a fan, you know, like, you have to bring this up. No, I'm just saying, but yeah. I know, I know. You only have to worry about yourself, right?

Right, yeah. When it's just you, you're like, dude, I can, I can, you know, sleep in a gutter, I can do this, I can do that. I can, I can suffer through. But then once you, you know, life goes on, you start building your family and everything else up, and then you start thinking about all the other stuff

that they could take away or where you can't get or, you know, so, like, so it's easier when you're younger. When's the happiest, that you ever were in MMA. Right now. Right now is the happiest. Yeah. Really?

By far. Okay, so it wasn't like the IFL days where you felt like you were at the top of your game, but also like no worry, like no real life worries, right? You're just kind of doing your thing. You're beating people up. You still feel like it's now.

Yeah, like the only thing now is, you know, is like my kids at home. Yeah. That's probably my only worry. But besides that, I mean, I have a good, you know, my wife's good to me. Yeah, yeah, of course. to me. I have a good family. And then plus I'm in Bellator. Like, there's a lot of good things going

for me. So I think I'm the best fighter now than I was 10 years ago. So why is that? Just smarter, you know, like, experienced. And, you know, the best person would be like, ask like Randy Couture, you know, like, I mean, I think he fought until he was like 47. So it's one of those things that you just know that you get better and better. The only thing that happens is just you have to train differently. Right. You just can't put your body through Yeah, unless you just start juicing. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

But it's like, it felt to me, correct me if I'm wrong, the end of the UFC run, you weren't feeling this way. Like the Volkov fight, that wasn't Roy Nelson. No, I just wanted to get out of there. Yeah, when you're already like, one foot's out the door already, because you're just like, dude, there's no please and there's no thank you and there's no appreciation.

I think that was just with the new management. Yeah. I think came in and kind of, like, I don't think they know how they're, you know, That's why I think the UFC's kind of going the opposite with the new management type of thing versus like getting fans back involved. You sense the difference?

Oh, you could definitely sense the difference. The morale is different. The employees are different. Like before, back in the day, you remember when employees were taught, like, let's talk about fighting. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Now it's just like, oh, there's a fight next week. Where's that? Right.

Who's on it? I don't know. Like, before there, I mean, there. the people that worked for it were like, dude, I can't wait. Roy Nelson's on the fight card next week. Like, this is going to be on the next week. Oh, I can't wait. There's too much, right?

It's not that it's not too much. I just don't think there's enough stars. Yeah, but you know why there's not enough stars? Because you got to build them. Yeah. And if there's a fight card every week, there's no time to build them. No, you can build them. It's just, you got to do it. I mean, WBWA does it all the time. But it's the same guys. But those guys could, yes, those guys can compete every Monday. True.

You can only compete. three, four times a year max, right? In this day and age of UFC, you're not getting more than three, four fights a year. It depends on your budget, on where you're at on the budget scale. Fair. So it might be one or...

Sure, exactly. One every 18 months. Yeah. But it's like now they have a show in Austin on Sunday. They just finished a show. And then the next week they have one in Orlando. And then the next week they have one. Like, you can't do that.

You can't have a... Like, that's why I think the old Bellator model didn't work because it was 13 straight weeks. You're just basically like, you need to get people emotionally invested in the characters and the flights, right? That's where the tournament comes in. I see that. I see that.

I don't hate on the tournament. The only thing I don't like about the tournament, if I'm being honest, and I've said it before, is that there's non-heavyweight in it. Like, if it's a heavyweight tournament, make it a heavyweight tournament. That's why you just call it a World Grand Prix. Or call it like a, what is it? What do they call it in Japan? Grand Prix.

No, it's like super fight. Like, you know, when there's open weight, open weight tournament. Yeah, but that's why you just lose the heavyweight. Just put World Grand Prix. No, Grand Prix replaces tournament. It doesn't replace the weight class. That's why I said, World Grand Prix. If you put the heavyweight, then it's a heavyweight.

It's a Beltaur World Grand Prix. It's a Beltaire World Grand Prix. Yeah. And then anybody can enter. I mean, if Roy wanted to do it, Roy's more unhappy to. That's right. He's not doing it. I'm just saying, but if you wanted to...

That's right. That's right. Then it would be something like, oh, Roy's wants to do it. Okay, he's a hundred and seventy pounder. More power to it. And then we can really do pound for pound. Yeah. How do you think Steepet would do in this tournament?

Steepet. What would that be fun? Yeah, I think it would definitely. I think, like him fighting D. That'd be the same thing. I mean, he's not a heavyweight. He's not heavyweight. Former, like, Strike Force heavyweight champion, D.C., right?

Former? Well, yes, because he moved down because of his friend. But former, so, like, we'll just say, hypothetically, if Ryan wins the tournament, then does that make him the heavyweight, or is he just the former light heavyweight, or is he the former? I get your point, but you get my point as well.

I do, too. All right. How would Steepa do? Steve, I mean, I think I think it all depends on matchups. I think Steve-Bade does well with like, I mean,

like France would do well. Like, it's all about, the heavyweight division is anybody can win on any given day. Yeah, yeah. Like the top guys. Like, it's like football. Like, you can go 10 and 6

and still make the Super Bowl and win the Super Bowl. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You know what I mean? So, you lock. six, it doesn't mean you were, you know, all you got to do is just like, I think, New England when they went 16 and 0, and didn't win the championship that year. Yeah, yeah.

So it doesn't really matter of, like that, but I think heavyweight, that's the one thing why you have to watch heavy weights. Right. It's because anybody can win at any given day, just like, you know, like Francis hurt Steepet in the first round. Then after that, it was like, nope, we're not doing that, and then it was all Steepay. If you win this fight, you fight the winner of Bader King Moe, right? How do you feel, Mo's a friend of yours?

Moe's a good friend of mine. I want Mo to win, but then after that, Mo needs to go down on 205. Are you training with him right now? Moe actually came out, like, was it a couple weeks ago? Yeah, a couple weeks ago. Wow. Like, I still, like, I talked to Mo two days ago. Okay.

Like, we're a good friend. Will that be weird? No. What is that? Oh, it's a phone call. Who's calling? Is it Mo? No, not my mom.

No, not your mom, Mo? No, with the mom. Okay. No, like, but like, to fight Mo, that's why I said. Like, I'm not even worried about that because I'm going to get through Matt. Sure. And then Mo has to get through Ryan, and then we'll deal with it then. Okay.

But are you sort of dreading it, the idea? Like, would you rather it doesn't come to fruition? No, I want Mo to win and then Mo go, you know what? I'm a light heavyweight. All right. I'm a light heavyweight champion. I just beat the light heavyweight champion of Bellator. I'm still a light heavyweight champion.

and now I'm going to, you know, that's what I would prefer. Right. But that's not Mo. Mo's all about, you know, putting on a show and going out and fighting. You trained at Mayweathers for this a little bit, right? I saw that on the countdown. Sure. Right. Does he ever show up anymore? Who? Mayweather. Which, Mayweather. There's a few. Well, he's the one who owns the place.

That doesn't mean anything. There's still. Okay, Mr. Floyd Mayweather Jr. Does he show up? I didn't see him when I was there. I'm sure he stops by. Yeah. you guys friends? Floyd, like as in like... Like when he sees you, he's like, what's up, Roy? Yeah, like that type of friend, yeah.

We'll say gym friends, yes. Friendly. Yes. Acquaintances. What do you make of him, like putting out these pictures about MMA? Is he serious? What's the scuttle butt? What are people saying?

We're talking about it. So I think that's one thing he does really well. But grudgingly. But you talk about it. Yeah. But is he serious? Does it matter? You're talking about it.

That's the... If he was saying he was going to go fight elephants, then everybody would be like, oh, is you really talking about elephants? Honestly, I regret even asking you about this because I hate the topic so much because I think it's silly. Well, then why are we talking about?

Well, because you're at the gym and there's not that many fighters who are at the gym, so I wanted to know if you had any inside scoop. No, all I know is February 16th, I'm fighting. That's all I care about. That's what I'm at the gym for. So I wanted to go back to the,

you said you had a foot out the door when you fought Volkov. When did that happen? When did you decide, like, you know what, there's no future for me here? I think that was probably

Brazil and after that fight with what happened with Big John that fight? Yeah,

just how like some of the inner workings of how the Brazilian commission works and you know the stuff like that. Is there any

so now like he's calling your fight Big John okay he's gonna as long as he's calling it outside that I'm good.

You win the fight on Friday he's gonna do do the post fight interview that's fine How do you feel about that? I'm okay with that. As long as it's not inside the...

You won't kick him in the butt? Well, if I do it there... Then it's okay. Then it's okay, right? He's not an official anymore. Have you squashed the beef, though? Yeah, no, we squashed the beef. He didn't even know I touched him.

Really? That's the best part. But there was beef going in. Obviously, you did that because you were upset at him for a string of decisions, right? Yeah, no, no, it's from... It came from, like, Derek Lewis fight. Uh-huh.

Breaking us up, like, stuff like where we talked... We talked about beforehand, like, how... how he's going to ref and, you know, because you always want to know how the ref's thinking and what they're going to do, and then all of a sudden they switch to the script where it's like, hey, I'm going to do this. Yeah.

Because I want to be, you know, popular or whatever. Okay. And then that, the fight I fought Bigfoot, it was kind of the same thing we talked about exactly. I'm like, okay, this is what you did last time, are you doing the same thing? Are we switching it up? Are you going to do this?

You can do that. Like, what's the, you know, the verdict? Like, I don't care. If you suck, you suck. If you're good, you're good. as long as you're consistent. Yeah. Like, if you're consistently the same guy, I'm okay with that.

Like, I prefer no refs in the cage at all. The only thing the refs for is to make sure you don't do a foul. That's it. Not, hey, how can I manipulate this? Right. And when you see refs start manipulating the fight where it's like, well, this guy can't, like, if I'm on top of you and you can't get up, that means you suck. Right.

I mean you need to work on your jitsu or you need to work on this. and we're doing MMA. If we're doing boxing, different story, you know what I mean? So you've cleared it up, though? Yeah, it won't be awkward. There's no beef.

Okay. Interesting. Do you know who's rough in my fight in this one? I don't. Do you? No. That's how often I care. Right.

What about this Mario Yamasaki? Everyone's hating on him. How do you feel about that? Like I said, I'd rather have a rough not do anything. Really? You think that was good? Well, see,

I've actually had fights where I've actually hit people and walked away. Yeah. And I've actually had fights where I've actually hit people and told the ref that he's knocked out. Yeah. And that's what I've done in the past. And so I either walk away and, like, I'm not one of those guys.

Because I know they have a family guy. Sure. It's like, so I don't have that typical mindset of, like, some of these other guys where, like, I'm here to kill you. I'm ready to hurt that guy. Ready to take his arm home with me. Yeah. Like, if you're really that, then you need to get a friend.

But I mean, the ref's job is to kind of protect. No, no, for protection. That's what I said. Like, fouls, like, you know, let it go too much. Like, it's one of those things like, well, didn't she, she got choked out, right? Yeah. Well, then it's like, well. But, I mean, it was going on for like two minutes where she was.

The choke or the? No, no, the punches on the ground. But like I said, like if you're moving, you're moving. I guess. But there's a difference between, like, moving to defend yourself and to work towards something and like just surviving like you're drowning is there not no like i'm coming from i'm coming from a fighter standpoint so it's like it what about throwing in the towel how do you feel about that yeah well they do that like quite often in boxing yeah they never do it in m m m m ms because there's only

three rounds what if you're getting beat up midway through the the second round why can't you stop the fight if you're a corner live to fight another day yeah but they're like man we're 15 minutes No, I'm getting paid. I got to get that other half. I got to get that other half. That's the problem. That is the problem. If there was just one amount,

the corner doesn't have to worry about the financial ramifications of this decision. That's true. Same thing with the fighter. In boxing, exactly. You step foot. You know what you do. No, no.

Like I said, that would be one of those things that helps you as a fighter. When you're younger, like I said, you don't care. You're like, oh, dude, I'm just going to fight to whatever. When you're older, you're just like, you're like oh i don't know about taking that extra shot sure but then you're like oh i'm getting half my kids not going to be able to eat next week so that system is is silly now it's antiquated

it is because i understand why it was put in place in the first place yeah but 16 years ago when they bought the company and they were trying to get people excited about it was it was that and then but it was also you can't remember fight cards used to be like this fight card this weekend um or this Friday is where from the first bell, or from the first fight, you wanted to watch all of them. Now it's, who's on the main card? No, who's the main event? Now it's, who's the main event? Because it used to be,

the main event used to be the main card. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Like, there'd be four or five, five fights that you'd be like, dude, I want to watch. Because if one fell out, guess what? Cards still get done going. But when you started just doing the one and the one card falls off. It was like, who's on the next pay-per-view? Well, it was supposed to be Max Hallway and Frankie.

Right, and now when that fell apart, they were like, whoo-woo. Yeah. And then they replaced it with they replaced it with Cyborg against Yanukunitskaya. They should have done Frankie versus Cyborg. That would have been 145-145. That would have been a fight. That would have been a fight.

I would have my money on Frankie, though. You think so? Yeah. Wow. Better wrestling. Yeah. I hope you don't see that anytime soon. But they're 145. I hated when they made you go up there and read that thing. That was the worst. That was so sad.

What was that? What was that? That was embarrassing. For who? For you. Not embarrassing for me. Come on. Sit up there and read an apology that you clearly didn't want to be up there reading.

What was that? What was this? Grade four? It's ridiculous. When you get slapped down, you got to just take your punishment. I've never seen that in the history of combat sports. Guys, before we wrap up the way in, Here's Roy Nelson with a written statement and you have to read it.

Not even issue it. There's one thing to issue a press release. Okay. But you had to actually go up there and read it? It was, it was, Roy personally at a UFC event. Yeah, come on.

Had to be a, yeah. I had to be at a UFC event. You couldn't call your own press conference? No, I had to be at a USC event. That's why I thought it was like, like I said, there were some. They had it out. There were some things with, I'm not saying, look, touching an official, there needs to be a line drawn.

No, no, I go up there. I completely, you know, take fall in that. But it was also one of those things, like, if John was the commentator, it was more like, I'd be like, man, you can't say that. Yeah. You've had, I mean, we all remember Elite X-C, remember? Yeah. Working on the Kimura.

I was there. Yeah, no, it's like, but that's why I don't fight in Florida either. October 4th, 2008. It was that long. Crazy, right? Almost 10 years. You've not fought in Florida since, correct? You refuse to.

Shame on me the second time. What was the time after? Jeff Monson. Oh, that's right. That's the crazy one. That's Roy Jones, right? Is it true that they had to buy out your contract to allow you to be on tough? No.

What's the story there? The day they started filming, Roy Jones calls up the UFC. Now he's, of course, fighting on Fight Pass. You see this? Yeah, I brought them all together. Yeah, yeah, yeah. They're all friends. This is a story. You were still under contract?

I couldn't tell you. You can't talk about it? Yeah, it's one of those. Is it NDA type of thing? Yeah, it's one of those. Something did happen though. Yeah, like, yeah, I fought on Ultimate Fighter. No, but you were still like, some... And then boxing came in. You know how boxing works. Right, right, right. There was, you know...

She can't. I always wanted to know that story. You know, it's America. What does that mean? I could sue anybody I want to sue. That's right. But they were, they were threatening to pull you from the show, right? The show? weren't the show? No. It never went, no. It never got that serious? No.

Hmm. Are you sure? As far as I know. Okay. You might know more than I did. But they had to pay off this promotion, right? The Island fights. I'm assuming, I have no idea. That was crazy. I remember that pay-for-view. It was a hybrid show. Remember it? Yeah, it was just like the one he just did. Yeah, exactly. You were on it. Colonel Bob Sanders, I think, was a, no, Colonel Bob Parker. And then, yeah, and then

Who fought? Petrizelli was a commentator. He was, yes, that's right, that's right. He's a Belter heavyweight. Professional wrestler. Oh, Bobby Lashley. Yes, that's right, that's right. Man, that was a good time.

Look at you now. Beltsware heavyweight Grand Prix. You've come a long way. I saw on the countdown, your wife cut your hair. Yeah. It's amazing. I noticed you guys cut it in the kitchen. Yeah.

I mean, doesn't it like, doesn't the hair get all over? No, we're on the front side. Okay. But you're not worried about, like food. That's what the living room. No, because we have a very open, like, we have a living room, and then it kind of goes into. Is there something on the ground to pick up all the hair?

Yeah, it's called tile or cement or whatever. Okay, and then you just, like, dust it up? Yeah. So when's last time you went to a barber? Last time, probably 2007. Wow. She's been doing it ever since. Yeah.

Don't you remember my haircut from 2008 when I fought Arlowski? Yeah, it was great. That was the last time you went through a barber? No, my wife was going through hair school. Okay. And she messed up. Oh, so she's actually like a licensed barber. Yeah, so I think, you know how everybody flies their barber in?

Yeah. You know, I was like, you know what? I'm going to do one step further. I'm going to marry her. I'm going to put her up and put her to beauty school, get my hair all done, so I could get a dye job, and get my, My barbershop. Do you diet?

No, I'm just saying it. Okay, if you need. Yeah, like, so I got it all set up, so she's been doing it for 10 years. Wow. Wow. Now, after start next year, I'm going to be ahead of the game. Okay. So I don't have to, like, fly in my own barbers.

She's going to have her own salon? No. Oh, why not? The investment in putting her through school. I understand. But why not open up your own place, like big countries barbershop or something? No, because I just like to have my own barber. Okay.

The beard is great. perfectly round. I appreciate that. Could I touch it? Sure. It's just a little bouncy. Let's see this. Oh my God.

It's unbelievable. It's beautiful. I appreciate that. You ever get annoyed of it and say, you know what? I'm tired of this thing. All of it, yes. Yes. You ever wake up and say maybe today it's going to go?

No. No. You think it's good. It's good for the gimmick. It's like, this is who you are. Yeah, yeah. No. Dana White loved it.

Yeah, like Gillette, you know, came in and said, hey, we're going to give you... That be big. Then, you know what? This is the razor I use. That's right, that's right. Look at that smile. Million dollars smile right there.

What is that logo on the side of your cap? It's RICO's. What is that? Rigo's cheese. Never heard of it. Have you ever had nachos? Or have you ever had nachos? Yes.

At a movie theater. Maybe not at a movie theater, but I've had it at a restaurant. You never had them... I don't go to the movies that often. And if I go, it's usually just popcorn or nothing, because it's very buttery the popcorn. Yeah, but we're talking. talking about nachos.

No, I'm not a nachos at a movie kind of guy. Do they do it? Yeah, they're in like 75% of all movie things. And they're your sponsor. Isn't it nice to have sponsors again? It is very nice to have sponsors. Is it comparable to what you were making on the Reebok deal? Better.

Better. What about the old days? Like 2009, 2010? The answer is yes, but it's taken a lot harder because it definitely took a beating. So it's like really try to teach the method of like when you get advertisements here You know what I mean

Thanks But you know like when you have You know your radio show You get a sponsor Where they know what they're getting into And like why they're doing it And blah like back in the day You never really had to educate a

Sure may sponsor They were just back Yeah sounds great Right Now it's like you have to kind of educate it Because they were so scared like Well why isn't anybody in your sport.

And you're like, well, here's the reason why. Right, right, right. Because this company over here paid this company, a lot of money for all the other ones to go away. Crazy. You know, so you could be that company. If you want to pay me like them, then we'll go ahead and make that $70 million deal for you.

One of the craziest decisions that everyone just signed off on it. Here, take all my sponsors. I don't think it was a sign-off. I never signed anything. It was just, that's how it was. like an addendum? No. For you, Sada there was.

Yeah. Yeah. But not really either. You didn't have a seat at the table, so what are you going to do? Just sit out? You didn't really have, you didn't have any of that. It was just like, here you go. This is what we're doing.

Right. You're like, okay. Yeah, what are you going to do about it? You want to fight? Like, when I hear people talking about now where they're like, I think Tyron talking about, we're negotiating the, like, before it used to be, they'd send you over a battle agreement, and you just go. there you go and that was it

whoa that guy's pretty good I need to get paid now that's how it is now time's change good for them right that's

I'm still old school like I like the just sign me up I just want to fight because I do it more like I'm a football player or a basketball player like I look at sport

like we're in a sports league not a you know like prize fighting we're not a typical prize fighter we've never been like that boxer because if we did

then we'd get television you know we know about television we'd be in the mahoma lee act it's like there'd be a whole bunch other things that we'd be involved with but we're not it's got to happen eventually right i don't not you're wearing uniforms right right right yeah that's why it should happen so you're not really uh that's more independent that's an employee that's like a professional wrestling how many how many more years you got left i got i got at least one more year at least one at least one more because that's how long it's going to take for this grand prix that's right but then it could be You win the thing and you ride off into the sunset?

Imagine that. I probably at least one or two defending, so at least a year and a half. 18 months. At least 18. At least 18. Okay. But not two years, maybe.

I give you two. And then when you're done, you go back to teaching. No, and I'm done, then I go back to movies. Movies? That's kind of got me what it got... Acting? That's what got me into martial arts in the first place. That's right. Full circle.

I wanted to be in movies. Are you in any movies right now? Of course. Kickboxer. That's right. Right. No, but right now. That's like a year ago.

No, I think we're getting ready to film the new kickbox. Oh, wow. Another one. Yeah, another one. Is J.C.V.D. Watch out for the kick. Cody Garbrang got nailed. Yeah, that's because he wasn't aware of that credit kick.

That's right. That's right. He's not used to. We're used to that Muay kick. That's right. The follow through, not the snap kick. Did you get any speaking, you know, parts in the in the in the yeah oh you do okay wow yeah and i mean come on i don't know

mike tyson has one he does yeah if mike tyson talks then i can't tie he's in that movie in part two yeah and then he's gonna be in part three with snoop wow he's a big mama fan exactly so we got snoop coming up on the third one mike tyson um cody's gonna be in it okay of course jcvd wow they might i think they might actually fight that's huge which um i think there might be a whole another, it's like a movie in the movie. For the DVD extras. Okay. Well, this has been fun.

You know what's fun about this? Now we're going to talk to your opponent. I didn't want to have you guys at the same time because I think that might be weird. Why have we been doing that all day today? Have you? Yeah. I like having the alone time. Yeah, so you're going to get two different answers?

Who do you think is going to win this Friday? Nah, I didn't even ask you that. No, no, but that's what you should ask. No, because I know what you're going to say. I asked you about the whole tournament, not the specific fight. But you already know if I say I'm going to win the whole thing. Exactly. That's why. And then Matt, Matt's good.

But at least I have that I'm going to fight for the heavyweight title. Right. Light heavyweight title. Right. And then World Grand Prix. Okay. We'll see what he has to say. See, if Matt was smart, when he said he didn't want to fight, you know, in the tournament, he said, can me check Congo.

Right. We have the best records in the cage right now or, you know, whatever. And then let's fight for the belt and then let these guys fight us in the tournament. Yeah. I don't know if that would have gone over. very well. But it wouldn't matter. Like, he would, I mean, that would have been the smart

political. Right, right, right, right, right. Okay, well, let's see what he has to say. But now he has to say. Thank you for doing this. I know. 2012, all over again. How about that? Remember that fight? Not really. Well, it went well for you.

I wish you the best on Friday. It was right, when I had my baby. That's right. That's right. When Jackson was born. Paramount Network, this Friday. February 16th. Main event, Mohegan's son. Roy Nelson against Matt Matreone. Thank you for doing this.

Are you going to Connecticut? Will I be there? In spirit. Wow. You live that close? I don't live that close. It's like three hours from here from where I live. Wow.

And also it's my son's fourth birthday on February 16th. Bring him up there. He's four. Did him involve with M.M.A. You know what? I don't need him around, you know, the glitz and glamour of the fight game. Not just yet. Have you been to Mohegan's then?

I have, yes. It's a phenomenal venue. They always draw very well, Beltoe. So that's what I'm saying. Can I think about it? Yeah. I mean, you got four days. Okay.

So I'll let you know. Okay. Thanks for doing this, Roy. I appreciate it. There he is. Roy Nelson stopping by, big country. They're going to walk you out. Joe's going to come out.

And then we're going to, when you and Matt cross paths, don't do anything crazy, okay? Or you can to sell the fight. You know? How much money do you have? How much is the money in the sponsorship? Here he comes. Uh-oh. Matt Matrione is here.

Roy Nelson doesn't seem to want to get up. He just woke him up. How you do it? That's a long as interview. I know. I'm not asleep. Matt. How are you, Matt?

I'm living a dream, buddy. It's good to see you. Oh, thanks. Appreciate it. Did you just wake up? I did. Were you that bored? Yeah.

I did. I didn't bring my book, so it goes. Have you been around him all day? What's that been like? It's hanging out with Roy. He's hanging out with Roy. He filmed the entire thing. I'm sure.

Yeah. Yeah. It's great. I think you're the first person to come in studio twice in our new studio. Yeah. Remember? Flattered right now. Last, you really did wake up.

I did. I just, wow. Damn. Yeah. You got like the bleary-eyed. You're looking great. How much you weigh? 274.

What happened? Scott Coker here, too? I don't know. Okay. Oh, okay. Oh, that's right. Scott Coker has been in twice. Thank you very much for that.

No, let him you know. So you're not. What's up, baby? Are we on right now? This is live. All right. Yeah. Let's do it.

How are things? They're good, buddy. They're good. Where's yours? Yeah, Scott Hoggart. That's right. I'll talk to him about that. We got the guy that, of course, you beat back in June, June 24th, I think it was, to be exact. Madison's great. Fador signed it. He did sign it for me. You know what happened? We had a guest Tiffany Van Suss, who was here, you know, Tiffany Time Bomb. Are you familiar with her? She stole my Fador.

And then Beltor was kind enough to give me a new one. And not only did they give me a new one, they gave me a sign one. So he didn't sign up for you. Not for me, no. But I thought it was a nice gesture. It's a nice gesture. It's a really nice gesture. How do we feel about this? I've got a Kimbo signature I can cut out. And I'm going super we can glue it on that. Not on this.

Oh, yeah, because it wasn't around. But here we are four days away. How do we, because you know, you were kind of, you were lukewarm about the whole thing.

How's fatherhood, how's fatherhood, how's great? I've got three, but more importantly, you have, you know, you know,

how about this? When I found out that I was going to be a father for the first time, one of the very first people I called. Do you remember who it was? Yes, I do. You?

That's how close we were. Yeah. Mitrione minute. Yeah. You got rid of me. You got tired. I did not get rid of you. You were like, you know what?

I've gotten enough heat from you. No, I got enough. Tito Ortiz still hates me because of you. And yet I see you guys chumming it up. Tito and are our friends now. Caged side. We're friends. He's moved on, you moved on.

Look at how nice the dudge you got going on here. Yeah, you like that? You're doing all right, buddy. I got the Beltor gloves right over there. I actually believe that you signed them. I did right there. Yeah. I see it.

I saw some great footage of you and your kids. I saw some great footage of you and your kids. Your kids, you brought your son. Was it Jacob to Super Bowl? Yeah. Amazing. He's in all the interviews with you. Yeah. How old is he now? He's 12. He's 12 now. Wow. I want him to be in a situation when he grows up. He never enters a scenario where he's not comfortable. Okay. So I try to bring him to as much as possible. I would bring Jonah to even now, but Jonah, he complains too much. Okay. So like, and he's too moody. You never know what you're going to get out of him. So like, I can't bring him for a day of media if he's going to be soaking and be. You're

be difficult. So I was like, look, did you grow up a little bit, handle your business like a man? And I'll bring you all. Was he upset that he wasn't invited? You know, for him, he didn't care. He doesn't understand it. Okay. He doesn't say like, oh, why are you taking my brother or not me? No, I don't get that yet, though. You don't feel guilty? No. Well, no, I wanted to learn it. Okay. Gia would be easier to bring than, Gia is simple. What are the ages? 12, about to be nine, seven. Okay. Gia is the youngest. Yeah, her hand is doing really well. Yeah, that was my next question. I felt the lead in. Yeah, you did. Okay. Yeah, it's doing really well, man. She has, only thing she does, like, so her nerve hasn't, it has regrown, look, there's my sleep mark.

Like, her nerve is regrown almost all the way. Okay. So she has a little bit of nerve issue up on the top. Still, like, no feeling yet. Okay. But it's getting there. Okay. And this muscle, since this hasn't regrown all the way, this muscle is still kind of sleeping.

