MMA Fighting - The MMA Hour with Ariel Helwani - Episode 423

Episode Date: February 27, 2018

Ariel Helwani recaps the week in MMA (00:07:06), then speaks to Derrick Lewis (00:30:18), Mike Pyle (00:53:24), Gilbert Burns (01:12:31), Josh Emmett (01:32:02), Artem Lobov (01:53:47), Brian Kelleher (02:15:30), Frankie Edgar (02:32:36) in studio, Paddy Pimblett (03:21:06), Molly McCann (03:41:41), Marc Raimondi (04:07:55), and NewYorkRic for The MMA [After] Hour featuring Ric's Picks (04:36:06) and the answers to your questions (05:05:12). 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 26, 2018. Hello again, everyone. I'm Ariel Hawani back inside our New York City studio. I hope you had a lovely weekend. Hope you had a lovely week. Last Monday in February, we, go to March next week. We've got so much to talk about on this particular Monday, my friends. Wow, I'm so excited today.

There's a lot of juicy stuff. There's a lot of interesting things. There's some controversy. There's some exciting things. There's some announcements. There's news. There's breaking news. There's fights coming up.

There's fights that just happen. Never a dull time. Never a dull moment in the world of mixed martial arts. We've got a loaded show once again. Another in-studio guests. We are getting ready for UFC 222. Feels like it's been a while since I've been to an event live and in person that will change come Saturday. I am going to Las Vegas for UFC 222.

I am also hoping to check out a Vegas Golden Knights game on Friday against your Ottawa Senators. I've never been to a Golden Knights game, of course, having the greatest season in the history of expansion teams in any of the four major sports here in North America. The Vegas Golden Knights, I think still number one? maybe even number two at at at at at worst anyway i'm looking forward to that i'm looking forward to 222 there's a lot to discuss there um so what we're going to do at the top of today's show we're actually going to talk about the weekend that was and of course what everyone is still talking about on this monday afternoon the finish of the jeremy stevens versus josh emmon fight what happened what went wrong what should have happened what could have happened what we would have done if we were

in there what people who are paid to do this for a living have told me about about the finish, all that and more. And then we'll also talk about the aftermath and how that was handled on Fox and FS1. There's a lot to break down there. Talk about some Cage Warriors action this past weekend. And then we'll look ahead. Let me run down today's lineup. And then we'll start talking about what transpired on Saturday night in Orlando because

we need to talk about the juicy stuff first. People are still talking about it. It's still fired up. And there's a lot of interesting takes on the whole thing. Okay, so this is the lineup. At around 515, we're going to do the MMM. after hour, you know the drill by now. Rick's picks, your questions, comments, hit us up. 455, our own Mark Romandie's going to join us, and he's going to talk about an article that he posted

yesterday that I must admit, as I was reading this article, my blood was boiling. I just could not believe what I was reading. And more so than that, I was trying to put myself in the shoes of active UFC fighters, and I'm trying to wonder how they would interpret an article like this. And so we need to talk about this article. The article is entitled, if you want to catch up, click debate, colon, Reebok pay, quote unquote, now a thing of the past, and was never really a thing in the first place. It talks about the new Fight Week incentive payment by the UFC. That's at 455. 435.

Meatball, Molly McCann, aka the first ever Cage Warriors women's flyway champion will stop by. She was victorious on Saturday in Liverpool. at the ECHO Arena in the main event of Cage Warriors 90, Molly McCann, big victory. Is she on the cusp of going to the UFC? Does she have the best nickname in all of them in May right now? Meatball, Molly McCann. I'm looking forward to talking to her at 435 and also experiencing that accent live on the show. And when you talk about that accent, no one has a better scouse accent than the one

and only Patty the Batty Pimlet, who was also victorious on Saturday at the ECHO Arena, picked up his first one in quite some time, moved up to 155, shut up all the haters, did so in his hometown of Liverpool. What a great night for the Liverpoolians, the Scousers, Patty the Batty and Meatball Molly. So we'll talk to Patty at 415 about what transpired on Saturday. At 325, we're going to talk to Frankie Edgar in studio. Frankie Edgar is headed to Las Vegas for UFC 222. He's stopping by here in studio to preview that card, preview that fight against Brian Ortega. And yes, we did talk to him two weeks ago, but a lot has changed in Frankie's life in the last two weeks. Most notably, Thursday afternoon, Connor McGregor coming out and saying that he threw his name into the hat to fight Frankie Edgar after Max Holloway pulled out of their fight due to the ankle injury.

He threw his name into the hat. And yes, from what I am told, he did suggest the idea of fighting Frankie for the 165 pound belt, which of course does not exist. But hey, if you can get three belts, why not go for it? So we'll talk to Frankie about that idea. If it was ever really real, what he thinks of the 165 pound belt suggestion by Connor, will he ever fight him? All that and more.

We'll also reminisce a bit about his journey leading up to this point. Brian Kelleher will stop by. What a big victory for Boom, friend of the show on Saturday in Orlando. He defeated Hennon Burau the unanimous decision and was probably like 10 to 15 seconds away from finishing Borow, the former Bantamway champion.

What a huge win for Brian Keller. We'll talk to him at 305. 245, everyone's favorite Russian hammer. Artem Lobov will stop by. Previous fight at 223 against Alex Kassaris and some other stuff. We'll talk to him about that. 225 will talk to Josh Emmett

in his first interview since the controversial finish on Saturday night. We'll get to that in a second. 205, we'll talk to Gilbert Burns. First time on the program, he was supposed to compete against Olivier Obam-Mercier on Saturday. But on Tuesday or Wednesday of last week,

I do believe it was Tuesday. He was pulled from the fight after checking in because, according to sources that I spoke to, he checked in at 186 pounds for a 156-pound fight. And so the UFC, to their credit,

they deserve a massive amount of credit for this, said, you can't fight. You can't cut all that way. Talk to Gilbert Burns about that. 145, Mike Pyle will join us. He's fighting this Saturday at UFC 222 against Zach Otto. He also has an announcement to make, so I'm looking forward to talking to Quicksand Pyle.

And at 125, we'll talk to Derek Lewis about his win last weekend over Marchein Tibera, the injured hand, he goes from here, all that, and then some. But first, let us talk about Saturday night. Saturday night was a great night. It was an entertaining card, some great performances, I thought. Of course, we love the Fox cards because they end relatively early. I think this one ended at around 1015 or so. Some really nice wins, you know, for the likes of Hanyaya, Sam Alvey. How about Alan Joe Bands, K.O.

Angela Hill with a solid win over Marina Moros. Marion Renault once again digging down deep and submitting the Olympian. Sarah McMahon, told you about Brian Kelleher. Max Payne Griffin walking into enemy territory as the biggest

underdog on the card, defeating Mike Perry. What a gutsy performance by Max Griffin deserves a lot of credit. Aliyah Latifie going in there, submitting Ovin Saint-Pru, like he's John Jones against Lita back at UFC 140.

Of course the referee missed a tap, but man, what a finish for Alir Latifi. Gesson Drogh is an absolute beast. She proved that once again with a big win over Tisha Torres. But the fight and the finish and the story everyone is talking about

is the main event. Jeremy Stevens against Josh Emmett main event. Okay. If you're watching this show, by now, you know what happened, right? You know that Jeremy Stevens won. You know that he won in the second round, 135 via CO. But it was controversial. And we must say right off the bat, because I'm the first one to always criticize them. I criticize the UFC. I criticize the broadcast when they sweep things under

the rug, when they're not transparent, when they don't address the elephant in the room. I don't like that I don't think that's the way sports should be presented in 2018. That was not the case on Saturday. Everyone right or wrong deserves credit for addressing what was the biggest story moments after. Not only on the FS1

post-fight show, but on Big Fox. Didn't have to go that way, but they did, and it was the right call. Fortunately, most of the people who were weighing in on what happened, and unfortunately, what happened,

in the closing seconds of the fight was wrong. And that's a big problem. And there's an underlying issue here, which is the real lesson that we should walk away with. And I'll get to that lesson in a second. But let's start from the beginning. And we actually have footage of it. And so for those that may have missed it,

I'm going to talk while the footage airs. So let's begin this journey. Let's start the clip. this is the closing seconds of the fight pause it here for a second if you can and we don't need to hear the audio just keep it you know Sands audio if you can

Austin there's Jeremy Stevens Josh Emmett is on the ground it was a phenomenal fight it went back and forth in the first round Josh Emmett seemed to have Jeremy in trouble we know what these two can do we know how hard they can hit this is the closing seconds of the fight

and as you can see Jeremy Stevens is raining down blows ground and pound he's en route to winning. Run the clip, please. Here are the elbows. Boom, boom, boom. Now, as I'm watching this live,

this is all good. Boom, boom. Top of the head, boom. Side of the head, boom. Beating him up, beating him up, beating him up. Now all of a sudden, pause, for a second, pause, pause, pause. Now all of a sudden I'm thinking,

okay, and I swear this is what comes to mind. Why is he teeing him up like this? It is very clear as you can see that one of Josh Emmett's knees is completely on the mat. It's not even like where the top of his knees on the mad and he's in that like, you know, that stance, the Tim Tebow stance.

The bottom half of his leg is completely on the mat. That is a grounded opponent. So why is Jeremy Stevens teeing up this man like he's about to knee him right in the head? Continue. Boom. And so when I'm watching that, I'm like, oh, wait a second. Did that hit? Now here it is in real time.

elbow elbow elbow I think nothing of this these are vicious blows but it's all in the heat of the battle cool what's going on here boom does that hit does that not hit

I'm not quite sure this is all happening in real time I do see the referee big Dan Miragliata standing right over there watching it perfect vantage point I see him

okay what happens you could keep playing I think this is the end of the clip we don't have the finish the finish isn't all that important to what we're talking about it. It ends right here with a couple of vicious elbows. Pause it there for a second. So I see that and I'm like, whoa, what just happened?

The fight's over? Didn't he just knee him? Did he try to knee him? What's going on? Fight ends. It's a KO finish for Jeremy Stevens. Now you're all caught up. They do the post-fight interview.

Would have loved at least one question to Jeremy. Not sure how much he could have provided. He certainly provided a lot and we'll get to what he said on the post-fight show. but it's all good. They addressed it. I think pretty, you know, pretty in depth during the post-fight show, and they gave it a lot of time. So you can't really hate on not asking a question in the post-fight interview. Fine.

I would have liked it, but fine. And so I'm listening to Dominic Cruz, who's a teammate of Jeremy Stevens and Michael Bisping and Daniel Cormier, and they're all kind of arguing this. and I'm shaking my head at the argument because to me there is a downed opponent right there. There is an opponent with his knee on the ground. And I know that there's a lot of confusion about the old rules and the new rules. But under the old rules and under the new rules, an opponent with knees on the ground. One knee, two knees, it doesn't matter.

If you have a knee on the ground, you are a downed opponent and any strikes to the head, are illegal. And it's very clear. Like there is no distinction there. Wyman Musassi, there was like a little bit of conscience. No, this is very clear. And he has a perfect vantage point. That is a downed opponent. So why are you even teeing up to clearly need the guy in the head? And why is there some talk that he may have had one hand up, one hand down? That doesn't come into play. It does not come into play. Jeremy Stevens was then on the post-fight show and he says that he was told in the back by Dan McGliott that if the opponent, Josh Emmett, has a hand up,

you can knee him in the head. You can strike him in the head. That's 100% false. That is 100% false. He is confusing two rules. Under the old rules, there used to be something called playing the game where if an opponent is standing

and puts, you can't see this, but he puts a pinky down on the ground, puts a pinky down, you can't knee him anymore. That's the old rules. You can't touch him in the head. You can only punch him. You can't knee him, you can't kick him in the head, right? That was called playing the game, and people were like, oh, you're cheating.

But that's just if you're standing. If you have your knee down, it's illegal. You can't touch the guy. You can't knee him, you can't kick him, right? People didn't like that, so they instituted this new rule that you had to have either both palms down or both fists down. Okay, so if you have both palms down, both fists down, then you can't touch him. But if you have one hand down and one hand up, one fist down, one hand up, now he's fair game. But that's if you're standing again.

That's not if you have a knee down. If you have a knee down, it's illegal under old rules and new rules. So he's confusing two things. But what he's doing is he's admitting that he was trying to knee him intentionally to the head. But he's saying, I waited for the hand to go up, which his hand was up, to knee him. But guess what? That's confusing two rules. It is still illegal. He's in an illegal position. You cannot kick that guy in the head. You cannot knee that guy in the head when he has his knee down.

And it's very clear from all vantage points, including the one that Dan Murgliato was in, that he is a downed opponent. You cannot knee or kick him. So why is he saying that Big Dan told him in the back that? I think he's confusing. I think he's confusing two rules. In fact, Brian Keller went on Twitter this morning and said that he was told by Big Dan, that it's a downed opponent when a knee is down. If he's up and has one hand up, then it's good. If he's got two hands down, then you can't, right?

That's the new rule, which in Florida, it's the new rules. I believe Jeremy Stevens is confusing the two, but he is admitting while doing that that he was intentionally throwing an illegal knee. So now the big controversy is, did the knee hit? Go back to the tape. Did the knee hit? That's the big controversy, right?

and what I'm hearing from many people who are saying that it's no big deal, they're saying two things. Yeah, but it didn't hit or yeah, but it only grazed. No one's saying it completely missed, either on the way in or on the way out. They're all admitting that it hit at some point, whether it hit a lot or it hit a little. They're admitting, by the way, grazing is hitting. Grazing is touching. And you see right there on the way back, right? Who are we to say that he didn't mean to hit him on the way back?

He's already admitting that he was waiting for the hand to be up. Keep going with the clip. Grazing is the same. There is no distinction made in the official rules about grazing or not grazing. It's just all about the strike. And we've seen time and again when someone sort of grazes a head with a punch. It doesn't look like it should affect all that much. And we see what kind of damage.

We have no idea. There you see, it appears like there's contact. That's what I saw upon the initial, initial viewing. And you'll also notice on the way back, there's a hit to the back of the head. And so I'm watching this and I'm like, I can't believe that this wasn't stopped. I don't know what to say.

But here's one thing that I did not say. Here's one thing that I did not ever say because I see a lot of people trying to tag Jeremy Stevens and say, you're taking away his win. You're raining on his parade. You're calling him a cheater. I'm not saying any of this. Jeremy Stevens does not have a history of being a cheater.

He is not a dirty fighter. He is fighting in the heat of the battle. That's why there's a referee in there to make sure that foul is doing. not commit, and sometimes things happen in the heat of the battle. Honestly, upon reviewing it many a time, I do believe that the elbows that people are talking about that could have been illegal, deemed illegal, those are tough calls to make in that instance. The head is moving. You know, it seems like he's trying to go for the side, the mohawk. I would have a hard time

calling a DQ for elbows like that. Those are really hard calls to make. But I do believe that this is what should have happened after the illegal knee was thrown. And why do I feel this way? Why am I going to say this? Because I have actually reached out to multiple referees, the best in the game, to get their take. I'm not sitting here, waxing poetic, as someone who's never refereed at MMA fight, telling you what should have happened. I have gathered the information from the best of the best. And this is what they all say should have happened. After this knee is thrown, and this is done intentionally, I am sorry, that is done intentionally.

After that knee is thrown, the fight should be halted. The fight should be paused. Okay? Separate the two fighters. Josh Emmett in one corner, Jeremy Stevens in another corner. You talk to Josh Emmett. You tell him, look, a lot of legal strikes just landed.

A lot of legal strikes just did a lot of damage. Now there was an illegal strike thrown intentionally. It's very clear. What isn't so clear is how much damage it caused. What isn't so clear is how much it really connected. But it was thrown intentionally and it grazed your head and it also hits you on the way back down. And this isn't like Yole Romero and Chris Weidman where there's a flying knee and then he kind of lands on him. and Wydenman was legal,

but then illegal on the way down, if you go what I'm saying, because he's down. He was down at the beginning of that strike being thrown and after that strike was thrown. He was. You saw it right there a million times.

And so what you tell Josh Emmett is, I'm going to give you a second here because an illegal strike grazed you. I'm going to bring in the ringside physician and he's going to talk to you and see where you're at health-wise. And now after this happens, three things.

could happen. There are three scenarios that could play out. The first one is the ring side physician walks in and says this man is good to go. Yeah, he's taking some damage, but this man is good to go. Cool. Josh Emmett, are you good to go? I'm good to go. Let's go. Let's go.

I want to fight on. You take a point away from Jeremy Stevens because we say it on the show all the time. There's no warnings. That should not happen anymore. A knee is thrown intentionally and it grazes an opponent. Whether a lot or a little, grazing is connecting. That warning happened backstage. A point is being deducted, okay?

A point is being deducted. And so that's the first scenario. And quite frankly, probably the best scenario for all. Rinkside physician says, you're good to go? Josh Emmett says, I'm good to go. Big Dan, who wants the fight to go on, I have no doubt of that, says, we're good to go. taking a point away in the second round. Awesome.

Scenario number two is this one. Ringside physician says, you're good to go. Josh Emmett says, I've taken too much damage. I can't go on. So the ringside physician is saying, despite the grazing, there was so much other legal damage, I still think you could go. Josh Emmett's saying, I can't go. Jeremy Stevens wins via TKL.

Because the guy is saying, I can't go, but the physician is saying he's good to go. Jeremy Stevens wins via TKO. The third scenario is this one. Ring side physician says he is not good to go as a result of the intentional illegal knee being thrown and then the fight is a DQ, which is the worst case scenario, but it's a possible one. So you understand three different scenarios.

None of those scenarios played out. The fight should have been stopped. It should have been halted. It should have been paused. not stopped entirely, but Big Dan, as he's standing there, and don't tell me he didn't have a good vantage points because he did, as he's standing there, seeing that all playing out, playing out, he should have paused the action, bring in the doctor, doctor determines if he's good to go, Josh Emmett determines if he's good to go, and then one of those three scenarios plays out. None of those things happened. And at the end of the day,

Josh Emmett loses. Josh Emmett deserved at least having the action paused after an illegal knee is being thrown to his head. And oh, by the way, I believe Jeremy Stevens owes Josh Emmett a massive debt of gratitude because I actually think that that knee would have landed flush if Josh didn't move his head. Josh is actually trying to defend himself from the illegal knee being thrown. I don't know what happened in the heat of the moment. I don't know if Jeremy lost his consciousness. I don't know if it was old rules. He was thinking, I don't know.

But that was an illegal knee that was about to land flush. And he moved his head. And so it really could have been disastrous. As a result, Josh Emmett loses, and B, he suffers multiple orbital bone fractures. It was a bad scene for all involved. It's unfortunate it happened this way, and we could have ended up with the same result. We could have ended up with a K-O finish, but Josh Emmett deserved to have the fight paused. And what was the underlying lesson in all of this?

The underlying lesson is this sport is fractured, and I'm not talking about Josh Emmett's orbital bone. this sport, we talk about the unified rules. There are no unified rules. There are the divided rules of a mixed martial arts. Florida is using new rules. Nevada is using old rules. New Jersey is using old rules. California is using new rules.

It is so confusing. Boston, UFC 220, as reported by our colleague Mark Romney, half the card is being told old rules. The other half is being told new rules. This is a sham. This is an absolute sham. This sport has come so far in 20 years or 25 years now. And we can't get the rules unified.

We can't get uniform rules in the United States of America. Are you kidding? What the problem is is that 18 months ago there was a vote and some commissioners wanted to keep the old rules. Some commissioners wanted to evolve and adapt and they instituted some new rules. And the real issue is that a lot of these commissioners have such big egos. they don't want to admit that this guy was right, this guy was wrong. So now you have commissions that are using completely different rules. Some are using replay.

Some aren't using replay. What needs to happen once and for all is a national commission where everyone is on the same page where there is one leader who is deciding as, you know, there's the head commission of the whatever commission you want to call it, and then everyone's working on the same page and they're getting a cut from the game. And we figure out a way to get this done. But this fractured sport is not helping anyone. And I get these people who say, move on.

Stop calling Jeremy a cheater. What are you talking about, move on? This is my life. This is the sport that I love. I get it. On a Saturday night, all you want to do is care about, you know, what you're watching and then move on to your real life. There are bigger problems in this world than what happened on Saturday night.

I get that. This is supposed to be fun. This is supposed to be an escape. But you cannot watch that. And you cannot watch the post-fight show and say, yeah, this is good. This is good for the sport. What are we talking about here? You cannot do that.

And then you have the fighter come up and you have his team come up and say, that we were told that this was legal. And then you have, you know, D.C., who actually was the only right one, saying, no, this is illegal. And you have Cruz who's, I love Dominic Cruz, but he was 100% biased in this situation. And you can't say like, oh, the fight is over. So what's the point of appealing? It happened already. What?

Like, if illegal things are being done, let's call them out for being illegal. An illegal strike was thrown. Did it impact the fight? Did it do the damage? That's not up to us to say. It connected. So if it wasn't fight-ending impact, call him the doctor, assess the situation,

make sure that he's okay to continue, make sure Josh Emmett is okay to continue. If he can't continue, but the doctor says he can't continue, then all you have to do is, then you call it in favor of Jeremy Stevens. If the doctor says he can't continue, then it's a DQ.

You hope he can continue. That's scenario number one. but if he says he can't and the physicians then it's a DQ. I've never said that Jeremy Stevens was a cheater. I never said he was dirty, but he is admitting to not understanding the rule.

He is admitting to being confused and he's also admitting that he threw an illegal strike. So at the end of the day, Josh Emmett deserved better. He deserved at least a pause in the action. And at the end of the day, the real lesson to be learned in all of this is that this sport needs unified rules,

not divided rules, unified rules. All the commissioners, I hope they were watching on Saturday. with egg on their face, because that's what happened when you let your egos not do what's best for the sport and the athletes. These fighters have enough to worry about. They don't have to worry about hand up, hand down, what state am I in? What is this? This is nonsense. And it's only going to get worse. So if you want to tell me that I'm blowing it out of proportion, if you want to tell me that I need to move on, then more power to you. Great. Enjoy your fights on Saturday night.

But as someone who devotes his life to covering the sport, I can't just forget about this and move on to 22 when, to me, the wrong call was made. The wrong call was made in a main event of a fight on Big Fox. Let's be better. Let's not sweep it under the rug. Let's be better. Let's make the right calls. Let's get people in there who know what the right calls are. Pause the action. Make sure everyone's okay. Resume the fight. Take a point away.

Teach people that it's not okay to cheat. And so that's where we're at. And it's unfortunate. And it really fires me up because people are saying like, get over it. What do you mean get over it? Yeah, but it didn't, it didn't affect them. It wasn't the damage. ending, you know, sequence that ended the fight? No, that's not the point. The point is an illegal

strike was intentionally thrown and it landed and it grazed his head, it touched his head, whatever you want to call it. That deserves a pause on the action. At the very least, at the very, very, very least, it's not up to us to say what, you know, okay, was this the actual blow that ended it? No. If you're going to throw illegal things, they're going to connect, something needs to be done. There needs to be a National Commission. There really does. And I'm tired of the divided rules. I'm tired of having to figure out where we're in and what rules apply and is their instant replay. It's just crazy. It's absolutely madness. Anyway, that's my spiel on Saturday night. A pause was needed. And then I laid out the consequences.