So when she tries to squeeze her fingers together like this, it actually goes like that. So, like, she can feel this. So when she activates that muscle, she activates the outside muscle on her hand. Okay. versus the in intrinsic muscle. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So instead of doing that, it pulls it out. So we're working on that now.

Okay. And that's pretty much like one of the last things. Is she okay with it? Yeah, do her hand is really quite normal. Okay. Like she's probably 92% minus that right there. I mean, do I... Not bad considering.

From what it was. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'll tell you, even if this is as good as it ever gets. I love seeing you with your kids. Like that footage on the countdown show, like you're saying lights out and everything. It's just, I feel like you're a cool dad. Oh, thanks, man. Right?

Am I wrong? Yeah, no. You're young at heart. You're fun, but you're a disciplinarian if you have to be. I have to be. You've been through a lot. Yeah. You know, you had your kids relatively young, so you've kind of grown up, you've matured a little bit, right? Yeah. You know, I talked about this earlier. I was on a show on Sirius earlier today. Why do you have to plug the competition? I mean, really. But I didn't say who it was. Huh? Was it a good show? It was all right. Okay. It was a Roy.

Same time? Yeah. It was smart not putting you guys together, right? Yeah. It was the point, dude. What's the point? Yeah. You can't have the one-on-one time. Yeah. And like, and on top, like, my personality is so strong that, like, I'll shine over him. You know how I'll go. So it's better for him. If you want to get to know Roy, have road by himself.

Sure, sure. We got to know him very well. Yeah. I'm sure. You guys talks long as well asleep. Yeah, yeah. But you were saying, you were on a show before. Oh, yeah.

And I was like, I was talking about, like, you know, the mistakes I had made grown up, like being married initially. And then, like, how I didn't handle, like, certain parts of the celebrity or the newfound celebrity or the traveling, the lifestyle. very well. You don't think you did? No, for sure. As a husband, I didn't at all.

But as, and as a father, like, I could have been home more. I think that, you know, I made some decisions as far as being gone. Did it help me develop sooner? Yeah, probably. But it was just a whole maturation process. And it really just took time. Yeah. Like, and I get asked all the time, like, you know, do you, especially now, like, about Roy and

fighting Roy again and whatever else. And, like, you know, it's a rematch and blah, blah. Well, and I have no idea how he answered any of your questions, whatever else. but I really don't see it as a rematch. Like, I fought Roy in my sixth fight ever. Like, that was his 24th or 25th. Like, he already knew who he was as a fighter coming in. I was just still developing.

And, like, you know, everybody has your excuses. And, you know, my tumultuous, bumpy road as far as getting, like, process getting divorced and all that stuff that went on. And I was going through all that, you know? During that fight? Yeah, but during that whole time, like, remember I had 14 months off. Yeah, I remember. And, like, during that time was when I was going to that divorce

and it's strung on. and everything, a bunch of stuff are going on. So, like, you know, if you're not, fighting's a funny thing, man. Like, you can play a sport, and you can be focused on a sport, and if you can compartmental as well. Fighting is an emotional situation.

So, like, if you don't have your ducks in a row, it's easy to kind of get, like, to feel like you're prepared for it. And then in retrospect, you'll be like, you know what? I was all over the place here. Like, I wasn't prepared or I wasn't focused when you should have been. And I think that's one of the situation. that I just wasn't as focused as I should have been.

I didn't know who it was as a fighter. I was still developing. And, you know, there's certain things that go on in life that if you could prevent that misstep, now you would have, but in the situation you did it. Do you regret anything? Are you the kind of person who lives with regret? I wish you could do things differently? Oh, I've been guilted into quite a bit.

I was raised. I was Catholic, right? And so, you know, it goes. So I have a very active guilt side. Yes. But, like, I would have been a better husband, for sure. Like, I would have been better. Like when I went on the Ultimate Fighter, Tina was left with Jacob, who was three and a half,

and Jonah was two months old. Wow. Right? And I'm gone for six weeks, and she's struggling to, you know, to hold down a job and take her these two kids. And when we got divorced, when we started our divorce, she was pregnant. I mean, it was just a bunch of things that went on. She was pregnant. Yeah.

I didn't realize that. Yeah. Oh, wow. Like, I mean, so there's all kinds of things. But, like, we get along well now. Right. And we co-parent as well as I can. I even try to, like, make sure that I let her know, like, knowledge, like, hey, look,

man, I dicked up. I did certain things I shouldn't have and I regret them. So let me try to be the best person I can be, best parent I can be, and the best role model to the kids that I can possibly be. How far do you live from your kids? From her? Yeah. Um, 1.8 miles. Okay. So, and you just split time. Yeah. How do they handle it? They're great, man. They're great. They understand it. Like, she's more organized than I am in regards to like schoolwork or whatever else. And she has certain ways, like methodologies of how to do this and that, whatever else. And I, I have different ways because my mind works differently than hers. Okay. So, like, if her methodology doesn't really work, she'll ask me to work with them on like, hey, can you help with this math thing?

They can't get it the way I explain it. So can you do it your own way. Okay. And then, like, usually the one of the three will kind of pick up what, either I'm laying down or she's laying down. Okay. All right. So, but it's, it's pretty smooth. I mean, obviously for the children, it's most important, right? Yeah. You got to, man. And they sense that. They see the madness, man, the kids can see through everything, whether tension or whatever else. And you get all kinds of questions. And like, she leans more left, in my opinion, she's kind of hardcore left. I lean more right.

In her opinion, I'm probably hardcore right. Okay. And so we have vastly different perspectives, paradigms on politics and life and social living. So, you know, but we, like, I feel like the kids get inundated with some things. I feel like they probably get inundated with things from me as well, from my, kind of blase, you know, laissez, lazay fratitude, whatever else. Did your son enjoy going to the Super Bowl?

Did you actually go to the game? No, no. I've been to seven Super Bowl's in every game. Wow. They're just media row or for networking or whatever else. Wow. Yeah. Did you, how was, this one was in a food cart?

Yeah. But it was cool because it was in the Mall of America. So we got to go to like, we did a zip line thing. We did like an obstacle course that was on a zip line. You had to walk around, a bunch of stuff, like 40 feet up in the air. We rode a roller co. This roller coaster, the SpongeBob roller coaster. Oh, yeah, yeah, I've seen that.

It goes upside down, right? It goes all kinds of loopy loops. But, like, it goes up 90 degrees and goes right back down 90 degrees. And that's what it starts. You like that? I'll do it. It's a trip.

Really? Yeah. So you took him out of school to do this? Yeah. Okay. Yeah. And mom's okay with that. Yeah.

Well, it's an experience. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And like I said, there's a reason that I want to do that with him. Okay. I want to get him comfortable. How does he feel about what you do now? Like, now he understands what you do totally?

And does he watch it? Is he like an MMA fan who's like, oh, Roy Nelson, you got to do, like, is he talking to you about the fight? Or is he just sort of... No. No, he's not that kind of kid. No. Jonah kind of is.

He is. Yeah. Really? Like, when Roy beat me, he was like, Dad, I want to fight Roy. I think I told you this forever ago. Wow. Like, he's like, I want to fight Roy, Dad. Like, chill out, little dude.

You know? Like, that was, like, really affected him. Wow. Yeah. And like, Travis Brown. He wants to fight Travis Brown. Really? Yeah.

See that picture? Yeah, I saw that. What is up with that? That's bad taste. That pissed me off. Honestly, it pissed me off. Yeah. And in fact, you would find that funny.

Not you. They were mocking the... They even made a Travis Brown rule out of it. Yeah. Like, yeah. I mean, that could have ended your career. Easily. Could have ended my eyesight.

Right. Well, that's what I mean. Yeah. Wow. Yeah. And that's funny. Isn't it amazing what happened to him? Who?

What a fall. Yeah. This guy was fighting for a number one contender spot on Fox, not that long ago. And now look at you. you. It's the way things work, man. Right. Were you annoyed that they, like, that he was a part of that? I think that was, I think that was bad, bad taste, but. Did it change any sort of mentality going into the fight? I don't care. No, I don't get petty like that. I've seen, I saw, like, not that

long ago, I saw that you guys were, you know, posing with each other. Yeah. Well, I mean, we're friendly. You are friendly. Yeah. But, so, like, how do you describe this? I just got to go punch him in his face and whip his ass. Right. And that's all. Like, can do what you gotta do? I know Roy can take a punch. So, like, I'm not worried about throwing hands on. I'm not worried about hurting him. He'll be all right.

Is he past his prime? I don't know if he's past his prime. I know Roy's not the same guy he was before. I don't know if that means he's past the prime or not. You know, I think I've always said it. Roy's like a rock'em, sock him robot, right? Like, he's absorbed a shit ton of punishment a lot. He's wrestling a lot more, right?

Like, he does a lot of wall install. you know, movement-wise, he's just not there. He never really has been really there. Fighting Roy is an IQ test. If you stand there and fight Roy in a phone booth, you're probably going to fail the IQ test. If you get out there and you move, the way I fight all the time,

be mobile, be long, should be fine. Yeah. It's interesting because you could say, like, when you fought the first time, you were kind of like the young gun coming up, maybe you're not ready for that fight. You were coming off the layoff, the Congo fight, but now it feels like the role. have reversed a little bit where you're sort of, you know, one of the stars of the division and

he's trying to, you know, make a name for himself. Yeah. It's what, right? Yeah, I see that. Like, I mean, that's the thing, man. Like, I feel like I'm pretty damn good at my job. Yeah. I feel like I'm pretty solid. Yeah. And, you know, I feel like if it's standing up, it has to do with, if it stand-up wise, I should win. Right. Handily, I feel. If it goes to the ground, we'll see what the hell happens, man. Like, I, I firmly believe, I understand how cliche it is to say this. But I firmly believe that nobody in this division trains like I do. I don't feel like I train smart. I train hard and I train smart. I have a great team, team two time back home in Indiana, Indianapolis. The whole camp was there?

Yeah, almost, almost my entire camp. Really? No Florida. No, very little. What happened? Nothing. Okay. I just, this was a better fight for me. I got butter, I got Charles, I got corn. Someone's listening to Buda Charles. Sounds like a meal. Yeah. You know, and like Buda's 6-1-280, Charles is 6'5'315, and corn is 5-11, 5-10, 5-6, you know, 295.

And they're all wrestlers. They all, like, they all throw big, heavy hands. And they're heavy position guys on top. So, like, I don't think there's anybody in the world that could get me more prepared to fight Roy than Team 2-ton. Okay. That's who it is. So was that just for this camp?

And then on top of got Chris, who, like, again, fights a lot like Fadour jumps in wildly and throws big old haymakers. Right, right. Really? Are you done with Florida, or is it just for this camp and made more sense? No, for this camp, it made more sense.

Plus, like, I've got Purdue University, and I've been wrestling at Purdue a ton. Like with their heavyweight. It's not their number one guy. Their number one heavyweight is a guy named Sean Streck, who's just a beast. Okay. But their number two guy named Jake Avin.

I've been wrestling with him, a tremendous amount. Coach Tyrell Todd, who was wrestled at Michigan, and he comes in, he watches what I do, we get down, we do a lot of work, gives me a lot of pointers, like the technical aspects of wrestling. Okay.

And I feel like I've learned a lot. I feel like it was a great place. Great place for me to be my camp. Roy mentioned, and I'm home with my babies too. Yeah, what do you want to be in Florida? I mean, it's nice over there, but it's not home. Yeah, it's at home.

Roy mentioned that he still watches UFC all the time. Do you? No. I don't watch fights. Never? No. Really? Yeah.

Even if it's a heavyweight fight? Like, why? Why? You don't enjoy it? I feel like, so my entire life is violence. Yeah. Okay? Yeah.

If I don't ever leave work at work, then I never leave violence. And I can't be that way, can't be aggressive, I can't have that mindset when I'm a father, when I'm trying to rebuild bridges that I either burnt from being gone or never had a chance to build because I was gone. Okay. So my entire life path is to become a better father and to become better to the people that are involved in my life. So if I don't ever leave that behind, I can't go. But then again, like we all each, my other, Tina and I, Tina, my ex-wife, and I both only have one TV in the house. Like there's no tablets, there's no, nothing else.

Wow. The kids don't have phones, nothing else. So we don't watch TV. Like, if we watch TV, we all watch it together. Yeah. We watch a movie or we do something else. That's either in her house or in my house. Okay.

So, like, we don't have time to watch that. Like, I'd rather scrapbook with my daughter or, like, build, like, friendship bracelets, you know? Stuff like that with my daughter. But if you're alone, if they're not with you for a weekend, you know what you, you just don't, it's a conscious decision on your part to not watch. Yeah. Well, plus, like, even that, like, like, if I'm alone by myself for the weekend, like, so my son is, my, Jacob is a crazy reader, avid reader.

Okay. Reads everything. Okay. So he's read all the Harry Potter series, right? and he's read all these other series and blah, blah. He has actually written out a list of books that he wants me to read so that we can talk about the books. Wow. So I'm just now starting the fourth Harry Potter book.

Wow. So now, like, so he and I talk about it. And I tell him, hey, I'm at this point. He gets dead. This part's going to come up. It's so excited. Or hey, it's going to be a little boring for a little while. But then this is going to happen here and you're going to be so excited about it.

Wow. So like, so it's just ways that I can connect. I'd rather connect with them on that level than have anything else. Wow. This gives me chills. Yeah. I love this. No, well, I'm glad.

Well, you'll be doing this stuff, too. Like, you miss a lot of time. Yeah. I don't travel as much as I... You don't. Well, obviously, you never want a small show as in the U.S. City, which is the ones out on the time. Yeah, like this one...

Yeah. Yeah. Actually, it's my son's birthday on Friday. My second son. Myzal. Thank you. I appreciate it. That's something I would say.

I appreciate that. No, but it's, that's amazing. I mean, those are great tips right there. Yeah. Only one TV, reading, spend time. Never have a TV in the bedroom. Never. Never.

Make your own entertainment, buddy. Wow. That's amazing. You really come a long way. That goes, brother. I, like, I almost get offended when people call you Meathead because you're anything but. You know, it was my moniker for when I was in high school, man. I know, but it's just like, it doesn't fit.

You've been typecast. You know, I have. But you know what, though, man? I like, you know, it's funny. I get, I get so much hate from all kinds of things, all the time. Really? And I always wonder, like, do they not like me because I think I'm a douchebag as a person? Or do they not like me because my character on the show?

Like, I always... You think it's still, like, stuck with you? Oh, for certain. Oh, yeah, if I get on it, Sam, I'm not a big social media person, right? I feel like every time you post on social media, it steals a part of your soul, right? Like, and nothing is sacred, like, nothing at all. Okay. So, like, and I feel like there's such an infassus for the fun of it.

Yes. On the projecting the life that you want. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That I'd rather not, right? And I understand that that costs me dollars. I understand that cost me a fan base. But I don't want that. I don't want the pressure and the commitment.

Like Snapchat, Instagram, Twitter, this, that, all the other stuff. Like, I don't want it, man. Like, and then, like, so I get off of social media all the time, right? Yeah, yeah. So then I posted this, well, I had my, had a person close to my family. I take over my Twitter for a little bit or Instagram for a little bit, yeah. Wow. For like a week or so, right.

Okay, because you got leading up to the fight, you got to do something. Sure, sure. Okay, cool. And I was like leading up to Christmas. Okay. And he posted a picture of me and I can fade or out. Okay. And I was like, and then like, I got out of this flack.

And I was like, why did you post that? And it's like, because I got sick and tired of getting all the messages on Instagram, direct messages saying, you know, like, fuck you, fuck your family. I'm going to rape your daughter. I'm going to kill this. Like, really, it's a lot of Russians. But like, I get all kinds of madness. Like, hey, you know what? I hope you fucking break your leg.

Hope you hope something bad happens to you all the time. Or your family. And he's like, and I forgot to tell them about that because I'm so used to it. that I just don't think about it. And so when he got it, he was like, I got so sick of it. He's like, so I posted this. And I was like, well, all right, man, this is going to do it. War's coming as a result.

Oh, it was brutal. You get that? For sure. For sure. And then like, I've never liked you from this person that time or whatever. I was like, get out of here. Cool. Whatever.

Like, don't feed the trolls. I get it. But like, to a certain point, you have to, you have to somewhat acknowledge that it comes in. But you're living, I mean, life is good. Oh, I'm happy. You're happy with Bellator? Yeah. They treat you well, other than this Grand Prix thing, you got over that, right?

It's reality now, it's going to happen. It's going to happen, brother. Did you watch the first fight? I was there. Yes, of course. You were there. Did you enjoy it? I thought that the fight card was good.

I thought Roy McDonald showed balls of just coconuts. He's so impressive. But then again, in that same breath, I really feel that if Douglas had kept distance, you know, and fought smart, I think he would win that fight. You know, possibly. He had it. I mean, fifth round. He had it. Yeah.

So I think he kind of gave that one away. Yeah. Maybe it was the pressure of that new situation. I don't know. But whatever was, it was pretty intense. But I think Douglas is insanely tough. I think it was a great fight to watch. Sure, sure.

I think Chale did exactly what Chale had to do to win. And I think anybody who thought the game plan would have been different as a fool. Okay. But I was shocked to see that Rampage fell for that, that over under body lock, the inside leg trip. And Chale must have good pressure on top. Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Massive size difference there. Massive. Like Rampage shouldn't, even if he's fighting the heavyweight, Rampage should not come in at $2.50 something. Right. In my opinion. Sure. Yeah, I don't doubt that.

What about, like right now you've done it a few times? Biggest difference in Beltor and UFC, what comes to mind? Freedom. The freedom's different. Okay. Obviously sponsorship dollars is different. Yeah. So financially.

Is it good for you? Yeah, I'm happy. Okay. Yeah. I mean, I can always be happier. Sure. But I'm happy. Is it like, were you making more in the UFC?

ever at any point, like post tough? No. Okay. Even in the Wild West, even back in the day. Yeah, that's what I mean. It was close. Like the spike days of 2010? Yeah, it was close.

I made solid money and sponsored. You're still making more now. Yes. So, wow, that's tremendous. Yeah. Yeah. Well done. It's good business, man.

So that comes to mind the freedom? Yeah, freedom does. And like, you know, it's just nice, man. It's nice to know that there's a, the UFC is, cannot get out of its own way. and I think it's pretty evident as to what they do, their consistent missteps. Like what? How they handle their guys, media, like not giving the show money to that cat who made weight and, like, just stuff like that, just little tiny things that are just another notch against. And I feel like they're in not a colossal, you know, nose dive, but I don't think they're on the right spot.

And I think that Mr. Coker does what he, I think very casually Mr. Coker does what he needs to do to bring fans or eyes over to Belator. And I think their production is completely different with Belator. So it's a spectacle. It is, you know, he took a page from old Japanese MMA and made up bananas. Yeah. You enjoy working with him?

Yeah, I do. Okay. Why'd you? I mean, there's always something, you know? Sure. What's on your mind these days? You know, really not much, man. Just like, I'm 39.

Yeah. Right, that's all. Like, so do I enjoy working with them? Yeah, sure. Those are things that I would change? Maybe possibly. Okay. But like, would they even be around the same?

Would they benefit anybody else? Anybody else even notice? Like what? What comes to mind? You know, on the spot? I can't really pull some stuff up. But like, like, I bring my own cut man in. I bring my own guy to wrap my hand of my own cup man.

Yeah. You know, and it's like, I just, Like that was something that I addressed before. I think it's been addressed now. So it's never a thought. But I still like, I don't want any chance of any kind of misthpping. So I just bring my own guy in,

make sure everything's kosher. Okay. You know? Little things like that to make you comfortable. Yeah. And they don't mind. They don't trip about it. Everything's good.

How much longer do you want to do this for? I think by the time I fight Roy, I think I have a finite number of months left on my contract. Oh, really? Yeah. Yeah. Interesting. Already?

Yeah. Gosh. That was fast? Yeah. Well, you know, it's like. Does it expire in the middle of the tournament? Is that possible? No.

Okay. It does not. Okay. But I know exactly where my number is. Okay. And so from that, like, we'll see. Like, if my body feels good, if my kids want me to retire, you know, if I have a career afterwards, which I do.

What is it? You know, my invention. Yeah? I have broadcasting. I have actually had quite a bit of offers for reality TV. Wow. Yeah. Like for shows, like network shows that I hate men.

To be a contestant. Wow. Want to go back to that? that? It's a totally different world. Sure, sure, sure, sure. Um, like whether I'd be a part-time host. Okay. Like announcing gigs for, uh, you know, athletically based, you know, reality show, stuff like that. Uh, I've, I've had, I've had offers for acting again. I have a movie that's kind of waiting on me when I get done. Okay. Uh, when I get done with this fight here, I have a movie. Okay. Okay. Okay. It's being filmed. Um, you know, just stuff. I've got a life. And even if nothing else,

I live in an insanely cheap part of the country. Sure. You know, like, um, um, um, so I can pretty much do whatever I really want to do. But the end is near. It could be. It could be. I don't know. Like, I'm not really worried about it. You're not.

Like, I feel great. Having fun, yeah. Yeah, I literally. You look great. I feel great. I feel healthy. Yeah. Like 275 pounds.

Right now? Really? What do you do to cut those 10 pounds? Just chill a little bit. Work out. Don't drink as much water. That's it? Yeah, eat salt.

No stress. No stress. So you're going to be 265? Yeah. Wow. Is that, you're usually less than, 260. I'll be like 250 probably. I'll cut 25 pounds. In the next four days? Yeah. Really? Just by chilling? Yeah. I don't buy it. I'm bouching it. Okay. I was I was, I was 2501.6 a couple days ago.

Oh, okay. All right. Yeah. I was like 275. You look. I mean, you look great. I appreciate it. I feel like I'm an absolutely spectacular shape. Okay. So, like, um. Best shape of your life. That's what they all say. They always say. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But I feel like I'm good. And that's thing, like, I'm not new and improved.

I'm the same, same dude. I just feel like I just, I'm good. Are you fighting, like, is there a bit of a chip on your shoulder that you're doing this whole thing? Like, do you feel like you have a point to prove? You know, they made you go, you beat Fador. You got to go through this whole tournament. Do I feel like I earned a shout of the title? Yeah, yeah. I feel like I could have had a shot of the title. Yes.

I had a situation come up, a reality show that I wanted to do badly, like a lifelong goal. Okay. This one in particular. Yeah. I think I can say it's over. So I think I can say it. Okay, go ahead. It was the amazing race.

Oh, that would have been amazing. It would have been amazing. Well done. It would have been great. And it was like team MMA. Yeah. And we didn't make the cut. You tried.

We tried. There were two other MMA guys that were brought on with me. So, like, one guy, and we couldn't do it because he actually fought the day that we were supposed to work for. So we couldn't do that one. Then we brought another guy in, and the other guy just didn't work out for some reason. Okay. Yeah. So we got cut.

And I think the whole process, I told him, like, hey, look, I'm going to be out for the year because I'm doing this. I'm doing the amazing race. Because I thought I was going to be on it. I put my eggs on. I put the card ahead of the horse. It didn't happen. It was out for the rest of the year. So it's not Belator's fault at all that I didn't fight.

Okay. It was a situation that I gave them. They had scheduled everything else. out. All right. Well, I'm excited. Thanks, man. So am I. I look forward to. I'm excited for you. That's a big fight. I remember the first one vividly. I don't think it will go like that in terms I just think you're a completely different fighter.

You know, that's why I say it's not really a rematch. Right, yeah. But there is that story there that I think people, you know, and you're too familiar faces, your two natural heavyweights, unlike the guys who fought in January. You know, that's another thing too. I saw it got out that, that Mike, whatever's name is, I thought of commissioner.

for Mojillo. Mike Missouli. Flew out to L.A. when we had the first fight. And drug tested me and Roy. Oh yeah. Tested us. Surprise tested us. Yeah.

We both passed. Yeah. I think it's absolutely fantastic. I like it a lot. Yeah. You know, I don't think that, it's funny because it's such a slippery slope, right? Like where does the madness end, right? Of what you're going to chase after.

The robbers are always going to be out of the cops. But I was really happy you came out and drug tested us. I thought it was great. You know, and that's like I haven't been drug tested much since I've been in the bell. But I was happy to have Mike Mizzoui took the initiative, flew all the way out to L.A. Not that you needed a reason to go out to the day. No, no, no, sure. You know, and then drop tested us both on the spot.

Wow. Like, as soon as we walked out of the press conference, he was there. Yeah, was there. Hey, let's go pee in a cup. Wow. Let's do that. Pee and blood or just pee? Just pee.

Okay. They're telling me in my ear, you have to go. Of course. You guys had a long first interview. I know. What was up with that? That's way it works. They told me you were sleeping, so I had to keep like killing time.

Oh, yeah. That's what happened. That's what happens. Killing time. That's right. I appreciate it. It's always great to see you. Thanks, brother.

You have a home here anytime you want it. Anytime you want to come and sit with us. I'm waiting for you to give me an offer. I can't refuse so I can retire so I can just go. Be co-host. Could you imagine that? Me and you're just tackling. No, we'd be co-host.

It'd be great. It'd be co-thunderer. Yeah. It'd be co-thundering. But it's always great. I saw you doing a bunch of interviews. We could be done. That's right.

That's right. That's right. That's right. That's right. But no, it's great to see you. I'm looking forward to it this Friday on Paramount Network. No longer Spike TV. February 16th, Mohegan's Son.

It's the second fight of the four-fight first round of the Bellator Heavyweight Grand Prix. It's Matt Mitreone versus Roy Nelson. Can't wait for it. I appreciate, as always, the time, Matt. And I'm so happy to see it genuinely warms my heart to hear you talk about fatherhood. Maybe 90% of my audience doesn't care about that stuff. But I enjoy it. It's a side of you that people don't often get to hear.

And I did, I remember vividly where I was when I called you. And the things that you told me have stuck with me till this day. Were they accurate? They were 100% accurate. You're a great dad. Thank you, Matt. Thanks for doing this. Joe's going to walk you out over there.

No, I got more. I got your boy Rashad coming up. Is he in studio? No, he's not. Oh, it's great. Love that, dude. Why? Did you want to do you?

You don't have a babies. Oh, is that what you were asking? I thought you met out the show. You know, as the great Fador says, if it's God's will, it's God's will. Yeah. All right. That's right. That's right. Are you done? For now? Had to work, buddy. You did? Well done.

Mazel tov. Yeah. Mazel tov. I'm awesome top. Thank you, Matt. All the best to you. Good luck on Friday. Appreciate you stopping by. Thank you for coming in.

Sorry for keeping you waiting back there. But there he is. The one and only Matt Matreone. Always great to catch up with him. And once again, they will be fighting on Friday. This Friday, February 16th, to be exact, second fight of the heavyweight Grand Prix. Okay.

Thank you very much to Matt and to Roy and to the rest of of the crew over at Bellator for stopping by. That was a lot of fun. And in case you missed it earlier, we are having another in studio guest in around one hour's time. We are going to be joined by Mike Goldberg. Mike Goldberg, of course,

will be calling the action, former UFC play-by-playman. Now the play-by-play voice for Bellator. He'll be calling the action alongside the one-and-only Chale Sunnan. Let's see here. And Big John McCarthy.

what's happening? Oh, I know what's happening. I gave you, I do this every time. Remember? I always give you the wrong number. I always give them the wrong. I always copy paste the wrong number. Right? Did I do that again? I think I did that again. Yeah, I always do that. My bad. Okay, so coming up, hopefully in a matter of moments is Rashad Evans. after that we'll be joined by Tyron Woodley who of course is the UFC Welterweight champion and then after that we'll be joined by Henry Sohudo and then

Henry Sohudo has a few things to get off his chest I'm looking forward to that he's in Natal right now in Natal Brazil and I think he took part in Carnival it's Carnival in Brazil right now and we'll check in with him then we're going to talk to Jose Shorty Torres, who is the Titan FC flyweight and bantamweight champion.

He'll be defending his flyweight belt on Friday, and he is very close, I do believe, and based on what he said in some interviews, he's very close to fighting for a UFC title. Excuse me, he's very close to getting into the UFC. So we'll talk to him at 4 o'clock, and then we will talk to Mike Goldberg in studio. A few things to talk about before.

What is this? So I have gotten four text messages from Ali Abdelaziz, our friend, who I have never heard from so many people and in particular managers, like all fired up about Ali's interview last week on the program. He's writing. He sent me four text messages. This is what he said. Ali, if you're listening, can you get us in touch with Rashad? your guy Rashad has gone MIA while you're sending me text messages. He's saying, I'm watching you.

Please do, please announce this for me. Fn, Zabit Maghomad Shari Pav, we all know him, has had five opponents turned down fights against them. He lists these opponents, but I, I am hesitant to actually call them out without checking in with them. So I'm not going to say their names. But he did say that Artem Lobov said yes to Zabit. and that his team said no, and he's asking if anyone can step up. And then he wrote,

man, please announce someone needs to fight Zabit. Now, they want to have Zabit fight in Brooklyn on April 7th, UFC 223. And apparently people have seen him compete, and apparently they're not too interested in fighting him, according to Mr. Abdelaziz. So he is trying to get the word out that Zabit Magomad Sharipov needs an opponent. So if you're out there and you fight at 145 pounds

and if you'd like to fight this young killer from Russia named Zabit who trains with Mark Henry and Tim Ricardo Al-Meda, he is ready and willing to fight you. So that's the word. Keeps texting me throughout. Like I'm not looking at my phone in the middle of this in the middle of these in studio interviews.

Roy Nelson is an interesting character, isn't he? It's like it's always hard to get a firm answer out of him. You ask him something, he goes in like eight different directions, and then he comes back to you. It's very interesting. But I do like that fight. I remember that fight like it was yesterday. I actually remember it for all the wrong reasons,

and I talked to Matt about this when the tournament was announced. The day they fought was one of the worst days in the history of, the United States. It was the day of the Sandy Hook shooting in Connecticut at that elementary school. And it was just a horrendous day. And I remember

Pat Barry fought on that card against I believe Shane Del Rosario and he said that he just wanted to go home and hug his family and kiss his loved ones. He didn't really want to be there. It was a very he got all emotional in the

post fight interview. And I just remember watching the card and just not really knowing what's going on. And it was definitely a weird day. As a new father, I think about that day all the time. I've actually driven by Sandy Hook, our own Chuck Mindenhall, lives like a mile away from where the school used to be. They've torn down the school since. But I just can't imagine. I can't imagine being there is just horrible.

One of the worst days ever. at least of my lifetime, these young innocent children dying for what? It's just horrific. And I think about it all the time when I drop my kids off at school and think about how innocent they are.

So I remember watching that show like in a haze, in a daze, just wondering like what is going on in this world. Of course, nothing's really happened since then as far as gun control is concerned, but I'm not going to get into that because I know people get all worked up when you bring up that stuff.

And this is not the platform. nor the show for that kind of discussion. However, that's why I remember the Matt Matrione-Roy Nelson fight so well and my emotions watching that fight. And it was a weird one. I remember when Matt Matrione fought Czech Congo.

I remember doing an interview the Friday night before and saying, I think it was, I was doing an interview with a radio show out of, I think it was,

somewhere in Canada, Calgary or Edmonton. And I remember predicting that in a year's time from that fight, which was UFC 137, I predicted that Matt Matreone would be UFC heavyweight champion. And if you recall, that fight didn't really live up to whatever hype there was surrounding that fight. It wasn't an incredibly entertaining fight.

It was a big deal for Mad. It was a co-main event fight under the Nick Diaz versus BJ Penn headline. minor. And, you know, after that, as, as he just talked about, he's been through a lot. He's had, you know, some personal issues that he's had to overcome. He was going through divorce and just didn't, I don't know, he wasn't able to pull the trick. You remember that fight? It was, it was the kind of fight that just never got out of the first gear, it felt. Maybe your classic Czech Congo fight. There's a reason, by the way, why Czech Congo is not in this tournament. He's

under, you know, contract with Bell Torres. I mean, that's just classic. that's just that's just classic you know Czech Congo but anyway I remember saying before that fight that guy is going to fight for the belt and he's maybe even going to be champion in the not too distant future and of course now here we are

you know several years later almost six years later and he's a part of this heavyweight tournament and maybe he has a chance at becoming the Belator heavyweight champion we shall see the fight goes down on Friday all right let us move along and welcome in our next guest. He had an eventful week.

You know, it goes like this for Tyrone Woodley. Sometimes it's like the craziest week with all kinds of drama news. And then sometimes he's like away for a couple weeks. We don't hear from him. Last week was the former. It was one of those drama-filled weeks. So wanted to check back in with the Walterweight champion of the UFC and see how he's handling it all. He is kind enough to be joining us.

I do believe via the magic of the telephone. He is online one. Is he there, Tyrone Willie? are you there? Tyron is here and you know what? I didn't want to do you guys with Skype. I'm driving currently and I don't want to have to bleep in and out because we got some real fish to fry.

No, that's fine. That's fine. I don't want you to look at the, like I'm very against driving and FaceTiming or Skyping. So I appreciate you doing this. Thank you. So the last seven days or so for you, Tyrant. I mean, we saw you on the post-fight pre-fight stuff on on Saturday. so it seems like all is all, but like you're openly like feuding with your boss. What has it been like for you?

What this past week? Is it been different than the last, you know, five or six times where this has happened? Has anything changed? You know, I mean, just, I mean, for the fans that did know exactly what happened because we were assuming that they all did. Okay. You know, I made, I made a statement, pretty bold statement, which I still stand by. Someone was asking me, you know, what's going on with me.

You know, I was just supposed to be rehab and out of time of the time. you know, I'm going to try and something because I'm not prepared to fight yet because of injury. So they asked me, who do I think I'm going to fight yet? I said, shoot, if I had to bet the house, I think I'm going to fight and first. I think that's going to be my next thing, which me as a fighter, me as a person, I'm deemed and I'm, you know, I'm due my own opinion. I can say what I never said. I had a bout agreement. I never said, okay, we negotiated it right now.

I never said any of those things. So that thing was taking and spiraled out of control. the good thing that happened about it is Nate Dia said, you know what? I think Tyrant is the next fight for me. So I'm like, all right, I'm with it, let's do it. You know, the thing that I don't like about it is the fact that the fans

and the media started to get behind the idea of me and they fight it. And, you know, it would have been a fight that I think would have got a lot of attention. It would have been a huge fight for myself in my career. I'm just trying to knock off, you know, someone that has the status of Nate. And Nate, Nate got

the status by fighting counter. George got the status about beating Matt Hughes, and we all know how Connor got about taking our Joseato. You always need that equal, that person that there's a few ticks above you that you're trying to hunt down so you can get yourself as a household name. So that was my whole purpose. Never declined to fight. Never declined to fight.

One, the boy never to climb a fight, Damia. And the funny thing is, I'm the only champion in our fighting the actual number one contenders. So that just puzzles me When you look at all the musical chairs Taking place in Mexico You see D.C. going up to heavyway. You see Connor doing whatever the hell he wants So you see Dillishaw wants to go down

You know, Amanda Nunes and Cyborg He's been talking about fight But please, let's hire one of them Something instantly He's complaining He doesn't want to fight this guy He's running from this guy He's playing the race car

I mean, the fans You guys should be tired of this now Like I'm probably one of the most marketable one of the most professional, hardest working damn fighters on the roster that's doing it all himself, marketing himself, pushing himself, and I'm out here

killing birds and eating at the table about myself. So I just took a huge offense to it. You know, when you make a statement that somebody's full of shit, you know what I mean? I just can't get with it. You know, that warrants to the phone call. It meant it instantly.

Oh. From who? A phone call from me, Sudana. Oh. On Wednesday night after he said this? Actually, you know, I saw Wednesday night. I was really pissed off because, you know, I can see if it was a situation that I literally just made up. Then maybe I can see what.

You could have even said it differently. You could have even said, you know what? To fight with Nate, I mean, Tyros was working. You know what? The next five for him is RDA. You know, Nate is not going to fight him. He hasn't fallen in a while. he lost his last fight, whatever, whatever rationale.

But when you say, oh, Tyra's so foolish, you know what I mean? Come on now. That's a little bit of harsh, a little bit of hardcore for somebody who's wearing the belt of your organization that people and young fighters aspire to enter into the UFC and they aspire to be a UFC champion. I don't think many people are going to aspire to be a champion when they see the way that the champions are treated. And they see that the non-champions and the people that are unprofessional,

middle finger flicking shit talking, they're actually making the money. So what are we, what kind of picture are we trying to play? I thought we was going in the direction to be parallel with the NFL, NHL, MLB, and other professional sports. You know, it's a circus

until it comes to tire it. And now we want to go back to the old school rubrics. And I got issues with that. So you called them up. You spoke? Oh, hell yeah, I did. And how to go? You know, I mean, obviously, Dana is a very very,

very strong, real person, and I think that's why you see me and Dana go back and forth. It's not that I'm going at, back and forth with Dana as a boss. It's as a man, and as a human being. Like, you treat humans a certain way. If it's good, I'll call Dana boss, man.

Congratulations on getting the counter Floyd May with the fight. It's crazy. He's called me, and he's called me, and some people, oh, I heard you bought your mom my house, awesome, da-da-da. So it's not always a negative conversation, but those conversations that are, that are, you know, a little bit more hostile is the one that people want to hear about.

So it was just that, you know, I just didn't think that was right. I didn't think it was, I think even if he thought that way, it could have been, said a different way. I think a lot of people spun what I was saying. Never said this, this fight was in negotiation, never said any of those things. And when they came out, I never heard anybody say how full of shit they was. I never heard anybody, you know what I mean? It's so funny that it was a one side of bashing.

So, you know, I just wasn't with it, man, all there around. So, you know, we'll have a sit down and meet in the next few days in Vegas and try to see, you know, try to see how we can do this in a different way. Because I've had this conversation before. And, you know, I've even spoke to you and, you know, your show about how the UFC is making an attempt to do things differently by me and marketing me in a different way. And they made a commitment and they, you know, tried to reach out. And that was true at that current time. And now I think it's time to take a pause, deep breath, snapshot because the shit ain't working. and this is this ain't, you can't go down like that.

It's very damaging for me for a fight that's trying to, you know, generate his brain, his name. So he was, was he kind of open to, like, okay, maybe I'm in the wrong here. I shouldn't have said it that way. Was he open to what you were saying or how you were feeling? Is that why you're meeting or was he not?

He wasn't really open to it because in his mind he wanted to make a fight where RDA happened, which by the way, I never was offered. She hasn't been formally offered, never declined that fight. So it's just funny that, you know, his whole mindset was basically me saying that I wanted to fight Nick was almost taking attention off of a potential.

By the way, not offered fight against RDA. You never declined a fight against RDA. So I think he wanted to focus more so on me speaking about fighting him versus fighting Nick. I mean, Nate, sorry. But, like, I think a grown man can say whatever hell he wants to say. I can say I want to fight yours, St. Pierre. Bushing fought him. business falling him and he didn't even fight one fight before he came back he came straight back after four years straight to a different weight class and fighter shot i said you know i just saw playing out the thing is that you look at all the fighters that have done it nick d has fought george st pierre off of a loss had won in five years came back off a suspension and fought anison silver and i guarantee if he comes back and want to fight he's going to fight whoever the hell he wants and it was it was contenders at the time i don't remember i

remember being at that fight car, Johnny Hendrix fought Carlos Condon. Johnny Hendricks has been rolled everybody. John Fish, Camden, obviously beat Carlos Conn in that fight. And Condon had a victory over Diaz. So we've seen this happen. You know, I don't have to play the picture to you.

You know, Holly Holmes fall for back-to-back titles off losses. So it's just kind of like, there's no sport anymore. So quit playing with me when you guys want to act like this is a sport. And people are, oh, Tyron, such a complainer, and do, do, do, do. Like, it's so much negativity. Use that energy to talk about something positive.

Switch to stats. Don't talk about how Tyron Woodley fought Damian Maya, and it was so many, so few strikes thrown. Well, if you tore your fucking labor, I think you might not be swinging a hammering that many times yourself. Nobody came back and, you know, regurgitated that statement and said, hey, you know, Tyrone Woodley, man, he's such a beast. he freaking beat this dude with one arm

tore that baby in the first round still won a five round fight didn't I get taken out one time by God it was on a seven-fight one shit took down his last love opponent how many times have you heard that's that but Stephen Thompson went seven in a row knocking everybody the hell out

never heard that let page Vanzan break her arm before the x-ray even pop up oh my god Sage Van Zand tell me on page Vazan is such a freaking stud oh my gosh she fought with a broken arm and lost she's so awesome that she was She was awesome, but there's

other warriors out here that are dealing with adversity, dealing with injury. It did the same thing with Kevin Gasselham. Broke my damn foot in the first kick, the first thing thrown in the whole fight. And I still beat the person that was supposed to beat me, go on the fight for the title. And what happened to him after that?

He got a fucking job as an ultimate fighter coach. So it tells me, Tyler, you're a little too professional. Start cutting up a little bit. Start freaking being unprofessional. So I'm coming late to press conferences. Start being in very difficult in negotiation. Start saying no.

And then that's how you get paid. Have you addressed yet this idea that you were never offered the Nate Diaz fight that a quote-unquote lawyer? That's a lie. That's a lie. Please somebody called Nate Diaz. He was off for six guys, right? Now, what was not said,

Dana said he was off for six fights, right? That he declined him off. Yeah. Yeah. Somebody lets get a lie detector out, And that's actually if one of those fights was terrible. Okay? And that's, that's, that's, now, and if you want to do whatever, that's fine. But when you, when you say that I'm full of shit and this guy was offered me, I was about to get surgery, Ariel.

You think I'm just ran out of all the fighters I can think of fighting? We all know I'm going to say George St. Pierre because he's the greatest work with all time. I'm going to say him number one because of who he is and what he's done. Why would I, on a, on a borderline on whether I get surgery or not, how would I just think that Nathan Diaz would even be an option. That would have had to been brought to me. How would Nate Diaz or his boxing coach or whoever put out the $15 million

amount? What would those prices come up for if nobody ever offered him to fight? Why would he just randomly say, no, I need $15 million? He just said that to himself? Like, I mean... I mean, I know he's what he was... I ain't trying to call nobody out, but I think

I got a pretty good reputation of being 100% and some people don't. Why do you think he's trying to, like, say that this never happened. This offer never happened that it's because if people get behind it, then you're in the business of making fights that people want to see. You got to make the fight. After Nate said it, the next day,

I thought the fight was on. I was getting, I was calling my coach and I was like, we're going to this going down. When they're going to say, hey, I think the most logical fight is Tyrone Woodley? You know what? I agree with you. That is the most logical fight. Now you might get your ass with a little bit, but hey, I'm with it, let's do it.

So I was, I was thinking that was going to happen. but it took me, it threw me for a loop when the complete opposite happened, a complete, one-sided, you know, slaying purposely. I mean, Fox is not, Fox is not, that show is not live. So when you do this stuff, it's premeditated, you know it, you can cut it, you can clip it. You have, they have to go back and bleep the explicit words. So that just, that just kind of frustrating me, but, you know, as a professional, I am. I didn't go back out. I didn't backlash.

I didn't slay people. I'm just going to do what I do, man. I'm just going to consistently go out there, put him in front of me. You're going to get somebody hurt again. Just like everybody thought Robbie was going to beat me because I was off 18 months and he was so destructive.

He was fight out of year back to back. Nobody talks about me having the fastest finish in World's Championship history, how I completely knocked him to fuck out and did not even get touched one time. One person mentioned that anymore. You know what I mean? Or how Wonderboy fight won.

was fight of the night of the biggest and the best fight card that UFC has ever put on UFC 205 the virtual mirror image of the same damn fight I mean pretty much

now it's a boring fight it was the same fucking fight both times yeah no so I'm just I'm just tired of being apologetic I'm tired of defending my you know what I've done in the sport I haven't had an easy fight since strike force

I've been fighting G's since Paul Daley that's in 2010 Jordan me and Terrick Saffini Paul Daley, Nathan Warcourt. You know, I've been fighting former champions and champions and contenders since the beginning. I've asked for the toughest fight.

Johnny didn't ask for me. I had the hassle for that for that fight. I had the hassle for the Carlos kind of fight and for the Robbie fight. Those are the guys that most people don't want to fight. Nobody was signing up to fight Carlos at that time. I mean, or Johnny, or Robbie. But people got a selective memory

when they've watched the way that I got to the belt. I didn't get to the belt because I had on the pent-out custom suit, and I was talking shit. I got there because I was beating people that were the best of the game. And they didn't look good against me, and they looked good against everybody else.

You know what I mean? So... Are you tired of this, Tyron? Like, is he getting tired of it? But I know me, even me, right now, I'm almost like border lines just vending a little bit. But, you know, I'm already moved past it just because I know this is not the way

that's going to solve the problem. You know, Dan Lambert told me this a long time. Winning solves it. everything. Once you just keep beating people, they can't, they can say whatever they want. Remember that time that the Anderson Civil was going through some scrutiny, but they couldn't find nobody to beat him. Try it, never found anybody to beat him, no until, until later in his career. Think about George St. P. Pia. We remember George St. Pia, and now he came back and stopped Michael Bisping, but think about how he was on his way out. People were trashed him. He had so

many decisions and took people down there on. So, so many fans we have short-time memory. So, I'll just remind you guys of, you know, me being one of the hardest, definitely in the top three of the hardest, fighting in the entire UFC Rosser pound for pound. You know, the only person I can think of the top of the head that punch harder than me is in Ghana and that stuff is just scary.

Actually, you know what? Me and Y'O.L. might be closed out of the last week. That's right. He scared the hell out of me with that punch. You know, but, yeah, you foresee this ending, though, Tyne? Do you think that this will be the case for your title? Like, is this just the way? Like, are you in Dana just oil and water? Who's going to read me?

Who they're going to get to beat me? Tell me the person. Because last time I'm I checked, all my toughest matches are behind me. Last time I'm I checked, the Robbie Lawless is behind me, the Carlos is behind me. Even the fights I lost,

Roy McDonald's, who's a nightmare matchup for me. Those fights are behind me. So who they're going to get to beat me? RDA? It sounds like that's what he wants. What happens if they offer you? RDA is going to get hurt.

Will you accept it if they offer you RDA? Yeah, but now that they're disrespected. affected me in such a way, I feel like the price tag might be a little bit higher. But yes, I will accept it. How is the shoulder rehab going and when in a perfect world, if it was up to you, would you like to fight again? You know, my shoulder's going, my shoulder rehab is going amazing, to be honest. I'm actually, today I was cleared to start punching, so I'm excited about that.

My strength is way beyond where I should be at at week eight, feeling good. I've already kind of been, you know, moving a little bit progressively, just shadowbox and moving around. So I can start running this week. I can start a shadow box in this week. So I'll be fine, you know, in one month is a point when the doctor wants me training. He's going to me a month, month three, the 12 week mark, he wants me actually train it. So I'm right in the cahoots with that.

So I got one, I got one series of stem cell coming up in the next week or so. Then I got another one six weeks after that. them selling PRP, along with just, you know, doing two days of rehab, water therapy, ARP therapy, chiropractic massage, you know, Miyagi son, anything you can think of, I'm hitting a shoulder up with, so I'll be ready to roll. Somebody getting hurt. I'm tired of everybody, get them on nerves. Whoever I fight next, you can blame Dana, you can blame the fans, you can blame me your FC. Sorry, I have to do you like that. It's not your fault, and I hope, I hope your family can recognize you afterwards. How do you feel about all these

tweets and Photoshop Justin Bieber stuff coming from RDA Well, RDA is not good at it, but I try to warn you. I would torture you and I used to do this for a hobby as a kid. He's just not good at it. I mean, it's great that he's one of the Brazilian fighters

that first language is Portuguese and he's really coming along in his English but not to the point where he needs to be trying to talk shit. Maybe Tiava Alves, because, you know, or, you know, the Sun Tiles

I'm one of those guys, but it's just a little bit off, it don't make sense, it's kind of corny. You know, it's a lot of corny shit talking into West Boy Division now, so it's kind of like, man, can't I just fight and win? Like, when did that stop me in the recipe? Do you ever remember Carlos doing that?

Or Matt Brown, a Robbie Lawler, or Chapman, John Fitch, or Jard St. Pierre, like, just think about what our sport has become. Like, and then these guys haven't even done nothing, like really you beat Terrick Safanning

who I beat in 2009 and you beat Robbie who basically is a fighter that's you know his best years are behind them

like now you're so deserving and nobody deserve a title of shot in any division there's no rubric on who deserves anything nobody deserves a title shot

you know I mean you just get it because they give it to you don't forget about Neil Magney beat Neil Magny too yeah Neil Magny

I forgot about Sorry, Neil, Neil Magnin, who's a decent fighter. But he didn't go through the godway. He didn't go to, you know, the fighters in the World's Way Division that I feel like I went through. He literally had, you know, three decent victories against decent guys. And maybe, you know, according to looking at the landscape of everybody else, he might be right. He might be the most deserving out of the guys that are there.

you know what, but, but that's not really saying much. Sometimes there's a blessing in the skies for me being, you know, undergoing the surgery and having some time because our division, it ain't nobody just poking out like, okay, that's a, you know what, it's a no brain, it is dude right here.

He is the one. So, you know, Lucy, I've never declined to fight against RDA. That's so hilarious to me. Like, and I'm thinking of myself, like, as you sitting in here like, okay, So thank you, Dana, for believing in me.

I'm thinking like, only if you knew, your ass was not even the first choice of me fighting somebody. Two people got offered to fight against me before RDA. Why he thinks somebody's so on his side. That's hilarious for me. Who's the other one? I can't tell like, no, and I ain't going to be that. I ain't going to be that. Why?

Why? You've said everything else. I mean, it wasn't him. What happened? For him, and he, and guess what? I still haven't been off of RDA. Wow. Still have not been offering him.

Nobody has sent me a bottle cream. Nobody has called me and my manager and formally offered me RDA. Was that for 219? The other one? That was for, so I got offered a fight. I got, you know what? I got off for, I got off for Robbie. Yeah.

Right after I tore my shoulder. Like, immediately after I tore my shoulder. I got off of Robbie. I'm like, didn't I just sure that I can't spend them? Like, you think I'm supposed to just

bounce back and fight him in three weeks? I got offered, I got off of him and fight him whenever the October or whatever that was. Okay,

okay, I would have had six weeks, whatever that car was. Yeah, I'm like, who did he beat again? At that point, I don't think he even,

at that point, I don't think he even, um, had fought. He might not even have fought, he might not even have fought, cowboy yet, or maybe he did,

I don't know. But I got off him then. obviously I couldn't take that fight and then got offered an assaulting offer for someone April 7th which I said

I said who who you want me fight I don't even know that person's name called me back when you got somebody for real so okay so that those are the two well really three

yeah I guess I guess three yeah when's the meeting when's the meeting with Dana um I don't know yeah, it's supposed to be the next couple days. Okay, wow.

A week, I think a week from today. Can you stream that for us? Can you live stream that or something? Maybe get DJ involved, Twitch that thing? You know what? I don't think it's going to be that bad at the meeting because nobody really has any line this hand on. Like, I've been, I've been talked about poorly in the media, and you've got to stop.

So it's not, I don't think it's a back-and-forth argument. It's just, it's just, plain facts. You know, he needs to stop. It's unwarranted and it's unnecessary. The amazing thing is you're Teflon because, like, he'll go on your show. That's the thing. And maybe this is a little personal because I worked there and I felt like they never had my back. But he goes on a show that you are like, at this point, you're more of a co-host on UFC tonight than DC is because DC's been very busy the last few months, right? He's been fighting. He's doing Ultimate Fighter. Your show, taped interview, as you said, and talking that kind of smack about you, And then there you are on Saturday. There you are on Saturday, pre-flight, post-flight. You know, there's Dana, though. Like, this is the thing.

The reason why I can go back and flip with Dana is because I'm not a very emotional person. You know, that's great for business because I can actually deal in business and not take things personal, you know, and this ain't the first time. This may be the six, seven times. Right.

You know, at one point I was, I choked in big fights. Another time I was terrified to fight. Hector Lombard. Another time I was your drama played. Another time, you know, I had some boring fights. Another time, you know, I'm looking for super fights. I just need to fight. I'm going to continue. This time I was a, you know, a piece of freaking

bullshit. You know, what other champions here are kind of lingo going around about? Yeah. Like, I don't have anybody else to talk to a while like that. And so people do a lot worse stuff. I'm getting in trouble. You know, I mean, running cars, not showing up. Like, what have I done?

Like, It's crazy. It really is crazy. Besides, be there last minute of this. Yeah. I mean, besides being her last minute, you know, stepping up clutch, you know what I mean, beating the top guys. How many guys were able to solve the puzzle of, you know,

Warner Boy? I said this other day. I don't see anybody beating Warner Boy, B Army. I just don't see the, I don't see the proper recipe. Guys don't take the sports serious enough to do the research and bring the right people. Who's going to be here? Darren Tilly ain't going to beat them. You know what I mean?

I thought my God might have had a decent chance to compete with him. that didn't happen. You know, Quifington, and he's no way I'm earnest. He'll beat him. So think about the person that I fought two times. It's hard enough to try to beat the ones. You've got to fight them twice. I mean, so I just, I'm just doing what I do, man.

Keep running through this division. You know what I mean? Probably won't fight George. But at the end of the day, I'll still be the greatest worthwhile of all time because, you know, I'll take everybody out. And even if I don't ever give the big fight, It's not even about a money fight for me. It's about getting the attention.

How does non-champions get pushed more than a champion? How does nine champions have a stronger social following via the UFC or whoever is helping, you know, and catapultane? They're exponentially growing socially, which makes him a stronger sell. How does your champion not get that? Does it make sense for me? So, I mean, I'm pretty sure people don't listen to this and I'm going to get 50% of people like, damn, that's what I thought. I never knew that happened like that. You're going to get the other half.

You're going to get. Oh, there's all that. But it's all fast go. Tell me one thing I'm right about. Tell me one thing I came back up. Keep doing your thing, Tyron. We got your back over here. Hey, we're out here.

Hey, they may not have your back at Fox, but they got your back right here on the MMA hour, all right? I'm not going to say that. I believe they do have my back at Fox. All right, all right. Dana's end. You can't control data. Okay.

Fox's family. They have my back. but Dana is going to be himself, and he's always been that way. So, you know, we'll talk. I mean, we already had to talk towards the end of the conversation. It seemed like we was good. But I just want to make sure, because we've been good a couple other times, and then some type of way these things keep popping back up.

So I just want it done for good and for all. And if I blow a fight and I'll stink it up, and it's horrible. I mean, it's okay to go ahead and say that. I'm okay with that. I've told you that. If I get knocked out, I got knocked out. What am I going to do? Get bad at you because you said I got knocked out.

got knocked out. All right, well, keep doing your thing. Good luck with the meeting, and thanks for doing this. I appreciate it. All right, there he is. Tyrone Woodley, welterweight champion of the UFC. Never a dull moment. I appreciate him stopping by.

Another Fox analyst, one who is probably not in as much drama as Tyron, is our next guest, the one and only Sugar Rashad Evans, he is standing by. Rashad, are you there? My man, what's going on? How are you, Rashad? I thought we lost you for a second, but we got you. We found you. man, you know what I always say, every single time we make one of these plans,

please remind me. But even still, I got to have a reminder for my reminder. I apologize. No, no problem at all. What about that, Tyron? Your buddy over at Fox, always some drama with him, huh? Yeah, well, I mean, look, I've, I was, I don't know if you, I mean, a lot of new anime fans would not know this, but I was the original Tyron Willey as far as the relationship

with Dana, you know what I'm saying? So I understand where he's coming from, but, you know, he's going to learn what I learned, you know, and, you know, at the end of the day, it reminds me of something somebody told me when I got married, you know, I said, did you want to be, you know, do you want to be right or do you want to be happy? You know, when I was arguing my wife, do you want to be right or do you want to be happy? Because if you want to be right, then you're not going to be happy. You know what I'm saying? And at this point, he can't win this because he fights for the UFC. Dan is the president of the UFC. There's no way he can win this.