I laid out the sequence of events. None of those things happened. And as a result, you know, we had a confusing situation that was made even more confusing by the comments that were made on the post-fight show. We'll talk more about this as the show goes on. We'll have Josh Emmett on. We'll have others to talk about what transpired. Hey, guys, it's New York, Rick. Back with a message from ZipRecruiter.

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and bring in the one and only Derek Lewis, who is coming off a big win last Sunday in Austin, Texas. Hi, Derek. Sorry for keeping you waiting there a couple minutes, but I get very fired up when it comes to this stuff, you know? Yeah, I see, man. What are you doing? I'm good. Did you watch that on Saturday? Yeah, I watched it. What did you think? Can I just ask your opinion on what happened?

Do you think that the fight should have been at least stopped? Like, pause there for a second, that that looked like an illegal strike being thrown intentionally. What did you think? Whenever it was alive, when they showed the live, I thought it was illegal. But when they showed the replay, I seen that he really missed him. You think he missed completely? He probably grazed him just a little bit. There you go.

Grazing is connecting, though. Yeah, well, you know, at the heat of the moment, in a situation like that, knowing that your opponent is a tough guy, you know, just throwing whatever you came, really, just to finish him. You never know if you're going to be in that same position again to finish the guy. guy. So, that's probably reason why you're through it. I'm not blaming Jeremy Stevens, right? I don't think that

he should be the one holding back. The referee is there to protect both of you. But I do think that the wrong call was made, the wrong non-call was made, or maybe a non-call was made that I think was wrong, if that makes more sense. Let's talk about you, Derek. How's your hand? Damn.

It's been better. So what happened? It's like a box of fraction. the first punch in the fight in the first round I think I hit his elbow too and hit him across the cheek so you knew right away that it was broken

you could feel it? I didn't know it was broken I just knew it was hurting the rest of the fight have you ever broken your hand before? Yeah when I was in prison what'd you do? I had a fight in prison

and it was my outside my pinky bump I broke it in but I didn't telling nobody because I didn't want to get in trouble when I was in there. And so I had to deal with it for a few months. Wow. No medical attention? Like no cast, no nothing? No medical or nothing.

Which hand? My right hand. The same hand. It's just so it's a finger over. It's a knuckle over. Was it because you connected or you hit like a wall or something? No, I connect. Oh, did you win? Of course, yeah. This was over watching TV. It was around the time Vince Young was in college.

He was the UT game. And the TV had blacked out for a little bit. And one of the guys trying to get come and change the channel why everybody was still watching. And I wasn't having it. And you were like, oh, hell no, we're about to fight for this? Yeah, yeah, for sure. Wow.

One punch knockout, walk off? No, it was two punches. How many did you have in jail? How many fights? Probably like five. Five, wow. What was your record? Five and oh. Okay. What was that big sound? What was that big noise? My kids, you know, leaving out the house. They don't have school right now?

He's going to kindergarten right now, so, you know, they go half a day. Oh, right, right, right, right. Wow, okay. So do you need surgery? No, they say I go back Wednesday and they say it should have hooked up. So that's the reason why I got to stay in this position for one week. And whenever I go back Wednesday, he'll let me know what's the update on it. I saw on your Instagram you had a needle. What was that for? And how much did that hurt?

Man, it hurt. They're like, hell. That was for the numbness. The numb, the pain around it. So he could really put it back into place, basically. So he popped him back in place, my knuckle. So that was for the pain. So the needle was to numb it? Yeah.

Oh, my gosh. Horrible. So he said, yeah, I had to touch the bone to do it. So, yeah. How's the back after the fight? Because that was the big concern, you know, since what happened in your previous fight. How does it feel now after a fight?

Yeah, the back is good. The medicine wears off in one week, a week. So it only lasts for one week, so I really have to go back, get some of my knees in. Okay. I'm really just going to go back and get some more whenever I still back train.

Right now, I could barely take. Did it feel okay after the fight? Yeah, the back was good. Okay. It was good. And what about the fight? cardio like how tired were you in that third round um i wasn't tired at all really i really wasn't um for anything i was really just pacing myself okay you know um just waiting for my moments i already

knew i was down in in the fight and just waiting until the opportunity um showed itself and they did you know because i knew if it was one minute left in the fight i was going to go balls to the wall swinging crazy you know let's try to get that knockout because I knew I was already down in the fight. You weren't getting nervous? You weren't getting nervous that time was running out? No, I wasn't getting nervous at all. I knew that because every time I hit him, that he was falling.

So, you know, I just knew that they getting him just put a couple of my punches together because I wasn't putting anything together. At first, I was just throwing one shot punches. Considering everything you've been through over the past few months, retiring, the back, that must have felt pretty gratifying, especially being home in Texas, right? Was that one of your favorite wins thus far? Yeah, that's one of my favorite.

Still, the Travis Brown was one of my all-time favorites. Right, and that was exactly a year ago. Sunday night, February, last year, right, in the Halifax? Yeah, the day before, yeah. Right. You do good in that spot. And then speaking of spots... A year ago I broke two of my ribs

and a fraction of foot. And the day before, I broke my hand from a year apart. Damn. So I'm always breaking something. The post-fight interview was just as entertaining for a couple of reasons. First off, you said the B-word to Jimmy Smith. Only you can get away with that. Oh, I can't say B-word?

Ash, man, I don't know. Did they say anything to you afterwards? I didn't say nothing to me. Let me see if they send me my own, my bonus. Then if they were sending my bonus, then I guess I was supposed to say it. What bonus? Your performance bonus? Yeah.

They didn't send it yet? No, it takes a month. Damn there two months to get that. Jeez. By then, you're on to your next fight. Yeah, I'm on the next out. Usually if I always forget about the damn check, and whatever hit my account, I said, damn, they make a mistake.

And I had to think about, oh, yeah, That's right is my bones. So you said the Bellator word, which is very taboo on broadcast for the UFC. They don't usually like to say that word. And then you mentioned your post-fight celebration, which got a lot of attention. Ultimately, was your wife okay with that? Or did she say to you afterwards, like, you know, next time don't say that? How did she react to that?

Well, if I already know, I'm half crazy anyway, so she didn't care. I saw you guys on TMD together. I didn't get that four-round in until a few days later anyways, because my hand was messed up and I couldn't, like, perform like I should anyway. I already knew I wasn't going to be able to perform like I should. So, you know, I wasn't going to let her do all the work. And plus, my nut wasn't going to be as good with her hands, so I had to be 100%. I saw you guys on TMD together.

You were very disappointed that you couldn't. Is that a Modella? what is that? Yeah, Modello doesn't pay you enough, right? It's not a Modello, man. Why y'all keep calling them? No, I said. Mishalo.

No, I know, but because Modello's the UFC beer sponsor, but what you were supposed to say was... Yeah, the people was trying to... Yeah, they kept... I was telling them to drink Mishelow, and they come talking about, yeah, you're going to drink Modela. No, Moldello is nasty as hell.

I try Moldello before. It's nasty. Uh-uh. And I tried when I was drunk and sober, and it was still nasty. Did you, were you bummed after, because that was a great, that was an incredible, you know, fight, finish, post-fight interview. But then, right after they cut to Nate Diaz with something, I don't know if it's, I still don't know if it's a blunt or a joint, but he was something. And everyone goes, do you feel like he kind of, you know, usurped you that he sort of stole your thunder? I don't care about that long as I won. That's all I care about. I don't care about what they did.

I don't care. Okay. You know, I have a question for you. Okay. You know, being a fighter, you got to be some type of crazy, you know, like you're stepping inside the cage. You got to have something had to be wrong with you. I agree.

You know, and, you know, I was watching you before, like, soon as the show started, and you just running off at the mouth, just talking all into the mic, all basically really just talking to yourself in the room with it. best with toys on your dressing and everything. And I'm like, man, I just went to watching a Trump speech earlier this morning. And he was mentioned about mental health, mental wellness or whatever. And I was like, I think so wrong with Ariel, man. He's sending up an organ into the mic to his self-based.

Nobody else, you're not even talking to nobody. He sent up the organ. He's mad over by a controversy and me. Yeah. I was like, something is wrong with this, man. Yeah, you're 100% right. There is something wrong with me. There's no, there's different things wrong with both of us. You go into a cage and get punch for a living. That's messed up. I can never do that. And I look forward to sitting in an empty room. There's no one in this room with me talking into this microphone and arguing about, you know, a thing that happened on Saturday in a fight. And nobody's talking back. No one's talking back. But I know people are listening. Like people are paying attention, I would think, right? No one cares?

Only in America, Derek. Only in America. This is the American dream. This right here, what I'm doing is the American dream. I see how you disrespect the cannon of flag. You let me touch the, um, to that's what are you doing? You let the American flag touch. What were you?

What were you doing? What were you doing in the cowboy outfit? I saw you over the weekend. What was that all about? You got a broken hand. Were you actually on a horse? No, of course I was on the horse laid on that night on my wife. But the rodeo had kicked off.

The rodeo had kicked off. Oh. So that was for the cook off for the rodeo. So everything now, the rodeo going on in Houston. So you have to dress up like that to go to it? You don't have to, but it's the Texas spirit. Right. Did you rent those clothes?

What hurt? No, I shouldn't because I wanted to take all that shit back. My feet was hurting in them down boots. They say you had to break them in after I already had brought the boots

and wore and whenever I already got bunions and blisses all on my damn feet and my damn pants walking around like going to different spots, different tents and all that at the place.

So I want them sweating a lot and wearing them jeans and thighs rubbing together, you know, shit. All that shit was burning, I was uncomfortable, and I didn't do it anymore. That's the first time you bought the whole attire for it? That's the first and the last time, and I wish I did renting that shit. Why all of a sudden?

Like, you've been a Texas guy your whole life. Why all of a sudden you buy it? Yeah, I know, but I just wanted to do something different. But being a cowboy ain't my thing, man. Yeah, I know. I'll say this. You look good in it. Yeah, I know. But, you know, it's like women, whenever they go out, they're looking good.

Yeah. They got the nice, it was on, all that. But after the club, they ask how to take their bra off, take their high heels off, and they were walking the street back for them because they were so uncomfortable. Couldn't wait until the show's over. It reminds me of Vegas. Vegas at like 3 a.m. You see everyone walking barefoot.

It's disgusting. Now, Derek, I was also a little bit disappointed because I thought you'd call out your guy, Francis. There wasn't much of a mention. I did call him up. I was like on the mic after the fight, I wasn't really wondering about anybody, thinking about anything. My wife and my friends that was there.

But whenever we went to the back, I did call him out. I called him out, Curtis Blaze, Kane, Fabricio Overeign You know, anybody else in front of me that a fight that really made sense

I respect that about you That you want to fight all those top guys But the fight to make Now more than ever is you versus Francis They got to make this fight happen Yeah for sure You know, we see what happened You know, really whoever signed the contract first

You know So I'll put that I put their names in the hat, and I told him I would like to fight them sometime this year. And so we'll see who will respond, who we want to step up to the play first. Considering the hand injury, when could you realistically come back?

When do you want to come back? They say I could really start training now, really, but I just can't hit anything with my right hand. So it was basically any day. Oh. But they say it takes six to eight weeks. for my hand in hell completely. So.

My dream was July 7th card, whatever that is, 226, you versus Francis, the Stepe D.C. card. That'd be a stack card. That'd be a good card, good entertaining card, you know, being him and Stepe and that guy.

You know, that'd be good. They give us some some coins off for that fight, too. You know, we all get paid good. But I doubt that would happen. Why did you just refer to Daniel Cormier as that guy? I don't know, man. I've been drinking. Okay.

Well, you got beef? I didn't know if you had beef. You said Steepin and that guy. I don't got no beef for nobody. Got a little beef from nobody but on Francis, really, since he's going to always talk to shit about me. There you go. That's the fight.

This is the money fight. Yeah. It'd be big. Yeah. big. I hope they pay me good, too. You got paid over $300,000 last fight, but still

it'll always be more. Wow, that's how much you got for that fight? That's pretty good. Yeah, it's okay. Pay the little taxes, whatnot. It's good. You just signed a new contract, though, so you got some time before you have to renegotiate. Although in this game, you can renegotiate

whenever, right? No, whatever. You know, depends on your performance. depends on if the people really want to see you fighting stuff like that, you know. It's be reasonable. You know, it can't just be like, oh, fighting all bones and canes and all that and having a winter street against a bunch of canes, then trying to re-negotiate your contract and be like,

I deserve this much, man, whenever you haven't even fought anybody. Right. You know, I fought some pretty tough guys. You know, I'm always calling up the toughest guys that's around at that time. Just for that reason, because whenever it's time for me to renegotiating my contract, it won't be that hard for them to not agree to whatever I want at that time. Because I know that I come to fight and I fight whoever, whoever is the toughest guy at the time. People love you. You are adored by the fans. My last thing for you, Derek, is, have you, why are you shaking your head? No, they don't love me.

They don't? No. What do you mean? Don't worry about it. Just go ahead. What's the next question? No, no, no. I'm just curious.

What do you mean? You don't feel the love? I got to go shopping, man. Okay. I don't got that much time. All right. I'm going shopping. Where are you going shopping?

Yeah, there you nose, man. Okay. Have you regained your love? I see why you nose. I can't say nothing. I see why you nose. You've used that joke already, Derek. Have you regained your love for M.

No. It wasn't me. Do you love the sport still? Have you regained it? You were retiring, this and that. Do you feel good about everything? Yeah, I felt good. Before the fight, I felt refreshed.

You know, I felt like the time off that I got, I really needed it. And I felt hungry. You know, I felt happy. I felt excited to really get back in there and was ready to approve myself, you know. My last outing and won't pull a knot. and I know there's a lot of people about me, you know, saying that I'm having a heart and all this and that. You know, and while we're on the mic, fuck Kobe, COVID-Ten, whatever the name is. Fuck you, motherfucker.

Why? I'm sure you hear that. Don't get that out. No, I already was talking shit. About you? That's one. Yeah, one of boys that wearing a polo shirts and soon you guys touch him, he's going to call the cops on him. when a prepper motherfuckers.

What do you say about you? I didn't see this. When was this? On Twitter? I don't know what it was on. I just heard you talk about shit. Damn. If he's drawn your ire, then he's in trouble.

Then, you know, I don't mind doing interviews with you. And from all other people that's calling and trying to get interviews, you know, I'm not going to do no interview with it. Because before the fight, a bunch of you almost. talking shit about me saying this and that or what. Then after the fire, I went not even doing an interview. Hell and I ain't not doing an interview with you. Fuck you. Okay. But we're cool still? Yeah, we are. Damn. But you're out there. America flag, though. My bad. I ain't going to remember that. I ain't going to forget that. My bad, my bad. All right. Well, I'll let you go shopping. Enjoy your Monday, Derek. It's always great to talk to you. I won't bother you for a while now,

Okay, but I hope your hand feels better. And I hope you get that fight with Francis. Respect. Howdy. Yeah, me too. I appreciate it. Okay. All right.

Peace out. There he is. The one and only. Derek Lewis. Rep in Houston, as always. Got the broken hand. That's the fight. That is absolutely the fight.

Francis and Ghanu versus Derek Lewis, no doubt about it. And do check out his Instagram because Derek Lewis in the cowboy garb is a sight to see it really is. I love Derek Lewis. You say he doesn't think the fans love him? I actually think the fans genuinely love the guy. But anyway, Colby Cunnington, holy smokes. Colby Cumberton, I will say this.

I don't know what he said about Derek Lewis. The tweet about Mike Perry's girlfriend. I mean, we can argue and I can concede the fact that he's been offensive in the past. I know on this show I talked about the filthy animal thing and how I think that he was playing shtick the tweet about Mike Perry's girlfriend

was so over the line was so inappropriate, was so classless in my opinion Colby owes Mike Perry an apology and yes I get you know like at this point he's going all in but there is a line there's always a line

in everything in life unnecessary. That's the bad kind of heat. You don't want that kind of heat. You know, the求 sun kind of heat where you're skirting the line and it's a little bit uncomfortable. All right, I can live with that. It's the fight game. But now you're insulting in the worst possible way, like just like nasty insulting. The girlfriend of a fighter. Come on, man. I'm like, what is that? That makes me feel weird. That was unnecessary. I didn't like that one. So I don't know what he said about Derek. but man, that's not a guy you want to draw the ire of.

Okay, let us move along. UFC 222 is this Saturday. It's in Las Vegas. Of course, we know the main event, Chris Seiburg versus Yanukunitskaya. We know the co-main event is Frankie Edgar versus Brian Ortega. One of the fights on the fight-pass prelims. In fact, the featured fight-pass prelim fight is Zach Otto versus Mike Pyle. Mike Pyle, almost 20 years in the game, back once again,

fighting in Las Vegas on FightPass, and he joins us right now via the Magic of Skype with an announcement to make. There he is, the one and only quicksand pile. Mike, how are you? What's up? Good, man. I'm good. How are you? I'm doing great. Thank you very much for joining us

from the Dolce Diet headquarters. We see the logo in back of you. I appreciate it very much. So we are five days away from UFC 222. You return to action, but you do have an announcement to make. So the floor is yours. Tell us what's on your mind,

and then we'll react, but we want to hear from you first. What's up? Right on. Right on. Well, I'm looking forward to my fight this weekend. And that will be my very last fight ever. I'm going to retire. It's been a long road.

And that's it. I want to hang the gloves up and move on. And I'm excited to make that move. I'm ready to retire. You know, I'm 43 this year. It's time. Well, I appreciate you coming on the show in announcing that and as I said to you via text, I congratulate you on a phenomenal

career that spans almost two decades and you fought them all, you fought all over the world. How difficult is it to, I'm sure you've told this to family and friends, but to say it out loud to the world, how difficult is it to say the R word? It's not difficult at all, you know, to be honest with you, it's more of a relief. It's like, you know, it's just time to move on. You know, there's always, there's always pressure on you when you're a fighter. when you're going to compete. You're always in training.

You're always getting banged around. It's a rough sport. It's a rough way to live. I mean, it's a rough way to make a paycheck. And for me, pretty much at this point, the juice is no longer worth the squeeze, you know. The paychecks just aren't big enough for me to stay in harm's way at my age. So that's it.

easily going to walk away. It's really not hard at all, to be honest. You know, it is my identity. That's what I've been identified as, as a fighter for so many years. It's going to be, you know, a different change, but not, it's nothing that hits the heart too much. When did you come to this decision? How long ago? Earlier, late last year, I thought, you know what, I sat with Shelby, talked with Shelby. I was like, I was like, let's do it one more time. Then I'm going to retire.

And he's like, you sure are you going to retire? He's like, you know, even if you win, I was like, I'm going to retire. If I were to close my eyes, duck my head down and within 10 seconds, you know, get lucky enough to put him to sleep like that. I really don't care. I'm retiring, you know, that's it. Again, the juice is not worth to squeeze anymore. Sorry. Did you have any say in which card, which city, which opponent?

Did you have any say in any of that? I asked for this card. I asked for a card, actually, in Vegas before April of this year. And my response was, I'll do what I can. And Sean was able to make it happen. And I appreciate that. Okay. When you found out it was Zach Otto, any reservations, any second thoughts, or were you cool with it? No, that was fine. Um, whomever it'll be, I'm going out to have some fun for my last fight, you know, and it's going to, it's going to be with with Zach. It would be someone. So whatever the name was, whoever it was, whatever their style, um, there's no pressure on me. I don't have to worry about getting cut from UFC.

I don't have to really worry about anything. I get to go and be me, let everything out, put it all on the table for one last time, one more time we go. and that's just fine by me with Zach. And considering those factors right there where you don't have to worry about what's next or getting cut or whatever, what has this training camp been like? Knowing that you're kind of doing everything

for the last time, right? Like this is the last way cut, the last way and et cetera. Do you find yourself smelling the roses, getting a little nostalgic? How would you describe what the last few weeks have been like? Smelling the roses would be like that. That would be it.

You know, it's just, It's been a fun ride for this camp, you know, for my whole career, actually. But it is, again, just a big relief to know that there's no pressure on me. There's no pressure at all. Just go have fun. And that's exactly what I'm going to do. Just go have fun. The last few fights, did you stop having fun?

Was there too much pressure? Like, how would you describe the last few fights for yourself? The last few fights, I just had a couple of times. of bad days at the office, you know, I suffered some knockouts two in a row. And that also was like, hey, that was kind of a wake-up call. Like, again, the juice just ain't worth to squeeze. You know, the bottom line is if I'm making, you know, a few hundred thousand dollars a fight, I might try to fight for a couple more years. But that's just not the, that's not the case. I didn't build myself up through the ranks well enough throughout my career to make good money,

each fight. And again, not to beat a dead horse, but the juice, just is not worth to squeeze anymore. So you've mentioned that a couple times. Are you disappointed with like the state of MMA? Are you disappointed with how much fighters are getting paid? I only ask this because you've said that line a couple times now. Like, is there some, do you leave with some bad feelings towards the sport? No, not toward the sport.

Again, the way the criteria is, is, hey, if you make $5 to show up, you make $5 to win. Your next, your next contract now you make $10 and tend to show, you know, so on and so forth. I did not meet the criteria. I, Mike Pyle, did not climb the ladder. I did not make those accomplishments. I did not build that contract higher and higher and higher. It was there. The money was there for me to take. I just is not, I did not do it. The platform was there. MMA is beautiful. It's awesome. I was fighting back in the day for free because I loved it. That's why I did it because I loved it. But, you know, I didn't build myself and I didn't make that money. So now it's time. You've had a phenomenal career. A lot of fighters can't fight, you know, into their 40s like, like you are. And it's a career that began in November of 1999, unbelievable, in the 20th century. And a lot of people may not know that your debut was. against a guy named Quentin Rampage Jackson

and you were giving up 30 pounds because your opponent fell out on short notice and of course Rampage was in Rampage but he was still rampage to a certain degree and he was still a lot bigger than you and you still took the fight. Did you ever think after that did you ever think that you would like did you envision

a 20 year career? Did you envision this or have you exceeded your expectations? I definitely exceeded my expectations. No, I did not see myself 20 years down the line because that didn't exist. When Rampage and I fought, to correct that, I was Rampage's first fight. I had about four or five fights before that, and they were some of Rampage training partners.

Still to this day, I can barely remember their names and all that. So it wasn't honored on Shear Dog, which is fine. I get it. Okay. I've been fighting since late 97, to be exact. So anyway, no, I did not see myself that far. because I got showed up that night. I got paid $100 to fight for page.

So I was doing it again for the sport of it. I thought, you know, me and another dude, you know, showing our skills and see who wins. And that's what I'd practice in my shed for so many hours for us to go and compete, not to go make money. And then it slowly turned into a job. What was your favorite? It had the sport got bigger. Sure.