So at the end of the day, feel the way you feel, but you got to know whenever the conversation comes up where it's, you know, Dana said this, don't even address it. Don't even go down that road. You know what I'm saying? And it's a hard thing to do because your eagle gets involved and you know he's wrong and you want to prove it. And you know, you may feel this because of this way or because of that

and you want to just expose the truth. But at the end of the day, is that what experience. expense, your, your, your, your, your, your, your, your, your, your chance to, to, to be remembered and, and what you love to do, you know, because at the end of the day, it's, it's, it's these kind of things that make you hate fighting. I took, I took, I took so many years off my, my, my fighting career, arguing with Dana, trying to get a fight with Shogun, not trying to fight this guy, trying to do all this stuff, but at the end of the day, it didn't, it didn't really matter much, you know, I just lost time. You know what I'm saying? So it's like,

I get with Tyrant San, and he's right to feel the way he feels, but at the end of the day, you got to assess, like, is it really worth it? You know what I'm saying? Now, now, here he is. He got to have a separate meeting about Dana with Dana with just about how they should handle, be around each other or speak about each other. You know what I'm saying?

That's not, that shouldn't be a conversation that should be happening. You ever talk to him privately? You ever try to give him advice? I mean, that's a great quote. I was the original Tyron Woodley. Do you ever sit down and talk to them? him about some of the things you've learned? Yeah, I mean, I talk to him, but I mean, here's the thing about when you talk to somebody

about something they're going through or something that you went through. They don't understand it until they go through it. So he can't, I can tell him. I can be like, yo, this is why I experienced. This is why I will go through. But he has to go through it for himself. You know what I'm saying? And he's going through it.

Now he has to say to himself, how much it is, how much of this am I going to do? The energy I'm not going to devote to this. Because at the end of the day, it's like zero sums game. It's like, what do you gain from being right to Dana White? What do you gain? What do you gain?

Nothing. You lose a lot. If you're wrong, you lose. So why even play with it if you want to be a fighter? And especially if you're tied into two of, you know, two of your revenue streams are tied into something he controls. Right.

The fighting and the TV stuff, right? Yeah. So, I mean, T. Wood is my boy all day. I just, you know what I'm saying? I just, you know, I just know the, the fight that he's up against is, it ain't worth it. Pick your battles. Pick your battles. That's it. All right. Let's talk about you now. There were some reports that you were going to fight Michael Bissing, a rematch of UFC 78. The first pay-per-view I ever attended in beautiful Newark, New Jersey. What a fight it was. The two tough. champions undefeated going toe to toe to toe We thought that there was going to be a rematch in London

What is the state of this fight? Is it happening? What's going on? Um Oh, it's not going to happen. It's not going to happen. And You know, I did get the call on Andrew calling Ali And, you know, they worked it out and and at first I didn't want to I didn't want to even fight Bisbing, but he asked to fight me. You know what I'm saying? So I was kind of perplexed by that, but I was like, all right, you know, maybe you know, he just want to scrap with his old friend one last time. I don't know. So I didn't get in my feelings about the

fact that my friend wanted to fight me or I thought my friend, you know, who I thought my friend was he wanted to fight me, whatever the case may be. I just like, okay, cool. So, you know, I started training, getting ready for the fight and then, you know, I started, like I didn't, you know, I didn't get back a contract or anything like that. And then I finally got a contract, but then it was on a day where I also learned that Bisbing wasn't going to take the fight. You know, he wasn't going to do the fight because he was having some kind of contract problems with the UFC. Okay. So has it been delayed or do you think it just won't happen ever now?

I don't think it's going to happen now. I mean, I think that that was a fight that may sense for him at that moment. I don't think it's something that's going to make sense for him or, you know what I'm saying? I don't know. You know, it may or may not. You know, it may appeal to him later on. It may not. but, you know, I guess the answer is just, I really don't know,

but I'm not going to sit and wait for it, you know what I'm saying? I'm not going to be waiting like somebody, like a fiancee, a woman waits for a husband to propose. You know, just what it is, you know. I'll just fight whoever and see what comes next. Are you going to stay on that London card, or are you done with that? Is it too late for that? Because that was supposed to be on the London card, right?

Yeah, it was. I'm not going to be on that. I just, you know, it's going to be, I mean, I'm not having an opponent, but I just, I'm going to wait and take a fight that makes sense and get myself proper time to train and actually go out there and fight like I know what I'm doing. Okay. Did you ever address, you know, the situation with Bisp being like, oh man, I thought we were buddies. We worked together. Why did you pick me? Did you ever ask him about that? No, I didn't because when we spoke, you know, I spoke, we spoke. We spoke. twice and once was when I accepted the fight and then you know it was like it was really

respectful and you know good luck you know good luck in training camp kind of like a similar situation I had with Chale and then um it was the second time was when he told me that he wasn't going to do the fight because of the situation with me so I didn't ask them you know I can only

I don't know I don't know you know so You haven't worked with him since, right? You haven't been in the studio with him since. Nah, I haven't worked with him. You know, I'm going to talk to him. I'm going to bust his walls when I see him about that. Do you think it'll be weird?

Huh? Do you think it'll be weird? It's a fight bit. No, it's a fight bit. It's a fight game. You know, you got to be, I don't take it personal. I don't take it personal. You know, for me, I just took it as like, okay, well,

because I'm really, really close. Like, I can't say I'm really, really close, but I'm close enough to know Mike and know things about Mike that he may not want mass people to know. You know what I'm saying? So, I think with that was maybe his intent of why he chose me to fight. Huh? You know what I'm saying? Like, like, huh? Go ahead, go ahead.

No, because he knows I'm not going to be like, you know, doing anything dirty or doing anything. You know what I'm saying? To try to really, really, really mess him. up or hurt them really, really bad. You know what I'm saying? I hear you. I hear you. Yeah. Like when you're Michael Bisning and you haven't made a lot of friends in a fight game because you're, you know what I'm saying? You're Michael Bisney. You know, when you go out there, you make it personal. So there's a target on your back. You know what I'm saying?

If people think that you're, you're wounded duck, they're going to try to go out there and try to kill you. You know what I'm saying? Yeah, yeah. No, I understand. You're not going to, you're not going to, it won't be personal with you, right? It's just business. Right. Right. Exactly. Exactly. So you're going back to, regardless, you're going back to 205. This fight was supposed to be a 205, correct? Yeah, I'm going to go back to a 5. I just, you know, making a way that 1-85 was one thing,

but performing at 185 was another. And that's what I really had a hard time doing, just simple things that I was able to do before being explosive, being able to have good movement to the point where it was function, not just like that bouncing around stupid crazy, like nothing happening, you know? Yeah. regret it? Like, do you wish you never did it going down to 185? No, I don't wish I ever did it. I mean, this is life, Ariel. You know what I'm saying? You live

and you make these choices and whatever choice you make, you got to live with it and you got to, you know, think that you made the best decision at the time that you made a decision. So with that said, I feel like I made the best decision at the time and what was going on in my life. It didn't work out, but that's life. Not everything he tries going to work out. You just got to keep on going. Are you, you know, obviously you still want to fight and you're looking for a fight at 2.05 and you're obviously looking to get back on track. Are you, like, are you a piece with the way things are for you

now? I mean, because you mentioned the chale fight, that's the last time you won. Are you, is it just like, is it eating you? No, I'm going to be honest. I'm in a weird space to be honest. I'm in a weird, weird space. It's like, you know, I want to compete and I still want to compete, but then I'm almost in a position where

it's like, do I continue to compete because then you know, does it mess up my legacy? you know what I'm saying? Then why am I even competing? And then, you know, like, what is the point? You know what I'm saying? So it's a weird, it's a weird space.

You know, it's a weird transition. And no one ever really talks to you about it. So there's really no one you can talk to about it. So it's kind of a weird thing I'm working myself through. And so how do you navigate that? Like the weirdness. How do you feel comfortable with where you're at? I don't know.

I just got to acknowledge it for one and just, you know, just follow my heart. You know, I follow my heart. heart to get here. So that's got to follow my heart to see what my next step is. You know what I'm saying? I've always been guided by my passion to compete. So I'm going to see where my passion leads me. You still want to fight. You still enjoy fighting. You still enjoy training. You still enjoy the whole process. Yeah, I enjoy it. I mean, I don't enjoy train as much as I used to. But yeah, I enjoy it. You know, I enjoy going to the gym and being part of the whole thing and stuff like that.

I enjoy it. It's become so part of my life that it is, I don't know my life without it. So it's another issue, you know, how do I, you know, assess, like, am I doing this because, you know, of the fear factor? Or am I doing it because it's something that's really that much part of me? You feel like, does it bother you that you're, you know, people say, oh, you should retire, you lost four in a row, all this stuff? Does that bother you that they don't remember the champion, that they don't remember what you did on tough, like the undefeated guy, all that?

Does it bother you that this is where we are with you? And is that something that fuels you that you want to remind people who Rashad Evans was, what you used to do? Does that eat up at you inside? Yeah, you know, I'm not being honest. Yeah, it hurts, you know. It hurts when I, you know, go on the Internet and some people, you know, say, you know,

give me advice about how I could be better than me. Like, it wasn't me. Like, I was a witness to myself, you know, like, I don't know. Yeah. So it hurts, but I know they're intent, you know, they're not trying to be mean and malicious. They just, they, they try to inspire me and they don't know what to say, you know what to say, you know what I'm saying, but they're just trying to do their best to give me

encouraging words, let me know to steal there. And then there's people who are just like, you suck, you are, you know, you are never as good as people thought, you said, you know, you were just overhyped or whatever. So, you know, all those things, it does hurt. You know, and it does make me, you know, wish things were different. But at the same time, I see things like this. I used to be like, oh, that's sad, you know, and it could be like, because I'm not winning.

But at the end of the day, the sun was going to go down on me anyways. I could be the most dynamic fighter in the world, a legend, the sun is going to go down. And it's just a part of life. everything ages to old and it's okay it's just life you know what I'm saying so once I started looking at it like that

then it didn't hurt so much and then I could be then I could fan the flames of other people who want to do it and be genuinely happy for them and not be envious because I did have more time and I don't know if my time will come again

but whatever it may be I can't I'm not going to be too upset about where I am right now so there were there was a point when you were in the gym and there's like the young guns coming up fighting for belt-to-all and stuff and you were envious to them? Yeah, I'm really happy for those guys. Those guys keep me going.

Those guys are very inspirational for me because, you know, I look at them and I see how excited they are and it reminds me of when I started. And then a piece of me, you know, gets inspired to tap back into that. You know what I'm saying? Because when you're doing something for so long, it gets when not in this at times. Yeah. You know, and sometimes you do forget how it all was in the beginning because it just happens like that. And so at this juncture, like, do you even talk to, like, I'm wondering if you even talk to older fighters who have been through this.

How did you get over it? How did you come to peace with where you're at this chapter? Do you lean on any of these guys or are you just kind of figuring it out for yourself? A bit. You know, I talk to people about, you know, just going through that different transition in life. You know what I'm saying? And that's all it is. You know, I don't need to talk to a fighter to talk to somebody about a transition in life. We all experience them. You know what I'm saying?

And it's the same. If you're fighting some, if you're a fighter or if you're, you know, you're a fireman or whatever you choose to do in life, you know, there's always these transitions in life that we have. And, you know, how do we get through them is the issue. Some people can't get through them. And it becomes something that becomes a detriment in their life. You know what I'm saying? and it can't get past it.

So it was just about me just being honest with myself. And it took time. You know, I'll be honest. There's, you know, days I get super depressed and I would get, you know, sad and stuff like that. But it was just, it was just part of it. So how do you handle that? You just kind of write out the wave? Yeah, you know, you just ride it out and just, you know,

because the worst thing is your own mind. Your own mind can convince you some things that, that are just, just not true. You know what I'm saying? So once you're cognizant of the fact of the demon, the own mind can be, it's easier to ride out those emotional storms where you feel like the lowest come on earth. The fascinating thing about this stretch that you're in is that it's not like you're getting knocked out. You know, like this is what we see, right?

When a fighter is, you know, at the end of his career getting knocked out, of the losses, of the six losses, there's only one knockout. the rest are split decisions or unanimous decisions. Does that kind of play tricks on you as well? Like, why can't I put it into the next gear? Why am I not finishing these fights? Because it's not like your classic, like Roy Jones type of thing. You know what I mean?

No, you're absolutely right because it bothers me. Because I'm a psychology major, I know it's psychological and I can't figure it out. And that's the hard problem. I know it's a psychological thing. I know it's not a physical thing at all. physically speaking, I feel better than I have before. But I, and I feel like fighting-wise, my IQ is way higher than it's ever been, but yet when it comes to going out and doing what I used to do, I just had that mental block.

And I think, you know, I've been theorizing on it, and part of my theory is the fact that I'm paralyzed by, you know, like post-traumatic shock syndrome, you know, when I've had all, I had some great experiences in the cage, but I also had a lot of bad experience in the cage. And I think that sometimes when you are emotionally so tied to those bad experiences, it causes you to go out there and have these pauses in your performances where you're going out there and you're looking like you're not in the moment. You're thinking too much, and that's what's been moving to me.

Do you talk to a sports psychologist about this sort of thing? No, I haven't. I was going to get one, but I feel like they tried to rip me off. I didn't get that. So you're just going to figure it out for yourself? I mean, I think if you don't answer the question why first, how can anybody else answer that question why for you? Yeah.

Maybe someone can help you figure out the answer, but I understand if you want to figure out. I mean, you certainly respect that, that you want to try to figure it out on your own. So you are going to keep going. You don't know when you're going to fight again. The Bisping fight isn't happening, but you'd like to get back in there sooner rather than later.

Is that all accurate? Absolutely right. Do you have an opponent that you'd like, you know, at the fight? Is there someone on your mind? No, you know, I've been having a hard time even thinking of anybody. Okay. If anybody wants to win me, just, you'll do it.

Call you up. All right. Well, Rashad, I wish you the best. There are very few fighters who are more honest than you, and I always appreciate that. Thank you for being as honest as you are. Thank you for coming on the show. I'm sorry, but maybe I'm not.

sorry that the Bissping fight didn't happen because I don't know, it felt a little too soon, and it felt like a fight that didn't need to really happen. Yeah, I'm actually happy I didn't get to fight the guy, to be honest. I like that, but he's a good guy. All right, well, there you have it. Thanks, Rashad. All the best to you. Talk to you soon, and thank you for doing this.

All right, there is. Rashad, I've been stopping by. I really mean that. Very few fighters, athletes that I've ever met, who are as honest as that man. He is just incredibly honest and hearing him, you know, a guy who was once champion of the UFC, beat Forrest Griffin at UFC, of course, lost the belt at 98. But, you know, one of the pillars of the UFC for around a decade or so, the tough two winner, the Sean Salmon knockout, the list goes on and on. And now he's stuck. And it's not like he's getting knocked out. One knockout, you know, he's lost six of eight,

but there's only one knockout there. And a lot of those fights are just like, they've kind of just happened. It's not like he's been like thoroughly beaten up by Daniel Kelly or Sam Alvey. And so it has to be tough to try to figure that out. And I do think a sports psychologist could work. I've never worked with them myself, but you've seen fighters have tremendous success. He wants to figure it out for his own. More power to him. Happy to hear that the Bispink fight isn't happening right now because it felt, at least for me, for Bispings' health, it felt a little too soon.

I know the story of London was so great. But just coming off the knockout, the two fights in November, maybe a little too soon. we'll see if they revisit it in the future. All right, let's move along. Let's go back to the phone lines and say hello to our next guest. An equally truthful, oh, he's on Skype. Okay, an equally truthful guest. He is joining us via Brazil, I do believe, from Natal Brazil, to be exact.

Flyway contender, Henry Sohudo is here. Let's say hello to him. Hey, Henry, how are you? Hey, what's up here? Can you see me? I can see you just fine. I can see you just fine. It's great to see you.

It's great to have you on. Were you at Carnival yesterday as well? Yes, I was actually. I was out with a couple of the guys. First time celebrating carnival here. I actually kind of got a little sick because of it. Oh, what happened? Too much partying?

I just weather. No, no. None of that area. Okay, okay. No, it's just a little bit of the weather change. It rains out here in Brazil. And I was out in Holland. And Holland was cold.

then I come straight from Holland, I came down to Brazil and to chill with the Pitbull Brothers and just the climate change. It's just different. The rain will mess you up. Rain and sunshine will mess you up worse than cold than snow. Okay, wow. How about that? You learned something new.

By the way, what is it like? Is it as crazy as it looks on TV, the carnival? Yeah, it's pretty, these people, These people love their two weeks of dancing. It's like carnival, from what I've seen so far, it's like, it's almost, it's like a Halloween. It's like everybody goes trick-or-treating, but they all celebrate at a certain plaza or a certain street. Okay. So it's not just people going out trigger-treat, or it's not people going out to house parties.

It's everybody goes out and celebrates together. So it's like a big Halloween. It's a big holiday. You dress up as well? No, I don't know. I'm, uh, no, I'm pretty, you know. boring. You're just a viewer. You just observe.

Yeah, I'm just observing, man. I'm just a fighter. I'm just a fighter trying to become the best in the world. That's it, area. Okay, so let's talk about the fighting. Last week, you came out with a tweet asking, you said, hey, Tim Elliott, let's go. And apparently, from what I've been told,

you're a bit of a different guy when it comes to Tim Elliott. You've been holding on to something with him. This is kind of personal between you and Tim Elliott. Can you tell us about that? yeah yeah i just think uh you know there's there's multiple reasons i just i've always felt like tim ellen was uh ever since i've met him and i've always got this this very arrogant it's a very like cocky feeling oh you meet somebody's just like dude you know you meet a good

spirited person it's like man i can respect that the d looks at me in the eyes uh the dude would talk to me and with ellie was different because i was with him on the on the ultimate fighter show for for six weeks and i've always always always felt you always had something that said every time I said something. Every time I said he always had like a little like a little smirk to his face. It was something that was just different. And it always bug me. And during the show, you know, they had asked all the other contestants, like, you know, what do you feel about the two coaches?

You know, they asked about Joan. They asked about me. And of course, they asked Ali, is that what do you think of Henry Sehudo? The first word that came out of his mouth was fake. And I'm like, oh, okay. so I'm fake. He goes off, beats two of my guys on the Ultimate Fighter show that I coach throughout the scene. Go out wins, has a good performance with Demetri's.

A lot of people will applaud him. And now he wants to leave the Flyweight Division. And I'm just like, hold on, hold on, hold on, hold on. You ain't leaving the Flyweight Division without getting a piece of the messenger. You said some things, and now it's time to man up. And that's just the way I see there. I'm not here to be a bully. I just think that this is

this is a good time for me to get a lot off my chest He calls me boring He calls me faith But yet when he says you'll fight anybody You won't do it So you either man up Or you apologize

That's kind of how I feel Area you either man up or you apologize And I'll take the apology just as I would knocking you out And that's just the reality area Because you don't go out on national television and questioning people's characters you don't know them

and then when it's time to fight you say somebody's boring you know and uh I just don't like him Mario I just don't hate him

I don't hate him by any means I just don't like them I don't like the ericants that he has the way he carries him so the way that you know he flips people off and it gets on a scale uh he

he likes to be little people a little bit and I think I want to humble that dude I want to humble I truly truly deep down my heart, I want to hurt that guy. Wow. And I want to put on the show for the fans. I want to, you know, I think it's good for, I think it's great for our flightweight division.

Yeah. He's a, he's a former contender. He's 31 years old. I just, my birthday was just a couple days ago. I'm 31. He's been fighting longer than me. I said, I will meet, I will meet Tim Elliott up at 135, a heavyweight if he wants to. Wow.

I want to fight Tim Elliott. I want to fight him. I haven't heard you talk like this about an opponent. I don't know if ever have you ever talked like this. Yeah, well, I'm a little sick and whatnot. You know, there's a little bit of passion in me. Yeah, I like it. Because it's different when you're on the show with somebody.

And then somebody says a bunch of things about you. And then thinks he can just walk off like nothing happened. And I'm being the bigger person here because I don't want to be portrayed as an idiot. You know, I always want to be portrayed as George St. Pierre. I was a mixed martial artist, man. I come from the background of wrestling, but we respect each other, we go out and we compete.

I understand there's some, there's some, there's some, there's some, there's some, there's some talking that has to go, and I understand that. But when there's talking, there's no fighting in there's, and then it's just a bunch of drama.

It's a soap opera. I'm talking about, let's talk and let's dance. What's up? So that show was like two years ago. You've been holding on to this for a long time. It's not that I've been holding on, on to. I just haven't had the opportunity to fight him.

Okay. Now he wants to go up. Now he wants to go. I told my manager, I told him he says, I will go up to 135 pounds, 145, whatever wet class he wants to go. I want to be a minute. I want to fight Tim Elliott. I think it's great for a weight class. I think he owes me an apology. And the best way to do is in the cage. Is in the cage. And that's it. And again, I'm not a bully by any means, Eric. I'm not. I just personally, I just want to fight him. So once you put this out, any response from either Elliot or the UFC, are they interested? Yeah, the UFC is definitely interested.

Okay. Make him, he definitely wants to make the fight. Now it's just, it's time for Elliot to step up and sign that. And, you know, a man up to his word, he said, you'll fight anybody in the world. And he personally told my manager in person, yeah, I'll fight Henry. Oh. And now he wants to fight, I think it's Eddie Weil. Now he wants people or, he's scared, man.

That's all there is to it, area. I'm here to compete, man. I'm here to compete, and I don't like guys that talk and that don't bite. Colin McGregor, for example, he talks, but I tell you what, he walks that talk.

Tim Elliott does it. And that makes me sick. Where do you feel like you're at right now? Because you had that amazing performance. What a dominant win over Sergio Pettus in December. It seemed like he was kind of being groomed for the title shot and you derailed that.

Where are you right now in the Flyweight Division? Where are you at in your career after that? I don't know. That's up to the UFC. Demetrius obviously is hurt. He's hurt, and he has a fight. You know, he's planning on fighting T.J., which is, you know, I'd like to five Demetri's, but I've been improving.

And I think a lot of, I think my last few fights have shown with Hayes and Sergio. With Sergio, it was more of a game plan. I want to throw people a lot for my next fight. But I think for the most part, it's either that or maybe, you know, wait for Joseph to get help. healthy and then do that fight again. So I got Demetrius, I got, I got Joseph, but I think more likely will make sense. And Mick Maynard says it, says it too, is Tim Elliott.

Okay. Tim Allen, this is great, this is great for our weight class area. A guy like that is going to hurt our weight class because he doesn't want to fight, because he doesn't want to man up. You know, this is really good. He has a name. He's fought for the title. He gave Demetius a better fight than I ever did. and now I feel like we should score down words were said

he calls me fake like I said Ariel I'm gonna throw some WW in here I'm gonna show how how real the messenger is you don't like being called fake this is this is this is something that bothers no no no it's not so much that's what they don't know you maybe if he knew me

he says hey man you're a hypocrite I'm like damn maybe it maybe it hurt my feelings but he doesn't know me he doesn't know who I am if he did it I guarantee you he think different. Since he doesn't and he opens that big mouth, then I feel like it's time to step up. That's all I heard. You said something...

I'm crying here. No, no, no, no. This is great stuff. I love the passion. You said you don't think DJ's going to fight TJ or you do think DJ's going to fight TJ? No, I do think. I do think that fight's going to probably happen. Okay, okay, okay. I do so I'm not going to sit around and wait. Yeah. I want to fight, and that's how there is to it.

Who do you like in that fight? If it does come to fruition, who would you pick? Dimitris. Okay. Demetris, I think Demetri's a speed. He's intelligent. But nothing to take away from T. And I said it before.

I think it's just a weight issue. I think it's just T.J. getting down those extra 10 pounds and seeing how he recovers the next day. I think that's going to be the biggest factor in that fight. So actually, I have Demetri's by a landslide, to be honest with him. Oh, wow. You think he thoroughly dominates him? I think so. I think so. And I've talked to a lot of, I've talked to a lot of MMA guys that fought before.

They're just like, when I've gone down on weight class, I know what you're talking about him. Yeah. It's like making, cutting that extra 10 pounds is a big difference. Now, T.J. at 135, it is a different game for Demetris. Right. Are you kind of hoping that if they do fight that Demetrius wins, because if T.J. holds a, both belt. It's a bit of a mess. Or maybe TJ wins.

It's a new opponent for you to fight for the belt. Do you think about yourself when you think about the fight as well and what that would mean for you in your career? Yeah, kind of. But no, I think it's good. I think at times I think it's good when the belt is passed around. Okay. You know, obviously, I don't want to be passing the battle around either.

But as a competitor, as someone that's in the weight class, I think it's good. when you start to have different champs, you start to build these different names and, you know, different, you know, different characters and whatnot. And it's just, I think it's cool. I think it's cool that they do fight.

But, you know, but I, I feel like I already know the outcome. Okay. Did you, by the way, did you watch Timeli's last fight back in, when was it? It was in December. You know what? I did it. Okay.

Actually, I think the last time I probably saw. I was against Dimitris. Oh, wow. And I'd be honest with being, yeah. So you're not really keeping tabs on him.

You just want to fight the guy and shut him up. No, no. Yeah. Yeah. Fight him. Again,

he beat a couple of my guys. He beat all my guys that I coach. Yeah. You know, he fought Demet Fiers. It was a five-rounder. I feel like, no,

you know, fight the coach, man. Fight the guy that, fight the guy that coach the guys that you beat. Let's see how good you really are. By the way, what were you doing in Holland? I was out there training, I was out there training striking for a few weeks. Oh, wow.

With Andy Sauer. Wow. Training, training, training my stuff. So, how was it? And I've been cross-changes, waiting, wait, and good, good, good, man. It's just, it's just focusing on one solid, one solid art, which is just stand-up and just doing stand-up twice a day. And just eating, breathing, just all stand-up. And now I come down to Brazil, and it's all M-M-A.

It's a lot of J-Jitsu's specific technique. of course we know about your your background in the olympics do you you keep tabs on the winter olympics no no i haven't i haven't uh i'm out here i don't you don't get good reception out here i don't think brazil is watch uh once of the winter olympics so yeah i don't even know if they have anyone competing i just thought like all olympics all olympians you know this is you know it's a big deal for you but maybe summer olympics you keep tabs obviously the wrestling right yeah yeah yeah with the summer yeah the summer's cool All right.

It was a big match, my. Kyle Snyder lost a couple of days ago. Oh, really? You guys saw that, the Olympic chairman. Yeah, he lost to, I think his name is Adam Kuhn from Michigan State. So it's a big deal that one of the best wrestlers in history just lost to a college kid. Wow. Is he, is he, he's from Penn State, right, Kyle Snyder?

Am I? Yeah, yeah, Kyle Stein is from Penn State. He just lost two guys from Michigan State. Wow. So I'm a little bump for him, but it's also pretty cool because it's only going to elevate the guy that beat him and hopefully he continue to wrestle this next Olympic cycle. So it's the thing about Kyle Snyder, he's a winner. So I'm pretty confident he'll come back and he'll come back and win it. Okay.

How long are you in Brazil for? I'm going to be here until March, until March. Oh, wow. And then get on that, get on that Phoenix card or maybe fights. I fight somewhere in Chile or Brazil now, but I'm in desperate of fighting, but especially Tim Elliott. All right, yes, we have established that.

The Phoenix card makes all the sense in the world. That's perfect. That's your backyard, Glendale, to be exact. I need you to give the next man in charge earlier. That's right. I get shit done. He makes things happen. Exactly.

Let's make it happen. There's nothing better than a grudge match, Henry. People love that sort of thing, right? It doesn't always have to be for the belt. You want to fight this guy. You don't like him. He thinks you're fake. It's a no-brainer.

The flyweight division needs fights like this. They're all just a bunch of random fights, right? Yeah, do me a favor. I'll tweet that to him. Okay. Make him feel bad. I don't know. Did you see Formiga on Saturday?

Did you see his win? Yeah, yeah, I saw that. Formigas. Formigas? He can trade on, man. For mega, he's good. Again, guys like that, man. but I think it's good far away to be.

Yeah, it is good. It finishes like that. Flyweight's picking up, but I'm going to make this one happen. I'll talk to Mick. We'll get it done. All right. Thanks again. Thanks again.

I appreciate it. All the love. Yes. And say hello to your friend and coach, of course, the captain, Eric Albaricine. At the beginning of the program, I told a great story in 2011. He came up to me at the Nogara Gym with a piece of paper. And he said, remember this name. Y'O. Romero, you will hear about this man.

And he's going to be a future. UFC champion. Eric came up with me with this paper August of 2011. Look at Yoel now. So Eric knows a thing or two about the sport. No, he's good. He's good around. I want to tell you from the bottom of my heart, I want to say thank you, man, for nominating

Captain Eric as as one of the nominees for the year, because this guy will cook for you. This guy will do everything. He plays an agent role. He plays a chef role. He plays a partner role. He'll take

your dirty laundry. I mean, the guy is amazing. So don't forget about that, man. Someday he'll be your guys' coach of the year someday. I have no doubt. Awesome stuff. Thank you, Henry. Good luck getting that fight.