Is there a moment that sticks out as your favorite? It may not even be a fight, but when you'll be talking about your career to your grandchildren maybe in 40 years, what sticks out? You know what? The entire career itself, all the friends along the way, all of the challenges that were put in front of me, the balls that I'd gotten throughout my career, the courage, all of it. All of it made me who I am today, and all of it plays a part, all of it. Do you have a favorite fight? I did enjoy getting that good knockout over near. That was one of my first knockout cold face down to the mat knockouts that I've ever delivered.

That was a good one. And when I'd beaten John Hathaway, when I'd beat the brakes off John Hathaway and 14 and O, as a as a feature bout in the O2 arena in England. That was a great moment for me as well.

I was lucky enough to be at that one. UFC 120 on Spike TV and I remember how they were grooming him to be the next big thing out of England and that place was silent after you beat him up. Everyone just viewed you as the opponent coming in and you completely... That to me is like

the first one that comes to mind what you did against John Hathaway, a very good opponent at the time. Do you leave with any regrets? No regrets at all, other than, you know, when you get knocked out, that just sucks. You know, you make mistakes. There's no regrets. The longevity of my career is through smart training, so I can't, I can't have any regrets toward that. I mean, what can you do? There's nothing you can do about a loss. There's really no regrets. I made no enemies through the sports. I made no enemies through the worked, only made friends. I have no regrets. How's your health after a 20-plus year career, as you just noted, how's the health?

And, you know, of course, you're not doing the safest sport in the world. You are taking blows to the head. You're putting your body on the line every time. How do you feel 20-plus years later? Barry, I feel great, man. I'm literally in better shape than I was when I was in my 20s because I'm smarter about everything. And, you know, and Mike Dolce has helped me over the years of working with him, you know, learn to have a lifestyle of good eating and just overall good health and without breaking yourself in the gym. Things like that is key. And some of the younger fighters hopefully are learning that through some of the older veterans of the sport and absorbing and learning through those guys on how to approach training camps and to stay healthy

and make it to the cage that night and have a career afterwards. What will you do now? What does life after MMA look like for you? Right now, I am currently on a show called The Tick on Amazon. I am a stunt double for the lead actor, Peter Sarah Finowich, which is The Tick, a comedic actor, and I double for him for the season, and the new season just got picked up again. So I'll be doing that. I think it got picked up.

I'm not sure. So I'll be on that, hopefully, this next season, which I'm pretty sure I will be when it gets picked up. So on the film side of things. Okay, you're going to be doing some acting. Stunt work, things of that nature.

More stunts. More stunt work. Yeah, and sometimes acting comes along with it. But stunt work is in the foreground. And, yeah, maybe you never know. Some more acting could pop up in my career as well. Do you enjoy that? I enjoy thoroughly.

I get to pretend to fight and pretend to take punches to the face and pretend to deliver them and make it look good on camera and I don't get any stitches. Do you think that you will remain in MMA as a coach and mentor things of that nature or do you want to break from the sport?

I won't break from the sport. I mean, it's a part of me. That's what I'm identified by. Coaching, no. You know, that's probably not I'm not that interested in that, you know, that's a big job. That's a big job that are not ready to take. And I know as a fighter what I would expect out of a kind of commitment on a daily.

You know, the film side of things definitely overpowers that, you know, as far as the bank account. Considering this is your last fight and you're fighting, you know, in your adopted hometown of Las Vegas, How many friends and family will you have in attendance on Saturday night at the T-Mobile arena? Everybody in that arena that night going to be my friends and family. Okay. This is my last walk. Everybody there. Everybody there.

I got, whole damn Vegas is behind me, man. Do you think you'll get emotional come Saturday? Yeah, you never know. I don't know until that moment actually happens, man. I don't know. And I hope so, because I want, I want, I want to feel, I know it will. Yeah, without doubt, I'm sure it will, man. There's, you know, and everybody there, you know, all, what I mean by everyone is everyone in the back.

All the, all the employees, you know, I've known them over years. I'll be, I'll be nine years. I'll be too much short of nine-year career in UFC come this, this fight. When I retire, I'm too much short. May 2009, I thought Brock Larson, I do believe. Yep, I remember it. Last thing, you feel like you leave the sport. I mean, wow, you've seen almost the full evolution of MMA.

You say you started in 97. That's just four years after the UFC was born. Do you feel like you leave the sport in a good place? Are you happy with the current state of MMA? Current state, I definitely would like to see more money go to all the fighters across the board, of course. You know, we're in a huge sport that's very, very recognized and understand. that it doesn't have the kind of money that NBAs and NFL's and Major League Baseballs and things, but I do believe it's heading that direction.

It's just not going to happen in my era, and I really do hope that that does happen for the fighters. You know, I really do. Not just, you know, I'm done with the sport, so I'm speaking for the other guys that are coming up. I was 20-year-olds, and, you know, I really truly hope that they can sit, you know, and not have to go and be a stuntman afterwards. and they can sit back and reap what they've sold throughout their career. And even at the bottom tier guys, you know, should still be able to have some land and a house and some money in the bank, man.

I really hope that for everybody. Is there anything you want to, I mean, now that we have the forum, and this is, you know, your retirement announcement, so to speak. And again, I sincerely appreciate you coming on the show and sort of keeping this under wraps publicly. So thank you very much for that. Anything else you want to say in parting? We'll see you again. later on this week, but anything else you want to say to anyone watching, any of your, any of your fans,

your supporters? No, all you fans, thank you for over the years. I know some of you die-hard MMA fans know who Quicksand is, and you guys follow me from the beginning. I truly appreciate that, all the fan mail, everything. I truly appreciate you guys. Thank you so much for over the years. Thank you.

Thank you, Mike. I appreciate it very much. Congrats on a phenomenal career. Thank you for all the entertainment for putting your body on the line. always going out there with the best hair in the business over the years. And I appreciate you coming on the show once again to say this. And I'm looking forward to it on Saturday. I'm honored that I'll be able to be there and watch it in person.

So all the best, the next five days with the weight cut. And we'll see you out there in Las Vegas. Thank you. Thanks, buddy. Thanks, everybody. All right, there he is. Mike Pyle, Quicksand Pyle, announcing his retirement on the program.

Officially, according to all the major sites of record, They say that his debut occurred in November of 1999, November 13th, 1999, to be exact. And he is saying that there are some misfights that, in fact, his career dates back to 1987, which means it's a 20-plus-year career, a 21-plus-year career. Nevertheless, what a career. Quinton Jackson, John Fitch, were his first two fights,

at least according to these official records. the former WC. Walterway champion. Fought for WC. fought for the IFL. Fought for Strike Force. Fought for Elite XC. fought for Sengoku.

Fought for Affliction. Fought for the UFC, of course, the last nine years. Made his debut at UFC 98 against Brock Larson. Fought him all, did it all. Congratulations to Mike Pyle in a great career,

and I really appreciate him coming on and announcing that on this program. Very cool. and he will be making that final walk on Saturday at UFC 222 against Zach Otto, and that will be the fight pass prelim featured bout. Mike Pyle. Pretty cool. Remember, the hair?

What was that show? That movie? Joe Dirt? Used to calm himself with that, Quicksand. Anyway, you know, another one goes, and I'm happy that he has a, a life after fighting, happy that he has the stunt work, and certainly echo his sentiments about fighter pay and that obviously we'd love to see all the fighters make as much as possible.

100%. Okay, let us move along. Thank you very much to Mike Pyle for his time and for coming on once again. One of the big stories last week was that Gilbert Burns was supposed to fight Olivier Obain-Mersier at UFC Fight Night, no, UFC on Fox, 28 UFC Fight Night Orlando, whatever you want to call it. However, the UFC

via statement said that they pulled him from the fight due to concerns with his weight cut. And so we wanted to get his side of the story. We're now being joined via the magic of Skype by Durino. Gilbert Burns. He joins us right now. Gilbert, how are you?

Hi, Gabriel. I'm doing your case. I'm doing good. Did I say your name correctly, by the way? Is it Durino? Yeah, that's the nickname. You know what that means? Like, little tough one. Yes. And no one has ever doubted your toughness. I know last week was a tough week for you. I want to start at the beginning of the week, if we can.

I reported I heard via sources close to you that you showed up in Orlando weighing 186 pounds, that this is common for you, but the UFC had concerns with your water loading and how much you weighed. Is that number accurate? Were you weighing 186 pounds? Yeah, it is. After the water load, you know, like I wake up, I have like all my coats. I have a group chat that I talk with my coach, my doctor from Brazil. I wake up on that Tuesday at 174. But I was just carrying, like I was putting all my packet in the car to get my way to drive.

So I ate and I saw my water load. I didn't drink a lot of water. Like I learned from the guy, like from Victor, from Candle, lean to a couple of guys that are training me, they water load a lot because they say that makes easier for the cut. So I was doing that in order to make my weight cut easier. So I wake up at 174, but I wake up at, well, 8 a.m. And then I just checked with the UFC at 5 p.m.

And I didn't have training yet. So when we get there, I was about 185, 186. But I didn't know we have a weight limits to checking it. You know, I just, I don't know. I always make weight. I was healthy, I was training, and I don't know, but they just,

after I checked with the UFC, I just get in the house, so I get a house over there to stay. Me, Vicente, I have my professor coming to Brazil, my jihitsu professor coming to Brazil, and as soon as you was getting ready to practice, my manager, Ali, he just called me,

and they said the commission, the UFC, when I canceled the fight, and then that's how it started. Is this typical for you to water load and get as high as, you know, 30 pounds over? Is that typical? Or are you trying something new this time? No, it's always the same thing. Sometimes go a little, I think that was the first time that got above 85, but I always get close to 80s.

But a couple of times it got lighter because I got, I checking in in the morning. So I had nothing to eat or just a little bit. And then I wait, I wait like 174, 175. But everyone who does the water load, they know as the day goes and you drink a lot of water, your weight goes up, but you wake up with the lightweight. So I just get surprised, you know, I was so prepared for that fight. I put a lot of work and I couldn't show up. Like, I couldn't perform.

And consider here in Florida because I'm living here like four years right now. I have a lot of students. I have, bro. I have over 200 people going. I make like a speech every class that I was teaching here. You guys make sure you guys go there, you know, support me. I don't know when the UFC is going to go back in Florida. So I have a lot of people coming to support.

Like, I couldn't fight, you know. Yeah, I can't imagine how frustrating it was. For those that don't understand, you know, what you go through, could you explain what water loading is and why it's good for a fighter to do this a few days before the fight? Yeah, for sure. So what happened is, especially in my case, I dehydrate. I took the water of my body, like with exercise and hot bath about 13, 14 pounds. And I take a lot of water from my body, you know.

And what the water load has help is that I superhydrate my body. So I put a lot of water, a lot of water. Like we do between four or five days, like extremely a lot of water, like three gallons. Sometimes a little bit more than that. A couple of fighters just go in two gallons, but I can't go above three gallons. And a couple guys are like that, too, Linton Vassel. He's one of my friends and my partners here.

He does a lot of water. Mike Handler, Vito Belfour, and I used to train with Vito, he does a lot of water to you. And what that help? When you start, when you stop drinking the water and start doing the weight cut, that, bro, you just sweat so much because your body

are used to getting a lot of water, so he throws a lot of water off. I just put a lot of water because that makes easier for me to do the weight cut. So I thought I was helping myself. I was doing something to make my weight cut easier. For sure, got a little up on the scale, but I thought on that day, that doesn't mean nothing. Me's on Friday, you know, on the way each day that I never miss away on the UFC. I actually fought with the guys that didn't make a way.

It wasn't the first time. So it was kind of hard. And I know the Yuzada, when the U-Sada came in, they have a guideline. Like, you've got to come close to 171-171. But it's kind of suggestion. It's not a rule. So at the moment that I started loading the water,

I knew my way it was coming high, but I kind of, I don't care. I just want to have a good way to cut to perform good on Saturday. I thought that was all about it, you know? And just to be clear, your check-in was Tuesday, right? Tuesday, yes. Okay. And so how does it work?

You go there at 5 o'clock. You check in with the UFC. You step on a scale. They see that you weigh 186, and then what happens? So then the UFC didn't say nothing. They say, oh, you're cool. Just water load two gallons right here. You know, you cool, no problem.

So we're just checking in. I signed the porters. I get to the house. You know, it was getting right to practice. So as soon as I make coffee, me and my Vicente Lucchi, he was there with me, was getting ready to go to the UFC gene to train. Then my manager Ali Abidalazi just called me, hey, they want to cancel your fight. You showed up to, you know, too heaven.

Then I just showed that two gallons of water right here. So let me come back and I'm going to stop peace. In two hours, I'm going to be under 180 soon without training. And if I'm training that I'm on my way right now, bro, tomorrow will be low. Tomorrow, I'm no 100% sure I'm going to wake up below 75, like 72.

And they say, okay, let me do a couple calls. So he called the UFC commission, doctor, lawyer, everyone gets involved with it. So I think they say it was kind of safe to me to don't even inside the process to do the wake cut, even that I did that

before, but I don't know how the commission works in Florida. I heard a lot of bad things from the commission. But I worked for the UFC. I had no problem, never, ever with the UFC. And it was kind of devastating for me. I mean, I put a lot of work for that. I believe I was one of my best shapes for coming to that fight.

But, you know, I just accepted the order, you know, like, you know, fight the fight was devastated on the beginning. Especially that I kind of got to call. All the coach explained, you know, call my wife, my friends, family, everybody, a lot of guys support me in Brazil too, was, bro, was just crazy, you know, like I was being worked so hard and I couldn't perform it. That was, it's not even about financial money. For sure, I want to make that money, but I don't fight for that, you know.

I just want to, I just want to perform, bro. It was trying to like, like 10 weeks for that fight, you know, getting prepared, pain, physical therapies, conditioning, dieting, nutrition, nutrition. is everybody like, I don't know, bro, just so frustrating. I'm trying to get over right now, trying to relax, you know, like even my older brother, we had a good conversation. He was one of the guys that helped me a lot, you know, like overcoming that. He's a Navy Sea in Brazil.

He's still a black belt on jitzo, and then one thing that he said was the thing that helped me so much. He just said, bro, sometimes we got to give to bed. They give us not rapid. you know, so they can't give it. I know it sounds crazy, sounds weird, but you can't do nothing about it, so relax, enjoy your family,

and go for the night. That's what I'm doing right now, trying to do right now. To the best of your knowledge, was it the UFC or the Florida Commission that made the call to remove you from the fight? I think it was the commission with the UFC,

but I think it was, I'm not sure, but I think it was the commission. Okay. And are you now going to change any of your weight-cutting routine practices as a result of what happened? Yeah, I just spoke with my doctor. He was one of the best ones that,

you know, they have that problem in Brazil from the hotel with the UFC Machiva, the last UFC Brazil. Yeah. My doctor was one of the guys that help a lot of guys to make the way, you know, like changing planes because the hot bath wasn't working.

So we just thought, we're going to, we're kind of still going to do the same strategy, water load. but I'm going to come lighter, you know, like, it's kind of crazy because everyone on the UFC is kind of one or two-way divisions above the ways that he fights. Even one of the guys that I like so much to watch in 170 is Darren Tiel. He even said, I'm a light-heavy fight in a world to wait.

That's me, too. I'm kind of almost a middle way. I walk around 185 and I'm fighting a light weight. So like a lot of guys do. So right now I need to get lower. I'm just going to make sure I'm going to fight. So they still don't have a, like, specific guideline or rules. Okay, you need to come on that in specific way.

They have a suggestion. But for sure, now I've got a debt. I don't want to go there, you know, do all my preparation, and get that it cannot perform. So right now I'm going to get there. I'm going to ask the user, the Jeff, say, how much I need to get that one seven. Okay, I'm going to get that one seven. Just make that rule more specifically. Like, let me know.

then I'm going to make the rules. I never go against the rules. I always make a weight. I have no problem to make weight. If you ask you, I'm heavy. Yes, I am a big 55, and I'm a big a lot of weight, but I always make weight, you know. What do you, like right now, how much you weigh? 185, 1806.

Okay. That's your walk-around weight? That's my walk-around. Okay. When you got that call, like to prepare and not get injured, and especially in Florida, near your family, friends, what does it like to not have the release of the fight? How do you, how do you, how do you, how do you deal with that? Man, that was so hard in the beginning because like I said, I have I have students right here. I have a gene right here. My wife teaches the kids. I have my brother

helping with the teaching. So we have over 150 students. So I make all the students go, you know, all the family going. I have a lot of supporters, a lot of friends. Even I have a lot of guys that stay in Black Seedians. I go do a couple of jiu-jitsu training at Fight Sports, Miami, Cyborgs. They train a combat club. I do conditioning on I-A-DP a different place. So I have all that places that I go training, I had the guys going to plus my students. So I have a lot of people going.

And when I found out, I'm not going to have a fight. And then people start knowing that was just devastating. Well, like, Tuesday night, I couldn't get asleep. Wednesday was even harder because everyone was getting to Florida. I had this guys coming from London. I have a lot of judicious community. I used to go, travel all the world, doing seminars competing. I have a lot of friends back.

Hey, what's up? You're not fighting? And then I got a jersey. The commission didn't allow me. They said, I was too heavy. So by Thursday, Friday, I kind of, you know, I guess. God, okay, I'm not going to fight. It's just crazy, but I got like two days to kind of figure it out, you know, to understand

that I'm not fine. Is there a part of you? I mean, we've seen some pretty bad weight cuts recently. Uriah Hall, you know, was in really bad shape, and it's something that is always on our minds, and we've seen some really ugly incidents. Is there a part of you that understands where the UFC is coming from? At the top of the show, I would say, like, I applauded them for looking out for your best interest.

Of course, we don't know, you know, what kind of best. position that you're in in terms of like financial and how much you know you work for this. That's a big blow. I don't doubt. And mentally, I know it sucks. But do you understand the position that they are in looking out for the best interests and the health and safety of the fighters that maybe that is a little too much, too much weight to cut in the span of a few days, 30 pounds?

I do understand. For sure, I understand the U.S. But I don't have a doctor taken on me to see how hydration was. They don't give them an opportunity to. come on the Wednesday and believe it not on my on my water load you know oh no option they just okay cancel you know then that's it that's why I believe was a little bit more by the commission than the UFC because I showed up like that before when I fought how boy you live in in Brazil I just got there on Tuesday I get delay on my flight I got there 180 something I don't

remember exactly but I think it was maybe the same thing 185 186 and was it was a the early way in is was the way in is late on Friday. And I still make one 54 and I fought three rounds, tough guy, got beat the first two rounds

and I, you know, I still, I finish the fight, still finished the fight. So I always make way, even show it up heavy, but I think that each case is different, you know, like, and if they have new rules right now, just let me know and then I'm going to be

on the rules, you know. It's just I understand, I do understand. They kind of try to play the sport, making more, you know, more safe. But let me know, you know, then I'm going to attack. I'm going to need to change. But it doesn't take my example. All you two have, you're not fighting. So what?

All my preparation, all the money that I put in, all the hours, you know, all the coach, all the sport, the sport that I bring, all the partners, my teammates, all the work, sacrifice, diets, you know, bring my friends. family, bring my professor from Brazil, it's just, you know, just make me frustrated, you know, like, if you're going to do that, okay, making, making the numbers,

making real, make it official. Right. You want to know exactly, you want to know exactly, you can't be over 170, right? You want it, you want a hard number, a hard rule. Sure, give me a number. Don't come with a guideline. Oh, we have a suggestion.

Oh, yeah, but that's too much. How much too much? You know, I don't know. We just saw you. Romero, they don't make weight, and now he's going to fight for the champion. So it's just crazy, you know, like, so I do understand, but on the other time, on the other time, like, he's just, I just bet they have a new rules now that you've got to come with the 15%, but, you know, I don't know about the new rules yet.

You know, if they make clear, I'm going to make the weight and going to have no issue. No, for sure. How much money do you think you lost as a result of all of this? Bro, I don't, so I have more personal physical therapies that I work with him by, by a camp or close by camp. It's over like two grants because I train. I like to say I like to work hard. I don't train just that simple session. If I can't do more, I'm going to do more.

I'm going to extra run. I'm going to actually do something. So on that camp, I'm going over with Miami one or twice a week to train you with cyborgs. So I paid the gene over there, kind of $1.5th a month. Then I have my conditioning that they do all the came from me at IEDP with J.C. Santana. So I pay monthly, I think total. I expay without getting nothing return to do about kind of five grants that I put on that six grants. And again, no, and then I get nothing, you know.

Right, right. Plus, I'm like, I had just a sponsor to respond to me with the car to go all the way there. I had a couple of sponsors that helped me out, but I still put in a lot of money, extra money, getting nothing back. I know. If the new rules are there, just, you know, let me know, everyone knows, and I'm going to make great. I'm going to honor my contract. Last thing for you, Gilbert, and I really appreciate you coming on and talking about this. So there are some reports that you're fighting Lando Venada in April.

Is that true? Yeah, we're talking. I think we verbally. He accepted the fight. Me too. I want to fight. I just had a camp. So, yeah, we should finalizing the contract.

But I heard, I heard, I heard, yeah, a lot of guys talking. Things almost sure. We didn't sign yet. But verbally, he said, yeah, he said, yeah. I think we had a fight. Which card? It's on April 14th, just engaged again, Dustyporea. Yeah, Orlando.

Okay. Well, again, I'm sorry this happened. Glad that you're okay. I'm very sorry. It went down this way, but I appreciate you coming on and talking about this, Gilbert. Thank you. Thank you, everyone. Thank you, everyone. You know, and let's go the next one. I was a different fight. Way different style, but I'm going to get prepared for that one. I wish you the best. Thank you very much, Gilbert. We'll see you next time. There he is. Gilbert, Derino Burns, unfortunate situation. as I said at the top I give a lot of respect for the UFC for recognizing that maybe 30 pounds is a lot

especially as we've seen over the last couple months some scary weight cuts most notably with Uriah Hall but he is right that maybe specific guidelines specific limits if you're fighting at 155-156 you can't check in over 171 or something like that that may be what would help some of the fighters but I appreciate him coming on and giving his side of the story.

Okay, as we said at the top of the show, the big story of the weekend, of course, Jeremy Stevens versus Josh Emmett and the controversial finish. I told you what I thought needed to happen after discussions with some of the best in the game. We have not heard from Josh Emmett up until this point. Let us change that. Let us go to the Magic of Skype. Very happy that he has agreed to come on the program and talk to us. We're now being joined by Josh Emmett, who I do believe.

is still in Florida. Josh, how are you? I'm doing all right. How are you doing, Ariel? I'm doing great, and I really appreciate you coming on and talking about this. I know it's probably not the most pleasant thing to talk about, but we certainly appreciate it very much. First things first, most importantly, physically, how are you feeling right now? I understand that you suffered multiple fractures of your orbital bone. How are you doing physically on this Monday afternoon? Yeah. No, I'm doing good for the most part. I, uh,

Yeah, I have, you can see here, I have, it's a tripod fracture, so there's three different fractures and three different bones in the orbital. And then I, I just left the dentist office because I had, I don't know, some messed up teeth. So I just got three root canals done. So that was, that was fun. But other than that, just my heart hurts a little. But, yeah, I'm ready to get back in there. Do you need surgery on the orbital? I believe so. I was in the hospital the night after the fight, and they were going to do an emergency surgery.