All right, Aaron. Thank you, man. You guys have a good one. Same to you. There he is. Henry Sohudo, the messenger, with a message to one, Tim Elliott. He doesn't like that you called him fake. He's upset about it.

He wants a fight. And guess what? It's nice to see a little grudge match that doesn't involve the belt. You know, we always see grudge matches, you know, at the top, right? We always see that. But I like grudge matches that kind of build to the top. And both these guys, they fought for the belt. Probably not going to get a shot anytime soon with the T.J. Dillashaw fight in the wings.

So why not? Make it happen. That's a great fight. I love that fight. So Mick Maynard, who I know watches the show every week. Dana White, who I know watches the show, doesn't miss an episode. Make it happen. Tim Elliott, Henry Zahudo. Let's get it done.

Even at 135. Why not? Nothing like a good old-fashioned grudge match. Okay, let us move along. One more guest via Skype, and then we're going to get to Mike Goldberg in studio. But I want to introduce you to an active champ champ,

if you will, the Titan FC, flyweight, and bantamweight champion. He is a perfect 6-0. He returns to action on Friday, Titan FC 48 in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. As I mentioned, the champion at 125 and 135, this particular fight on Friday is a 125-pound title fight. And if all goes well, there's a very strong chance that you're going to be seeing him inside the UFC Octagon very soon, perhaps even in June when the UFC returns to his hometown of Chicago, Illinois. We're talking to Jose Shorty Torres, the Titan FC Flyweight and Bantamweight champion now.

He joins us via the magic of Skype. Jose, how are you? I'm great, man. How about yourself? I'm doing great. Thank you for joining us. It's great to have you on. So you're back at 125 on Friday.

You're the champion at 125 and 135. I know that you've done some interviews. I know that the word out there is that the UFC has come. I'm calling multiple times. And every time you do an interview, it seems like you're talking about the UFC. Is it hard to give 100% of your focus on what needs to be done on Friday without thinking about what could happen if you win this fight on Friday? Yeah, it definitely, you know, mess in my mind a little bit, the last fight, I felt defending

my belt for the second time at 135. Didn't need to be done. It was fighting an unranked opponent, some guy that was just next in line, which is cool. But I was ready for the next level. and I was called six times to be called up, you know, to the UFC. Just so happened every single time I got called up. I was injured, recovering from a broken hand and torn MCL. So just couldn't take it.

It was just horrible timing. But, you know, took the fight, and I wasn't much prepared for it because I was ready for the next level. I felt that I didn't need to fight Gleets into Hizuzuzzoos, which was the opponent I fought. And I didn't perform on my best because of it. But this time, I'm not trying to depend on the UFC. I know they want me.

They called me actually a couple weeks ago to fight in UFC Charlotte because a couple of fights backed out. And sadly, two of the opponents that they gave me, I'm not going to name any names, both they don't want to take the fight. So it's either I'm injured or people don't want to fight me. So for now, I'm just doing fights to keep on making a living and keep on showing that. I'm not just a double champ, but I'm a very dominant champ at that.

Who are these people that turned out fights against you? Let's hear their names. Come on. I definitely. Why? Why are you protecting them? They stopped you from realizing your dream. Why are you protecting them?

them. Hey man, you know, things happen behind the scenes and now sometimes just things don't work out his plan. That's all it is. Okay, so if they turned you down, why didn't you still get into the UFC? They wanted you. Like, why was it only contingent on that card? Why are you not in the UFC now? And that's, and that's something I'm still trying to figure out myself. Make it called me seven times, which hey man, I appreciate every single time, but, you know, a few of them from the contender series, a few to fight just as Skagans, Timeli, and then this last one in UFC, Charlotte, just, you know, nothing, nothing's been able to work out his plan. So I'm not just, I'm not just, just hoping for a call, I'm hoping for a contract.

Okay. And you said in the past, you've been called and you've been injured. How difficult is it to say no? Like, were you close to just saying, F and I'm going to take this fight, even though I'm injured? Well, at the time, I was still definitely, I still even throw a punch. I still wasn't able to really kick because of the torn MCO. So there was no chance of me ever taking the fight, but I know they called me a few times at the contender series, one of them being literally the same day I get cleared to start punching again. It makes like, oh, come on, take it. like, man, I want at least a training camp to make sure that, you know, I'm definitely healthy. It's my first surgery ever.

I want to be able to make sure I'm 100%. No, man, I'm 25. I definitely have a lot of time to recover and a lot of time to, you know, be in the UFC. So there's no rush. You're referencing McMainard, who's the matchmaker for the Flyweight Division. Is it true that he has you blocked on social media? Yeah, I'm a little annoying. It's okay.

So the guy who's essentially like your past to get into the, the big dance has blocked you. This doesn't have you a little bit concerned? A little bit. At least I know I definitely have his attention. And because of him blocking me, everyone else that he hasn't blocked has been hitting him up for me. So it's like double the trouble for him.

But hey, man, it's nothing but respect. I was just tagging him on a bunch of stuff. And now, hey, man, he probably just got annoyed from it or me saying no so many times. Wow. That would freak me out. Like, I would be so nervous about that. Oh, my God. I pissed him off.

I mean, it's one thing. think to maybe mute you, but to actually block you, that's a strong move on his part. And makes a really easy going guy. I was like, hmm, this is probably not a good sign. But hey, man, you know, as long as I keep on winning and keep on defending my belt, I'm doing what Conno did at 14 and 2 in Cage Warriors, but I did it at 5 and 0 and I defended one belt at the time. Now I'm 6 in0 with two title defenses, with two championships, now going for my third title defense. So I'd be in the record of 57 and 19 or 57 and 21 at only 6. No, I mean, no one has my resume.

No one has my accolades. When people say, oh, they've never fought someone like me, I can legit say that. No one was a two-time amateur world champ. No one was a two-divisional world champ for Titan Fc and two-time defending champ, hopefully soon to be a third. So I'm just more waiting for the call. I know what's going to happen. Now I'm just waiting for the contract.

Okay. And which weight do you prefer fighting out? 135 or 125? 35. 35 is definitely a lot more fun to make just because I get to enjoy myself a little more. But 25, I'm 5'4, 25 is definitely the division I want to be. I mean, I've trained with so many people around the world that are at the band and weight division, T.J. Dillishaw, Brau, I mean, so many guys. It's like anytime I train with them, I go, no, yeah, I'm a flyweight. Yeah, yeah, definitely a flyweight. You're now at American Top Team, right? That's where you're training with Borrell.

Yeah, so I'm down in American Top Team. You know, I helped just hear of Omiga, Burma. Rao, Pedro Moonhost, Kioji Horaguchi, Adrian Amaras, I mean, the list goes on and on. So there's so many guys in my way class. I mean, I'm holding my own with some of the best, and these guys are, you know, trying to get me ready for a UFC debut as well. So your nickname is Shorty, and initially I thought, okay, it's because you're a flyway,

you're not the tallest guy, but has nothing to do with your size, right? No, actually, you know, one, my whole family's short, so everyone's named Shorty, my father, my mother, my brother even had it. So it kind of wasn't the family. So when we say Team Shorty, it's like a legit thing. But for me, yeah, I always say I'm a, you know, the Shorty from the 90s, the Shorty trying to make it up out of the neighborhood and really trying to show that if this shorty can do it, other shorties can do it as well.

So like the neighborhood that you grew up in wasn't the best? Yeah, you know, my dad was a big game banger back in the day. He was a goonie and, you know, he used to fight to collect the money, kind of like Rocky in the first movie where he was just a goon. And, you know, for me, I grew up, you know, getting into. be but properly where I was able to learn how to defend myself and learn how to take care of myself in the streets and my dad showed me how to do that and actually I'm actually making a homage to him for for this next flight coming out with the with the warm-up outfit that I'm coming out in

but you know man it was it was a tough upbringing but I'm at where I'm at today because of it what's the outfit um well the outfit it's it's more of the colors um so the colors are purple and black which was my dad's former gang back in the day and those are the colors that raised me even though it wasn't, you know, the best upbringing in the world. Again, it gave me every single opportunity to all the struggle that he went through, all the stuff, all the bad stuff that he had to do for me to succeed and give me a better left than what he had. Hey, you know, he succeeded.

And, again, I'm at where I'm at today because of it. Is he still around your dad? Yes, he's definitely still around. He's definitely one of the proudest guys ever. I mean, we watched boxing fights and he's just randomly crying. I'm like, why are you crying? Because I'm so proud of you. You do this too.

I'm not even fighting right now. You don't have to cry. You're good. That's amazing. I love, you mentioned Team Shorty, and I think you're repping one of your shirts right now. Yeah. But you do a great job.

There it is. Yeah, it's a very nice looking shirt. You do a great job of sort of marketing yourself, but there's, there's a lot of good that comes of it, because from what I understand, you actually take a proceed from all the gear that you sell and give it back to, like, a youth team

to help them go and compete. compete as well. Is that accurate? Yeah, so my gym combat doughbacked Chicago, Master Bob Sherman, we used to have Shoney Carter and Terry Marta come out of our gym back in the day. You know, that was a gym that saved my life. You know, I was going into gangs, going into, you know, a bunch of hard problems and actually got me focusing in the school and the reason why I graduated college in the first place. But, you know, it got me the chance to travel and train and, you know, fight against some of the best and really just compete all over the world. For me, I had to hustle and do a lot of things that I probably shouldn't have done just to get the money, just to be able to travel and compete.

You know, so for these guys, these kids coming up or even these young adults trying to make their own living, whether they want to be MMA fighters, or just trying to figure out who they really are. 20% of all my earnings at TeamShorty.com actually goes to the kids and just people in my gym trying to travel and compete and see where it takes them in life. Wow, that is amazing. Well done.

Thank you. I'm not making a living, but I'm making enough just to survive. And if I'm able to help back and give everyone, you know, something like an opportunity I was given, then so be it. And I'm able to do that. Will you continue with that if and when you make it to the UFC? Yeah, I'll definitely continue with it.

I'll probably even raise it just because I know I have a better living. Again, I'm not trying to be a million there. I'm trying to be able to survive. So as long as I have the money again, I grew up for nothing. So if I start with nothing and I end with nothing. So if I'm able to help out throughout that, that's perfect with me. And so you're fighting on 125 this week, and you've also fought at 135. Lex McMahon, who's the CEO of Titan FC and who, of course, has been around the fight game

for quite some time. He told me that the first time he laid eyes on you, you were training with Khabib Nurmaghamedov in Bahrain and really going toe to toe with him. Is that true? Yeah, yeah. So Khabib is actually one of the reasons why I got signed to the Tynfcfc so when we got signed, it was a KHKMMA team. The Prince of Bahrain wanted to sign people like Frankie Edgar, Khabib, Islam Akhachev and a bunch of the Daghestani guys and former UFC veteran Alex Soto. So I come in as a two-time amateur world champ. Lex has no clue who I am. And Alex is getting ready for Tennessee 35 at the time for a ban on weight debut. He goes, hey, short, do you mind sparring with Alex? He needs some help for his fight. If it gets too hard,

if he's too much for you, I'll stop the fight. I was like, oh, yeah, sure, cool, whatever. And so I go in there and I do very well. Yeah, and then he's like, who is this guy? Whatever. And then we have a big team practice, and I'm sparring with Islam and some of the Dagestani guys. And Khabib just wanted to keep him moving. I was like, all right, let's go. You know, so I just, you know, we're, oh, hey, my lights turn up. Oh, wow. We're like play fighting. Sorry, automatic time.

So we're like play fighting. And I don't know where we start going serious. And he just can't take me down on the wall. Given I'm pretty sure he's being nice, but I'm fighting back. He takes me down. I'm getting up. I don't know where I'm spinning him. I'm trying to take him down.

I take him down a couple times. And that's where I learned the Dagestani, you know, top crucifix where you don't get out of. But, man, it was a. I love the experience. I mean, Khabi taught me a lot. And all the Dagestani fighters, their Samba style is amazing. And because of that, the next day,

Lexham has like, hey, do you have any plans? You want a four-fight contract for Titans? Yeah, that's exactly what I wanted. So it was perfect. Wow, that is amazing. And so you win two belts. You're headlining their show on Friday. You're on the cusp.

And the UFC's going to Chicago. I feel like this is all, like, forget Charlotte. This could work out perfectly for you, right? debut in Chicago, fall goes well. What's better than that? Your boy, Curtis Blades, just did well on Saturday. He wants to be, like, this is great. Yeah, hell, I used to train Curtis Blades for his amateur fights,

and it's crazy to see how fast he's improved. And, I mean, Mark Clinton's a legend in the sport, so it's really amazing just to see what he was able to do last weekend. But, man, U.S. Chicago, that's my holy girl. That's my Mattis Square Garden. You know, there's nothing better for me. I haven't fought Chicago in five, six years, because by the time I started picking out my amateur career,

I got to almost 10 and 1 no one wanted to fight me so I went to Missouri went to different states, won the national titles won world championships and was training and competing in Brazil and Chuck Republic and all these other places so I haven't fought Chicago in yeah about five years

why such a long amateur career we don't often see that in MMA so two reasons when I signed with combat don't I was starting my amateur career Master Bob Shermer which is still my coach today he goes hey man I again I've had Tony Carter turn Martin and they do fantastic in their amateur debut.

They go five and on and go, you know what? I'm going to turn pro and just go at it. Well, they're a big fish in a little pond. That's great. But what happens when they face other big fish in different ponds? Usually, you know, you're going to find out who's the bigger fish. Well, for me, he goes, 20 amateur fights automatic. Well, by the time I got the 20 amateur fights, I won my first world championship,

I still had one year to go at school. He goes, you know what? That rule's broken. Get your college degree. Your one year left, make sure you get your bachelor's degree, and then you can turn pro. Well, that's what happened. I got my bachelor's degree.

at the same time I was doing the second world championships and said might as well let's see how this goes and I ended up creating history and becoming the first two-time ever world champion I mean because of that no one had the accolades in the sense paperwise at least I'm the Vasil Lomachenko of MMA. I mean I don't have Olympic runs because we don't have that but no one's ever been a two-time amateur MMA champion

consecutively I was the first ever to do it and because of that I mean you see my long amateur career 26 amateur fights 50 plus in kickboxing moitay pan American two-time gold and medal champion and kickboxing and then all-American wrestling. I mean, I have nothing but accolades to offer. It's just being able to get the opportunity to show it, and that's what I'm trying to do now. It's amazing.

What a resume you have. If only you could get unblocked by McMainer. Don't worry. I know what it's like to be blocked by a UFC official. Yeah. Yeah, it's all good. There is light at the end of the tunnel. I'm not as talented as you are, so I think it will work out just fine for you.

And I think that it's weird how things work out with the Chicago card coming up. you can have you know cm punk you curtis blades why not get the local guys on there it's perfect oh man it's yeah sim punk that'd be great you know he a hater if it brings popularity to the yeah yeah no i'm definitely hating i'm definitely no but it's it's one of those things man it's it's it's really cool to things happen for a reason you know when i got hurt and i beat sherip off i broke my hand to my mcel i got hurt i was like oh man that's okay and then i don't know where i get for pauls, it's the worst thing ever. You know, that's your dream kind of being pushed back more and more and more.

But again, things happen for a reason. And I'm just happy to keep on, you know, being able to do the sport as I do. When you watch the flyweight guys in the UFC right now, do you feel, all right, you know, the creme de la creme, right? The so hos of the world, the Tim Elliott's. Of course, there's DJ up there. Do you feel like you can hang with those guys right away? I know I can hang with those guys right away. I've trained with almost 75% of both the flyweight and band and weight division.

I know what I can do, given its practice, and yeah, that's a whole different thing. But when professional fighters in the UFC pay me to go help them train for a UFC championship, I'm pretty sure there's some type of reason behind it. I know I can hang with some of the best in the world. Again, it's just the opportunity. Again, I'd be in the record of 57 and 21 at only 6 and 0. My second pro fight, the guy had 16 pro fights. I was only 1 in 0 at the time.

My first title, I beat Pedro and Obra. He was 18 and 2 and 2, went to distance to Melia, who went to distance to me, Demetri's Johnson. I was only 3 and 0. I knock him out in 86 seconds. He's never been TKO before. So I'm doing things that are really unheard of. Paperwise shouldn't even happen, but I'm doing it.

Have a feeling we'll be seeing you in the Octagon soon rather than later. First things first, though, this Friday, Titan FC 48, Jose Torres against Alberto Orilano. There are three title fights on the card. It also airs on UFC Fight Pass. So if you want to watch this man in action, you could do that very easily most people who watch this program or listen to it I do believe are already subscribed to Fight Pass.

Great to meet you, Jose. All the best on Friday. And of course, good luck with that next step trying to get inside the Octagon. I appreciate it, man. It was a pleasure. Thank you. Thank you. There he is.

Jose Shorty Torres. Appreciate his time very much. Like I said, Titan FC on Friday. There's also Bellator on Friday. We've talked to two of the headlines. both of the headliners, I should say. Matt Matreone, Roy Nelson. Now let's talk to the man who will be calling the action on Friday from the Mohegan Sun.

How about this? This is very exciting. My good friend, Mike Goldberg is here. Look at this guy. What's going on, my friend? This is great stuff. Been a long time. Good to see you, buddy.

Great to see it. Let's hug it out. Of course. You're my guy. Strong handshake. Thank you very much for coming in. I appreciate it. You reached out to me yesterday. And are you pulling out your computer too?

Well, I might. I got a computer, but I got a gift for you, but I'll wait. Okay, all right, wow. Really? I like it a lot. Okay. Thank you for that. You're welcome.

It's great to have you here. It's good to be here. So you came early? Yep, spent some time with my daughter. Okay. She lives here. She's been here for two years, 20 years old. Wow.

She's a very proud papa, needless to say. Yeah. So with the show Friday at Mohegan's son, I came here, spent a couple days in the city with my daughter. I'm going to work my way to Connecticut. My fiancee's brother and sister-in-law just had a baby. so I get to see the baby. And then we'll work.

I live in Milford, Connecticut. Okay, okay, okay. And I'll keep working my way down. Yes, yes. And Mohegan son, it is. Wow, your daughter is an aspiring act. What kind of actress? She can do everything.

She's triple threat, quadruple threat. Yeah. She really has a love and affinity for Broadway. And that's, I think, what really was, you know, the magnet that brought her to New York City instead of L.A. She lived in Vancouver for a year. That's right. But she can do anything.

She's broadening her skills every day. And I keep telling her. or just matter of time. Once you get that little hole in the dam, boom, then it'll start going in 20. She's, you know. 20 years old. She's got some time.

She's unborrowed time. So the actress daughter, hockey player's son still? Of course. Still doing his thing? Absolutely. Wow. How far is he going to go with this?

You know what? He's going to stay with the junior son devils. Okay. Next year. Is he at ASU? He is. That's what I'm going to tell you, which is awesome.

So he got accepted to the Kronkite School of Broadcasting. Wow. Like his old man. Like his old man. Wow. And he knows way more about hockey. than I do now. Okay.

So I'm like, you're like Bob McKenzie of ASU right now. Like he's the insider. Wow. But he's going to stay and I coach him, junior son devils for one more year. Okay. And then look to play at ASU on the D2, D3 team. I mean, those teams are powerful. They've won national championships.

It's great to see him play the game and love the game the way I do. So he wants to be a broadcaster as well? Yep. Yeah. Really? Yep. Can't talk. Kim or my daughter out of it.

But then again, I don't try that hard. And what kind of broadcasting does he want to do hockey? It'll be sports. And I think he'll gravitate towards. hockey. I mean, when I say the kid knows this hockey, and some of it are the video games now, and they play with everybody. But he can talk about fit,

six defense pairings on all 31 teams. He told me more than I think George McPhee was going to tell me about the draft for Vegas in the summer. He's got a great passion for it. Loves the NHL, of course, we're big sharks fans. Great comeback last night at Anaheim.

Down 2-0, winning in overtime with Pab and Kooch, scoring in the shootout. So, Like you said, I'm really proud of both my kids, and I love the direction they're going. When did you start to realize that your son was getting into broadcasting? Did he want to come on trips with you and shadow you? When did that happen? We took a trip a number of years ago, Ariel, which was really, really cool.

And we went to Toronto. Okay. And we went to the Hockey Hall of Fame. Yeah, yeah. Then we worked our way to Montreal. It was for one of Patrick Cote's fights. So we went to a Maple Leafs game, and we sat about 10 rows back from Mr. Gretzky. Oh, wow.

So there's Walter Gretzky, and there's Cole. We went into the locker room, Penguins were playing. Cole got to talk to, you know, my good buddy, Pascal Dupuis and Chris LaTang, but also Crosby and, you know, Mark Andre Fleury. It was a wonderful opportunity. But we stopped by the TSN studios where the NHL network was at the time. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Jamie McClennan was one of the goleys in Minnesota when I had the job back in 2000. So Cole actually sat on the set and did like this little fun thing that we taped.

And he broke down Mary Ann Gabrick, where his top of the job. pick of the wild and talked a little bit about Rick Nash, who will see how much longer he's here, one of my best buds. And I was like, that's not bad at all. That's not bad at all. And then a couple of years ago, one of our preseason parties, team bonding, some of the kids started to do interviews with myself and the head coach. And all of a sudden I'm like, it's not bad at this. You're not bad at all. So he definitely sees what I do, loves what I do. He really would love me to get back in hockey. but I'll let him be the hockey broadcaster. What about MMA?

Does he have any interest? He does, but more so hockey. He's interested because of his pops, but I'm okay if he's got the cage over his face, at least for now, and not fighting inside one, as any father would be. I don't mean, by the way, as a better. No, no, no, just as a broadcaster.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, if he had an opportunity, of course, he's seen me do it for a long, long time, but it's all about hockey. So the last time we spoke on this program, you were on twice last year. Yeah. The first time was when you parted ways.

The second time was just days before the MSG show your debut. So now you've had, what, eight months? Yeah. What's it like? It's unbelievable. It is. Unbelievable. Why?

Refressed, reinvigorated, re-energized. It's a different culture. And I don't really think I need to explain that to you or anybody out there. And there's just a freedom that exists and an appreciation that exists that is really overwhelming. And I'm grateful for it. I'm grateful for the belief. Keep in mind, everybody pretty much at Spike, same people that I worked with when the UFC was on Spike all those years. So I already had those established relationships. Now getting know Scott Coker and his family, his Bellator family, has been amazing. You've talked to Scott many times.

And he's all about the no-a-hole zone. There is a no-a-hole rule with Scott Coker. And it reflects the whole broadcast and the whole feeling there. What was that for, you know, I remember I was in the media room at MSG, first fight, and like hearing your voice was so on spike, you know, the logos there, it's not Paramount Network, but it was just, it was a trip for you what was alike. You know, for the first time in over a decade, you're calling, you're calling MMA, but it's for a different company and it looks a little different, right? You're the new kid on the block.

What was that first, that first night like for you? You know what? The crazy thing is it felt the same. It did. It really did. And that was something I wasn't sure of. Okay. When they closed that gate and all of a sudden the focus is on the two fighters and the referee staying out of the way, it honestly is the same.

It is. And that was the cool thing. Now, keep in mind, Ryan Bader Phil Davis was the main event. I called that first fight in the UFC. So there were a lot of, you know, common parts to it. We had Chinzo Machita instead of Leoto. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So I'm calling brothers' fights now.

Right, right, right. Douglas Lima instead of Diego. Mitrione, of course, on the pay-per-view chale. It was a cool opportunity, and I enjoyed it a lot. It was really great. I had Mitri-Oen in studio earlier and asked him about what, in his opinion, was the biggest difference between Belator and the UFC. From your perspective, what is the biggest difference?

The biggest difference between Belator and the UFC is that Belator is embracing the matchups, and they're trying to make them better and better. Okay. The international world for Bellator continues to grow. We're headed to Budapest. I did the show, and we texted back and forth. I did the show in Israel, an amazing experience to do MMA fighting in Tel Aviv.

Yeah. And have guys like Noid Lahad, I noticed your hat. Have those guys fight there. Haim Ghazali fight there. There's an excitement there, Ariel, that existed on Spike a number of years ago, around tough one and tough two of, wow, this ship is really starting to sail. And man, where are we going next? And it's about appreciating the journey.

And when I look back at the UFC in my UFC days, those were the best times. Yeah. People would think, okay, UFC 200. Yeah, it was awesome. First show Madison Square Garden, absolutely amazing. But what was more special when I look back is all the little stops along the way in those first experiences in different places. and all of a sudden looking around one night

and seeing 55,000 people at the Skydome in Toronto. That was what was the most special about my UFC run. Do you find yourself reminiscing a lot about those days? Appreciating them. I don't know reminiscing.

Okay. Appreciating them. It's interesting when you step away and as you know, so busy for so long, so many fights, you never have time to kind of step back and take a look at the force. You're always right there, next fight, got to study my bios.

I do appreciate it. And I think about the special places that I've been, more so the special people I've met. Sure. And the experiences that, you know, existed for literally two decades. That's what I appreciate the most. And that's what I take away from my time at the UFC. I also know if the UFC didn't believe in me for 19 years,

I wouldn't be the TV guy for Bellator. So trust me, I understand that I was able to establish myself as the voice of MMA. I always thought the voice of the UFC, fans are the ones you're saying, no, you're the voice of MMA, which is, I'm grateful for that. I mean, that's very humbling to hear. But I did that by the octagon.

Now, continue to do it with Bellator. You know, it's interesting because, like, when you're working for the UFC, you're on a treadmill, right? Like, you don't stop. It's amazing. You could do, like, three shows in a row from, you know, Australia to Europe,

to New York, whatever the case is. I'm not going to need this. Okay. And so you take that, break for what like six or so months and you're not doing anything what does that do for you mentally sucked i mean every day was like okay do i text today do i get that email i had a number of you know potential employers say no brainer no brainer oh goatee no brainer no brainer supposed to be like a week right much like you're talking to fighters about no brainer fighting chicago no brainer fighting

Phoenix if you're Henry Zoodle. No brainer. I was like, okay, we're set to go. So no brainer took a lot longer. Then I thought, and you know what? I realized that I missed everything. And it was refreshing in that regard. And it gave me a new appreciation of what I do, but more so the people that I do with and the people that I get to interact with. And the way I was greeted in New York City by the fans, but by these fighters, you know. Even Mitriol, welcome back. You're going to get to say it's all over for the first time in my career. When I knock out the legend, when I take out Fador, it was cool.

And the reception that I got was very gratifying. And it made me just realized that what the UFC and what Bellator and MMA is all about are fans that have no shallow into the pool. It's the deep end and they're passionate. That's what makes my job so great. is that the fans care, the crowds care, and the fighters care. And it's like doing the Super Bowl every time you have a show. That's the experience that I've had.

And so as a broadcaster, if you're able to call those big games, that's magic. That's what it's all by. Were you ever worry that you wouldn't get to do MMA? Because there's not that many options, right? It's not like the NFL, you go to 30 different teams or, you know, you get what I'm saying, NHL. Absolutely, I get what you're saying. There's not that many options. Absolutely.

Absolutely. Yeah. For sure. I mean, for me to be one, you know, where I was for so long. And for Bellator, number two, and closing the distance, by the way, closing it quickly. That's a blessing. I did this, I did that. I fit in perfect. Okay, that's all good. But if something would have got messed up in the works, where do you go from there? Yeah, could I do hockey? I can do a lot of things. I always tell people, Ariel, I did all the normal sports before I got into two dudes in their underwear,

fighting in the cage and all the girls do the same thing. Sure, sure. I've done all that, but to get back into it, when you've exclusively been an MMA guy for well over a decade, you don't just pick up the phone and call the SPN or Fox to say, hey, you know, give me the Big Ten package because, you know, the guy who's done it for 20 years, he's no good anymore. That doesn't happen.

So, yeah, there was some fear, and that's why those six months really sucked. That's the thing that I had to try to fight and say, it's all going to work out. Just be you, do what you do. Big John McCarthy was a big part of smacking me in the head and big brothering me a few times. Get it done, get back. John's words are the greatest in the world what you do. Let's get back to doing it and everything will fall in place.

And now he's my broadcast. Yes, and we'll get to that in a second. But I know the feeling of waiting for the text, waiting for the email. Oh, yeah. And it could suck. Oh, yeah. So how'd you pass the time? I don't know.