But since I didn't damage, like, a lot of the major nerves were still intact. I didn't have to do surgery, so I'm going to get back home. I'll probably do something in Sacramento or go down to the Bay Area and have Stanford work on it. Are you still in Florida because of the injuries, or were you always scheduled to still be in Florida? Yeah, I'm here just because I had a lot of friends and family come out. So they all went to Disney World with their families and stuff like that. So my wife and I planned on going. But I had some other issues I had to take care of. So we were unable to make it out to Disney World.

But maybe tomorrow we might meet up with them. Because of your health? Yeah, for the most part. We were going to meet up earlier. But I had to get in and see the dentist ASAP just to make sure that I didn't take a chance losing my teeth. Okay. This may be a silly question about asking anyway. Did you suffer a concussion? I'm assuming I did. You know, the hospital I went to in Orlando was pretty bad. Like when I was in the bat getting checked out by the UFC doctors, everything was okay. I got put in the ambulance,

and then I'm allergic to morphine. I, you know, I experienced vomiting and just get nauseous. So I told them that. That's all they had on hand. So they didn't give me any pain medicine. And then I got to the hospital and I don't know what the holdup was, but it took, man, it took so long before they administered anything to me. So I was just like laying there in pain. And then, you know, like 90 minutes into it, I finally started getting some pain meds. They gave me like 0.5 milligrams of something. That didn't do anything.

Then they gave me some more. That didn't do much. Then they gave me a full dose. And then I started to kick in. And then what they were saying is they usually typically don't do that because, you know, it slows your oxygen levels down. I guess I kind of stopped breathing for a little bit. And the alarm was going off. So I was woken up when they were shaking me.

Like breathe, breathe. And then that happened a few times. So it was a little bizarre, not the best experience I've had in the hospital, but it is what it is. Would you say this was the worst experience of your MMA career, like just the pain that you've felt afterwards the result of what happened in the fight? Is that fair to say? I don't know. My first U.S.C. fight was pretty painful. That compound fracture.

That was painful. When I fought in Sacramento in my hometown, I got a bad knee or kick in the first round, separated the cartilage, couldn't really breathe. That was pretty bad, but this was just a little different. You know, I thought my jaw was broken, but that wasn't the case. It was just the orbital and then, you know, the displacement of the T. So it's definitely up there. Have you ever broken your orbital before before? I have not.

I've broken my jaw before. I broke this part in half, and then I shattered the right side in training. before back in the day, but this is just different because there's so many nerves, like I said, in the orbital. So my whole lip, my nose is completely numb and my face. So it's like I can't feel anything. It's just, it's just a weird sensation, you know, so I don't know if I, if I have anything on my lip or if I'm drooling or if I'm, you know, drinking something and it's coming out. My wife just keeps telling me you have something right there. And I'm like, I can't feel it. So it's just frustrating. Have you had a chance to watch the fight on television or on your phone online?

I have not. Man, I really, like I said, I was in the hospital. I was in there until 4 a.m. I, you know, it's kind of just in and out of it. Then they took me back to the hotel. I woke up in the room. And I didn't realize that my wife and I were staying at an Airbnb. And then I woke up in the room in the morning in a hotel and I was like looking around and I was like man where am I um and then I started getting all these like just text messages and stuff I didn't check my my phone the night before and people were talking about it illegal blows and and your eye had talked about you know appealing it and my management team so I had no idea what was even going on and then and then I saw a short clip that my manager sent me and and then I watched it and I was like oh man that that

That makes sense. I thought I got kind of hit with the uppercut. Could have been a knee. And then obviously I'm getting hit. We're in the fight. So I'm not going to stop and be like he's hitting me in the back of the head. You know, and not saying he's a dirty fighter at all. But after watching it, I just wish I had more of a fair chance.

You know, I wish Dan would have done his job. If he would have stopped the fight, I got a little time to recover. They maybe took a point away from Stevens. It could have been a completely different outcome. And he's saying he didn't see it. I watched the clip. Uri even sent me a picture, and it shows the need connecting with my head and Dan looking right at us.

So I just, I don't really get what the whole, how he couldn't see it. I know this has happened in the past, even at UFC 210 when I think it was Wyden and Musassie, it was a legal blow and he stopped the fight. But then this was an illegal blow and he didn't stop the fight. So I don't know. I just wish I had a fair chance. could have been a different outcome. So based on what you've seen,

you feel like the punches that were thrown before the knee were illegal, they hit you in the back of the head? Oh, there was for sure. There was like two, three elbows to the back of the head. And I know I turned over, but I wasn't really, I wasn't moving my head a lot like they were saying.

You know, I was just taking hard elbows to the back of the head. And then I stood up. And, you know, it was a, it was a, I thought it was a pretty decent blow to the head, maybe not direct impact, but even a hard glancing shot is still a hard shot. And then obviously the elbows that he followed up with, those are the ones that kind of put me out and hurt me. The knee after the punches to the back of the head and the elbows or to the side, and those

are always tough in the heat of battle. It's always tough for a referee to determine, you know, are you moving into them and what's going on? So you'd like to give the referee the benefit of the doubt. But that knee where he's clearly squaring you up and you're on your knees so you're in that illegal down position, so to speak, do you recall at all? And I know this is a very hard question, but just for the sake of asking, do you recall how much it hits you if it hit you at all? Because that seems to be the big point of discussion. Did that knee actually hit you? It's clear that it hits you on the way back in the back of the head, but the initial throwing of it, Did you recall it touching your head at all your forehead?

I just thought it was a blow. I didn't know what hit me. But it definitely skinned me after watching it and coming down. And regardless of the new rules or the old rules, I was still a downed opponent because both knees were down. So even if one hand or two hands was up, it was still an illegal blow. Even as Daniel Cormier said, any impact, it doesn't matter how hard it is if it makes contact. acted still in an illegal blow. He should have stopped the fight right then.

I got my break, whether they take a point away or not. You know, and it could have been a completely different outcome. That's what it's just, I didn't even know, you know, it was a fight. Sure. I know he wasn't trying to do that to the heat of the battle. But, man, there's a reason why there's rules in place. So I think they should have implemented them. and yeah, it's just, it's frustrating now, you know, but it is what it is.

In the post-fight show, on the post-fight show, Jeremy Stevens said that in the back, he was told by Damri Gleada that if you have a hand up that that is a legal strike. I believe, with all due respect to him, and I don't believe he's a dirty fighter, I believe he's confusing two rules. I believe he's confusing the old, you know, down-d opponent rule where you have two feet up, but no knees on the ground and you play the game. And the rule where if you have a knee, down, it's illegal no matter what. I think he's confusing

those two things, but I'll ask you because maybe it's Dan Reguatta who's confusing it. I would be very surprised if a referee of that stature is, but did Dan go out of visit your locker room and tell you the same thing that Jeremy Stevens is saying, Dan told him? Yeah, he said that Florida's under the new rule.

So I know what the old rules are. Like you're saying, so if you're in like a tripod position on both feet, both hands are down, I pick one up, then you can knee or kick in the face. But when both knees are down, you're still a downed opponent. I could have lifted both my hands up. He needs me in the face. That's a downed opponent, which I was clearly. And I don't even think he picked one hand up, like he said. I saw that interview. He put both his hands on my shoulders and went for the knee to my

head. So whether one hand, two hands was up, it's still a downed opponent. It's still an illegal blow to the head. It should have been stopped. Yep. Do you feel like he did it on purpose? Do you think he just lost control and on purpose? No, I don't think so. You know, it's a fight. You know, you're trying to win the fight. We both are. I don't believe he's a dirty fighter either.

I don't believe he was doing it on purpose. But I can't say that because I don't know what he was thinking, you know. So maybe he was, but I would hope he wasn't trying to do that, which I don't think he is. But it's still a rule is a rule. I just can't get over that. You know, otherwise, there should be no rules, and it should be with pride rules, you know, back in, you know, if there's rules that are set, they need to be obeyed. Did you hear, have you heard from Jeremy since the fight ended? No, I haven't heard anything from him, but I just went out, you know, I posted something the other day and, you know, just congratulated him and just saying like it.

And then after seeing that, you know, I would like a rematch, you know what I mean? I was winning the first round. I was winning the second round, doing really well. He caught me. Just perfect, you know, little left hook on the chin. I was composing, getting back up, and then I just felt like some of those illegal blows and made it a lot worse for me.

Have you heard from Dammer Glead at all? No, no. Did you recall him saying anything to you after the fight? No, no, I don't remember anything. So are you going to appeal the loss? Yes, I didn't even know anything about that. So Uriah is one of my managers and Tabriz and Zari. So they're the ones that started the process.

And I guess after some, I don't know, the media was talking to them, they were the ones saying that, oh, we're appealing it. So I didn't even know until the next day. And then they already started that process today. Okay. Okay. Because they look out for my best interest. Sure. I totally, you know, I know they're looking out for me and I'm up for whatever they want to do.

And to be clear, in a perfect world, you'd love a rematch with Jeremy? I would, yes. That's your ideal scenario. Next fight, whenever that is, whenever you heal up to get another shot at him. Yeah, I'll take it in a heartbeat. Okay. Did you hear from the UFC at all about their thoughts? UFC officials, Dana White, Shantza, anyone reach out to you?

No, I haven't heard a word. You know, I haven't heard a word from anybody at the UFC. You know, I'm just out here in Florida still. Broken orbital, messed up teeth. I haven't got any call, text, or emails. Wow. Does that disappoint you? I don't know, a little bit, but I don't know.

It does a little, you know, at least like, hey, how you doing? but I know what I signed up for. This is the hurt business. No one's looking out for me, but my teammates, my coaches, and my wife and family. Just curious, did you see any other portion of the post-fight show

and one person who has received some criticism as Dominic Cruz for really backing his teammate, but maybe doing it a little too much? Did you have any issues with the way the whole situation was being presented on either Fox or FS1, considering you are the one being affected by it? I saw a few clips of my teammates posting things.

I really didn't see anything because I was fighting and then I was in the hospital the whole night, but how he was just excited about what was going on on the Fox booth. I didn't really care for. After Wayne's, I went up there and I did the Fox booth live as well, and they positioned me right next to Dominic Cruise, and I know that's his teammate. I know it's his friend. I just thought it's kind of awkward, and he's asking me, like, questions that I'm, you know,

it's, uh, I know he's rooting for his teammate, obviously, you know, he's biased towards him, and he's trying to ask me questions that I already know, he's just trying to get a rise out of me. And I don't have, I don't have, like, an alliance, or not an alliance, but I don't have, like, a feud against any of them. I don't know any of them personally. And he's asking me if I, there's a rival. There's no rival for me.

there may be from my teammates to their teammates, but I don't know them personally. So I'm not going to, you know, make accusations about someone I don't know. And I just thought that whole thing was a little weird. And then how he's carrying himself on the Fox panel when, you know, he's a, he's a journalist, and he should be held to a high standard. And I don't know. I think sometimes it just looks our sport look bad. You know, a last thing, I don't know if you obviously probably didn't.

you've got better and more important things to do. But I did reach out to several referees. And I just wanted to throw this your way after what happened on Sunday and ask them what they would have done. And you know, this is a tricky situation for them because, you know, Dan is a colleague. So no one wants to really come out and criticize and say, oh, I would have done X and Y. But to a man, the unanimous response was the action should have been paused because of the legal strike thrown and grazing your head is very clear that you were down. pause, separate you two, bring in the ringside physician. If the ringside physician says that you can go and you say that you can go,

point deduction from Jeremy Stevens, which you said. If the ringside physician says you can go, but you say for whatever reason you can't go, K-O for Jeremy Stevens, and if the ring-side physician says you can't go, then it's a DQ. One of those three things should have happened after bringing in the doctor and, of course, the fight being paused. And so my stance is, and I would say to you,

I would say to Jeremy, I'd say to Dominic, anyone, you deserve better. You deserve the fight, you know, being paused because there's nowhere in the rule books that states, grazing is okay, but connecting flush is not. If it touches, it touches. And to me, it clearly touched. And to me, you were clearly down. And in the post-fight interview when he says, he thought that your hand was up, and that's why he threw it, he's obviously confused there. And that's okay. But he's also admitting that he threw that knee intentionally. So that's a problem. And so I really feel for you. And, you know, I think it's a crummy situation that you were put in, especially in your first main event.

So I'm sorry it went down that way. It's okay. And that's what I, man, I felt great. Like I said, I was winning the first round. You know, the second round was going really well. And it is just unfortunate, you know, because it was such a big fight for me and just the way it ended, you know. And, man, it's upsetting. but I can't really, there's nothing I can really do.

And, you know, my management team's talking about filing an appeal, but I don't know really where to go from there, and it's an uphill battle, and it's going to be a little tricky, I'm assuming, but hopefully it all turns out well. Last thing, would you like to see replay being used more? You know, in Florida you can use replay. Do you think that should be something used? I definitely think so.

And I think in the past, even in the UFC, they don't, really use too much replay anyways, right? It's a newer thing, yes, in some jurisdictions. Yeah, so I think they should go back to that or have some sort of protocol where they can do these things to legitimize these rulings, you know, because it's at the top of the game and it's on the same playing field as like the NFL and NBA, and they do instant replay and things like that because you can lose a fight. And this was a huge opportunity for me.

And this was going to be life changing. And now it ended that way. And then, you know, I still get the critics like, oh, well, you still lost. But I'm like, it doesn't matter. It's the way it went down, you know. Otherwise, there wouldn't be rules in the first place, but there are rules. When you fly home? We're actually leaving tomorrow night.

Okay. Well, safe travels. As soon as I get home. Yep. Oh, no, I was going to say, as soon as I get home. home, I have to see a doctor, and then we're going to check out the orbital and probably get right into surgery ASAP so I can have a speedy recovery and get back into the gym. Well, I certainly wish you a speedy recovery. I wish you nothing but the best. I really appreciate

you coming on and talking about this, Josh. Thank you so much. Try to enjoy the sunshine over there in Florida, and I hope you'll be back at it sooner rather than later. I know these appeals often don't work, but, you know, good luck with it. And I know there's also a stigma attached to the appeal where you get called for like, oh, being a sore loser, but you said of yourself, rules are rules. So you might as well try to do what's right. Thank you again. Congrats on a great fight up until that point. And I hope that we'll see you back in there sooner rather than later. All right. Thanks again, Ariel. I appreciate you. All right. There he is. Josh Emmett. Unfortunate situation, but I can't thank him enough for coming on.

Yeah, just a bummer, but I do think his breakdown of what should have happened is correct. I've obviously stayed in my opinion. And I also respect the fact that he is not harboring any ill will towards Jeremy Stevens. And I actually think that like a lot of people are confusing this. Just because we criticize a situation or weigh in on a situation, just because we're saying what should have happened, doesn't mean that we're calling Jeremy a bad guy, doesn't mean that we're calling him a cheater, doesn't mean that we're calling him a scumbag, doesn't mean that we're calling him dirty. But things happen in the heat of battle. We know that. We have the benefit of sitting at home and watching a million replays. I know that Dan McGuade doesn't have that benefit.

So at the very least, that's why I feel like it was clear something happened there, right? Pause the action, assess the situation, bring in the doctor. And nowhere in the rule books does it say, yeah, but this wasn't the most damaging blow. It only talks about illegal shots that are landed. And in my opinion, one landed. One. Forget about the others that you want to, like there is clearly one before the end. So we'll see what happens. Typically, these appeals don't work, but maybe Josh Emmett will have better luck. Okay, let us move along coming up at UFC 223 in a little over a month in Brooklyn, New York. It's going to be Alex Casares against the one and only Ardum Lobov. It's been quite some time since we talked to Ardham. He's joining us now. Be in the magical Skype.

There he is. The Russian Hammer himself. Where have you been, Ardham? Oh, good. How are you doing, Ariel? I've just been here in Ireland training my ass off. Okay. Well, welcome back, my friend. It's great to talk to you. It's great to have you back on the show. Let's start here. The last time we saw you in action was several months ago. And after the fight, it did seem like you were sort of teasing that maybe you would walk away. Did you ever seriously consider retiring after your last fight? You know, I didn't really. I more so meant maybe a change of sport. You know, it's a kind of difficult position. to be in where I actually have other options. You know, I have offers from, you know, K1 promotions. I had boxing offers. I have offers from other, you know, MMA organizations.

I could go back into banking, you know. So it's kind of a difficult situation. Obviously, you know, I'm always a realist. You know, I assess the situation realistically. You know, I obviously love MMA and I enjoy fighting. I love fighting. But, you know, sometimes if I see perhaps maybe, a change of

profession is in order or maybe I could go into a different sport you know like Connor did before so that was kind of that that was that tweet was about that more than anything I didn't really I wasn't going to retire

completely because I don't think I could actually do that if I want to because as long as I know I'm healthy and I'm able to fight you know my heart you know there's just a fire in my heart that burns and it just you know makes me want to get into that octagon and throw it down. You know, I absolutely love doing it. So, so I don't really see myself being able to

fully retire, but I just sort of was hinting at perhaps change of sport or profession or whatnot. You didn't really consider banking, though. I can't see the Russian hammer banking. You know, you know, when you're kind of a loser fight and you're at a very low point, you know, strange things go through your mind. Yeah. Yeah, obviously, you know, when I kind of reassess it and think about it a little bit more. Banking is probably the last thing in my mind. Okay, so how close to leaving MMA were you and focusing on kickboxing or boxing?

Well, I'll be honest with you. I messaged the UFC and I told them. I said, look, guys, I understand, you know, the position I mean, you know, if I get cut here, I completely understand what's happening, you know, it's going to be a fair decision. and I will take it, you know, on the chain, it's, you know, probably I wouldn't be happy about it, but, you know, what can you do? It's a fair decision. I mean, many people have been kept in my

situation. There's multiple examples. But also many have been cut. So if I was to get cut, I would understand it and that would be fine with me. Did they respond and say why they were keeping you? Or were you left in the dark? How did it go down? Yeah, the UFC just responded and they just said, no, they were, they, they were, They were happy to keep me. You know, I always bring it. You know, I don't turn down fights. I'm easy to deal with.

You know, whatever guy that want me to fight, it's a yes for me. You know, I don't bitch and moan about anything, you know, and I'm a true fighter. And the fans love watching my fights. You know, if you look at most of the other guys that are kind of outside of, let's say, top 15, you rarely hear anything about them, whether they get caught or whatever. You don't even notice that. Whereas I seem to be one of the guys that people pay attention to. Whether it's to do with my friendship with corner, yeah,

probably definitely plays a big part. Whether it's to do with my three knockouts on the Ultimate Fighter, that probably has a part in it as well. Or it's because I'm able to either head kick and stand up like nothing happened and continue pressing forward and throwing down. That probably has something to do with it also. In reality, it's probably a combination of all those things. But, you know, the truth of the matter is,

people watch my fights. And at the end of the day, that's what matters. You can be the best guy in the world, but if no one wants to see you fight, well, then there's no money to be made. Considering all that, are you surprised that they kept you or not really? To be honest, not really. Like I said, there are multiple examples out there where people have been kept. And also, you know, given the fact that, you know,

I'm on a two-fight losing streak, but one of the losses was a fight of the night, performance against the top four opponent, you know. So that's a big, big task in itself. And then the last fight itself wasn't that bad either. You know, it wasn't fight of the night, but still was a good, exciting fight. You know, there was a lot of exchanges. And, you know, fans can expect to see more of that now that I'm still in the UFC. So you are given another chance.

You're fighting April 7th in Brooklyn, UFC 223 against Alex Casares. I know you say you don't turn down anything and you don't. But when you were presented, this opportunity? Did you like this fight? Did you like the card? Did you like the location? Did you like the opponent? I certainly love this card. Yeah, I mean, New York, you know, who wouldn't want to fight in Brooklyn, New York? And the opponent, of course, I mean, Alex, I've known him for quite some time now, you know, he's a very unorthodox guy, but he's gotten a lot more, he wrestles a lot more, and he's last few fights. And that probably is due to the fact that he's dropped a few decision

losses where guys just kind of outwrestle him and just score a lot of points. So he probably seen how many points take down score. So that's what he does nowadays a lot more. But I was certainly happy with the matchup. You know, he's a small enough guy because he made bantam weight before. So that tells me he mustn't be that big of a featherweight. He doesn't really have a knockout punch. So, you know, that's always good.

Not that that ever mattered for me before. But still, it's a good one, you know. So I feel he's quite open. And I think there's going to be openings there for me to catch him and land some nice shots and produce another interesting fight. Can we clear up the Zabit thing once and for all? Because from what I understand, you were okay with the fight, and he concedes that, but he says that your coaching staff said no to the fight.

You guys squared off at an event in Russia, I do believe. There was a picture that went out. Were you offered a fight against Zabit? And what was your response when you were offered this fight? Okay, I think the first thing we need to clear up here is that anything that Zabiz manager says, we cannot take it seriously. I mean, I think that's a fair point. I think that's a pretty fair point. I mean, that guy, you know, I, to be honest, I hate seeing managers talk so much shit.

If you're not the guy getting in there answering for your words, then keep your mouth shut. That's my view on that. You know, any other fighter can say something to me if they're willing to get in there with me and throw down and answer for their words. And I always feel the same way whenever I say something about another fighter. If he is to challenge me to a fight, I will accept it. I will step into that octagon and I will answer for my words. So that gives me the right to say what I want to say. But the manager doesn't have that right.

You're talking about Ali Abdelaziz, right? Just to be clear for the viewers at home. Yeah. Yeah. And I mean, I've asked Sean Shelby on a number of occasions for that fight. I've messaged him personally saying, look, I want that fight. His management wanted, I want it, let's make it happen. And it hasn't happened.

I mean, I can see why the UFC, let's say, want to give him somebody else maybe. You know, I'm on two losses now. He's on two wins. So, you know, he's on a different path right now. I need to get back into the winning ways. So I can see that. But as far as my management or my team or anybody turning down a fight, that is complete bullshit. I have never in my life turned down a fight.

Never. And I never will. And my management, my coaches, they are well aware of that. So that was absolute crap. So you said yes, and for whatever reason it was the UFC's decision to not make the fight. Yeah. Okay. Are you upset that you're not getting the fight?

As far as I know, I sent the message. I won the fight for multiple times. This wasn't the first time. And I just didn't. They said, no, no to the beat. They said, but we'll get you somebody else. Okay. Probably not to the beat.