You don't know. I don't know. Every day was so long, so long. You know, Fernando, my fiancee was, she was my rock. She was great. She was able to, you know, make me smile each day. And my trainer, Master McGowan, who you've met before. He was the best and the worst thing for me during the time.

Because he loves me so much and believes in me so much. Every time I go into the gym, do you hear anything? The cocker call. Do you want championship? What's going on? It's going to happen. When do you start? Are you starting in London?

I'm like, dude, I was actually in a good mood. Now you reminded me that I still don't have a job today and that I didn't get that phone call. So I always talked to Master about that and we laugh about it. I'm like, okay, dude, don't you think I would have told you if I'm starting in five days? If Scott Coker called me on the way to the gym,

don't you think I would tell you, Master? But it was his way of sending love and I trained a lot, but I'm the kind of guy and you know that and you are as well. I'm not the kind of guy to sit back and go play golf and say, okay, this is a long overdue vacation. enjoy it, cherish it. No, I was about getting right back on the horse as soon as possible. So every day was a long day, and thank God it's behind me.

January 1st of 17, I didn't have a job. Yeah. January 1st of 18, I do have a job. Much better you. You like this better. I like it a lot, a lot better. Yeah. Was it hard to get used to the roster?

A lot of new names there, a lot of new faces, right? For sure. Was that difficult? Because a lot of these guys in UFC, you've been there in 19 years. Right. I've called like all their UFC fights. You've been with them for decades right at this point. Was that tough at first?

You were like, oh, man, I'm watching guys for the first time. It's okay, like a card. You have a guy you're watching for the first time once or twice. But like the majority of some of these cards you're watching these guys for the first time. Which is fine because I did that for years inside the octagon. And you know, I've always been very diligent about my prep. Corey Brady, our researcher, I'm going to give him a little love because he's awesome. I took my prep very seriously.

It's different watching Michael. Chandler or Patrici Pitbull than it is to call their fights, let alone the rest of the roster. The thing that I've really worked diligently on Ariel is those references in the timelines. Like I can talk about spinning back to Shoney Carter because I lived it. I didn't live all those moments in Bellator. Jimmy did. And so I had Jimmy there, but I needed to have that base of knowledge. So little things like a full screen of the next fight, I was looking up all these different dudes.

It's like, who are they? What did they do? How long have they been here? So I've just prepped really hard, but I got to tell you, I've really enjoyed it. It's been refreshing because they're new dudes, their new faces. It's wild. Like on January 20th, you guys were going head to head. Oh, yeah.

You're in Bellator, Jimmy's UFC, lasers with Bellator. Like, who could have predicted this five years ago? Well, who would have said when we were here at Madison Square Garden to the UFC? That's right. You'll be back at Madison Square Garden. Belator, yeah. I was, yeah, that didn't make much sense. sense, but it does now. It does now. How helpful was Jimmy in those early days because he had

called the majority? Massive. Yeah. Massive. Were you sad to see him go? Yeah, absolutely. He's a good dude, man. He's a good dude. And you know what? This is what I did. And Bill Clement taught me this a long time ago, going into NHL locker rooms as a broadcaster. Act as a guest. Behave like a guest. I was not some ordained, you know, perfect person and I could do whatever I wanted coming into Belator. I treated it as I was the rookie because I was. And Jimmy appreciated that. Everybody around appreciated that. And I said, hey, bud, I'm coming into your world. I'm fired up about working together, but I'm coming into your world. And so I would ask Jimmy, all right, what are your strengths for Ariel Hawani, the fighter? So we could almost like, you know, study and then present

the broadcast in reverse. And so Jimmy was huge in that. There was never a question that was bothersome to Jimmy. In fact, I think he liked sharing his base of knowledge with me. We had some great shows. Like, I'll put our broadcast up against any in MMA. And Jimmy and I were having fun to the point where John Norton, our producers in my ear going, okay, children, you know, the Love Fest, can you bring a pack a little bit? We had all the fun, as you know, with virtually identical. Yes, yes. Yeah, Jimmy is a great guy. And I was fortunate to be able to come into Bellator with a guy who has that great base of knowledge. But again, I respect Jimmy a ton and he respected me. First guy Jimmy called when he heard it was going to happen was Rogan.

Okay, well, duh. Like Joe's, even if Joe's lying, he's going to say good things about me, which he's not lying. You know, so I got a good thumbs up and I remember calling Jimmy. It was a couple of days, you know, after Sean Grandy made the announcement, Sean and I are good, were professional broadcasters. I thought he did a great job. He was always prepared. I thought that was a good team. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I watched a lot of Bellator while I was waiting to get my spot. It was never intended to be a spot to replace Sean. We were going to at one point share the package. So I let that kind of settle and Sean kind of stepping aside. And I called Jimmy. Jimmy Smith. Goldie, I go, why do I feel like I've known you forever? That's how it started

and it was awesome. He gets compared to Rogan a lot. Did you feel like that was fair? Are they, are they that similar? They are. They are. They are. They really are. And it's, it's the way they attack the sport and it's you know it's Brazilian jihitsu 101 201 301 401 and then the fight game and you know so when people say he's a poor man's Rogan that's bothersome to me yeah because he's a rich man's jimmy smith yeah and his base of knowledge is the same as joe's his passion is the same as joe's and like i said ariel he attacks his job much like joe did so it was comfortable for me but then Again, if you're going to be a poor man's A-Rod or a poor man's Tom Brady, which I hate to say that name, because you went to Michigan, by the way, I think you know that.

You know, a poor man's boomer Asiacin, my guy, number seven of the Bengals, that's not the worst thing in life to be. And I don't believe that, but still, you're up against, my partner, not up against, but being compared to the best of the best. Right. And he's right there. He's right there. So I think he's awesome.

he will tell you, and maybe he has before, he was the first one to shave his head. So Joe is actually a poor man to Jimmy Smith. You've had two shows now with Big John. Yes. What's it been like? Unbelievable. Unbelievable. Why?

Because he's one of my best friends. Okay. Legit. Legit. December 21st, 1997, 1997, Shinyo, Oklahoma, Japan. I walk in midweek, never done UFC, never done MMA. I took the bullet train. So I fly from Vancouver at the time to Tokyo.

And then Al Connell, you know, who was in charge, Concom, of course. Like, take the bullet train. Well, nothing says bullet train to get off in Tokyo. That's right. Oh, okay. I had a huge, huge bag of clothes, which was way too much. Walk into the lobby, first person I met was Elaine McCarthy. Oh, well.

Elaine was, if you will, the Donna, you know, Donna Markleini of the UFC. back then under SEG. Like a coordinator? Absolutely. She was in charge. She was the event coordinator. She actually told me RZH in Portuguese. She actually told me about L.E.O. Gracie and the little man in the answer on his back and so on and so forth.

Jeff Blattnick's my partner. Randy Couture, right there, Belator, Bobah. Randy was the main event. Frank Shamrock made his debut against Kevin Jackson, Olympic gold medalist, Michigan State. So I meet Elaine and then I meet Big John. And Big John and Jeff Blatnik, like bigger John, huge Jeff Blatnik, Olympic gold medalists. They bring me into this huge conference room. And Big John says, all right, let's show you something.

I'm going to teach you something. So he lays down on his back like this. He goes, come on, come on. And I'm like, dude, I'm a hockey player. I just met you. I don't want to snuggle. I'm not understanding what you're doing here. He's dig a butt down here.

I want to teach you something. So it was mount, you know, half mount, guard, half guard, side control, and then a couple little things, you know, submission-wise, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. It was real quick, and I'll never forget. And I talk about this quite often. John put his arm around my chin and just, you know, cranked a little bit. Every time that Joe, and there were hundreds of times would say,

hey, it hurts, but it's not under the chin, he won't tap here. I'm thinking to that day in the ballroom with Big John. and Jeff Blatnick going, I would. I did. And I would continue to do. And how about job security? Bob Marowitz and his wife, who owned the UFC back then, SDG, walked by the conference room and see the new announcer like baptism by fire.

And John and I have been tight since. So when I say I'm working with my best friends in the world, it's 100% true. Wow. Those days must have been wild, right? Those were the days I was kind of referring to. Yeah, yeah, yeah. The journey that we didn't know. I mean, when the WWE came calling, I think it was 2005, right?

We were at a place in the UFC where we were about to find a beautiful island. We didn't know how beautiful. We didn't know if we were close, but we knew we were pointed in the right direction. The WVE was already a beautiful yacht. It was established. Everybody knows that. They are the best in the world at what they do. But I'd been through all those rough seas.

I'd been to Bay St. Louis, Mississippi. I'd been to, you know, the outskirts of New Orleans. I remember Vitor fought in New Orleans. It wasn't in New Orleans. It was in Kenner, Louisiana. We stayed by the airport. It was horrible. He gave away tickets as we went to the venue.

I had been through all of that. And that's the thing that I remember the most. And we were so close with the UFC at that time that I felt like, man, I've done all this. And part of the family. I don't want to leave. Yeah. And that was a big part of my decision. You wanted to see it through, right?

Absolutely. Where's it going to go? Nobody knew we'd be where we are today. with this sport. Do you remember the first time that you met the Fritita brothers? Absolutely. What was the... Okay, this is actually, this is funny because they brought a bunch of employees from SEG into Vegas.

We knew that, you know, these were, you know, millionaire owners, billionaire. We didn't know. We just knew that they were cool. We went to an Italian restaurant and we were in the back in one of the private rooms. And Lorenzo and Frank are talking and they're explaining their beliefs in what they want to do. we want to make this sport legit and so on and so forth. He goes, any questions? Well, I didn't go to Vegas a lot prior to the UFC.

And as I got into Vegas, you notice all the billboards and stuff, right? Cirque de Soleil, all that, all the cabs have the signs. I said to Lorenzo, I said, will we ever be on a billboard in Vegas? That was all I, that was great. That was, you know, game over. I'm good. Will we ever be on a billboard? He said, yeah.

I was happy. I'm like, wow, we're going to be on a billboard. Wow. And I'll never forget asking him that question. I think we were on a few billboards. Yeah. Was Dana White there? Yep.

He was at that meeting as well. Dana, if you remember, and I love the interview we did with James Worme in the early days. We still had hair and he was kind of timid. You know, was becoming the Dana White of today. Yeah. Dana was absolutely there. But Dana was being guided at that time, like us all, by Franklin Lorenzo. Right.

And so we did get the opportunity to meet him and obviously worked for him for him for a very long time. But I'll never forget that all at my expectation stopped it. Will we be on a billboard? Have you ever thought about writing a book? Absolutely. Will you write a book? Yes. You will. About all this stuff. Yeah. I mean, the stuff that you've seen, very few can say that they've like been there for the majority of the rise of mixed martial arts in North America, right? Absolutely 100%. Other than like five years at the beginning. I was there. You were there. I was there. I came in when it was human cockfighting and you know what? It was. Like Senator McCain was right at the time. He was. And what did Zufa do? They embraced regulation. Yeah. I've got so many great stories. I was,

I was thinking about writing a book right after my last UFC. Yeah. In that time. And, you know, it was a hot topic. Yeah. Where am I going next? And I talked to a couple publishing companies, and we're really close. And then I kind of stepped back and I said, you know what, let's see where the dust settles. And while I continue to establish myself, you know, at Bellator, and I say that, I'm still establishing myself. At Bellator, I'm going to have more stories. So I've talked to my guy about a book. Okay.

And two things. First of all, it's not going to be, you know, a story time. I know a lot of things, but you know what? A lot of people know a lot of things about me too. I'm a hockey player. That's sacred locker room. Okay. That's not, and I'm not going to write a book, Ariel, that my children can't read.

Okay. Plain and simple. Okay. But I have had some really, really cool experiences. and I'd like to share those because there's some fun stories, much like the one I just shared with Big John and Jeff Blatnik.

Big John and Jeff and I went jogging. I don't even run. It's Saul Paulo. Like, why would you go outside to run in Saul Paulo? And they said, be careful, be careful. I literally stared at Big John's butt. I don't know how long we ran, but I was close enough that there was the eclipse

of Big John and Jeff. So if anybody fired at us, I was pretty safe because they were right. here. They had me protected. Just fun stuff like that. And I had great experiences in hockey, calling the last goal against Patrick Waugh, Andrew Brunette with the Wild. Michael Jordan, I was there. The first three titles, I was a sideline reporter. Wow. I have a lot of cool stories in that. You were the sideline reporter for those three? Absolutely. Wow. It was, what was that like? Unbelievable. Unbelievable. I remember coming here, staying at the Plaza

Hotel for like the first time to John Starks, Charles Oakley, Patrick Ewington, those There's great battles with the Knicks. Yeah. I was here. I lived them. Michael Jordan gave me one of the greatest compliments ever. Really? Absolutely.

So I was always respectful of Mike. Yeah. I didn't bother him, if you will, on a day-by-day basis because I did every game. John Paxson and I used to have this little thing where he would be my pre-game interview all the time. Okay. Dayton Boy, Notre Dame, well-spoken, perfect interview, in and out. Yeah. And he'd always go, hey, did you ask Michael?

And he'd say, no, I was scared. scared. What about Scotty? He said, Scotty said, no. He said, what about Horace? Well, freaking frack?

Well, he was definitely fracked. Okay. I said, well, Scotty told Horace to say no. Right. And then packs would go, cartwright. I'm like, John, he's so tall.

Yeah. And then he was a spiter of him. Okay, okay. So it was like a big, massive spit by the time it hit me in the face. And he's like, all right, let's do it. So that was like our Abbott and Costello

before every interview. But I came back, Michael came back. You know, because I was even on the, you know, 30 by 30 of him when he was in the batting cage with really, really large hair at the time, as people had seen. And I stepped in and Ron Harper and I went to college together. Oh, wow. Same years at Miami of Ohio.

Okay. So I went in and say hi. And I stopped by and said hi to Mike. And he goes, what are you doing now? And I said, well, I'm actually doing play by play for ESPN. And Michael Jeffrey Jordan said, and I quote, I always knew you were too good for that sideline shit. Wow.

Exactly. I'm like, oh, man, I'd like to have that on my iPhone. I don't know if we had iPhone back then. You didn't. It was. That's incredible. Unbelievable. To have Michael Jordan say that.

And then when I started doing ACC Sunday night hoops, he was as proud of me as anybody else. Wow. I was doing that on Fox. Yeah, yeah. It was a lot of fun. But I'll never forget Michael Jordan saying that to me. Why would I? That's incredible.

Why would I? So were you there when they won the championships and all those games? That must have been incredible. You were like traveling with the Beatles. Absolutely. And you know what was interesting too was when Michael stepped aside. Yeah. You know, and Scotty thought he wanted to be Michael.

And all of a sudden, the burden of being Michael is a lot more than I think Scotty expected. Right. And he did this one-on-one at Scotty's house. After the gun, after the Tony Kooke coach. And I had a great conversation with Scotty, which was one of the things that I really cherish as well. I had pictures from that. I had a really big hair still and a really bad shirt on.

But everybody wore that back then, or at least I thought, right? But it was amazing to be around those guys. As a younger broadcaster, I was probably in my late 20s, but just to go to the stadium and gate three and a half and then the United Center

to the house that Michael built. And to be with the Bulls, unbelievable. Wow. Unbelievable. Other than MMA, greatest sporting event you ever worked at. Oh, man.

I'll give you two nights of the greatest sporting event ever. And it was 2003. It was the Minnesota Wild. Okay. It was a Wednesday and a Thursday. So the abs were up in the series 3-1. Then it was 3-2, but we were facing elimination in game six at the XL Energy Center. The game went to overtime.

Richard Park scores in overtime. Richard Park, the winner in overtime. Denver, here we come. because game seven was the next night. Oh, wow. The next night. Really? Yes.

Back to back. The planes were literally right next to each other. We had our luggage in the car, but season could have been over. Right, right, right, right. So now the next night we're in Denver and down, I want to say 3-1, much like we were in the series. And here they come. Here come the Minnesota Wild. And all of a sudden they tied the game late.

And then game seven, Andrew Brunette. Brunette. Brunette. Brunette, he looks. Brinette, he moves. He scores. He scores. He scores.

The Minnesota Wild have defeated the Colorado Avalanche, Andrew Brunette, the game winning goal. Wow. Those were the best two nights of my life as a broadcaster. So unexpected, such a rush, young team third year, not expected to come back from a 3-1 deficit against the mighty Colorado Avalanche with Sackik and Forsberg and Blake and foot and everybody, Pange. They were loaded.

You know, Hay Duke. Newk was one of the big studs back then. And of course, Patrick Waugh in the net. So it was so unexpected, but the back-to-back games and to be the play-by-play guy was awesome. And it continued because we were down 3-1 in the series to Vancouver. Todd Bertuzzi came in for a morning skate. And there were a bunch of Minnesota fans waiting to buy tickets for game six. And in typical Todd Bertuzzi fashion, he told all the fans they had no reason to wait.

You know, that's Bertuzzi. Well, Kathy Ross, her name, her father actually played on the Olympic team. She was from Rozo. She was Bill Robertson, our media relations director's right-hand man. Kathy heard this. All of a sudden, this is a huge story. The Pertuzzi said, you know, we're not coming back to St. Paul. Well, we came back from a 3-1 deficit and beat them in their barn in game 7.

And still to this day, it's the only team in NHL history to come back from a 3-1 deficit twice in the same playoff. Wow. So there were a lot of other great ones. Why aren't you calling the Golden Knights? I was in the mix. Yeah. I was in the mix. And I was very interesting. Could you have done Bellator and Golden Knights?

That was the question. Okay. That was the question. I remember there were times where you wouldn't show up to like the random UFC. And those were weird times. Weird times. I remember sharing Saturdays with college football studio. Yeah.

Jumping on a flight. And just getting there to the point where Craig Borsari and I looked at each other and he goes, you can't do this again. I know. We were on the tarmac not moving, and times just ticking away. You're freaking out. Freaking out. What would they do?

That's a great question. One time they had Rogan and Baroni, remember that? That was when I was with the Wilde. Yeah, yeah. We're in the playoffs. That was at same time. Yeah, I think it was a show in Miami, right? Correct.

Yeah. Knockout Rich Franklin and A-Quil. That's the one I missed. Wow. Because I was in, I missed that whole show. Sure. Not because I was supposed to be there. Gotcha, gotcha.

Because I was serving two masters, much like I would have had to do with Faye. And we were in the playoffs. So a playoff game, I had to say, you know, it's a playoff game. Got to do it. Joe Rogan, he's talked about it before, came to me the next show. And he said, dude, don't ever. It's a freaking show again. Don't ever do that.

Because all of a sudden, he's getting all the counts. He's the one who's like trying to see what promo is next. Forget that. Just let me be me. And then Joe's greatest compliment is you never realize how good Mike Goldberg. is because he's so good that you never realize what's going on behind the scenes. And it's something I take is a broadcast, a lot of pride in, because that's my job to keep the calm and make my partner the star. And I'm cool with that. But yeah, that's why I miss that show in Miami. But Joe definitely

gave me some extra love from that moment on. You still came to touch? Yeah, you do. Yeah, he was in Phoenix a little bit ago, went to see his comedy show. That's right. That was that picture. Yeah, it was awesome. People love that. Two hours upstairs. We were just chilling. Wow. It was cool. You can't take somebody's brother away from. Right, right, right, right. We might not work together anymore, and I might be on another channel with a different organization,

but the relationships don't go away. They don't go away. And actually, I want to say something real serious for a second. Speaking of relationships, Bruce Connell, my producer forever. Bruce, we think it was an aneurysm. This was about a week and a half ago. He's good.

He's good. He's on the road back. Okay. But I just, I'll leave him looking. I just want to say my prayers. I love that guy more than life. I'm going to go to the hospital and see him. When I get into Connecticut, I'm going Tuesday.

But Bruce Connell has produced the UFC longer than any of us have done the UFC. Because he was doing it with Bruce Beck even before that. So just my prayers for Brucey, one of my greatest friends, the guy who called me out of the blue and said, Goldie, I got a gig for you. It's in Japan. You got to take a jihitsu class. I just heard Japan. And I was like, and gig because I was in between jobs.

And that's how far I go. I go all the way back to ESPN hockey with Brucey. So everybody say a prayer, please, from my buddy Bruce Connell. He's on the way, he's on the way up. And he's going to be fine. I know he's going to be fine. He's a hockey player, so he's a fighter. But I didn't want to send him a lot.

I would venture to say anyone watching this program, if they've watched UFC, like a lot of them don't date back to 1993. They have seen a Bruce Conno. He's been the only guy doing that job, producing it. Tonight Show, produced by a show. Bruce Gond. Yeah, yeah. I mean, he's a mainstay.

Al-G. Yeah. Which the Pasqualee A.G. added in, you know, in remembrance of his father. Okay. I didn't know that. Yeah, those guys are mainstays. Big time.

Unbelievable. So, yeah, I'm sorry to hear that. I wish him the best as well. Thank you for mentioning that. Thank you. Do you still watch the broadcast? Yeah. Smile there a little bit.

Don't lie, Mike. Is it hard? No. It's not. It's hard to keep my thoughts to myself. What do you mean? We're, we're, well, you've always been that. And that's why I tweeted.

You never know what he was going to ask me. And I actually buried myself there because you just asked if I watched. It's different. Yeah. It's different. And I'm a competitor, let's say that. Yeah. And I will do everything in my power to make sure that Belator has the best TV broadcast.

Okay. In MMA. And that is not being disrespectful to. anybody. John Anick is my buddy. JA never did anything to me. I never did anything to him. Those guys are my friends. But at the end of the day, it's a competition.

And we're all trying to get ratings, and Bellator's ratings are going up. We know what's happening on the other side. I just want to continue to do what I do. So do I see things that made me go, wow, like, that was really, you know, that was really kind of interesting. That was really not that exciting as it could be.

Just moments. Nobody's fault, just times, and don't get me wrong. People said that about me for 100 years and I made my mistakes. I would remind people my blooper reel is about maybe 15, 20 minutes long. Probably on the air for like 2 million minutes, right? It's pretty good. That would get you an A in most colleges, even at Harvard, right? But I do.

I watch it and I see the difference. And, you know. I don't blame me if you don't watch it, to be honest. I don't blame me if it's too hard to watch because you were so close to it for so many years. It's personal. It was at first. Yeah. It was at first.

I mean, I was blown away when you were at the event in Phoenix and they caught you. You told the story. Oh, yeah. But I was shocked that you even wanted to go there. Yeah. Well, I wanted to go for BJ. Yeah. And I'll tell you what.

I'm not a guy who has to be patted on the back and, you know, my ego's in check. But the way I was greeted by the fans was incredible. It was pretty special because my last UFC wasn't a moment where I, I wanted to be embraced. I wanted to be alone with my best friends and say goodbye and cry. And, you know, this is a long journey with a lot of great people and a lot of hours all over the world three or four times. Yeah. So that was kind of the feel, you know, in the Ronda fight, my last fight, UFC 207.

Phoenix was more of a celebration of what was a great run for 19 years. And it was really cool in that regard. But I will tell you a story, which is awesome. Tony Orlando, like the Tony Orlando, knock three times, which some of you probably don't know that song. I've noticed a lot of people don't. Tony Orlando and I've become close. His son, John Orlando, does the podcast with Jake Ellenberger, you know.

Tony's a big fan, and he's a fan of mine. And I met him at the UFC. So that night after my last show, I went to the restaurant. I met Tony, John, and Tony's daughter, and just some people. and Tony Orlando grabbed me, typical Greek fashion. Like, I call him Uncle Tony. He grabs my cheeks. He goes, Michael, just remember one thing.

You are the brand. You are the brand. That will never go away. You are the brand. And I'm like, you know, getting the kiss on the cheek, the whole bit, you know, Uncle Tony. But to hear from a guy like that, an iconic performer for decades was, again, like, so humbling. And it was hard for me. me to really take it in at that time.

Because I, you know, I was bummed, man. It sucked. The journey, at least that one was over. Right, right. It wasn't a fun night at all. Right. But for him to say that is something that, as the months went on last year and I got started, got back on the horse, he's right. And I didn't realize that.

Yeah. I guess because, again, we're just, we're in the trees and we're just trying to do great show after great show. And Tony brought me in, Uncle Tony. Wow. Give me love right way. I've always wanted to ask you something, and maybe this is a good time. What happened with the football game? Oh, man.

What happened there? And did that come back to haunt you as you were a free agent? Did that come up a lot? No, no, it didn't. Could you tell what happened? Absolutely. I can tell you exactly what happened. Please.

I think I over-prepared. Okay. How did you get that? Was it a part of the deal with Fox? No, no. Separate. Free UFC when I was with Fox, when I was working for George Greenberg, when I was doing all the studio, college football, you know, on the lot, Sepulveda. And then I did NFL

I did sidelines for Fox. Okay. For if I was living in Minnesota, Atlanta, I'd always be the local sideline guy on the network broadcast. A lot of times with Menefi and Brian Baldinger back in the day. And then I went to NFL Europe. And Fox uses NFL Europe as a breeding ground for potential NFL on Fox announcers. Okay. So I did well. I did Cardinal. preseason for a couple of years, they had a ton of college football. And so, you know,

Jacob Bowman and John Enst were like, if we can get you a game, let's get you a game. Like, let's get you a game. And I was, I was pumped. I think I over-prepared.

I worked with a really, like, rookie, rookie guy in Brendan I, Bidaejo. I can't say it anymore. But he was awesome. And it was just that perfect storm,

unfortunately. And I'll be the first to admit, But humbly, I don't have a lot of bad shows. I had a bad show. My flip chart wasn't flipped when all of a sudden it's Golden Tate. I looked down at 15. Of course, they know he doesn't play for the Vikings. It was just like, oh, right away, I corrected it.

What got me on social media was when people started to say, do a little prep. Work a little bit. Do your homework. Because that's something that I did and did and did some more. But Dayton all the way back to when I was sick. And Therese Owens, if you remember, they were the ones. Terez Owens.com, they were the ones with this unnamed source about all these problems that I had, which you and I talked about.

Right. I didn't have. I saw a tweet that said Terez Owens and I shot back FU. Yeah. In the UFC world, that was very mild. That was timid. That's right. In Fox Network, it wasn't.

Okay. Do I wish I could have that back? Absolutely. because I was scheduled to do another game in Buffalo a week later. Okay. I can guarantee you I would have had a great game and the shitty game would have been behind me. Right, right, right. And it wouldn't be, you know, their number three guy, but I would still be getting games the NFL on Fox.

That's what happened. I had a bad show. Just because of that tweet. Absolutely. You think the tweet sealed. Oh, absolutely. Really? I was told straight up, straight up.

Because now all the attention was on this Fox guy cussing out people. Right. On social media. and when they called me to tell me I wasn't going to do the next game, I was straight out told. If that tweet didn't happen, even though it was a rough one, you would still be working in Buffalo that next weekend.

You know, I created my own, you know, my own ending to something that I dreamed of doing for a long, long time. The Olympics, the NFL, stuff like that, even though I've done so many cool things, those are at the pinnacle of any broadcaster's dreams and aspirations. Sure. That's what happened. But it's not the ending.

I mean, you could. No, no. Thank God. You know, thank God I wasn't. Did this come up last year? No, not at all. Okay. But thank goodness that, first of all, I owned it.

Yeah. I owned it. And that was huge. I've learned that. Did you realize what was happening while it was happening? Like, I don't, this is not my A game. I don't have a grasp on this situation. Yeah.

What is that like? Really frustrating. Yeah. And if people know about being a football broadcaster, you are dependent on a lot. of different people, unlike pretty much any other sport. I'm doing hockey. I know my roster. Thornton gets it back to Pavelsky over the point. Logan Gatured dumps it in, back to Burns. Like, it's on me. It's on me. I see the 10 guys or 12, whatever you want to say. I see them. In football,

you got a lot of players on the field and you got your flip chart and you're dependent on your spotter. You're dependent on your stats guy. You're dependent on boom, boom, boom, boom. And when it works, and it worked for me in the past, it's so much fun, because everybody's coming in. Yardage. You don't just guess the yardage. You're getting somebody with a card going,

eight yards, eight yards. That didn't exist to the level in which I was accustomed to. We were a fifth or sixth game. Nobody's fault again. But so now I was in the booth, and I'm looking for, you know, was it a third and three,

what is it? And, you know, I'm not waiting for the graphics on the screen, and I probably should have waited for that. So you look at the scoreboard area, trust me, 50-50 on the scoreboard, they might be third and six, and the graphic might be third and four, and it makes me look like I made the mistake. And technically, with what was on TV, I did. So I was searching for ways to make it happen on a tough day for the team, and it just kept kind of spiral.

Was it hard to get over it? That wasn't your main job. But it turned into this whole story, right? Yeah. Yeah. It was hard to get over it because when I step back, I should have known better. Like, I've learned my lesson with social media in the past. Again, it wasn't about my performance.

I agreed with the criticism. It was about my preparation, and that's when I started to get aggravated. And so I was tired. I got off the air. As I said, I studied a ton. I was so fired up for it. and it just frustrated me. So, you know what was great, though,

is one of my main guys at Fox said, Goldie, this was supposed to be fun. You were supposed to do a couple of games a year for us, and this was supposed to be fun for you, and this is not fun. So, you know, don't do it. Right. You don't need it.

Right. And he was right. He was right. I'm glad I had the experience. Probably taught me to, you know, restrain myself, and certain opinions and thoughts, be it on my phone or in person or talking to somebody. So it was a learning lesson,

and that's what I had to take away from it is. All right, if nothing else, learn your lesson to just let the trolls be trolls and don't fuel their fire. Don't give them an identity because that's what they're looking for. And I did that Sunday afternoon. And that's on me.

That's on me. You know it's wild? I didn't obviously know that you were going to come on the show today until last night when you texted me. But someone, and I want to just pull this up because I didn't have it, but I was, let me just hear it is. Someone sent me an email seven days ago, seven days ago, a fan who I've never met, his name is Tom Glenn.

People send me emails sometimes. And you were a part of the email. And so I feel like it's apropos to read it to you because it's about you. Part of it is about you. Let me just quickly read this. This is from Tom Glenn seven days ago. Hey, Ariel, how's it going?

I'm enjoying the MMA hour and MMA beat, as always. I love the afterbeat. Some unsolicited advice. I have some thoughts on why the UFC ratings are down. This is Tom Clinton's thoughts. Number one. I'm going to like this guy, I think. Mike Goldberg.

Number one, I stand by my belief that losing Mike Goldberg was the single biggest reason for declining ratings. By perhaps being isolated from the home viewer experience, the top brass who are at the actual events and many of the media were not aware of the branding. that Goldberg had on the product. It's a product that's marginally interesting sometimes to the casual viewer, and Mike managed to make it bigger than it actually is without him. He's great on Bell Tour,

but obviously starting from scratch with an inferior product is what this man is saying. He mentioned a couple other things, Connor, bad luck, but I thought it was fascinating that you were the number one thing. I appreciate that.

Isn't that amazing? I think Tom is a wise man. Yeah. You get that love. Like even when I'm listening to you here and I want to close my eyes, I go back to like 2009, 2008, when I was started. It was a different time.

The sport was different. It wasn't a show on every week. And I maintained that that's a mistake. There should not be an event on every week. Too much of a good thing is never a good thing. And the shows felt special. The pay-per-views were stacked. And then the one spike show, a quarter, it wasn't like, oh, who's fighting tonight?

No, it's like, oh, UFC is on? I'm in. It didn't matter. Right. You know what I mean? And then like the stars from Tough, then graduated. And so when I listen to you, it's like you are the voice. You are the voice of M.A.

They can never take that away from you, no matter what you do from here on now. And so it must feel awesome. I know you get it on Twitter and you got it when you left. You don't want to be a witness at your own funeral, so to speak, like when you leave.

But I know the fans have had your back. So like that moment sucked. But in this world, for the most part, they seem to have had you back. And how I'm feeling, re-energized, the way the fans reacted.

And Tom, thank you very much. Again, I think he's a very wise man. That's what, invigorated me the most. And the fighters, like having these fighter meetings with Belator and having these guys, you know, thrilled that I'm calling their fights. Michael Chandler, you're going to say it's all over. They love it. Finally, my whole career, I haven't heard that. That's something I dreamed of. I'm like, really, Mike? He's like, absolutely. It's validation for them. There's no question. Yeah. There's no question. And so all those mistakes, all those journeys, you know, rumors, false rumors, proper, you know, being properly

disciplined for things that I own and I know that I could have been, you know, a better man, a better broadcast, whatever it was at the time, I was the golden child. Because you never know what you have until it's gone. And that's how the fans reacted. So I'm driving, literally I'm driving on the street, going home one afternoon. And there was an article that basically had said that. I can't remember who wrote it. But it basically said like Mike Goldberg, you know, who caught flack over the years, criticized by the fans for, you know, George French. Brazier and Joe Forer. That was a tongue twist.

I know who the dudes are. But I said it wrong in the air. He's now like the golden child. And I'm driving on the street. And I say to Nanda, I go, okay, as soon as they get back on the air, I'm going to say something stupid. Because that's inevitable. I mean, a human being. And then all of love is going to go away again.

Oh, he sucked. Why is he back? You know, Bellator is better before him. But I'm enjoying this little, like, honeymoon period. That's right. And I appreciate it for sure. So happy that you reached out. So happy to have you here.

It's very rare to have an Arizona guy in studio. So thank you for letting me know. I appreciate it. Continued success. Great to have you back. Good luck. This Friday, Beltor 194, Paramount Network. What do we have now?

Wow, we got the, what is it, the 8 by 10? The 8 by 10. We can put a little like. For the studio? For the studio. Yes. Thank you. Wow.

And I will even sign it for you. I appreciate that. The proper Sharpie. Thank you, Mike. Thanks. Good to see you, brother. This was fun, thank you. I didn't need my notes.

Yeah, what did you have over there? December 15, 2012. Okay. 1889 days ago. Five years, two months, one day from the first fight between country and Mitrione and the date Friday when they fight again, including tough. And we were just on a conference call before I got here. Okay. And Big John's like, we've got to include those fights.

So including the fights in the house, three for Nelson, two for Mitrione, it was Roy Nelson's 28th professional fight. It was Matt Mitrione. 9th. Wow. What a discrepancy? That was what I brought. That was my big thing. I appreciate that. Thank you. Thank you for that, Mike. All the best to you. My man Joe is going to walk you out over here. I appreciate it very much and I'll be watching on Friday night. And I'll sign that. Yes. He's trained best ever of all time. I'm going to make it perfect for you. I want something. You can do it outside and give it to Joe. Thank you. Thank you. I appreciate that. There he is. Mike Goldberg. Thank you. Yes. All the best. The hand. Always fun with you, bud.

Thank you. There he is. The voice of mixed martial arts, the man who will be calling the action on Friday on Paramount Network. It is Matt Mityon versus Roy Nelson. So now we have covered that fight comprehensively, if you will. We heard from Matt. We heard from Big Country and we heard from the voice of Beltor, the man who will be calling the action on Friday from Mohegan's son. The one and only Mike Goldberg. How great was that? A little trip down memory lane with Mike Goldberg. So much fun. All right. So that does it be. for today's interviews. Hope you enjoyed them. Now what we're going to do, as we like to do around this time, we're going to go exclusively on Twitter. You know the address. I've been tweeting it out, live.com slash m-ma fighting. I do believe is that address off the top of my head. But you've seen the link. It's on the page. It's on my Twitter. That's where we're going to do the after hour. We're going to do Rick's picks. We're going to be answering your questions. We're going to be doing the whole song and dance that we do when we like to get freaky on the MMA after. There it is. live.com slash mMA fighting.

So go there right now. Without further ado, the MMA after hour starts right now. All right, and we are back. What a fun show today. Three in studio guests. Matt Matrione, Big Country.

I think Matt was mad that we went a little long with Big Country, so I have some explaining to do. I do believe he was actually sleeping. Anyway, Mike Goldberg as well, Tyrone Woodley, Rashad Evan, Timmy Zahudo.

The list goes on and on, Frankie Edgar. But no time to waste. We've got one's favorite segment of the day is Rick's Picks. It starts right now. To open up your ears and your minds, MMA fans. It's time for Rick's Picks. Rick's Picks.

Yes. Rick's Picks are lots of fun and his hair isn't a bun because it's, you already know what it is. Rick's Picks, yeah. Mr. Gentlemen, boys and girls, it's the moment you've all been waiting for. A lot of text messages. It's the new craze taking the world by storm. Live from the Vox Studios in Beautiful New York City. It's time for Rick's Picks.

Boom. There he is. Rick's Picks himself. How are you, Mr. New York, Rick? I'm doing well. How about you? I'm doing great. Let me take these.

Fun show today. It's bright. It is bright. Yeah. It's down. Is it brighter than usual? It's like super bright. I'm like staring into the sun over here.

I'm doing well. It was a good show. Just good? Three. Okay. Fine. Fair enough. Last week, I said, we had a great show.

You're like, oh, it's not the best show ever. All right, fair enough, fair enough. No, it was a great show. And three-in-studio guests, I feel like we delivered on the goods. Not that we don't every week. That's right. See, you did it again. You know what?

I had enough of you. I had enough of you undermining every compliment that I have for the show. But, no, it was a great show. Do the thing that you're going to do, you know. You're probably going to do it on Rick's Pick, so let's not. I actually don't even know. You know the thing about Style Bender, you know, you've been waiting for this.

No, no, no, I don't know what you're talking about. I've seen a lot of your type doing it over the last couple days. My time. Yes. So, yeah, the bandwagon. What do you mean by you mean by you people? I said it. Kickboxing hipsters.

I called you out. It's one thing. You're not going to, you know what? You're not going to drag me into this. Let's do, let's do Rick Spines. We're going to start at the, uh, at the, I think this was the open workouts. Yes, this is the open workouts for UFC 221.

We had Yowel Romero turning it into a salsa dancing party. Can we get some audio on this? Let's hear the... They moves. Oh, really? No audio. What? They had no audio on this?

I can't believe that. I mean, you take a tweet from the UFC. What do you expect? Damn. But I think this was... And he's not the first to turn the open workout into a dance party, but I think this is one of the more participatory. It almost looked bad in hindsight had he missed weight and lost.

No, because it led to Luke Rockhold, upset saying that Yoel should have been doing the salsa and the sauna. Some bullshit as usual, says Mr. Rockhold. But this is all old news now. Post-fight. Yoel Romero with the salsa dancing emojis. That's post-fight? That's post by whoever is running UL's Twitter.

Tip of the hat to you. Good job, Abraham. Is it Abe? No, no, I just, I call people Abraham. That's like, it's like bro. That's what you went with. Yeah, it's like, bro. Well done, Abe.

Well done, Abe. Rubbing it in the face. But I'll say this. Maybe a little bit undeserved because I think Rockwell could have been a little more pissy after the fight, but actually he was pretty respectful. Here's his tweet after the fight. Respect to Yol, that man is made of steel.

Not wrong, I think it was a hell of a performance by Yowel, but I mean, he did miss weight. It would have been easy for Rockhold to kind of lay that at the doorstep. Instead, he was pretty classy saying that Yowel was a tough MFer. So that tip to Luke and to Yol's social media people for some good twittering. Yes. Okay.

Tai Tui Vasa, who was featured on Rick's Picks last week with his Vanessa Carlton doing the Shui. By the way, did you see what happened during the show? I mentioned the guy who made it famous, the F1 driver,

and he tweeted me. I did not see this. The guy tweet, let me one second, what was there, read them. I'm grabbing it. Sorry, Roseanne tweets me a lot.

If you're, yeah, if you're listening along, we're watching Tai Tui Vasa, drinking alcohol out of a shoe. Daniel Ricardo. Familiar with a shoe. By the way, 1.4 million followers, Mr. Ricardo, Formula One driver from Australia. Thanks for the shout out, Ariel. You got the pronunciation bang on too. I'm a regular listener, so I had a little laugh about the shooey,

which is delicious, by the way. All the best. How about that? Look at that. Incredible. Would you ever do this? Let's talk about that later. Okay.

Let's talk about that during the Q&A. All right. A portion of this. Oh, here he is. Next, we move to Israel, Adasanya. Oh, okay. Yeah. What's that?

What? Ariel. Is it the last style bender or style bender? Because I've seen both. It's the last style bender, the style bender. It doesn't really matter. It's whatever you want to call them. But don't call him leave for dinner.

No, I think it's the last stylebender, but I think I've also heard, you know, the stylebender. But I think the proper full one is the last style bender. Okay. And here we're taking a look. I think Pedro, the audio should be good on this. We're taking a look at, it's up now. I think it's in there, so take it out of this thing.

Anyway. Well, you know who I am now. Oh, yeah. We're going to listen to a little bit of Israel at Asana's post-fight. Oh, and look at some of his work. Boom. Four turned it down. Bang.

Look at that face. He must have something up the sleeve, but not tonight. Great moment from this fight, Wilkinson, clearing a little blood, almost spitting it at Israel, who then proceeded to throw some body some rib roasters. Same energy, I keep the same energy. Oh. I know there's a lot of pressure on you.

You seem pretty immune to it. What did you make of him peeing or mimicking? Yeah, the peeing on the yard. I liked it. It's his personality. Here it is. A new dog in a yard. Nice to f*** all over this cage.

Dang, homie. Yeah. If you look at what he did, pre-fight, he did actually walk in their mimic urinating on the cage. Oh, really? I missed that. Yeah. Oh, you thought he actually mimed it?

No, no, I saw it. I thought it was after the fact. No, no, that was before the fact? Yeah, yeah. Okay, my best. That was as he was getting in. Damn. He's fun.

He's a fun fighter. I can't wait to talk to him. And I love that he's hashtagging. Oh, this is it. Look, non-Jones. Here we go. From Izzy on Instagram. Hello, newcomers.

Welcome. If you haven't stocked my page already. And he mentioned that in his post, I talking about people stalking him. You should know, I like memes a lot. It's almost Valentine's Day. Get familiar. Hashtag I make my own memes.

Hashtag I do my own stunts. Hashtag non-Jones. And then he has the hipster Ariel meme. Wait, so can I... Am I crazy or did I feel like he was taking a shot of me here? I mean, it is a hipster aerial meme. Do you think really he was? I'll say this.

He makes his own memes. He's a smart, he's a smart dude. That just occurred to me right now. Wait, is hipter aerial a real? thing? That's a meme that exists prior to this. What is it? What is it? It's basically her, the meme is you insert

something, the text in impact font being something that a hipster would say and it's this picture. Why? Because she's a hipster in this picture. It's hipster aria. But is that like a real thing? This is a meme that existed prior to this.

No, I know, I know, I know, but is this taken front, is she ever wearing glasses in any of the movies? No, but In the meme she is. Yeah. So is he trying to say like, oh, here's Ariel like Johnny Come Lately? I mean, is there a double meaning to this? Who knows?

There might be. That's it. Banned. But it is a great meme and it's a continuation of his personality, which I think everybody's kind of gotten exposed to. It was nice. It was nice to see the MMA world paying attention. Yeah. Yeah.

I bet. To Israel. Okay. Also from Australia. John Wayne Parr. Is that B. favorite and BJ Penn. This one's from

Uriah Faber's Instagram Okay. Hanging out. Now I think this is old, by the way. Yeah, I think this is a throwback. Yeah, yeah, yeah. He's coming back to Australia. Yeah, yeah.

But if you give me an excuse to put BJ Penn. Sure. He looks great. In Rick's picks. I will. But John Wayne Parr, and I believe Uriah did make it down to

Australia. Teruto Ishishihara and John Wayne and Chris Widman. getting some work done. Oh my God. Chris Wyman, I was making fun of him. I mean, it was just like a love affair.

Him and John Wayne. Oh, my Lord, all week long. Hugging. Oh, it's so great. Enough already. Yeah, you know. Enough. I'm here for the bromance.

I'm here for the bromance. But speaking of love and... There it is. Relationships. The baby, Robert Whitaker's new baby. God always has a plan. Sorry, I was gutted. I couldn't defend my belt at UFC Perth,

but I've just been blessed with a little girl that stole my heart. wife did so well and i couldn't be a prouder husband or dad welcome to the world to uh robert wittaker's new daughter um you know i say that's a good consolation pride amazing he would have missed it not being able to to defend uh his belt also continuing the ricks picks theme of children of fighters mini blessed minnie blessed just styling just killing it on the skateboard there's there's more to this again tagboard doesn't let me show all of them but go check out max holloway's uh instagram for more of mini bless styling with a skateboard

photo shoot fresh as they say and profiling now we move to fight bookings this one this one from the realm of fantasy tyrant woodley versus Justin Bieber posted by hafeldos angios who has stepped up

his social media game hashtag fake news in the corner there if you want a money fight why not Justin Bieber he's a lot of followers would be good for your legacy where's the fake news hashtag fight RDA in the top corner oh I see yeah I see it hashtag on the bottom Woodley comedian

What are the chances He actually made this I did see some tweets There were people accusing him Of having Ali run his Twitter No At which he said Ali Is not his manager

Yeah that's any longer But do I know if it's RDA running the social It's impossible to tell these days But I'm in for it You know what was weird about it Can I tell you what was really weird about this It says world Welterweight Championship

Saturday, July 16th. Okay? First of all, that's not a UFC event date. July 7th, the 16th is a Monday. It's not a Saturday. Yeah. Like, what? What is that?

Maybe they were intentionally doing like a fake date because it's a fake thing. I don't know. I mean, really? And also, look, Justin Bieber's rank number one. Okay, fair enough. But like the fake date just seems weird. I agree. But it's all weird. Yeah, I guess. But I'm here for it.

I'm here for the Hafeel Dos Anjos who's photoshopping. Welcome to the Photoshop world. But we do have some real fight announcements. Here's a tweet from Ariel Hawani. Cyborg versus Kunitskaya. Edgar versus Ortega set for UFC 222.

Two big fights like both of them. You like it? Yeah, I mean... Can she hang at 145? I think she can. I think... But it's the same thing. that is going to continue to happen

with Cyborg. There aren't a ton of two 145ers out there for her. Kunitskaya though, after winning the title, the Bantanweight title for Invicta, California recommended she move up. So I don't think it's necessarily a situation where we have, you know, a Bantamweight going in against a featherway. I think it'll be

close in size here. I don't hate it. She's long and she's rangy. I think this is a good fight. I just, I like this fight. I mean, we're the hardest of the hardcore. Are they going to promote her? she's got a highlight reel that's promotable, that's for sure. She armed barred, famously

Tanya Evanger to capture the Bantan Wade title, and then the decision was reversed. Yeah, we don't have to the results. We don't have to go over that, right? She armed barred. No, I'm just saying for the sake of this promotion. No, look, the armbar happened, regardless of the result. The commission ended up

overturning it because the referee acted improperly in their estimation. But she is game. She is a tough fighter. She's gone. She's shown she can finish, but she's also shown she can go five rounds, going five rounds recently with Raquel Paa Louis. I think this is a viable opponent, but this will always be a conversation is, is this person of 405 or is this person worthy of fighting Cyborg? I think in this case, we do have a matchup that I'm interested in seeing.

The best was Dana on FS1. He's like, Cyborg is going to fight Yanha Kunitskaya. Look, it's, oh, come on. And then it says nothing. And then it says nothing. It's a difficult. No, but like, the easiest thing you could say, is yeah she's the former Invicta Banditza it's not like you even have to like run down her her record or anything

and we also get on that same card Edgar versus Ortega which I also love obviously I think Edgar is worthy of a title shop but I think Ortega with a win is also

in that conversation so I'm okay with this fight and kudos to Frankie stepping up as always also announced Invicta back on March 24th Strawweight, vacant strawweight title being defended. Janice Moranjan versus Verna Janji Roba.

Full card now out. And this one from, I think it was Friday? Thursday. It was Thursday night? Okay, Thursday night. Roy Jones Jr. in his final boxing match, we think, for now. The problem with this quote-unquote retirement fight is that he never really committed to the retirement. He kept talking about Anderson Silva.

This is pretty badass, though. what he's doing right here. Yeah, this move right here. If you're listening, he's looking away, playing with the mouthpiece a little bit, taking it out of the mouth and then... Is that the mouthpiece or his tongue? Mouthpiece.

Looks like his tongue. That's a tongue. Ariel. It's a mouthpiece. That's not a mouthpiece. Is it? Maybe it's his tongue. Over the top of the mouthpiece?

Yeah, maybe. Maybe over the top. Under. Mouthpiece is just on top. Yeah. Maybe too difficult to do with the mousepiece. It looks weird. That's his tongue, look it.

Going side to side. Yeah. 100% his tongue. Sticking out the tongue. And then boop. Legend. I feel like it's, I feel like maybe it's retirement.

Oh, it's 100% retirement. Anderson's not coming back anytime soon, but it just, it would have been nice to, you know, not only do we look forward to working with you guys again. All right, all right. You almost have forgot.

Bang. You almost have forgot. Oh, Eddie was there? Here we have Eddie Alvarez posting an Instagram photo from the Philadelphia Eagles Championship Parade. Another bandwagon Eagles fan, huh? Huh? Wow. Damn.

I don't think Eddie's going to be happy next time he comes on. We know what happens when he is unhappy. He boycotts the show. Yeah, I know. We just smoothed it over. Don't ruin this area. Cristiano Ronaldo, linking up with Khabib Narmaga Madov,

here exchanging a jersey I think we actually have video, let's see, giving each other gifts. Oh yeah, this is great. Salam alaikum. Wahalekum, salam. Welcome to this guy, Habib, rubbing elbows with Ronaldo.

How about that, huh? Real Madrid saw that he was such a big fan. They invited him out. He's boys. Look at them just. But here's the thing. Ronaldo gets around. Is Ronaldo the Drake of MMA?

You know how Drake just like pops up at every basketball well like he's always cozying up to you know the hot team or the hot player we recall Ronaldo checking in with Connor before the second Nate Diaz fight and now here he is on team Habib

what's up with that? Also friends with Botter Hari he's deep in the in the fight game yeah I like it Shiano fan of the fight game but here exchanging gifts with Habib Narmaga Madov what's this

Nate Diaz checking in Not to announce a fight, but to highlight, I don't know if you've seen this, this is great. Look, wait, wait, right there, boom. That one frame, that one second right there was what he posted. It was him in the background. If you weren't watching closely, you'll miss it. But in the latest Wisn'Khalifa video,

there's footage of Nate Diaz fighting. That's the shout-out. But I think Wiz Khalifa just released something called Captain an album, and then you have Nate Diaz in the back fighting. But I know Wiz is, into the fight game. We featured him on Ricks picks earlier or middle of last year getting some training

in. And this is our last Ricks pick. We had video last week. This week we have Demetrius Mighty Mouse Johnson delivering the face punch to Jamie Fox who you, I mean, you went out of

your way to slam. You mean the washed up, Jamie Fox? Oh my God. You know what? I can't have this. We had a debate before the show who's a bigger star in today's America, Jamie Fox or O'Dell Beckham Jr. It's not even close. Yeah, it's O'Dell Beckham Jr.

It's not even close. I didn't see Jamie Fox on any Super Bowl commercials. That was an NFL commercial. Yeah, but they chose him of all the players in the NFL. They chose OBJ. Oh, so is Eli Manning the trendsetter? Is Eli Manning the... It's pretty damn popular.

I'd pick him over Jamie Fox, too. Oh my God, you're crazy. If Jamie Fox came out... Oscar winning actor. For what? Has he won a Grammy? I don't even know if he's won a Grammy, but he's a great musician. Oscar winning actor.

For what movie? Right. No, someone just said it. I heard you. Yeah. That's some kind of BS back there. Hey, Ariel, I know you don't watch movies, but we all kind of know this. No, right.

Yeah. No chance. What are you talking about? Are you saying he didn't win it? Are you saying, what are you saying? I'm saying you didn't know that. Ariel. Just because you're out of the loop.

See, this is you not, this is exactly what it is. You not knowing that he won an Oscar for that is exactly why you're not the one to determine who's more popular in culture. If Jamie Fox came out with a pair of shoes, sneakers, who sells more? Him or a sports star? If Odell Beckham or Jamie Fox came out with a movie, who does more box office? Probably the Odell. Is the movie him dancing with Eli Manning? Is it a remake?

Is it a remake of... Did you know that Jamie Fox and Katie Holmes are dating? expecting? I didn't know they're expecting, but they've been dating for a while. Damn. I knew that. I didn't know that. That's a strange couple. Why? Why? Toes to Jamie Fox? I don't know. Okay, how about this? They were co-stars and collateral. Another movie, I'm sure you ever heard of it. Jamie Fox. How many followers on Instagram?

2 million. 4.5. Wow. Odell. How many followers? I don't know. 10 million. Yeah. That's your measure. More than double. That is pretty impressive.

Damn, Odell's killed... He's bigger than you think. He's killing the game. But no, Jamie Fox is still a bigger star. There's no... There's no question. Did you see the message I just sent you? Yeah, yeah.

We can get that done? We can do it. I want to ask our guest, our surprise guest, this question. Okay, let's do it. Okay. We're going to do it in one minute. A little surprise. A little surprise for the after-hour folks.

You know, we like to talk to everyone on today's program. We like to talk to everyone. And in a matter of moments, We are going to be joined by one half of the headlining act for Sunday's UFC Austin card. Yes, we don't often do guests on the after hour, and we are running out of time. But I did want to talk to the one and only Yancey Medeiros. He is fighting Donald Soroni on Sunday night, FS1, Austin, Texas. He's an island boy.

He's a brada. He's got great mahalo. Great, Aloha. And he is kind enough to be joining us on the phone. Is he there? Do we have, Yancy? Aloha. Aloha, Yancey.

How are you? I'm doing good, man. Hawaiian's getting adjusted to this cold weather in Austin. Cold weather in Austin. I don't feel bad for you in Austin. What's the weather like over there? It's like 40, 18? 40.

Oh, yeah. Really? Snap. It's not like New York, but yeah, it's a cold front going on now. Wow. Okay, my bad. By the way, thank you for joining us. It's great, and I'm sorry we got to you a little late.

The show went a little long, but I did want to talk to you before this big fight for you. This is a big deal, headlining a show against a legend like Donald Soroni. Why are you there so early? Usually, is it because of the time difference? Because this is a Sunday card. I thought maybe you'd go out on Wednesday. Yeah, usually coming out from Hawaii, we try and get a little bit more time acclimating to the time and the weather. We didn't know what Austin was going to bring.

And obviously it brought some cold weather with us. So I'm glad we came a little early. We try and do that too just to decompress. Get ready for the fight week. We do a lot of, you know, try and do the sighting, I guess. Every time when we come to the venues, it's like too short. We're just cutting weight, doing work. No, no, we try to come a little bit earlier with the team and indulge in the culture wherever we are.

Just, you know, give it a family look. We were having a debate before you came on. who's more popular in today's America, Jamie Fox or Odell Beckham Jr.? Who's your pick? I say Odell Beckham, no-brainer. What do you say? Man, come on.

Jamie Fox, man. What? He's a round, individual. Get out. He asked. He asks, is it because he's being biased because he's from New York, bro? No.

Maybe. Come on. Odell. Odell is a trendsetter. The guy wears, like, crazy clothes. People love him. He's got the crazy hair. Super Bowl commercials. What does Jamie Fox do?

Everything else. Yeah. No, but I ain't hated on Odell at all, man. I just, I think that's one of the guys I'd love to meet Jamie Fox. Right. He's a man of many talents. Great actor. Wow. That's your guy. You like Jamie Foxx. Yeah, I think he's a good key. He's a good actor. He's a good actor. He's a good actor. I've always enjoyed his films. But I definitely want to meet Odell Beckham, too. He is a trendsetter. Also very cool guy.

I wanted to ask you, Yietti. This, this, this. This was kind of like news a little bit, a couple of weeks ago. When they came out with the poster, we had Soroni with the American flag. We had Derek Lewis on the American flag, but no American flag for Hawaii's own Yantamideras. What was up with that? It's all good, man.

Hawaii has his own kingdom. So we have our own flag. But you should have put it on my shoulder, but it's all good, you know? Did you think it was weird? No, they put the Pacific Ocean in the back. Did they really? It's all blue. It's a blue in the back

It's the Pacific Ocean They got the Hawaiian in the water Okay, all right Fair enough So you weren't offended No, I mean, it is what it is We make, I mean, I turn the negative Into a positive

It keeps it a long vibe to go ahead Okay What was your reaction When you got the call at the headline This is your first UFC main event What was your reaction when you got that call? Let's do it I'm your Huckle Bear

I mean I tell everybody the story came about My manager sent me a chance screenshot cowboy asking me i believe it was christmas eve he did a post or something about him asking for a fight my manager screenshot that i was like hell yeah call him call up sean shelby tell i'm a fight on march third called john shelby up came back with a main event february 18th i was like yeha let's do it so what you initially you wanted to fight on the same card as max i honestly i i didn't know max

was going to fight. He was doing some traveling so I didn't get to talk to him. I didn't know he was going to fight that car on that car. And I just was, I wanted to fight on a Vegas car, something domestic a little bit closer to home. I've been going to Detroit. I went to Brazil. So I wanted something a little bit more close.