And then not something else. That was it. I have to ask, is there a growing sense of frustration because even Ali calling Connor a prostitute, which I think crossed the line last week, he has taken shots at your coach, John Kavanaugh. Is there a growing sense of, you know, like, did you want to beat this guy up because that's your closest, you know, way to shut him up? Is there like a growing sense of frustration amongst the team about things that he's saying about you and other fighters? I'm really smart. I'm really smart. There is no way I would take out my frustration for some dope of a manager that talks a lot of crap.

up on a fighter. You know, I know Zabit has nothing to do with that. You know, he is just working with this guy at the moment. And in the future, he might not be working with him anymore. There's plenty of guys that have been working with that with Abdulazizza and they don't anymore. So, so of course, I wouldn't take out my frustration. My frustration is with the manager himself. And I already explained why my frustration is there because he is not the guy fighting. So he should probably, you know, stay away from all that. I mean, let's just remember that ridiculous time when he took Frankie Edgar's Twitter and started tweeting

pretending to be Frankie. I mean seriously like I mean come on now. This guy is a clown. He is not a fucking manager. I wouldn't want that guy to represent me. I literally wouldn't let this guy represent my fucking toenail. Seriously. Because if he is your manager and he represents you

that's a reflection on you as a fighter and if you let this guy do that sort of fucking comedy stuff that he puts out there like he did with Frankie's Twitter before, I mean, come on no, we cannot take this guy seriously. This is not a guy we need in this sport. Maybe in the 1993, when UFC first started, he could have been someone's manager. But now this is the age where you need a real businessman to handle your business. And Artem, do me a favorite,

do me a favorite, put your camera down a little bit. I want to see your full, there we go, there's the full face. I just want to see your full face. All right, so you have this opportunity and when I found out about it, I said this is brilliant because there's a huge Russian population in Brooklyn, as you may know, and that's why it's brilliant that Chabib is on the card. And there's also a huge Irish population in New York, as you may know.

And so I thought this is a great booking. And then when I put out the news, everyone, you know, responded saying, oh, of course, this just ensures that Connor is coming to UFC 223. And I totally didn't think of that until the people on the internet reminded me that, you know,

of course the lightweight tidal and all that, you being on the card, does it ensure that Connor will be there? Well, it's certainly important. probably helps the situation for sure. I mean, this is a matchup that I'm sure they would like Connor present during that match. I mean, they've done that with Aldo Mendez in Brazil. So I'm sure they would love to see Connor in there. I mean, there's a big anticipation for Connor fighting either one of those two guys already. So him being present at the event as they

throw down for that belt, of course, that's going to only add to it. So I'm sure UFC probably would love him to be there. Has he told you if he's coming or not? You know, it's too soon to say, you know, Conner is a busy man. He's a businessman. You know, there's many things that need to be taken care of. So, you know, but I always know, you know, I always have his support. I know if there's an opportunity.

If he doesn't have to be elsewhere, then he will be there supporting me. How close were you in the team to going to Vegas this Saturday to fight for a 165-pound title against Frankie Edgar? Very close. Really? Very, very close. It was real. It was very, very, it was real. Ah, 100%.

Connor was ready to go. That was it. Like, we were just, you know, gathering the troops already, ready to go. You know, we're planning, what do we do? We just fly off to Vegas straight away to, you know, do this short little camp or, you know, plans were in place and everything. Everyone was ready to go. Connor wanted to fight. You know, I was, you know, talking to him the whole time.

And, you know, he was ready to go. Wow. So there was what he can do. So why didn't it happen to the best of your knowledge? To the best of my knowledge, I think this was, UFC weren't really all for it because, I mean, you know, it was really short notice, wouldn't have given enough time to kind of build the fight.

And so from what I understood, that was the main kind of reason for it. Ah, that's too bad. I want to ask you, there was a picture that was tweeted. You were, and correct me if I'm wrong, were you at the Kremlin? were you working as security for the Russian government? Can you explain?

This was like a couple of months ago. You were there for several weeks, right? We may have lost them. Is this what happens when you ask about? Is this like the elections? I think we lost Arnhem. But we'll get them back. Let's reconnect.

The timing is unfortunate on that one, but we will get him back. And how about that revelation that Connor did in fact offer his services? I call hogwash to the idea that on a week or so notice, it is not enough time. This would be more than a week. This would be almost a month. But even if it is a week, like we learned, the one thing we learned that UFC 196 with Nate Diaz that you don't need all that much time to promote a Connor McGregor fight, and a Connor McGregor fight does not suffer pay-per-view buy rate-rate-wise

if a fight is thrown together on short notice. That's the one thing we learned with that. I mean, that fight was done on 10 days notice and it, you know, broke all kinds of records. Is Arden back? There he is. Yeah, I'm back. Ardum, I ask you about the Russian government and you and you disappear. What's up with that?

That's crazy. I know. I think that the fear is going to go break. I know. It's great. So what was that? Can you tell us? No, so basically I was invited into Kremlin to train the forces.

It's the people that protect their president. It's called the FSO. Okay. The department is called FSO. So this is those people. I mean, they already trained guys, but, you know, they just wanted to get a little bit training in with me. You know, they're big funds of MMA.

They do a lot of training themselves. So that was just that. You know, I just came there for one day to train them and kind of spend some time with them. And it was an absolute honor. And I was absolutely delighted to be invited there. And I would absolutely do it again if I was asked. Did you meet Putin himself?

No, unfortunately, I did not meet the president himself. I mean, this is certainly on my wish list. I really hope that one day I get to meet him, but I didn't get to meet him at that moment now. Was that your first time in the Kremlin? Yes, it was my first time ever. I mean, I remember being there as a kid, just kind of looking onto it and thinking that, you know,

would be nice to go in there one day. But I, you know, it was really, really, you know, As a Russian person growing up, you see Kremlin. Kremlin is a very, very special place for any Russian. So for me to actually go in there and do all that, and it was absolutely incredible. I was speechless. Was it nicer than you envisioned it being?

It was very, very nice. I was very impressed with what the permanent looked like on the inside. To be honest, I don't even know where I envisioned. I didn't really know what to expect. You know, I just knew Kremlin. This is the place, you know, this is the most important place for For Hino-Russian, I guess. And I didn't really know what to expect. But when I did see it, I was very impressed.

Two last things, Arnh, before we go, are you doing anything different in this camp? Have you learned any lessons from the losing streak? Do you feel like you need to change anything? And if so, is there anything you could tell us about what you're doing differently to prepare for this fight? Yeah, maybe, you know, I'll, I've worked. working on my takedown defense. I mean, I did feel in the field of fight it was good before I got kicked in the head. He tried a few takedowns and I was able to stop them. My reaction was good. You know, my hips was strong. You know, I felt good. But obviously after I had that, you know, my mind wasn't there, 100% I guess. I was a little bit, you know, a little bit, I guess you could not confuse, but just not 100% there. So he was able to take me down then. But I still worked a lot. I continued. working a lot more on my takedown defense. I've sharpened up,

got some detailed my submission, because I was able to go for that leg lock on him multiple times, but I just wasn't able to finish. So recently we had Craig Jones over, who is one of the best grapplers in the world, and a leg lock specialist himself. So it was great to get those little detail

that I was missing. So certainly my submission game has gone to a different level now, my takedown defense, and perhaps maybe I'll be a little bit tighter in my striking this time around. You know, I don't want to get kicked in the head one more time. This was my second time by the eating head kick.

But still, I've never been knocked out, my friend. You know, yes, I did get kicking the head, but this Russian-Irish head, you do nothing to it. Yes. They call you the hammer for more reasons than one. It's hard to knock down a hammer as well as, you know, the power that comes from the hammer. Do you feel that it's do or die, though, this fight? Is it a must-win to stick around? Yeah.

But you know, it's certain to stick around. Yes, definitely. That's definitely. It's a must win. That's the way I want to approach it, to be honest. That's the way I want to approach the fight. Because I feel you should approach like every fight this way anyway. Sure.

Because that's what makes it an exciting fight. Sure. If it do or die, then there's no way back. There's no way out. There's you can only win. That's the way I approached my whole life. I have to succeed in this life no matter what. It doesn't matter what I'm going to be doing, but I have to succeed and I will succeed.

By the way, do you see the things on Twitter, like people calling you the goat and all the gifts and things like that? The reaction, anything that you do is sometimes hilarious, but you do have a passionate following, whether it's sometimes in jest, tongue and cheek. People react to you, and at the end of the day, that's all that really matters. Do you see this stuff? And if so, how do you receive it? How do you feel about it? Yeah, I see it, of course. I mean, I don't really mind.

You know, I love banter. I love laughing, you know, sense of humor is a very, very important thing. Like, you know, I'm sure I spoke to you before and I said, you know, I've had, I don't want to moan about a complaint about my life, you know, but there's been many difficult moments in my life. And sometimes, you know, laughter is all you have left. And, you know, if you kind of smile a little bit and able to kind of, you know, laugh a little bit, things don't seem that bad. And then you're able to carry on and continue and keep pushing forward. So it's no big deal, you know, to me. It's fine. You know, I'm here. to prove what I'm worth, you know.

And I think I've done that a little bit in certain moments, but I know I have a lot more to prove and a lot more to show of what I can do. And I think I will get my opportunity. Artem, you're the man. It's always great to catch up with you. I wish you nothing but the best on April 7th. Can't wait to be there.

It's a great card for you to be on in Brooklyn with the Russian and an Irish population. Very happy that you're sticking around. I did not think that they should cut you after those two losses. We've seen way worse, and those are two quality opponents. So kudos to you. Best of luck in training. Thank you for the time, as always.

And glad that you were able to come back on the show. There was a time when you were so popular, you were turning me down. I remember that. You remember that back in the summer? You were so popular that you had to actually turn me down. But I'm glad that we're friends again, and you made some time for me, Ardum. Thanks for having me, April. It was a pleasure.

It's a pleasure. It's a pleasure. We'll talk to you soon. There he is. The one and only, Ardomlobub, the Russian Hammer. Once he was known as the Prospect Killer, now he is the Russian Hammer, and he returned. turns to action on April 7th. What a great card that is. Brooklyn, New York, Barclay Center, Alex Casares. That's a fun card. That's a fun fight on a fun, that's a fun fight,

on a fun, that's a fun fight on a fun card on April 7th across the river in Brooklyn, New York. All right. Let us move along. Brian Keller had the biggest win of his career on Saturday in Orlando. UFC on Fox 28. You recall he was in studio as he was preparing for that fight. He just got the news that he'd be fighting the former UFC bantamweight champion

Hennon Burrow. Well, he got the call. He stepped up. And I do believe he was around 10 to 15 seconds away from actually finishing Henan Burow on Saturday night. He is a friend of the show

and of course, after that victory, we had to talk to him. So he joins us now. Via the Magic Skype. Look at that. Future so bright. He's got to wear the shades.

Boom, Keller. in the house. How about that? Congratulations, my man. I got something for you. Okay, okay, okay. I came into this game and nobody knew my name. Took out the former world champ. I'm a lion, you can't tame. Self-belief is key, so I open up the lock. Would I had him knocked out if it wasn't for the clock. Oh, yeah. Boom. My man, boom. How about that? Way to go. Wow. That was good stuff. Was that a freestyle right off the bat off top of your head? No, I can't lie to you. I wrote that down.

You should have said yes. No, no, I came up with it, like, really fast, but I wrote it down just in case. I don't want to mess it up on the big show, you know? Yeah, yeah, yeah, I feel you. Where are you right now? Are you still in Florida? Yeah, I'm still in Florida. Yeah, I'm in Orlando right now.

You're taking some vacation time? Yeah, I'm here until Tuesday. Tomorrow I fly out. I had my girlfriend and my mom came in yesterday. and we're just spending some extra time hanging out with the family and my brothers are here and everything so it's pretty cool.

Wait, your girlfriend and mom came after the fight? Yeah, it's funny. Like, my older brother came here for the fight. He was in the crowd with my younger brother's friend. I had my dad and my other brother in my corner. I just like with my girlfriend and my mom, I just feel like they bring more nervous energy around me. So I'm like, I'm just straight focused.

Like I wait to see them, after the fight. Okay, fair enough. And it went well. I mean, what a stage, what an opportunity, what a fight, what a performance. You've been through so much, considering all of that, considering who you beat and the stage, I mean, this could sound crazy, but I have to ask it, would you say that was the greatest moment of your career thus far on Saturday?

Oh, yeah, 100%. I mean, this guy haunted me for like weeks and weeks, you know, like before I would go to sleep, I would visualize that I was fighting this guy, you know, who I looked up to before I got in the UFC, you know, as a former world champion, dreaming of days like this. And then there I was in the cage living it. And I was like, this is unbelievable. But this is what I want. This is where I belong. And this is how I'm going to prove, you know, my worth. You talked on the show about the nerves going into the debut. And of course, you've had several fights since then. But you just said that he haunted you in your dreams. And he is a former champion.

Were you more nervous than usual going into this fight? You know, the trip out, fight week, Saturday night. How did you feel? Yeah, you know what? I would say I was more nervous, like, leading up to the fight. But for the actual fight, I'm very professional with my mindset and how I get into, like, an unfazed mode before I get in the cage. So, you know, before the fight, I'm ready to go. I have killer instinct in me, and that's it.

You know, I don't care who it is across from me. But leading up to the fight, I just kept thinking Henan Burrow, Henan Burrow, like, thinking about the days where, you know, he knocked out favor and he was world champ and everything. and I was like, wow, man, like, I'm losing sleep over this guy, you know what I mean? But, yeah, getting in the cage, I felt supreme confidence. I knew I belong here, and I knew I could beat this guy. What is it like when you're in the cage and you're actually staring at him and Bruce Buffer saying his name? Henan Burrow, former champion.

What does that like for you? I know you're not only an MMA fighter, but you're like you're a fan of the sport. You watch all the fights. Is that surreal? Oh, 100%. I just, I was like, I feel like everything I used. usually do before my fight. Like I have a little routine. I kind of put my arms out. You know, buffer calls my name. Like, I was like lost in the moment. I was just like in awe. Like,

all right, here we go. Like, oh, my God, there he is, you know. I'm always like sizing up my opponents too. And like, I don't know. I feel like I make my opponents bigger than they are sometimes in my head. But, uh, yeah, it was weird. Like, look at a cross and I'm like, here I am fighting this guy now. Like, I can't believe I'm living this right now. This is crazy. But then I just, I had to focus and forget about all that and just get into the fight. But it's funny. because I usually start a little bit slow and it's kind of like a feel-out process but once I get hit

like he was kicking me that calf kick was catching me and I was like man this guy's trying to hurt me and that's when I turned it up and I was like firing back you know Are you happy with your performance I mean obviously you got the win and it was unanimous

and most judges I think if not all had it 30 to 27 did you like after the fact are you happy did you feel like okay that was the best that I could do? Yeah you know well I'm really happy with my performance a lot of people who don't understand understand the game planning and, you know, the technical things that goes into fighting a certain guy. Of course, you always want to be exciting.

And I know that third round was amazing. But Henan Burrell is a guy that gases out towards the later rounds. And he doesn't do that by going with his pace and coasting and just striking back and forth with him at a certain pace. Like, I was clinching with him on purpose because he's a guy that has a lot of lactic acid buildup in his muscles when you clinch with him and you make him. defend takedowns. I wasn't even going for most of the takedowns 100%. I was doing that to just get him to defend, get him to worry about it. And then in the third round, which I usually go into fights

thinking, I'm going the distance, no matter what. You know, you can never predict that a fight's going to end early. So I'm ready to go full three rounds. Go to war. It doesn't matter. But third round, I usually is my best round. And that's where like I find out what a guy's looking for. I can see what he has. I felt all his punches. I wasn't phased by anything so I can let loose now, you know. And so that's what I did towards the later round. I looked in his eyes. I was hurting him with a lot of shots. I see his eyes roll back. He's on wobbly legs. I tried to take the guy out, man. I was, like you said, I was like 10 seconds away from a K.O., I believe. Yeah, you really felt that. You really felt like he was on his last legs? 100%. I actually saw the referee in the corner of my eye during

that exchange, like kind of trying to step in closer, but then he would step away right after. So I'm like, man, I was throwing bombs in there, just trying to take this guy's head off, you know, like, and I saw his eyes, like I said, just rolling back. He was on wobbly legs. Like, he almost sat down a couple of times, but

like you saw with the Dillishaw fight, it doesn't matter, man. That guy just does not get K-Oed, you know? It's really hard to put him away. Were you upset that you couldn't finish him? Yeah, definitely. I mean, after looking back, I'm like, man, If I could have just TKO, KO right there at the end, that would have really sealed the deal on making a statement, you know,

because a lot of the other guys that Barow's fought that are at the top, the current world champion, you know, they couldn't put him out within three rounds, you know? So I really wanted to make that statement. So it sucks to like look back at it and be like, man, 10 more seconds, I had this guy's number. But either way, to be able to beat him and to look good against him like that and come out victorious, I'm happy.

You've obviously never fought him before, but you've watched him a ton. Is that the same Henan Burrow or is this a guy who's lost this step? And of course, you know, you and others have mentioned the Usada thing. How would you assess who he is today compared to the championship days? Yeah, you know what? This is a topic that's kind of been on my mind. You know, I'm a guy that's like on social media looking at all the comments. And like a lot of people kind of write, they write him off like he sucks.

You know, like they discredit my victory because they think that. that brow is washed up and everything. But I'll tell you, man, when I was in there, he felt sharp. He looked in really good shape. I mean, he was as lean as I've ever seen him. And, you know, with the USIDA thing, like, I never make an accusation. Who is to say that they saw him put a needle in his ass? You know what I mean?

And take the steroids. It's just like he looks different. Yeah, maybe he's a little bit more bloated, a little bigger in the past. But that doesn't really necessarily prove anything, you know. He's 31 years old. I'm the same age. he's training out of ATT and you got guys who've never fought in their lives

saying like he's washed up, he's this, he's that, like man, I'll tell you, I believe in my power, I hit that guy hard and I almost caoed him and put him away. Like, you can't discredit my win because of thinking, you know, he's washed up because the current world champion took his soul or whatever.

You know, I know what TJ took a lot out of him with that win, but that doesn't mean Burrow's not a great fighter and not a, you know, a championship level fighter. By the way, what's the aftermath like when you win like that against someone like Barrow on Big Fox, does it feel different? Is the aftermath, you know, the reaction, is it different than, say, a win on FS1 or fight past things like that?

Do you notice a difference? I mean, not really. I mean, it was cool to get a little bit of limelight with the interviews and everything backstage after that was cool. I'll tell you what, the Orlando crowd got loud for me with that boom after the fight. Yeah, yeah, yeah, that was good. But, yeah, that was nice. And I ran up to D.C.

And actually, you know what's funny? I don't even know if they caught this on TV. But after my fight, my brother's friend actually came up with this idea. And it came to me last second. I did a curling celebration. I don't know if anybody was so that. I did the curling thing. Oh, wow.

And my brother and me were like chopping away at it. And the crowd was cracking up. But I don't think they got it on TV. Oh, man. I didn't see that either. But maybe I was focusing on something else. But that is a great idea. Very timely of you.

You also, speaking of timely, you tweeted this morning because it has been a hot topic with Josh Emmett and Jeremy Stevens about what Dan Murgliata told you in the locker room because I was surprised to hear Jeremy say that he told him that, you know, lifting the hand, even if you're down, is legal. I do believe, with all due respect, again, to Jeremy Stevens, that he's confusing two rules. But I was just curious, since you tweeted it, tell us what did Dan tell you about the new rules in Florida? Yeah, I agree. I think Stevens is confusing the rules. and what Dan told me was that, yes, if you're on your feet and you're reaching down playing that touch game, that's no go. In Florida, you can't put your fingertips down

and you're not, you know, you're not a downed opponent if your fingertips are down and you're reaching like that. But if your palms are fully down, then you're a grounded opponent. Now, if you're on one knee or two knees, you're a grounded opponent. And I believe Emmett was on both of his knees when Stevens threw that knee, whether it hit or not, I think the guy's intentionally throwing a knee to hurt you to knock you out. That's an illegal strike. I mean, that's my opinion.

But, you know, that's how Dan Merglia explained it to me in the locker room. And I understood clear, you know, I know I don't play games when I fight. You know, I don't try to, you know, trick the guy like, oh, I'm down. I'm not because, I mean, the guy's going to, he's in the heat of the moment. He's going to throw the strike at you. So I think maybe Jeremy Stevens just confused the rule. Have you gone to Disney World yet? No, no, I haven't gone, man.

I'm such a simple guy that, like, I don't even want to deal with traffic. I don't want to deal with any of that nonsense. Like, I don't get crazy with drinking. Like, I got a smoothie with kale in it right here. Yes, the good light. The chance shake. So no Disney World celebration for you. No, no Disney World, just kind of walking around town and enjoying the sun,

going up to the pool at the hotel, like just relaxing with my family. That's all I need. You know, we had a good dinner last night, and I'm happy. So you say you want John Lineker in Atlantic City. Is that right? Yeah, I would love John Lennox in Atlantic City. You know, I got some bumps and bruises now, but I'm healing up pretty quick. I already feel a little better since the fight.

And, you know, I don't know. I'll probably be back in the gym within, like, a week or so. So it's about two months away. I mean, I'm for sure going to be ready for them. I don't know about him. But, yeah, I think that's a great matchup for me. you know, I think a lot of guys are afraid of his power, and I'm not one of those guys, man. Like, I'll get in the pocket in exchange.

I really believe in my chin. And I didn't feel phased by one punch that Barowl threw in this fight. I got hit. I got hit a bunch, but I didn't really feel it. It didn't rock me. It didn't phase me, you know, so I'm willing to get in there and take Linegar out. Do you hear anything back from the UFC? Do you know if they're interested in this?

Where do things stand two days later? You know, I know that Linneker's manager, I think it's Davis. I don't know. Yeah, Alex Davis. Yep, Alex. Yeah, Alex Davis. Yeah, he actually approached my manager, I think, it was like, does he really want that fight?

And my manager was like, yeah, I mean, that's what he called out for. So I think that they'll take interest in it. And I think after this performance, the UFC will definitely look into that. Yeah, man. I mean, not a lot of people are, you know, actively, and you are actively calling out John. Why him? Do you just feel like he's the next best step?

Like you said, a lot of people don't ask for John Lentiker. Why do you keep asking for him? Yeah, you know what? It's one of those things. After my debut, I fought a rank guy, and I figured if I take this guy out, if I finish him, that they might give me that fast track, you know? So the next guy I thought was, okay, let's be the Brazilian killer, which I just took out another Brazilian.

So I'm like, you know what? Let's stick to this theme. Let's call out John Linnaker. I think he's a good matchup for me. And yeah, he's number six or a first. So my goal is the title, you know, that's my ultimate goal. So whatever's going to bring me closer to that, I'm going for that. And I think Lennox is a guy right now.

He doesn't have a fight. He was supposed to fight Rivera, pulled out of that fight. Now he's probably looking for a new opponent to fill in. So I'm the guy, man. You took a big step on Saturday, Brian. You really did. Congratulations on the win. Very cool to see how far you've come.

Less than two years ago, you're asking New York Rick to take you to 205. Now you're knocking out essentially Henan Burrow on Fox. You're seconds away from finishing the former champion. I mean, look at you. Look where you're at. Shades on. Look at him. Still sitting in the back there, right?

I mean, unbelievable where your lives have gone. You talk about sliding doors, unbelievable. You would think New York, New York, Rick, would be in your chair by now, you know? I'm here beating Henan Burrall. Yeah. He's still back there, you know, behind the scenes. When he called you, did he even congratulate you? He probably didn't even congratulate you, right?

No, no, no, no, he did. He did. Yeah. It's all love with New York, Rick. Could you imagine? Oh, man, you know what was crazy? Yes, go ahead. At the way in, at the way ins when I saw Sean Shelby, I told him like, hey, do you remember me from UFC 202? I came down to the stands to like, you know, propose like, I'm ready to fight for the UFC.

Yeah, yeah. After my spinning back for the stand. And he's like, I actually do remember. And I'm like, man, look at me now. And he's like, it's crazy how time flies, right? I'm like, this is nuts. But you willed this into existence. You didn't give up.

You kept going. You kept fighting. You never lost your hunger. You never lost your desire. Your motivation. It's really an impressive thing. And especially after what we learned when you were in studio about the anxiety, you're an inspiration, my man.

So kudos to you. Congratulations. Enjoy the victory. Enjoy Florida. And, of course, good luck getting that fight against John Linnaker, whether it's in Atlantic City or maybe a little later on. Love that fight. I love that fight for you.

So well done. Thank you for the freestyle at the top there. It's not often we get, you know, exclusive freestyles here. I'm a man of my word. You know, I told you I was going to bring you something next time. That's right. All right. Thank you, Brian. All the best you will talk to you soon.

Congrats again. Thanks, Harry. I appreciate it. Boom. There he is. Boom Keller in the house. And how about this? Do we have, you know, yet last week we had the hat out, but we don't have the hat out. You know, it always changes. It always changes the setup here. but probably a week that we should have had the hat out. But what a big win for him. I said knockout.

He was literally seconds away. If you missed it, as I'm going to take this off, if you missed it, he was literally seconds away from finishing Hannah Burrow, a massive victory. And again, you got to give a lot of credit to a guy who is, you know, actively calling out the former, you know, former contender at 125, now contender at 135, John Lineker. I mean, what a great fight that would be.

What an unbelievable opportunity that would be for him in Atlantic City, close to his, you know, his residence in Long Island, so or on Long Island, as you should say. So congratulations to Brian Keller. We appreciate the freestyle. And we look forward to what's next for the man they call boom. All right. Now, let us turn our attention to UFC 222. This Saturday, Las Vegas, T-Mobile Arena. Main event, Chris Cyborg, against Jana Kunitskaya.

People's main event is the co-main event. It's Brian Ortega against Frankie Edgar. Without a doubt, the winner is next in line for a title shot. Of course, this card was originally supposed to be headline by Frankie Edgar versus Max Holloway for the featherweight title. Two weeks ago on this program, we add Frankie Edgar on the phone. Now we have him in studio. And a hell of a lot has changed since then. This is very exciting.

He has been in studio once before. How about this being graced in studio by the one and only, Frankie Edgar? How are you, my man? How are you doing? It's great to have you here. Please have a seat, Frankie. Thank you for doing this. Yeah, alright.

That's nice little... Did they bring you here, this first time in the news studio, right? Yes, it is. What do you think? It's a bit of an upgrade. You could see you face to face. I feel like we're always talking on the phone, texting, but here you are. How are you?

I'm good. You're good? Tired? No, I mean, I'm tired of doing interviews. You are. You are, all right. All right. It's been a long day?

Yeah, pretty long day, you know? When did it start? I got, I mean, I left my house at 8 o'clock. Damn. All over New York? All over New York, yeah. Okay. And when do you fly out?

Tomorrow morning. Is this not, are you cutting weight right now? Are you a little ornery? I mean, I'm not cutting weight, really. I mean, you know, I'm just making sure my weight's good. Okay. How much weight right now? I'm probably 10, maybe nine over. Okay. When you go around to these, you know, this is essentially like local for you, right, Tom's River. Kind of. Ish. Not real?

It's going to take me two hours to get home probably. Oh, really? You know, traffic, all that stuff. That's right. It could take me an hour if there was no traffic. Is this your last one? Last one. Okay. My question was, though, do you get the sense that a lot of people know who you are, or is it still in that, like, educational phase where you have to tell,

tell people what you do, who you are, the sport where it's at. No, I think for the most part, you know, especially around here, people know who I am. You know, I mean, unless they don't follow the sport, obviously. Sure. But do you get that a lot? Yeah, and more so every fight out, I get more, notice more and more. Okay. So we spoke to you two weeks ago, and then, you know, we were offered UFC very kind to bring you here.

So it's awesome to have you. Always love talking to you. And I was like, okay, now I have to get a little creative because we talked about taking the fight on short notice. But some stuff has happened since we last. talked. And I don't know when you got here, but we did have Connor McGregor's teammate, Aram Lobov on, and he said that they were like booking flights to go to Vegas to fight you. That's funny. How real was this from your perspective? I heard about it in the head. When did he get it? When did he say? Thursday? Thursday. That's

I woke up from a nap and I see it on Twitter. So that's the first you heard. First I heard ever. Never brought your attention. Never. Wow. Never. Unless someone didn't tell me. Right. I don't know. Did you ask your team, hey, did this ever come, you know, on your radar? Ali said that they asked about Connor. And they said, Connor's not even fighting for his own belt. You guys asked that he asked about Connor. Right, right, right. I didn't even know this. You know, Ali. Sure, sure, sure. He said, you know, which, yeah, of course I would have. Why wouldn't I want to fight that guy?

Yeah, of course, you know. And, you know, they said he's not even fighting his own weight class. Why would he fight in any other way class? And I would have fought him at any weight class, honestly, you know. So the story is that he asked for a one. 165 pound belt. I mean, come on. There is no 165 pound belt. You know what I'm saying? I want to fight on the moon. You know what I mean? Come on. So do you call BS? I don't know. I think Connor's just being Connor, man. He's the best at it, right? The best at making news and staying relevant. And, you know, I don't mean relevant. He's the most popular guy in our sport and this and snap. But to stay in the news cycle. He does it better than anybody except maybe fluid me or other? Right. Maybe these days even better. Right. So when you read this, what is your reaction? I was just like, I'm not surprised by it, you know? And I'm not getting sidetracked. by it because it doesn't matter it's it's a non-news to me okay because the news is i'm fighting a guy that fights in ufc right now brian ortega right do you think he's trying to sidetrack you by putting this out there no but it's easily to get sidetrack by it i just think he's just trying to keep

you know his name in the news you know what i mean and he's smart he's great at it and um he accomplished it but you know in the same token i mean my name's in the news a little bit more now yeah i actually kind of feel like it made the fight a little bit bigger yeah it did it made you a little bit bigger the fact that you were kind of put in this story right right right sort of gave the fight a new layer he's putting my name on his twitter or on his Instagram post, so hey, that can't hurt me anyway. So after investigating it, did you find out, like, was it ever real? Like, they're saying, and I heard from other people, that they were really planning on, or at least

wanting this fight. And of course, as you say, like, I could say I want to play for the Knicks, but you know what I mean? Yeah, exactly. After your investigation, like, was there any truth? Like, was it ever closed? No, I just heard what you just said. Okay.

Oh, he said he wanted to fight for a six, five pounds idol. Yeah. You know, if, I think if it was real, Dana would call me personally. He's done that before. You know what I mean? When it's like the big stuff. Yeah, when something like that, Dan would call me personally, and he didn't. So, you know, I had to think that it wasn't real.

Is there any frustration in the sense that, like, I feel like you kind of got over. Like, I remember that one interview that you did where you were like the C stands for Connor and the UFC. Like, you were really fired up, right, after the Mendez fight. And now you're kind of moved on from it. He's not even in your weight class. And this just kind of brings it back. Is that annoying? Not really, man.

You know what, man, I just, I don't take anything he says too seriously. Okay. You know, if we're going to fight, we'll fight. I doubt it. I really don't think we'll ever cross. I really don't. You've kind of put that in the back of your mind. Yeah, you know, at this point it's crazy.

We've had many times we could have really, it could have been real and it just never materialized. And if it didn't materialize then, I just don't see why I would happen now. Do you think he doesn't want to fight you, like it's about you? I don't know. I don't know, I just, I don't know if it's about me. You know, I don't know. He doesn't want to fend his own belt.

You know what he wants to fight me? I mean, hey, that'd be great. That'd be great for me. Sure. Let's be real. You know, I'm not scared to fight anybody. Come on. been doing this too long to be scared to fight anybody.

No, absolutely not. And I mean, if anything, that would be very good for me to fight Connor McGregor. You're, obviously, your manager and your coach is Mark Henry posted something very spirited, lengthy on Instagram. They always, as we talked about last time, they come to your defense, and it's impressive to see the loyalty. Did you have any issues with any of the things that were said from them? No, you know, Ali's being Ali.

Yeah, we can say some outlandish shit, you know what I mean? And Mark, he just keeps it real, you know? I think stuff he said holds some truth to it, you know? But, again, I'm not one to do that. You know, I don't need to defend myself. There's nothing to defend, you know. I'm who I am, and I'm comfortable with that. I do wonder, though, if all goes well on Saturday,

what would you explore, what interests you more? The Conner fight or Max Holloway? Now that this has been brought back to your attention. Yeah, you know, I mean, Max, that's the fight that matters. You know, because, again, I just don't think Connor's really serious about it. Okay. If I really felt he was serious, then, yeah, maybe we'll explore that. But, you know, I know Max is, he fights.

He's going to get in there. Have you officially turned the page on the Max thing in the sense that like, okay, you're going to Vegas to fight Brian O'Tate? You're supposed to be the headliner. You're supposed to fight for the belt. There's a lot that comes with that. Do you think about that at all now, or are you really putting that aside and focus on the new cast? Yeah, I'm putting it totally aside, you know, because it's easy.

You know, with this whole Connor news and Max, I mean, it's easy to get sidetracking. Think about Max. Think about Connor. I got to focus on Ortega, man. It's a dangerous fight. You know, everyone says, oh, it's a risky fight, and they're right. You know what I mean? I'm putting a lot on the line, and that's my focus.

Do you like fighting on the West Coast? Do you like fighting in Vegas, or would you prefer fighting closer to home? Fighting close to home is good. I like fighting earlier. You know, in the day, you get a little, you know, after your fight, you get to kind of go eat something and hang out and relax. I like Vegas just because it's easy. Everything's very convenient in Vegas. You know, you don't have to really drive anywhere.

The weather's usually somewhat good, although this week don't look that great. Oh, really? Yeah, man. I was looking at all winter. It's like 70, 65, 70, and now it's like 55. Really? Yeah. Damn.

That's a bummer. But when you fight home, because you're so popular, and I feel like you have such like a loyal team surrounding you, is it almost, you know, you haven't had many opportunities to fight on these coast, but you did have the MSG show and a couple others. Is it more of a headache to fight closer to home? Not really, you know. I mean, MSG worked great, you know, it was right next to Hanzos.

I felt like I was home. I felt like, you know, I felt really comfortable here. I drove, I drove here, you know what I drove to the city. I mean, like I do all the time. That's crazy. It just felt comfortable. You know, it's amazing. I was rewatching some old clips of yours because I kind of wanted to reminisce if we could

because, you know, I know everyone's talking about. talking about today, but I stumbled upon this video blog that you did prior to UFC 112. You're going out to Abu Dhabi, and one of your children, so UFC 112 was 2010. Would that be your older son? My oldest one. You only had one at times. My wife was pregnant with my second. So you were teaching him how to walk.

Yeah, yeah. Do you remember this? I do. He's wearing like a soccer jersey with no pants, and you're teaching him at a walk, and you go and pick up Chris Algerie and Mark Henry? Ligori. Ligori, Ligori. Chris Algeria is the box.

Yeah, yeah. It's been a long day. And it's just amazing to watch, like, you had yet to become champion. You had yet to, like, really, like, you're fighting the legend. And it's just amazing to see, like, how young you were and, like, where you were. I don't think you're living in the same house. Your house seemed smaller then and all that. Do you ever look back at that stuff and reminisce and smell the roses?

Are you so focused on today? Yeah, I'm focused on today. I think there will be a time where I definitely will look back. I don't want to look back because I think I'd save that for the end, you know, when I'm all set in it. You never, like, go in, like, the YouTube rabbit hole and look back at that stuff? Not myself, maybe other people. Right.

I don't really watch my fights, really. I'll probably watch, I'll fight. I'll go home, I'll watch it once, and I probably won't watch it again. Really? Yeah. Even if it's like an incredible performance. Yeah. Why?

I just, I'm not that, I'm just not that into it, you know? You don't want to, like, learn? Let's move on. I'll let my coaches watch and show me, like, clips and stuff I do good. I'm just not a big film guy. Even guys, I'm fighting, I don't really watch film not much. I let them do it. Nothing.

Again, Mark makes me sit down and watch. He does. You prefer not to? Probably I've never watched the whole fight of anybody. Really? Would you prefer not even to see a single clip? No, I think it's good to see a little bit here and there. Okay. And again, I let them kind of show me what they want, but I don't like to focus on that stuff.

Is there a reason for that? I just think when you start, you could almost, I already put my opponents on a pedestal. You start seeing they do stuff really well. You're like, oh, you know, you kind of, not psyched myself out, but you don't want to build them up too much where you're worried about what they're doing and you kind of forget what you want to do. Okay. As far as, like, recognizing things and tendencies, is there value in watching? I think there is.

There's some people that like that, and that's cool. I'm not knocking them, I think. It's smart. It is smart to do that. And I just believe my coach is that much. I know they see the tendencies, and they're going to see it even before I will. So after a win, you're only watching it once. Do you even watch losses?

Yeah, I do. You do? Yeah. But again, once. Just once, yeah. You never harped on them. No. Have you ever just skipped the fight?

I'm not watching this? One fight. Which one? The last Aldo fight. The last Aldo fight. The last Aldo, 200. Yeah. Why?

I just, I've been fine. I've seen clips of it though, you know, so I've kind of probably watched it now, but by now, and it's entirety. And it's entirely through clips and stuff, but yeah, I had stung, man, that one stung a little bit. I felt like I really laid an egged that fight and show up, and that's something I feel like I do well as I show up every time out, and that one I don't think I did. Do you have a theory as to why? No, not all.

I mean, no, hats off to him. He had a great game plan. I didn't adjust. I think that's what it is. Game time adjustments, like in-fight adjustments, I think I do better than most. And that one, I totally didn't. Do you feel like, do you believe in the theory that there's just some guys, like Mike Brown has your eye favor's number, like they can fight? Do you believe in that stuff?

No, no. No, I don't. You know, I thought that my first fight, I mean, you could arguably say I won that one. Yeah, that's true. You know, the second one, you know, if anything, I usually get better in rematches and do better and rematches and that one I did worse. So something's up, you know, I don't know. Again, it could have been him. Could have been out, though.

I'm not one to say it wasn't him. I can tell you, you don't even like talking about it. Yeah, no, I mean, you know, I don't like harping on the past and negative stuff. but yeah is that a dream scenario to get a third fight with him is that one that like still eats at you

I mean if it worked out yeah if it didn't I mean you know I just gotta live with it what is what is what is the difference between like life now now you have three kids obviously

and you're successful you have the career but when you look back at life back then in 2010 before you became champion simpler times of course do you sometimes like think about those days

like were the motivations different the way you went into fight weeks different Is there anything that you can compare? There's differences, and there's a lot of similarities. You know, I guess, you know, I'm much more of a home body now. Yeah. Back then I still would come home and train and want to go kick with my friends and stuff.

And now I'm just like, I'm going to go home and hang all my kids. Sure, sure. It's almost better in that aspect, I think, you know, having like a little more focus. Do your boys understand what's going on now? Oh, yeah, yeah. You know, my seven-year-old competes wrestling. You know, he was actually a tournament yesterday. You know, he was battling with that.

How do you? He went one-on-one. Okay. But he really well. There's a round Robin. He beat one kid. and the kid he lost he beat the kid, he lost her. He lost it, you know what I mean? Oh wow, interesting.

Kind of like round around, but he, you know, he won an overtime, crazy barn burner. It was fun, a little emotional match. It was a good time. Is that your oldest son? My middle son. My oldest son wrestles sometimes. You know, he does basketball, baseball. Okay. How old is he? He's nine. Do they take interest in MMA? Like, are they? They like to hit pads and stuff. We'll hit pads.

You know, wrestling is pretty much MMA to me, you know, a big part of it. So, you know, they did you just a little bit. I think, you know, I want to focus on wrestling. and I want to confuse them too much, but eventually we'll start doing, they'll start doing a jihadism. What if they just say don't want to wrestle? Oh, they don't have,

my older one kind of didn't wrestle all year. Okay. You know what? You got you. You're not upset? No, I mean, am I upset? No, I would love to him. I love for him to wrestle.

But if he doesn't want to, I'm totally cool with that. You have, wrestling, you know, most sports, but wrestling especially, you have to like to do it. You have to want to do it. Right. It's not an easy sport.

You know, losing sucks, and every kid loses. I don't care who you are. Sure. And it's tough to deal with. So if you don't want to wrestle, hey, go ahead, no problem. We did basketball. What about watching?

How tall? Is he going to be tall? No. He's not okay. But hey, you know, it's funny. He's like, he's tall in our family. Okay. He's like a head taller than his brother who's only 16 months older.

But then we go to the basketball again, he's the shortest dude on team. Really? Yeah. You can be point guard, no problem. Do they watch your fights live? Not. They try to, but usually they end up passing out. But you're okay with that?

Yeah, I'm fine. I'm fine with them watching. Even, obviously, not knowing. the outcome. Yeah, it's life, man. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Not everything's going to go the way it's planned. How do they react to you leaving?

They're cool with it. They're used to it. Okay, it's just like a business trip. Yeah, yeah. You know, say you later, I'll see you when you get back. And it's nice to know that no matter what, when I come back, they're happy to see me. Sure. Do you get more emotional than they do leaving?

Considering your home body and all that? Yeah, I mean, you know, it's always tough for me. But, again, I've come used to it. I've gotten used to it. I know they're in good hands to my mom-in-law comes, takes care of them and everything. So I talked to him during a week, you know, and they, my two boys, they're starting to say I want to come. They want to come to the fights. Right.

And it's not, you know, they're very high energy. They freaking fight all the time. So it's tough for my wife. My wife's going to have to deal with them. So I'm not taking them yet. But I told them, well, listen, before it's said and done, I'll definitely let them put into a fight. Have they ever been to one live? Never won live.

I brought them to MSG weigh-ins, and they came to the way-ins. So that was cool for them to experience that. But before it's all said and done, they'll come to the war. You didn't want them to come to the fight? Not this one, Vegas. Hopefully we'll get... No, the MSG won. Because it was local.

Again, it was in the city, they were frigging running around all. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Like animals and my wife's like, dude, I got to get the hell out of here. Sure, sure, sure, I understand that. You know, it's an amazing... Again, I was going through this, like,

Frankie Hager Rabbit Hole, the celebration video of your friends. Yeah, that was sick. That one is nuts. Yeah. So you win the... So the clip starts with, you know, the fight's over and you're standing there.

And I forget who the ref was. Do you remember who the ref was for that fight? Was it Herb Dean? UFC... 112. 112? Was it Herb Dean? It might have been Herb Dean.

Man, I should have had the clip. And, like, they're all in this. Where are they? My buddy's condo. Okay, yeah, because it looks like a bit of a small place. And there must be like 50 people there. There was a bunch, yeah. It was during the day.

During the day? They were all probably lit. Yeah. And so you know who that person is? Yeah, it's my best friend, yes. Wow. And, you know, it's the best is that they say, first they say, Buffer says 50 to 45, and they all think it's for a BJ.

So they're like, this is bullshit. Like, they're all bad already. And knowing in high stuff. I'm like, guys, just chill out. And then they explode. Yeah, that was awesome. What does it like to watch that? I'm sure you've seen it, right?

Yeah, I've seen it. Yeah, I've probably haven't seen it in years, honestly. But yeah, that was awesome, man. It's, you know, we have that support. We support our own, man. We do. We really, really have that jersey pride, and it's very cool to see. Did you, so you had a parade upon returning home, right?

I did, yeah. Like a real parade? I mean, I got picked up from, well, customers took forever. They were waiting from forever. I got picked up in, like, some shopping center, and I had a bunch of fire trucks, police cars, kind of take me down Route 37, which is like, you know, kind of the main stretch, one of the main stretches of my town, took me around and then brought me home.

That's incredible. And I had probably like, by 100, 200 people waiting at my house. Did you know that that was waiting for you? Yeah, they told me because I kept telling, my cousin was trying to keep a surprise. Like, yo, when you come, when you come? Because customers took forever. So, uh, and that's just like, go, you got all these fucking people here waiting for you.

Where are you at? Okay. But on the plane you didn't know? Only upon landing. Wow. Wow. Yeah. And you had a serious staff infection?

I did, yeah. I mean, it didn't get too super bad until the next. day. Oh, really? Yeah. Okay, so you weren't in pain? I mean, a little bit. A little bit, yeah, I was. Were you, were you in pain during the fight itself? I noticed it that day, I think. Where was it? My thigh. My thigh, I noticed it that day. And, you know, luckily, I really didn't feel remnants of the staff. You know, sometimes you get, you know, drawn out and you get tired and stuff like that, but I didn't feel any of that. Luckily. And what happens the next day after the parade? Home, kicking it, my knee just, my whole legs blew up.

Damn. I think I went to, I think, yeah, I went to the hospital. They cut it out, you know, they had to cut it out, packed it. I went back home, and it just kept getting worse. And then I had to go back to hospital and I ended up staying, like, I got quarantined because it was Mercer. Oh, man. For like four days, three, four days in the hospital. So, like, your three, four days home essentially is champion.

Yeah. You spent it in the hospital. Yeah. Damn. I had people come visiting me and stuff. It probably was one of the more enjoyable hospital stays of your life, right, because you were still on a high? Yeah, yeah.

I was on a high. I was on a painkiller high, too. Legit high. It worked out, yeah. So you couldn't even celebrate. I mean, yeah, you're right. I really couldn't. No, but eventually we did. Sure, sure, sure. Was that the happiest you've ever been in your career that moment? Like, I remember going into the, you guys were in trailers. Do you remember that?

Yeah, yeah. Outdoors. And I remember walking in because they let us do interviews in the locker room. And you and Henzo and all these. Actually, Henzo was off to the side because he had just fought against Bad Hughes. But Mark and Ricardo were there, you were like jumping around. Mike Stracho was in the midst of it. He was jumping around celebrating with you guys. Talk about, you know, impartiality. Was that like the happiest you've ever been in your career? I mean, I've had a lot of happy times, yeah. Luckily, I think I've had a great career, and there's definitely been some moments like that. But, I mean, that one sticks out for sure, you know, the first time you win the title.

Especially in my amateur career wrestling, you know, I never got that title that I was always, you know, seeking. And to finally be considered the best in the world, that was definitely special. And at that point, you had only been in MMA four years. Yeah, pretty much, yeah, four years, yeah. That's incredible. In 2005, I think. So end of 2005, 2010, yeah, about four or five years, yeah. That must have exceeded your own expectations.