Okay. Unfortunately, Max got injured and, you know, he's going through his rehab and he's in good spirits, but just keep this a line wave continuing in Austin. The main event slot is very well deserved. row, three straight finishes, arguably the fight of the year in your last fight, a phenomenal

fight, and this all coincides with you, you know, going back up to 170. Why, like, what's, what's working for you now? Why do you, this is your longest winning streak in the UFC. You haven't had three in a row in the UFC you had prior earlier in your career. Why is it all working for you now? I just think, the move up, the move up in the weight classes is just less of a strain for me in every aspect, emotionally, physically, financially. I mean, if I was making McGregor money, I'd be hiring the nutritionist, and I'd make that 155, I'd be in tip-top shape.

But Hawaii's expensive. Hawaiian loves to eat, and I ain't got that type of money. So, I mean, we make the adjustments, and I feel that my coaches and everybody around me is just, I think I could take more damage, as you can see. The last fight, the plan wasn't to block all those punches with my face. But, you know, I can't. I feel like I'm a lot I'm a lot more durable

I'm a lot more durable not that I like to take punches but you know I can dish it I can take it but I can dish it all also and I just feel that Walter weight I don't want to be I wanted to show last year I wanted to show you UFC and everybody in the Walter Way that I'm relevant that I belong in this weight class and so I did that

this year I want to make moves and show UFC that I'm here to be an investment not an asset. I want to be an investment to this company. And I need them, and this is the type of moves they're going to do. And they gave me this main title shot. And yes, I mean, I feel like I need to be at, I feel like I need to be at the top. And I'm going to strive to be there. I train with martial arts, the best martial artists in the world. I train with world champs. And, you know, I just feel that this is, this is my calling. This is my time. And they're going to give me this situation. Everybody out there's talking about what they deserve, what they need,

what they want to get paid and all that. And I'm just talking about. my hands. And yes, he's going to keep giving me these opportunities and to keep swinging. I love it. On the flip side, Donald hasn't had that kind of success since moving up to 170. Where do you feel like he's at? You know, you just had the fight against

Darren Till. He's lost three in a row. This is kind of new territory for him. Do you feel like he's on the downslide of his career? Not at all. Not at all. I'm expecting the best Donald Seroni there is. I feel I've took in loss and I feel that that only makes me

that only makes me want to get better. Yes, he lost three times, but he lost against three good, he lost against three hammers. He lost against three good fighters, man. You know, it's all top contenders and they're all in the top ten or even even higher than him in rank. So I ain't taking anything away from Donald.

I'm expecting the best Donald Soroni. Like I said, I'm your Huckleberry, and I'm going to go in there, I'm going to bring my guns to this gun battle, and we're going to be swinging. So, as I said, your last fight, fight of the year contender, in the end, I feel like on most people's list,

it lost out to Gaichi Johnson. Do you feel like you were robbed? Do you feel like in the end, your fight should have been the fight of the year? I actually have no, no, I didn't feel any, it's just, if people felt that way, people felt that way,

I'm over there to give them a heart. This is a business of entertainment and I'm there to entertain. And not take too much beating, but I mean, give the crowd of entertainment. And I've seen that fight, and there was a war, too. They were just standing in the middle and they were going at it. So, I mean, hats off to both of them. We both want money.

That is true. It is what it is. It is what it is. If people felt that that was the better fight, yeah, that was the better fight. It doesn't matter to me. I don't get bitter. I get better. Yes.

And, I mean, in the end, you can't go wrong with either fight. two tremendous fights. That one was, I mean, just watching it live, like the first round, the back and forth, and how you were able to withstand that, and then eventually finish him, just insane stuff. I'm assuming you'd prefer, like, maybe a little less of a brutal, like, you'll take a 10-second finish in this one, right? You don't want to go through all that again? Oh, most deaf. Like I said, it's a business of entertainment, and I'm sure, if I ain't trying to punch your neck off, I'm trying to, your head off, I'm trying to rip it off, and choke it off.

So, I mean, less damage, give more damage, take less, take, and take less damage. That's the game plan. Is Max going to this fight with you? No, unfortunately not. I think, you know, he's recovering from his injury, and he's got some things he's got to deal with personally. So he's going to stay home right now.

There's a bunch of other teammates fighting on different venues, on different cards. So, you know, he's still being a team player, and he's supporting the team. and all my coaches are here for me so we needed some we needed some guys back at home and actually gonna hold it down

for the team back at home right now I do believe your friend Nate Diaz is going to be there right? Yes sure you do there wow so I mean you could he's headlined a show or two so having that experience having him you know in Austin that has to help

right? Oh most definitely I feel like the more family the more better it is for me Nate's more than just a friend he's a family he's definitely a brother brother to me and I'm just happy him Gilbert a lot of the guys

that I've looked up to growing up that made me a better martial arts is coming here and it's you're here to ride this Hawaiian wave too they surf too Ariel that's right I know we need to get to you win this fight you get the first headlining fight and then finally I feel it in 2018 it's happening I feel like that show

is happening that we keep hearing you guys talking about I'm I'm hoping so I just get a UFC connect with Hawaii make those negotiations happen so I can give back to my island. Amazing. Yancey, thank you for doing this.

And sorry for keeping you waiting, but I'm happy we were able to squeeze you in at the very end of the show. I wish you the best. I can't wait for it. Very happy that you're getting this opportunity to headline a show. And if you ask me,

this show's better than the one that they were charging $65 bucks for on Saturday night, and this one is free on cable television on Sunday from Austin, Texas. I believe that. You believe that as well? Look at the lineup. I'm going to make them believe it

because like I said, This is a business of entertainment, and I'm here to entertain, Ariel. I'm going to entertain often in the rest of the world, February 18th. I look forward to it. Thank you, Yancey. All the best team. We'll talk to you after the fight. Thank you, Ariel.

Aloha. You have a great day. Aloha, Mahalo, my friend. There he is. Yancey Madero is stopping by headlining February 18th. So he ends up being the judge and jury. He claims that Jamie Fox is more popular. Also, some other people weighing in saying that Jamie Fox are,

video editing guru, shooting guru. Casey also says, never heard of Odell Beckham. I don't know who these people are that don't believe in Odell Beckham, but... Listen. Yeah.

The ruling is in. You can't fight the people. How about this from Tim Elliott? Henry. He tweeted, Henry Sohudo. Henry, I am extremely sorry that I beat up your team on tough. I am sorry you are so sensitive

and cannot take a joke. I am sorry that you are five foot two inches tall and have still missed weight several times. There is no benefit fighting a boring wrestler that can't make weight. I'd say that that would fall under the shots fired category. I want to see this fight.

Also, weirdly enough, he retweeted the video. Yeah, well, he's giving the context. Right. He's a good journalist. Some other people want, yeah, I get, I mean, oh, okay, no, here's from two days ago. okay, so there you go. I like that fight.

He's not a fan. And yeah, it seems like he's very not interested. I'm interested. Okay. I'd like to see that fight. Okay, let's answer some questions before we go, because we can't be here all night, all right? I'm sorry, but we just can't.

I know. I'm, I apologize for... I'm happy we got Yancey in. He deserves to be in. First main event. Oh, I'm thrilled we got Yancey. Great timing. Because, I mean, the man has taste.

He knows what he's talking about. Okay. Fancy. You know what? There was a character on the Jamie Fox Show named Fancy. We brought in Yancey to settle the... Anti-A. How about that? Would you approve of a single card having both Robert Whitaker versus Yowell Romero... Wait, you didn't do a question of the day. You're right. I didn't. Let me just read it out. Yeah. I do have it up here, but you're right. MMA hour question of the week...

Of the week, sorry. Who should Robert Whitaker fight next? The options were Yowell Romero, Chris Weidman, Jokkerese. and Kelvin Gastilum. Who wins? With 27,300 votes, Yoel Romero, 68%,

Wideman 14, Gastilum 10, and Jaceret pulling up the rear with 8%. Wow. So how about that? The fans say, miss weight,

screw your missing weight. Well, I think because it was for an interim title, it's almost like... Ball don't lie. That was number one contendership regardless. Does it really need to... Does he really need to be penalized

and not fight for the title, my answer would be no. I think Yoel Romero should get the title shot. Just because I don't feel like anybody else has staked a claim to it. I think any of these answers is a good one,

none more than the other, to be completely honest. Yol just being the most recent and the freshest. There's no great answer. There is no good answer. It kind of sucks when you have to do like the immediate,

like I wish, it's not immediate though. Well, no, no, for Whitaker. For Whitaker it is, but he fought to get there. This is like the Aldo Holloway situation. But didn't, wait, did,

did Holloway fight anybody? No. Yeah, so that's the thing, though. I want to see him fight someone new, but there isn't anyone, so. Aldo and Holloway both didn't fight anybody between there. No, no, no, no, they didn't. But you just, in the first title defense,

I wanted to see him fight someone fresh like Luke Rockhold. I have more of a problem with it if Yowel didn't earn his way back. Sure, sure, sure, sure, sure. And I think he did. No, I mean, he earned it. Yeah, as far as the actual fight is concerned, you know, he gets penalized. What do you think of, this leads to that next question that Mark Luther asked,

what do you think of Robert Whitaker versus Joel Romero? On the same card, you get the rematch that we've all wanted, Rockhold versus Chauceray Sosa. I was kind of hoping for Wydenman, Jaceray. That's a fight I've been wanting to see for a very long time. So then, Rockhold, I'm sorry, Whitaker versus Romero. Rockhold versus Weidman. No, no, no.

Jaceret versus Weidman. Sorry, Jacqueray versus Wythman. How about Rockhold versus Gastelam then? I don't hate that. I don't hate that. I mean, who knows how long, A, Romero's going to be out, B, Whitaker's going to be out,

and then, of course, Rocco just got knocked out. We saw the news from Romero's team, not a broken leg. Yeah, but still. Just to hurt, like, no, I'm saying he could definitely could be out for an extended amount of time,

but not as bad as we thought. A lot of people initially thinking that it was very bad. In a perfect world, I love that. I love when they do, like, I wish they would do more, you know. All one division. Yeah. Because then everything time's out together.

And you can really focus. Yep. I love that. Just Widman Jacqueray is the fight, in my opinion. I want to see Rockhold and Jacqueray. I've been craving it since the strike force. Especially like on the ground. Jacqueray's Jiu-Too against Wyatman's wrestling.

What a fight. What is, is, is, uh, Rockhold is slouch on the ground? No, but he's not an all-American wrestler. I would, I'll say this. Maybe I'm, maybe I'm crazy. Maybe I'm going on the limb? I'd say Rockhold's better on the ground. It's just, you know,

Weidman was kind of like this super, you know, a quick learner when he came to juditsu, his grappling. Remember early on he was getting all those guilletines and stuff? I don't know. No, no doubt about it. Weidman, a really, really good grappler. I just think,

Rockhold is kind of known essentially as a striker. I think he's a better grappler. I think he should have probably been pressing the action a little bit more to get it to the ground. Now, make no mistake about it. Yo Romero is not exactly a guy who's just going to be there for the takedowns, but I think Rockhold is one of the best grapplers in the division

and should be going to that. This time next year, Scott Wiley asks, Mark Hunt is A with the UFC, B, with another organization, C, retired. I mean, if he could get through the fights, I'm going to go with B. Honestly, he'd be perfect for the Belter tournament. Perfect. Yep. Absolutely perfect.

Dan Hardy on Twitter suggesting kickboxing. I think, I think, if there's an opportunity for somebody to take down Mark Hunt, now I think Curtis Blades is a specific example, a great wrestler, that's his bread and butter, he's going to go to that after, especially, I mean, the people who are upset with the performance from Curtis Blades,

he'd stood there, took the beaten, and then decided... He'd be an absolute idiot. It'd be stupid to stand there. It was a perfect game plan by him. In fact, I thought he stood too long with him. He took some shots that he didn't need to take. But I think if there's an opportunity for Mark Hunt

to stay standing, That's where you got to go. You got to keep it on the feet. Question of the week from Mr. Sped. It's his question. Okay, okay. Who should Israel, the last time in there, a Sanya fight next?

I think this is a very important thing because it seems like we have what many people are considering a star on our hands, but this matchmaking is going to be important. Slowly, slowly, slowly, slow your role. Don't get all crazy on us. We were talking about this before the show. Please don't get all crazy.

Don't push him too fast. Don't make him fight in two weeks. weeks. Like, let's just chill out here. We've got something good. Let's market him the right way. He's fun. You know, we were looking at, like, and I hope you don't, like, we were, I was saying, okay, what, you know, Adasania against Machita. I like it. Too soon? Maybe too soon. I think there's a step between. Uriah Hall? Because Uriah Hall is ranked above Machita, believe it or not. Yeah.

I'm just saying, I don't even want a rank guy. Just give me five, six unranked. Who's like 15? Who's 15 right now? Brad Tavares. That's a grinder, man. That's not a good fight for Israel. I don't like that right away because I think Brad is going to mix in the takedowns.

I think you need to match Adasania favorably. Not because I don't think he's capable. I thought his takedown defense was pretty good. But you need to match him favorably. Let him go six and no in the UFC. What's the big deal? To get that momentum.

Yep. Why not? Build them up. It's okay. They need people. I think it's okay for that. They've got something special here. build them up

the problem is you have to protect them from himself because he's going to want to say I want to test my wrestling I want to show everybody that I can do this I want to you have to you have to bring them along so you can build up that you know look the Connor McGregor the way he came up

it worked yeah it worked it got people interested there was a clear progression you need to do that and I think Israel is a star like a CR great fight striker another stand up fighter yep

just slowly slowly you know I don't want just don't get too crazy don't get too we've got something here please don't mess it up like no Brunson none of that's a

that's a nightmare you can't you can't do that you got to build up now down the line sure let's let's see it but now it's time

you give them you give them somebody who's going to stand there Trevor Smith I don't know one of those guys hot sauce I like it yeah

okay which is the grosser celebration Bam Bam to Ivasa Doing the shui Taking the beer out of so much shoes Or that eagle fan Definitely the eagle Who reached down

Come on Like I like You know Is there an amount of money I could pay you to do a shooey To do a shoe Yes yes The dung no

What? Yeah I'm with you on that Shooey What's the price What's the price tag My own shoe Or someone else's shoe Somebody else's

That's the problem That's the real problem You don't And you know what You don't know if they've been Walking on it all day Are they wearing socks? Are they wearing socks or no socks? They're wearing socks.

But you don't know. Look, they could have been doing laps before they got there. 10,000? Wow. That number is lower than I thought. Really? You know what? Good for you. The dung? I mean... Zero. Not a chance. I feel like throwing up right now just thinking about it. I couldn't do it. But...

If that really happened, I haven't seen the clip. Oh, it happened. Legit. You know what? It wasn't staged. It happened, I think, in the Cavaliers. Like, a Cleveland guy did this first. Well, that doesn't surprise. And then they rep... I'm not from Cleveland.

They did it in Cleveland. And then I think this guy replicated that, which is like inspired. Philly, you're in, you're touched. But there's no amount for me for that. But 10,000, that's lower than I thought. I mean, our boy did it for free. Well, I mean, he's paying...

He's paying... Ricardo's winning races and doing it. So, I mean, I think... I feel like 10,000 is a good deal. Tradition. Tradition trumps. If anyone wants to pay me $10,000 to drink out of a shoe, I will do it. How about that?

There it is. We got to put this to the sponsorship team. Yeah. Sponsorship team. We can't get a single sponsor on their show, let alone freaking me drinking out of a shoe. If we get 10, I think we can put 10 g on this. I'm excited about the prospect. I will drink out of the shoe for 10,000.

That's how desperate we are for sponsors. I'm going to message Ben right after the show. You used to get, you know, this thing, that thing, mattress. Okay. Forget 10 Gs. This is the question from Kid Holland. If the bills won the Super Bowl, would you do a shoey? I would do that for free.

You would do it. Austin, are you into? Austin back here would do it with you. I'll do two shoes. I'll do two left feet for you. How about that? Man. Yeah.

So that tells me that you'd pay more than 10K easy for a Bill Super Bowl. honestly for that joy there's no much like you would put up everything Nick's number one I'll be honest next number Nick's would give me the greatest joy because I just feel like I've

I've hurt so much especially last week Chris Staps pulls off his shoe after the game Ariel drink up suck his toes What are you talking about pulls off the drink up Oh His feet

612 This is this is where we're at Are you kidding me Oh my God just thinking about it I mean last week was so depressing Not only does he go down with the ACL, we've got the Billy Heron and Gomez trade. I mean, don't get me started at this job. Yeah, I mean, I feel bad for any basketball team out there that's struggling.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, don't worry. Give it six months. You'll be there. Less. Got a young core? Yeah, five months, max. But anyway, yeah, Nick's win, absolutely, and Bill's. I'll tell you what, if the Expos ever came back,

oh, I'd be there on opening night with the shoe. I'd go to a subway cart full of sweaty New Yorkers and say, drop them all, fill them up. Let's do it. Oh, man, I'm saving this footage. Okay. James Beckett asking, do you think Woodley is playing the victim? If so, do you think it's hurting or helping his cause?

Essentially, is this playing out in public beneficial to Tyrone Woodley? Detramental? Neither, both? What is, how do you feel about this? I'll say this. I thought Rashad Evans is, you know, his advice and maybe his experience was fascinating. I thought his quote of being the first Tyrone Woodley was fascinating.

The moment he said it, I didn't put two and two together. Oh, there was a time. It was a time. But he's absolutely right. I do think that there is a method to Tyrone Woodley's madness. And I was watching because, you know, when I announce him for the show, it's like, oh, cry baby, Woodley. And then I watched the numbers and they're going up.

People want to hear what he has to say. He challenges Dana White. Even when they're saying cry baby, whine, or this and that. this is who he has become. And, you know, we'll see what happens with his next fight. If it is RDA,

the key is not to have people feel like they don't care about you. Like, they're apathetic towards you. I don't know. I think people care about him. Maybe not in the best way, but they care.

Maybe they want to see... I mean, it really started... I mean, it... I don't know if it started with 201, but right, remember like a second after he beat Robbie Luller, he was talking about, about Nick Diaz

by George Napierre and right off the bat Dana White's like what are you talking about and he is right he's fighting the number one contender every single thing he said on the show today yeah you can't argue with yeah can't he's telling the truth why begrudge him for trying to go out and get the fight and by the way he was offered the fight

and Nate Diaz was offered the fight he was offered the fight by one of the most influential and powerful people in that company Dana never says his name for some weird reason but Hunter Campbell is the quote unquote lawyer that was involved in those talks. He is the General Counsel of the UFC. All the big

fights that are being made these days, all of them. He is involved. He is not just some guy picking up the phone and calling up Nate Diaz and saying, hey, what about this fight? He's a power player in that company. He is a very important part of that company. He has called himself

the Lorenzo to Dana White's Dana White, if you get what I'm saying, with Lorenzo leaving. So he's not just some lawyer. And quite frankly, he deserves some respect. You know, some respect. He's getting deals done. So the fight was offered.

It's real. It is real. We'll see if they, you know, one fight I will say, and I'm not trying to take away from Tyrant Shine, but one fight that is not being talked about that I feel like is the most logical fight right now for the UFC is George St. Pierre versus Nate Diaz. There's no belt attached. There's no rankings nonsense attached. There's no meritocracy nonsense attached.

There's a legit story there. Nate's brother lost to GSP in a fight that was somewhat controversial because Nick says that, you know, he thought that he was like drugged beforehand. He thought GSP didn't make weight. Here's Nate Diaz. Now the star Diaz brother. That's a money fight. That's a fight that does over a million clearly with GSP returning. I mean, I feel like that might be something they need to explore. And I'm quite frankly surprised that Nate is barking up the tyrant tree as opposed to the GSP tree. Because by the way, GSP gets him to Connor too. Don't you feel like that's, that's, that's, that's. That's a no-brainer? The only reason I could think that it's not even in consideration is that you're using two heavy hitters that you might want to keep separate. That's what you need to do. But yeah, I mean, I like that.

Two guys who are just not really in the rankings conversation and just looking for a big fight. There's a story and they're both once, like they fought at 170. It's not like you're forcing anything. It brings Nick back into the story because you know he will reemerge. I mean, this is money.

Let's go. Okay. Let's assume. that Nate is out of the conversation now. Who deserves the shot of Tyron? RDA. This question from Josh Reyes. RDA Covington?

Is Covington even still in the picture? I mean, does he have a horse and race? It's very clear that Dana White wants RDA. By the way, it was interesting that Tyrant didn't want to say Cumberton's name when he talked about April 7th.

Do you notice that? The fight he was offered that he didn't want to say the guy's name, but it's Covington. But so I think it just comes down to timing. But in the end, I'll say this, a win over Maya, as Covington did, especially in Brazil, I think holds a little more merit than the win over Robbie, right? But I don't know, maybe Covington should get one more.

It's a tough one. I couldn't argue with either. I think both are deserving challengers. And I think RDA is fresher in people's minds. So that's definitely influencing the... I also feel like the Covington fight has lost a little bit of that momentum. That's what I'm saying. I think it's lost it.

Now, Covington, God bless him, is trying to keep it alive with the NyQuil wrestling. Yeah, but it's a little bit forced. It's a little bit forced. That describes everything about Colby Covington. Everything is a little bit forced. I didn't feel like the other stuff was forced, but this feels like the wrestling stuff. All of it. All of it's been forced.

But I think RDA will eventually get the shot. Former champion. We'll see. And Tyrant said on the show, he was willing to take that fight. Yeah, yeah. He was a mid-offered. Let's get it done. What's your take on Jimmy Smith taking on some responsibilities that were once only done by Joe Rogan?

We've seen him in the promos now. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, commenting over things. I thought he did a phenomenal job. I thought he was flawless, he was seamless. He is very good at breaking things down for the layman. He is very good at breaking things down in a very easy to digest way. He talks about the round, the scoring, who he thinks. Like, he's just very good at his job.

He is just really good. It's a phenomenal pickup. this needs to be said more. John Anick has worked with at least 10 different color analysts at this point and he never misses a beat. And we take that for granted because there is a chemistry that needs to build

it's a long show. And he has a relationship with Jimmy and I think we saw a bit of that come through. I thought he was really comfortable with Jimmy. I thought the tandem. I think that might be one of their best tandums. It really is. It felt like old friends.

It was really good. Jimmy to me is the heir parent to Joe Rogan. Eventually, Joe is going to move on. He's doing less. He's doing less international shows. He wasn't doing this one. If that's the guy, they could do a lot worse. In fact, he's probably the best guy. He's just really good at breaking things down. He does it in an easy way. He's very insightful. He can do the post-fight interviews, which I have always felt that seeing the play-by-play guy do the post-fight interviews is weird. I feel like it should be Jimmy. He's an ex-fighter. eventually I think they'll transition to that.

It takes less, you know, responsibilities for, for, for, for, for, for, for, for, for, for, for, for, for, for, for, for, for, for, for, for, for, for, for, for, for, for example. It's more common anyway. And I had someone from Beltor say to me, I think it's so funny to see all you guys go Gaga over Jimmy. Um, he's been doing this for us for what, like eight or nine years, whatever it was, maybe less. And it's not that. We appreciate it. But just seeing how he's transitioned so well effortlessly, how comfortable he is there. and just playing to a bigger audience,

it's notable. It is notable. Not to say that he wasn't doing the same job with Beltor, good job with Beltor, it's notable. It's very notable and it's commendable. Yep. Last question. Where is the amazing Roy McDonald Bobblehead?

That figure is the best sports merch I've ever seen. It is. Or is it locked in a safe glass box so no one can touch it. Never mind the steel. Before you answer, let's just give another plug to the guys at Plastic Cell to Danny Tran.

and his brother who killed it. I mean, it's absolutely incredible. I think it's actually available, limited quantities available for order right. It is. I was actually going to say that because Roy just posted this a day ago. Yeah.

It's available at plastic cell, so that's two Cs. Dot big cartel.com. Yep. The second I got that thing, I ran home and my kids play with it like my son, Walter, was playing with it yesterday.

I was very worried about it. I have, I have a couple things in this sort of makeshift office that I have at home, and they're just, they think that it's real blood. I told them that they use real blood. They're blown away by it. I couldn't stop looking at it. When I brought it home and I showed it to my wife, I just couldn't stop staring at it.

It is, without a doubt, the greatest piece of MMA memorabilia, if you want to call it that, figurine, whatever it is, that has ever been created. I wish those guys would do more. Like, could you imagine what they could do with some. I think they've done some MMA in the past. And I think the ascension they're getting for this will probably... But see, like round five is cool. Those were cool, a little generic.

But what's great about this one is it's an iconic moment. You know what I mean? Yes. But you have to consider the differences of scale, right? Round five was mass-producing figures. Oh, 100%. They're doing these individuals. Every single iteration is a...

It's sort of like a snapshot of an amazing moment and an amazing fight. And not even a fight that Rory won. That's the most amazing part about it, that he celebrated it. And he didn't even win the fight. You know what I'm saying? it's the Robbie Lollah. You could have done Robbie Luller with the lip hanging off.

Oh, there's a million of them. Could you imagine that one? That's a great one. Could you imagine that? James Thompson with his ear exploded. I mean, the list goes on and on. So all of it, I feel like there's a theme here. All of it is for you is the gore.

Can we rewind for a second? You told your kids it was real blood? It's for fun. What's wrong with you? My daughter liked it. It's fun. It's real blood. I wanted to see their reaction.

But no, those guys are amazing. Plastic Cell. Kudos to you. I just, you know, we've been through this. I mean, I don't even know. Oh, there it is. The Anderson Silva watch, which is no longer with us. Although I do appreciate whoever did this, put Anderson Silva.

I mean, that's a nice little touch right there. But a couple of things, you know, where's my Bob Sapp, CD? There's a few things. Look, these things have a life. They have life expectancy. And sometimes they, you know what, Ariel, they went to a farm. They went to a farm. They went where they ship off those like Buffalo Bill's Super Bowl champions.

No one knows where they go. Well, those go to third world countries, I believe. Yeah. Like the Patriots, where's Joe? The Patriots T-shirts go to third world countries that they print up and donate them. It's nice there. That's it. We're done.

All right. We're out of here. God bless. Salamalalekum. Thank you very much. Austin, you can hit my music. We are out of time. We have stayed far too long.

My buttocks is numb. I haven't stood up. and five hours and 24 minutes. And it's time to go home. But we've had a great time. UFC 221 is in the books. What else happened? James Galaher is back.

As I said, John Dodson, Pedro Munoz, rebooked. Alexei Olinick against Junior Albini, UFC 224. That was booked. Michelle Waterson against Courtney Casey. That's going down in Glendale. How about Al Jermaine and Brett Johns in Atlantic City, Tiago Santos and Dave Branch 2

They are talking about CM Punk and Mike Jackson Which we talked about On this program last week So we'll see if that comes to fruition And of course UFC Austin is this Sunday Bellator is Friday

Also our guy Jose Torres fighting for Titan FC On Friday The Austin card is a great one on Sunday We'll be back on Monday to talk about that But Derek Lewis, Sage Northcut The Yante Medeiros fight

James Vic all fired up So much going on and of course we'll have much to discuss on next Monday's show. I do believe it's President's Day, so we'll be honoring our presidents on next Monday's show. For now, we shall say goodbye. Thank you very much to everyone who tuned in. Thank you very much to everyone who stopped by. Thank you very much to Frankie Edgar for stopping by.

Best of luck to him on March 3rd, UFC 222 against Brian Ortega. Thank you to both Roy Nelson, Matt Mitreone, and Mike Goldberg for stopping by. Amazing having them here. And thank you to Bellator for hooking that up as well. Thank you very much to Tyron Woodley. Good luck to him with that meeting with Dana White. Thank you very much to Rashad Evans. Good luck to Henry Sohudo.

And of course, good luck to won Jose Torres as he defends his flyway title on Friday. Back next week, same time and place until they say peace. Samaria.