Like, you probably didn't think that you would be... I mean, I didn't know. I never really put a... You know, I got into the sport. I wasn't thinking titles, wasn't thinking that. I was just thinking, man, I want to fight. And then, you know, when I got to UFC, I remember I had a buddy say,

hey, man, I know you're excited to be in UFC, but, you know, your goal should be a be a world champion, and that's when the wheel started turning. Okay. I remember, I think the first time I ever saw you was the MTV, True Life. I want to be a fighter. Yeah.

How did they... even contact you for that. Through email. They just reach out to you. Yeah, hit me up. But why you of all people? You know, I don't know. I mean, I guess the whole Almond Mixed martial arts day, I wanted someone in the UFC, some like amateur guy, and I think Kit Cote was the other guy, so it was kind of like mid-range

at UFC, you know, an MA guy. And he asked me in my story, and I told him my story to snap, and I said, I'm getting married 10 days after my fight, and that's me, he's like, okay, yeah, you're the guy. They love that. Yeah, yeah, I love that. And that was the great Maynard fight. Yeah. Did you like having the cameras around you? That was the first time, I think that was my third fight in UFC,

and that was the first time when camera's really on me, and that was tough for me. I wasn't used to it. Sure. I didn't like it, no. I don't know if it affected me or anything like that, but it definitely, I didn't like it. Now, I'm so accustomed to it now,

but yeah, that was, that took some getting used to. Do you feel like it affected you at all going into the fight? Nah, not so much. I mean, I just. What about the wedding? No, my wife, you know, she did everything. Sure, sure, sure. I said, tell me when I show up.

But considering that it was happening, days like you didn't want to get serious injured did you ever think of anything like that uh-uh i was hoping i had a black eye or something you were hoping you know what i'm cooler for yeah good fighters yeah can't find that clip anywhere i tried to find it have you seen it the the true life yeah i'm sure i have it somewhere you know gave it to you were you in a sequel did they do like a catch-up they did they did a catch-up i think in 2013 2014 something like that so you had been champion and yeah went through it all man unbelievable like to go from that where you're you know like essentially part of like this you know, I want to be a mixed martialist to the career that you've had now.

It's really incredible what you've accomplished. Yeah, I'm, yeah, I think if I, you know, when I look back, I'm going to be proud of my accomplishments, you know, and I work hard, so I think I deserve it, you know. Yeah. The UFC 125 was nuts. Obviously, UFC 136 was probably even crazier. Of those two, which one are you more proud of, like the comeback and what you, it's amazing how similar they are? It's tough to really pick one. I mean, you know, the fact that, you know, the 136 ended definitively would a knockout.

out. What a clean knockout. Something about that fight stands out is I remember coming back to the hotel. And I went through the main entrance to the lobby and the place was jammed with people. People were grabbing at me and stuff. It was cool. It got a little tense. I thought I was going to fight someone on the way to the elevator.

Really? The love I got, I felt like a fucking beetle. You know what I mean? Really? In Houston. Yeah. Wow. People were just waiting there for you.

Yeah. It seemed like that. I mean, maybe they were just gathered in the lobby. But when I walked in there, everybody went nuts. We used to have a picture in the old studio of your celebration. after that knockout. It's like one of the, to me it's like one of the greatest moments

in MMA history because that fight had it all. Like a 10-8, I think it should have been the first round. I don't remember if they actually gave it to. They were a little more strict with the 10-8s back then. And then the clean finish

like that. Holy smokes. And then you lifting your hands and then to be done with them and it's amazing to see what's happened to your career since then. You know what I mean? Like you could have been great-mannered.

Right. I mean, unfortunately for him he hasn't been able to recapture that magic. Do you think of that? Yeah, I mean, I'm just lucky. I'm on the other side. Yeah. Because you're right, it could happen that way.

But, you know, I don't know why. I don't know. I'm sure he trains hard. I'm sure he wants to be good and all that stuff. And, you know, I don't know if his career is even over at this point. No, I don't think it is. You know, he's still out of it. So who knows, you know, what can happen with him. But there is some luck involved in all of this, right?

The longevity, health-wise. I think so. I do. You know, people always say luck is nothing to do with it. You know, or like, good luck or like not do you need it. Or like, hey, a little luck doesn't hurt anybody. Sure. But you have to stay healthy, right? by taking care of yourself too

and you stay healthy by training the correct way you stay healthy by being in shape I think guys sometimes they get out of shape and they try to come in the gym and they're just body not ready to go that hard and they get hurt. I feel like I'm always on top of my stuff. Is there a moment or an achievement that you're most proud of thus far?

I mean when the titles always stands out and then that last mainer fight just the way it ended that always stands out and hopefully that's not the last one. Sure of course. Did you watch the fights on Saturday? I did, yeah. Did you watch the main event? I did. What do you make of that?

Do you have a take on what transpired? You know, it's tough. I mean, I don't know if that was, it changed the outcome, you know, with the grazing knee and the elbows and stuff like that. Elbow, I mean, the guy was turning, so, you know, it's just going to happen. And, dude, he got rocked pretty bad himself, Jeremy. He sees this guy rocked. I can finish his fight.

I'm going to do whatever I can to finish it. I mean, you're in a fight. You know what I'm saying? You guys are throwing punches and you're trying to hurt each other. Sure. Is what it is. To me, I say let it all go. Let it all go.

Let it all go. What's the difference thing? Needing someone on the ground or needing someone in their knees here or their knees there? If anything, I think you probably need someone a lot harder here than on a ground. So I think let's just make the knees legal. Really? Okay. I would say make everything legal. I know that won't fly.

Yeah. But I think make knees legal. So you're down with like soccer kicks, like pride style? I mean, I would be. I get how it would look to the public and everything like that. But I mean, hey, real fight's a real fight. Wow. Would you, like, do you dream of that?

like one fight in Japan to anything goes like Master Hinto back in the day that would be cool if I got the opportunity I mean I did fight it you know no holds bar fight in the city ahead by somebody Underground Combat League so that was kind of cool right but you know to me like I just feel like considering the rules

we could you know you could you can have your take on what they should be but considering the way they are now I do believe that grazing is the same thing as connecting like there's no distinction in the rules whether it hits a little bit or it hits a lot so I thought that at least the action should have been paused because an illegal strike, you know, landed, right? True. The guy's on his knees. True. I mean, I guess by definition of the rules, yes.

But in a split second, we see it on TV and we rewind it a thousand times. Yeah. You know, who was the ref, Big Dan, right? I mean, dude, it happened so fast. You're almost looking to see as the guy, okay. You might not even seen the knee crazy. Or you might have said, ah, that didn't really hit him because it really didn't affect his, you know, the trajectory of his head or anything like that.

You might even be like, ah, didn't hit him. Right. I think, though, the biggest issue is that the rules aren't the same, in every state. Yeah, that is a problem. That's a problem, right? Like New Jersey, where you're from, they have a certain set of rules.

They've kept the old rules. Florida has new rules. And I think Jeremy was confused a little bit. And some places use replay, and some places don't use it. What does Vegas have, you know? Vegas has the old rules. But the old rules don't affect,

and that's crazy, like, you even have to ask this question, right? You're about the fight. You know what I mean? That's why I asked. And the broadcasters don't even know, like, at times. But, you know, so what does the old rules mean for your fight on,

on Saturday, if your knee is down in the old rules or the new rules, it's still illegal. Yeah, true. But if the hand, one hand, two hands. If you have, if you're literally standing like this and you have a pinky down, but no knees, look, we're not talking. We're just standing in staying. You can. You can. Oh, no, no.

For old rules. Old rules, you can. Old rules, you can. Don't do that. But in the old rules, you have to have palms or fists down, both of them. You know, I tell my corner, hey, let me know sometimes. If I'm in a situation where you think I can need this guy, say, hey, hands are up, Knee, knee, knee.

Yeah. Sometimes you have to think, right? Yeah, for sure. But isn't that crazy? Like, they call this the unified rules of MMA, and actually they're not unified. It's a divided rules of MMA. Yeah, you're right. It's a big problem.

It is a problem. I don't know how they could fix it. I mean, well, there is a way they can fix it by making, you know, one set of rules. Get it on the same page, yes. But you know how that goes. I feel like there should be like a national, exact, there's ego. So some people are saying, no, no, no, I don't want this. Some people are saying, I want the new rules.

I want evolution. And now I feel like fighters are put in positions. like Jeremy Stevens in the post-fight interview was talking about something that wasn't even true because I think he was confused about what the rules are. Like other sports have problems like football, what's a catch, what's not a catch. But this is like life for deaf stuff. That's true. Yeah, we're trying to hurt each other.

So I definitely think it needs to be addressed. But the problem is it's the commission. It's not even the UFC's FAA. No, no, it's not. They can't make the choice, you know? That's another misconception. People blame it on the UFC. Right, right.

UFC may have some say in the matter, but at the end of the day, it's the commissions. It is, yeah. You fought Jeremy Stevens. we just had Josh Emmett on and we saw his face and he has fractured orbital he's messed up his teeth he can't feel his teeth and he hits like a truck

how would you compare like obviously you won that fight and you did very well but you felt his power I didn't get hit many too many shots with his hands he did catch him with that kick and rocked me a little bit luckily I didn't get kicked with his leg I kind of got the foot so

kind of kicked got my wits about me pretty quick but yeah he's a big boy man he definitely slings him obviously as you can see Sure. That elbow, I'm sure, is what broke is orbital. Yeah. At the end. And, yeah, that could happen to anybody, I guess.

Hardest punch are you ever faced? Probably gray. I'd say the hardest punch. The hardest hit, I would say, was Benson's upkick. Oh, yeah. That was a heel to the face. That's right. You know, and that was rough, man.

I bled for a month. You did? I had a nose bleed when I came home. I think because I blew my nose pretty hard. That's right. I was in the hospital for quite a bit. I had a bunch of procedures. My nose won't stop bleeding for like a month.

It just kept going. Kept going. I got it packed. I got it quarterized. I had surgery. I had something where they went through my artery through here and then tried blocking it through here. Still kept bleeding. It eventually stopped, obviously.

Wow. That was the first one, right? Yes. The one of Japan. Yep. And is it a problem now that? No. I mean, my nose bleeds a lot, as you as everyone knows.

Sure, sure, sure. Yeah. But was that something that you dealt with before? Yeah, I mean, yeah, I'm a bleeder. Okay. And your nose, obviously, it's a little crooked now. Is that as a result of that particular punch? No, I think...

Or are they kick? Even in wrestling, I bust him in those a couple times. Luckily, I got a little beak, you know, so it's not too bad. Do you have a dream fight, a dream opponent? Brian Ortega. That's it. Is it right now? Yeah.

You see Hento's coming back? Yeah. What is that all about? Against Valid? No. Yeah. I thought he's fighting Sakharaba. Hento Gracie.

I thought he's doing like a grappling match against Valid Ishmael. Oh, no. Yeah, I don't know. Okay. That isn't here. I know he's fighting Saga Robin risen, I thought, though. For real? Yeah.

You may have just breaking some news for us, right? No, I'm pretty sure it comes out there, yeah. Come on, there we up. Really? Hendo Gracie? I'm pretty sure, yeah. I think it was posted out there. Recently? Yeah, yeah, like a month ago, three weeks ago, two weeks ago, something like that.

I don't know, it's hard to keep up, but how do you feel about that then? Yeah, I think that's cool. You know, they're both kind of from the old guard, and, you know, it's not like, you know, he's finding a young buck. Sure, sure. And, you know, they have a little history, you know, with the... Of course. He popped his elbow with the Camorra. And then they did compete in Jitsu and Henzhou won that one.

So, you know, let's go for the trilogy. You mind if I just look. I just need to see it. Yeah, go for it. Maybe confirm it. Rematch in one on January. One, yeah, one, not risen one. Really?

Yeah. That's insanity. Yeah. Where was I during all this? Come on, man. He was speaking at the one announced that he has recently signed to one championship. And he, so this was Shatri Situatung said, Henzel leaked it, Renzo.

But Henzel Gracie will make his debut in one championship. He's going to fight Sakaraba. What? Look at that. That's insanity. Wow. What kind of shape is he in? He's in good shape. Yeah.

Hensel is always training. He's always mixing it up. So, yeah, we'll be ready to go. I'm a little bit concerned. No? For who? I don't know. I feel like there comes a time where we should stop, no?

I mean, they're both warriors, man. Let them do their thing. If anybody's with it, Hensel's with it, still. is. Not like, well, you talk to him, you know?

Oh, I know, but I'm not doubting that, but I just feel like, you know, your body, you get into late

Ford. But like I said, if he was fighting a young guy, maybe I'd be a little more worried, you know, but he's fighting a guy

that's kind of on his level, has been through the ringer like himself and these guys want to go at it. You know what? They should come up with an old-timers league or something. You want,

Vito Relford is the one who keeps pushing that like a master's division. You're down with that? I mean, yeah, I guess it won't be bad. It won't be bad.

If guys are willing to do it, let him do it. You know what we call the master's division, Belator. Belator. Is embedded here? Yeah, no, is that embedded? They get that? Come on, guys. That was for you.

That was for you. It's not going to make it regardless. Will you help him train for that? Or has he started training? Yeah, no, he's training. He travels a lot, you know, so he's training where he's at. But yeah, I'll help him train. Of course.

I'll do anything for Henzo, man. Hensel asked for anything. We're all there for him. Of course. All right. So to recap, it's this. Saturday. It's at T-Mobile. And you get to exercise the demons, right? Yeah, that's true. Yeah, look at that. It's your first time back. First time back, yeah. You didn't think of that?

No. I'm sorry. That's all good. I'm not, I'm not a superstitious guy or anything like that. Different hotel you're staying at this time, maybe? Different hotel. Okay. That's good. That's good. But I do like those stories when a guy comes back at the arena where maybe he had, you know, Yeah, I don't believe in that stuff, man. You know, every fight's different, you know. I feel like that's why I wouldn't be a fighter Because I do believe in that stuff You wear the same underwear, all that stuff There's just certain things

I'll leave it at that that I keep the same And I feel like you can't have those like mental idiosyncrasies when you're fighting, right? That's kind of a sign of weakness somewhat You're gonna go there, huh? Do you have any of those? None. Zero?

None. No superstitions? None. Wow. I envy you. I really do. Who's cornering you for this fight? Same corner as always.

Always. Mark Henry? Armada? Yep. First La Gore. That's it. What about when you fight for the belt? Do you bring a fourth ever?

Yeah, Anderson Franca for a while. Dave Esposito, when I was fighting for, when I was going to be fighting for Holloway, it was going to be Dave Esmigito, one of the wrestling guys. Yeah, so what do you say to him now that you're not fighting for the belt? You know, he's got to sit it out. Okay. I'll call you this summer. So he's not even coming?

No, he just had a baby. Okay, maybe it's a wrestling coach in high school states. He's the same exact day. Okay. Oh, wow. So he was going to come for the title fight and all that stuff, but, you know, he decided to sit it out. Are you still hopeful to make the quick turnaround for AC? I know you're focused on Saturday, but...

Yeah, I'm focused on Saturday, and, you know, we'll see, we'll see what, you know, how quick Halloween can come back. Okay, so it really depends on him. You're not going to take another fight. We'll see, man. I don't know. We're worried about Saturday. Sure, sure, sure, fair. We're close.

We're close enough to wait. Is there a finish that comes to mind, like an outcome that keeps coming, you know, like, do you see a certain path to vicking here with this guy? Again, I'm not one of those either, but, you know, I'm not one thing to call my finish. but, you know, I think I can finish this guy. I do. Okay. Well, what a performance it would be if you do. I mean, a huge win.

The guy's undefeated, right? He's a stud, man. He's a stud, man. He's a stud, man. He's a future division, but I'm the present. That's right. You are the answer to his question. That's right.

Yeah. I appreciate it. I know it's a little bit of a, you know, of a pain in the butt, but I appreciate you coming in any time. And, you know, listen, 165 belt. Yeah, hey. We can do it.

Like I said, on the moon. Yes. All the best team. We'll see you out there in Vegas. travels down there. My man Joe's going to walk you out. There he is. Frankie Edgar, Brian Ortega, Saturday, T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas. It is the co-main event. But as I said,

it is the people's main event. If you ask me, that's what everyone is talking. I will tell him, Frankie, for God's sakes. This is the one everyone's talking about. Saturday night, the people's main event, Brian Ortega against Frankie Edgar. And it's an important fight in that featherweight division because, hey, the winner is going to fight for the belt. There's no

doubt about that. There's no one else. Now, Stevens is on a three-fight winning streak. He is certainly close, but there's no doubt in my mind that the winner is fighting for this, for this belt. What is, um, ah, see, Guillermo is telling me, by the way. Looks like Sakaraba has a knee injury and can fight anytime soon. Henzel told me today he's under contract with one and will probably fight someone else. And the Valid thing, well, that's a mess. Okay. Maybe that one just kind of flew under the radar for me.

me. Henzel Gracie. How old is Hendo Gracie? One FC. How old is Hensel Gracie? How old is Hensel Gracey? Let's see. 50. Dang. Turning 51 in March. What a legend. I'm not doubting the man, but, you know, 50 is 50. Well, thank you very much to Frankie Edgar for stopping by. Thank you very much to the UFC for bringing him. Frankie's a no-nonsense kind of guy, all business. Fun to reminisce a little bit as he prepares for another trip in Las Vegas and another big fight for him. All right, in around nine minutes time, we're going to be joined

by our next guest. Our next guest is Patty Pimlet. You know Patty Pimlet. He has been on this program before. He returned to action on Saturday. Cage Warriors 90. Alexis Savides was his opponent, and what a finish it was.

We can actually play the finish. Do we have the finish? This was a very important fight for Patty Pimble, because as you recall, He fought in April of last year, and he lost his featherweight title. He lost a unanimous decision. He was supposed to return a few months ago, but he suffered an injury, and he had to pull out. So it has almost been a year, because it was April 1st that he last fought, Cage Warriors 82. And I believe he's one of the brightest young stars coming out of Europe.

I think he's one of the most popular fighters coming out of Europe. He's one of the most popular fighters not signed to either Bellator or the UFC. He has a very loyal and passionate following, especially in his hometown of Liverpool. He sells that ECHO arena out every time he fights. It's brilliant that they keep putting him there. And then the guy lost, he lost his featherway title in April. And amazingly, like, I have never seen anything like this. This is, I was blown away by the amount of hate, the detractors that came out that were quick to calm and never was over hype, over

blown. I mean, it was just any time I would mention him, tweet about him, see something related to him, the majority of the comments were, oh, and of course, you're not going to see people who support. Those aren't the people who are usually the loudest and most vocal. But it was just amazing to see how many people were writing him off after a unanimous decision loss. And so that's why afterwards I said, you know, this guy is just as big of a star today as he was last year when he lost and the people who, you know, jumped off the bandwagon and not only jumped off the bandwagon, but kicked them repeatedly as they were jumping off. They should be ashamed of themselves. And you could tell that he had a bit of a chip on his shoulder. We even played the clip

last week of him and Meatball Molly McCann, his teammate, responding to those tweets. And we'll talk to him a bit about that and dealing with that. And we talked to him after the loss about dealing with that. But it was just amazing to see how many people did not have this man's back. And then he comes back on Saturday, back in Liverpool, back at the scene of the crime. And he back where he lost last year and he pulls off this move. Here's the finish. Certainly,

boom, look at that. Flying Triangle. Certainly on the short list and I know it's early in 2018. Bang. And look at this reaction. jumps into the crowd. Not only does he jump into the crowd,

the guardrail falls down. A man of the people, truly a man of the people. One of the great submissions of 2018 this far. Look at that, Patty the Batty. We'll play one more time. as we talk about it, but a flying triangle victory for Patty the Batty and a big, a big FU to all the doubters. Let's see you one more time if we can as we are connecting with him in a matter of moments.

Patty the Batty with the Flying Triangle victory. Look at this. Bang. Look at that. Looking like a young Owen Hart. At 155 pounds, I got to say, this is a man that looks to be in great shape. He's now 14 and 2. He's just 23 years young. Look at that extension. And what a great moment for him and his team. And of course, later on that night, Molly McCann, his teammate became the first ever Cage Warriors Women's Flyway Champion. Cage Warriors is doing great. And thank you to them, by the way, for this footage. I like the new graphics. I like the new colors. It's still yellow, but the logos changed, the graphics package is changed.

They do a great job. I mentioned on Twitter, one of my many goals, look at that guy, standing up there, crossing his arms. One of my many goals in life is to one day cover an event over at the ECHO arena. I mean, could you imagine an event in Liverpool with Darren Till, Patty Pimbleau, Molly McCann, among many others? I mean, just those three alone, that card sells out in 14 seconds, maybe 13 if they're lucky. easy. They put on three fights with just those three alone and that thing sells out. Easy. And so congratulations to Patty Pimlet for the big victory. We're going to be joined by him in a matter of moments. After Patty Pimbley, we're going to be joined by his teammate, Meatball Molly McCann, who I mentioned last week has maybe the best nickname in M.MA right now.

She picked up a big win on Saturday. She is now the brand new and the first ever Cage Warriors, Women's Flyway Champion. and then after those two individuals, we're going to be joined by our own Mark Romandy, not to talk about Ronda Rousey, although that's probably what he wants to talk about most because he's such a big pro wrestling fan. We're going to be talking about the article that he put out yesterday over at mhmatfighting.com

entitled Click the Bate, Reebok Pay, now a thing of the past, and was never really a thing in the first place about this new policy, the Fight Week, incentive. payment policy that went into effect in early 2018, which I must admit as I was reading this article, and it's great reporting, it's great journalism, it's really well written and researched. My blood was boiling a little bit because this does not affect me in any way, shape, or form. I'm not a fighter. I'm not employed by the UFC, but I don't understand how people who do

compete and get paid by the UFC see this and are okay with it. That's that's the part that baffles just a little bit. So baffles me at least. So we will be joined by Mark at around 455 to talk about that. And then we'll go to the MMA after hour and answer some of your questions, comments, and also checking with New York, Rick. As I mentioned, UFC 222 is coming up a very busy weekend in MMA this coming weekend with not only UFC 222 but also Belator is back. It's actually a super busy weekend in MMA. There's Belator. There's UFC.

There's LFA. There's Cage Warriors. There's KSW. Of course, New York, Rick, instead of getting Patty lined up is reminding me that Bader Hari is returning to glory against someone. That is exciting news. Although, you know, wake me up when it's Rico Verhoeven. but there's a ton going on.

Never a break for the combat sports fans. UFC 222 obviously has, you know, the on-paper one-sided main event between Chris Cyborg and Yanukunitskaya. But when you actually look at the card in totality, there's a lot to like, there's something interesting, in my opinion, about almost every single fight on this card. Like there aren't any fights that are just kind of there. Brian Carraway is coming back.

It's been a while since we've seen him. He's fighting Cody Stamann. I think that that's a great fight. We just found out that Mike Pyle is going to fight in his last fight on Saturday. That's always, you know, a retirement fight is always of note. CB Dahlaway returning for the first time in a while fighting against Hector Lombard. Talk about a fight that has flown under the radar at 185. John Dotson against Pedro Munoz is a fight that was supposed to, of course, happen not that long ago.

And Munoz, Mrs. Wade, and we had Dotson on the show to talk about it, so they got rebooked. So I'm curious to see what happens there. Benil Darius is fighting a gentleman by the name of Alex Hernandez, who is taking this fight on a week's notice. So that is notable who is very confident going into this fight. Dariuush is someone that we obviously know about. And then, of course, one that everyone's excited about McKenzie Dern, making her long-awaited UFC debut against Ashley Yoder.

That's on Fox Sports One. Then you go to the main card. Katzengano, who hasn't fought in forever, is fighting Caitlin Viera. So I'm curious to see how Katzengano. looks. Stefan Stroup against Andrei Alofsky went from being the co-made event all the way now to the second fight on the main card. That one's not going to distance. Fireworks, knockout,

blah, blah, blah. Sugar-Shahn O'Malley against Andre Sukumtat. I want to see how Sugar-Shan responds, and there's been a bit of a back and forth between the two. And then, of course, Frankie Edgar versus Brian Ortega and Chris Seiberg versus Yanukkunitskaya. I noted on Twitter late last week, we got the PR schedule for this one.

And, you know, it's a fairly standard one for the UFC. They have the media day on Thursday in the morning, and then they have an open workout. The media day has most of, it has the main card plus the McKenzie Dernfight, and then the open workouts has just the main and co-main. And I thought that it was a misopportunity in this day and age where the UFC is trying to pinpoint future stars, future draws, prospects, people that we really need to know about. When you have two people like Mackenzie Dern and Sean O'Malley on the card, Sean O'Malley being a very charismatic, colorful character,

McKenzie Dern being someone with a very loyal following who has a very impressive resume coming in from the world of Jiu-Jitsu, these are people that I feel like you should put in the open, like the open workout doesn't have the same kind of juice as it once. once did, but I feel like these are the perfect kind of characters for the open workout. And sometimes, you know, the UFC, I think, gets stuck in these sort of routines, okay, Maine and Co-Mane. And maybe they get afraid of, you know, going down the card and pinpointing someone. It's okay to do that. You know, Connor had his own open workout prior to his second UFC fight, if you recall, in Boston.

It's okay to pinpoint someone. And I really thought, look, we've got some colorful characters that are going to make some memorable workouts. People are going to talk about them. It's a good way to promote them. It's a good way to get some other people to notice them. These are the kind of people that should be on open workouts. And I thought it was a missed opportunity. And I tweeted about this.

And then Sugar Sean O'Malley comes out and says that he's going to do his own open workout. And people have done this before. Guys like Donald Seroni in the past, you know, I recall them being upset that they weren't on the list. and they just showed up and they did their own. And that stuff's great. You got to sometimes take these things into your own hands.

You really do. And I like the fact that they're bringing them to the media day, but these are the kinds. And they did do a good job at the end of the post-fight show. They had a little feature on Dern

and historically the UFC has not wanted to push talent before they debut. I think that they want to just let them debut. And then if all goes well, like talent that they pinpoint as being you know, superstars or stars in the making. They want to just let them have their debut

quietly for the most part. And then if things go well, they'll then do the hard push. They did that recently with Israel at Asana. There was very little promotion for him. And they did it for a guy like Arjun Buller. Very little promotion for him. And after

the fact, you know, they push them more. Even Connor's debut, that was on Facebook. You know, very little promotion. Just kind of flew under the radar. And so I sort of feel like that's their MO these days. They just want people to like have the debut, be victorious, prove their worth, and then if all goes well, then they give them the push. And, you know, witness the fact that Israel Adasania didn't get much of a push in his debut. He wins, gets the big push afterwards, and now he's fighting on the Glendale

card on Fox against Marvin Vittori. Now it seems like he's getting that push. And and maximum exposure. So maybe that's the line of thinking with McKenzie Dern. I don't think putting McKenzie Dern and Sean O'Malley, who, by the way, are two people that Dana White himself mentioned in that U.S. Two-Night interview that, like, he went out of his way to push. These are clearly talents that they pinpointed as people to get excited about. I think it's a missed opportunity by not putting them on the workouts, but what the hell do I know?

All right. Let us go back to the interviews. Let us go back to the Skype machine and say hello to the man who is victorious. we were just talking about him. Saturday night at the ECHO Arena in Liverpool. That's my Scouse accent. The one and only Patty Pimlet is joining us. Patty, how are you, my friend?

I'm good. How are we? You're all right, Ariel. I'm doing great. Congratulations to you, Patty. Yes, it has been a while. How are you? Everything's good?

Yeah, and I'm great at the minute. I appreciate you doing this. I know you're very busy. You're still sort of in the afterglow of Saturday night. So I appreciate it very much. And congratulations, you on the big victory. We saw pure joy on your face afterwards.

What a moment you celebrating with your friends, jumping over the cage, the guardrail falls down. Considering everything that you've been through over the past year since the loss, how satisfying was that victory? Is it possible that it was more satisfying than becoming the featherweight champion? Yeah, yeah, you could say that, no one of me. After 10-month layoff and she didn't want to be sitting out for that long as soon as you lose, no one of me.

You want to get to safe back in there. I'd had that many fights in a short space of time that I needed a little break so it ended up working out better for me I think in the end and yeah the victory was a bit sweeter, I'd say it was there, it was unbelievable jumping over and jumping over to all my mates

and I'd just seeing them there and then it was over there, everyone went wild, it was great. No doubt that there was some kind of pressure on you after what happened in your last fight. Did you feel it? Were you more nervous going into this fight to quiet all the detractors, all the haters? No, I swear I went in there to do To silence all the doubters

No, I'm not what I mean People have been down with me For the past few months Just talk because I got beat by someone That's it, I'm finished Well, I'm not finished, no one of mean I'm back, and I'm back better than ever Patty, I mentioned this before we connected with you

But I can't recall a story in an instance Where a fighter has such a strong following Is so popular, stumbles And everyone just wants to kick you And everyone just wants to write you off and say that you were and never was and all this stuff. I mean, it just blew me away. Even after the victory, there's a little bit of that. But why are

all these people, and some of them I look at their profiles, they're from England, and they want to take something away from you. What is it about you that leads to people acting this way? I don't know, I'm like my arm, you either love me or you hate me, no what I mean? People watch me to, because they want me to win, and people watch me because

they hate me and you want me to lose and want to see me get knocked out. So, it's one of the of them. They can write me off all he wants. I want them to. It just pushes me on more to be successful.

Was there ever a point where it got to be too much? Where you had to take a break from everything? No, I'm always on my phone. I'm going to be, and I get my own. I buy my bed and buy all my coaches and that, put that down. All my coaches and like that and my teammates in the gym and so

can see me like Paddy, Paddy, Paddy. And then they'll go, Patter. And I look up at them. My dad goes me pastor. You did, though, go after a certain troll, right? And you exposed the troll. Is that correct? Yeah, we found him.

I mean, he was given, not just me, he was given all sorts of people stick online, but he was pretty like going after me for about 18 months. So I ended up finding where he was and put him up online. He's deleted all his accounts, hasn't he? How did you? So what did you do? You hired a private investigator to go after this guy?

Yeah, me found him. It was sound. Why did you feel the need to do that, like not just block him and forget about him? Because people nowadays, people lose sleepover stuff like that, no, I mean. Like it's cyberbullying, people, kids nowadays, it affects them, I know what I mean?

So I'm just not the type of person to just block someone on I wanted to expose him. And I have, no, what I mean? He wasn't just saying stuff to me. He was saying stuff to all sorts of different of many fighters. all sorts of mad different abuse so he deserved it and he was just a young 19 year old lad

and he supported Liverpool football as well which made it even worse for me done me heading and did he reach out to you afterwards did he apologise did he like you know come crawling back and saying his story? No we started to deny him say it's not him but we know it's him

no what I mean if we had two different people found him and it was the same same account so we know with him I've actually done something similar where I found a troll who was bothering me and I called him and almost like turtled up

like a little baby turtle apologizing and saying how sorry he was you didn't have that experience he didn't call you and apologize no no he just had no he's hard to deny it was him

to say like it's got nothing to do with me and that's hard to say that he didn't know what was but in his bio on his own Instagram account had said lover of UK MMA and with that

being big-headed. If you watch UK MMA, you know who I am. Sure, sure, of course. All right, well, congratulations on that. Well, done to you. Why did you fight this fight at 155? Are you done at 145? I don't know, to be honest. I didn't have to do any bats or sore after my point yesterday. I just started to dance that way.

So I was just, I'd say, being more professional this time, I've grew up a bit, no what I mean? It took losing to realize the opportunity. to you have got here and I'm not going to throw it all the way like what the people have just by being daft

and wanting to be a kid no what I mean I'm an adult now and I need to put the work in like an adult no one of mean hard work beats talent when talent doesn't work hard

and I work hard enough relying on your talent is it fair to say though that for now you're going to stick at 155 you're going to stick with that since the weight cut went well and you appear to be in phenomenal shape yeah

I'm going to stick with 155 for now and then get that world title and then get the 145 one back, get my belt back. Okay, you want to be a double champion at the same time? Yeah, one on this shoulder, one on his shoulder.

You sound, no. Hey, I noticed, did you trim your hair a little bit? It wasn't as long as it was in the last fight. Hey, I'd sign get it trimmed so that it's not in my eyes, no one of the main area. Okay. For the fight, I'm always sparring and like that,

brushing it out the way in my face. It's not what you need, I swear. So I've got it trimmed a little bit, little fringed a little bit shorter than that, all wearing in my face. Is there a certain name for that kind of haircut in Liverpool? No, I haven't got a clue. I just got one and say to trim that of it for us there,

and not. I go through the hair dresser me, but it'll absolutely ruin my hair. They're just the only no-one hairstyle of three and a two, and they'll just absolutely one shot me head off. Wait, so you do it yourself? No, I go to the hairdresser. Okay, okay.

A woman, woman hair dresser. Ah, okay, yeah, you got to go with the women. The women are more sort of, they're delicate, right? Yeah. You can call it the baddie. They said you've got to be delicate. That's right, that's right. Yeah, we can if you want to.

I think if that's what you want to call it, we'll go with that. The flying triangle, an amazing move, an amazing finish. It was beautiful. Is that something that you work on a lot? and did you see an opening for it? Tell us how you actually hit it. He just come in and push me against the cage, and I just thought about it for the second.

I was like, oh wait there, I've got an over, oh, yeah, I've bumped through my leg over, and that's just something that I've always done, know what I mean? I've went for them in amateur fights and never finished them, and then that's my third line triangle of a prone now, so I'm doing all right for them.

Do you feel like he's submitted more from the pressure from the, the triangle or the arm bar? Well, I think the triangle was on tight. I think he was already about two taps at the triangle before I ended up going for the arm, but I just thought the arm would be easier option to get the finish as well.

So I think he was a tattoo hard, to be fair, the triangle was quite tight when I got the hang on it. Okay. Was that your first time back at the Echo Arena since your fight last April? Yeah, first time back. What was it like being back? Great, I mean. I was there last time when Fishee Defender's

belt and Molly won I was there that time but obviously I couldn't fight it was horrible being there and not being able to fight but it was nice to call on my teammates and then just had me wanting to fight even more

I know what I mean tried me itching to get back in there so I was glad when this show was actually in February and not a bit later in the year this you know it was very cool to see your teammates like Molly you know she's fighting later on in the night

she's there supporting you during your fight. You win, you're there supporting her. It felt like one of those sort of memorable nights where everything kind of goes well for the team. Did you even notice that she was there? And what does it mean, you know, like she's about to fight for the belt and she's concerned with you, Cage side and watching

you and cheering you on? Yeah, of course. I've said it before, I don't know what I? Jim's more like a family, but all there for each other all the time. Like, Elliot was the fight before me. I was out watching him. Like, if I was before Molly, you know what I mean? I'd be watching

no matter what we can't help but we're always out there watching our team mates, we're not, we're selfish us, no one of me, and we're like brothers and sisters and Paul's like our dad. Our coach is like hard dad, he keeps us all in line, no what I mean? I kind of feel now, I know you have these

aspirations for the featherweight title and the lightweight title, but I sort of feel like the time is now for the UFC with all due respect to Cage Warriors. Is there any chance that this was your last fight for Cage Warriors? More than likely not like, the UFC haven't come in with a fresh offer or not

so we'll see what happens if they do we'll consider it obviously but for now it looks like I'll be fighting on cage by his gang we want to get another fighting quite soon to be fair but we'll see what happens okay because I did notice that in like some of your Instagram posts you did hashtag

UFC bound so you do want to end up in the UFC at some point right yeah of course to to build a legacy in this sport a lot of people say you've got to go to the UFC to do it, you know what I mean? Like, Ben Asker and how good he is,

he doesn't get talked about as much as he should, really should he, know what I mean? Just because he's never been to the UFC. Right. Have they even ever offered you something? And it just wasn't good enough? Yeah, they come in with an offer after I won the Cage Warriors title, but then Cade Warriors come with a better offer,

so we stuff with them. Okay. Do you suspect that they're going to come with one after this fight? I don't know, you know. where the real see always, you know what I mean? I'll obviously go over any concept, I'll get sent over with my coaching

and my manager and if it's a good offer then yeah, you'd see me in the UFC with in the Reebok shorts, but for now, well, I'm just planning on fighting on K's against soon enough. What a travesty that would be. I mean, this is the perfect example

like someone like you should not be in the Reebok shorts. Like you're just too unique I don't want you to look like everyone else. You get what I'm saying? It drives me mad, Patty. I know. I'll be honest that I'd not have them rebucked shorts. It's not a ride to wear my scramble ones with the last day.

It's no good, is it? Does it mean something to you? Like, do you really feel like before you cross over at some point, do you want to get the Cage Warriors titles back, you know, just to sort of exercise those demons? Is that a really important task for you? I'll be honest. I want to like, but it's not to be all in it.

end all is it? Like I've got being a world champion. I was a world champion at the age of 21. So,

but if I get it again, I'm a two-time world champion by the age of 23, aren't I? So. Not bad.

That would be not bad. But hopefully I've got another belt as well, so I'll be three-time world champion by age of 23. So then to them

was sound and I've got one belt on your shoulder. That's when we're definitely going to UFC. Does it feel like a weight has been lifted though? Now that you're back

in the wind column, do you feel different on this Monday? I feel a nice little bit chubby where I've had some nice food. Okay. Just being for an Italian then for my dad's birthday,

it went down the street. But I do feel like, I don't know, it beats waking up on a Monday morning after you have lost for it that way. Sure, sure. I can understand that. By the way,

I forgot what that felt like until April. Yeah, yeah, yeah. The t-shirt that you were wearing, Alfie, a life. What was that all about? there's a young lad by ours he's on like a life support machine and just being doing all

like court cases and stuff saying should he turn his machine off and let him like die no to mean but I've been to see him and he's not responsive but he is he squeezed my hand he was blinking he was looking around no what I mean and like the son of turning his machine off on him

just let him die which I think is absolutely disgusting this is a friend of yours No, his dad's a friend of man. He's only a young kid, he's only about to. Oh, wow. Wow, and his name's Alfie? Yeah, that's why I'm in a hashtag, a hashtag Alfie's an army.

Wow, and where do things stand right now? Now his machine's still on. He was saying he were going to turn it off on Friday, but his machine's still on. So hopefully it stays that way. Okay. Well, I wish him to very kind of you to bring some awareness to that. And by the way, also curious,

your teammate, Molly, I noticed that she was coming out with the Everton flag, and you're a Liverpool FC guy. What's up with that? How are you guys even friends? I thought that that was like the thing that, you know, you guys can't coexist. No, it's the same city in a friendly derby. I ate United. I ate mine United more than eight Evan. You know what I mean?

as long as I've been alive, I haven't won a trophy, since I've been alive. So I don't even hate having that much the shouts of me fair. But I hate mine united them, or I don't even mind it and just the blue shite in it.

But our little, little cousins, they're terrible compared to us. They don't finish above us, Ariel. It's quite slight. We haven't got a trophy's of their name. So you can't even, like, muster up the animosity towards them, right? No, not really.

I can't. All right, fair enough. I was surprised to see her come out with that with the blue and everything. I thought that you guys were like, you know, mortal enemies, but I guess not. Do me a favor, though. We talked about the Reebok thing. If, in fact, you know, the UFC does come calling, please do not get rid of your walkout song.

It might be my favorite in MMA these days. It's not going nowhere. How long have you made to ask me to change a little bit of it than that. No. Staying the same. It's great. It's a great tune. I won't be changing that. It's beautiful. The way everyone's clap.

Was it the same reception on Saturday? The one, you know, in the last fight, it was, I mean, deafening, even off the television hearing it. But did it feel the same this time, or did you feel like the fans were kind of a little more, you know, trepidacious toward you? No, it just felt the same, no, me. I felt like everyone was going nuts. I think they were. To be honestly, I thought, the crowd did affect Alexis more, but given my students, experience play the past and he was game.

Well, it was a great moment, a great finish, a great victory. So, what, you know, if there is no UFC, April 28th is when you want to fight again, correct? Yeah, hopefully, get on then. Just the only thing from that fight is a little stiff wrist. The bottom of my feet are in where they've jumped out the cage onto the concrete. I feel like I've had heels on all night. Oh, wow. So you got banged up in the celebration?

No, just like the bottom of my feet are eating so it's at him when I walk around with no shoes on the bottom of my feet are where I've landed on the concrete that I've added all my weight. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay. It's laughing.

Yeah, well, all right, at least it wasn't anything too serious in the fight. I'm very happy for you, Patty. Again, I thought it was, you know, very disappointing to see how some people were kicking you, but you stuck it to them. You have a lot of supporters, more supporters than the detractors, and I think you shut up all the detractors on Saturday night.

So kudos to you. Congratulations, and I'm looking forward to your next one. I didn't jump off the bandwagon like many others, my friend. Still here, still driving that thing. Best starting up, hey? You best starting out? No, no, I would never do that. I would be having wards when I do you see you.

I'd love to get the baddie haircut, by the way. I don't know if I could rock it, but it would be something. Maybe for Halloween. But it's great to see you back in the winter circle. I just saw you in a body wig. You'll get in a little body wig. Do they make those? No, but we'll get them sorted.

don't worry. Gosh, what a great thing that would be. You get the whole crowd wearing that thing? That's brilliant. You make some more money. Do it. Market that. It's what I'm saying.

I'm a marketer's a black dream. Well done, Patty. Congratulations. And happy birthday to your father. Thank you for doing this after a night out. I appreciate it. Thanks very much. Nice one, Ariel.

We'll talk to you soon. There he is. Patty the Batty Pimbleat. Back in the Winter Circle. Getting it done on Saturday. Warriors 90. Always enjoy watching him. He is a treat. He really is a treat. He's got an infectious smile. He's got a joie de vivre. It's a beautiful thing. All right. So that was part of the story on Saturday. And this was all, by the way, this was going on in the midst of the early prelims

for UFC on Fox 28. And I got to say, and it's very rare that this is, happens, I will admit, I was more captivated by what was happening in Liverpool at the time than I was what was happening in Orlando. I really was. The atmosphere was phenomenal. The broadcast grade, we see Dan Hardy there. They really do a nice job. It's a great presentation. As I said, I like the new logos, the graphics package, all that stuff and more. I think Patty's a big star. I think he's one of the biggest stars and obviously one of the most popular fighting. fighting out of the UK who's not signed by either, you know, the UFC or Bellator at this juncture. And I think it was very cool that they had him kick off the main card.

But in the main event, just as big as the Patty Pimbled return victory, if you will, main event, Cage Warriors was crowning their first ever women's flyway champion, 125 pounds. It was a fight between Brioni Terrell and our guests at this time. I guess we spoke about last week on the program. We showed that clip of Patty Pimbleau and Meatball Molly McCann responding to some mean tweets. And now Meatball Molly McCann is the brand new inaugural Cage Warriors women's flyweight champion. She wins in very impressive fashion. she wins via knockout in the second round

and Liverpool's own Molly McCann was in the main event and came up big and ended the night in a very happy way for all the fans who are in attendance from Liverpool at the ECHO arena let's go to the Skep Machine and say hello to Meatball Molly McCann there she is

Molly how are you? Hi mate are you doing good yeah I've still got a bit of a sore voice from Luz now on Saturday but yeah, it feels good being a champion. Let me tell you that much. Yes, I can only imagine. Did you lose your voice in the celebration afterwards, partying? Of course, I did. Okay. I was home. Ariel, I was home by about 4 a.m. I had 50 chicken nuggets and a big mac in bed.

Wow. That's the champ life right there. I know. I'm sure you've dreamed of becoming a champion and from what I understand you're the first female from Liverpool to win a major title in combat sports so congratulations on that did this feel like you dreamed of

like is this better was this how you dreamed of it going down how would you compare your dreams to the reality I think did you watch my celebration when I finally won I couldn't believe it was finally there. I had envisaged that so many times growing up.

And then when it happened, my head fell off. I was just like, I've just done it. Oh, my God. I jumped out of the cage and I missed Paddy coming in and my coach. That's how shot my head was. I couldn't believe that it had happened. But it does feel amazing. But it doesn't feel like anything's changed.

Saturday was Saturday. I was back in the gym this morning and straight back to away really, mate. You didn't take any time off. No vacation, no nothing, no day off on Monday. Why? I got out unscathed. I didn't get hurt. I'm not injured. I'm not in the UFC where a champion, do you know what I mean? I'm going to have people knocking on the door to try and take this belt off of me. So I've got to keep getting better, mate. There was one sequence, or actually it happened a couple times and it also happened right before

the ending. where you were like putting up fingers in front of her. And you were telling her something. What is that all about? Yeah, yeah, yeah. So she was the, the Outsonel grappler. She was supposed to grapple fuck me everywhere. She was supposed to submit me or grand and palm me.

She tried to take me down once. And I said, 1-0 to me, Brianie. And then when she tried the second take down, I said, ha, 2-0. and the last time she shot in on a single I stuffed it and Brianie that's 3-0 and then she looked at me

like that and I just hit it so I seen online people were saying oh it was a sucker punch it was this I was playing dirty it's like now look at it from a different angle you see me go 3-0 Brianie and then Dan Hardy was like that was brilliant

yeah so there was no foul play the most honest truest fight of that there is so I wouldn't be having any of that and yeah and I absolutely obliterated there I will admit upon viewing it

the first time initially I thought that you faked her out I thought that you were putting out your fist and she was standing there but then after watching it it's very clear that you're putting up the three and she's like caught off guard and you nailed it so you've been receiving some flack for that um say off like three people maybe four people

yeah everyone kind of knew what the score was but maybe I don't know people believe what they want to believe or will have their own perception of what they think happened I know if I spoke to someone and said I have half three nil I know what happened

if you watch the they show you if I'm a different angle you can clearly see me do three or two or one and there's another bit when I go come on let's go. So, I don't know, you can watch any one of my fights area. I've never been a cheat or anything like that.

So I'm not too bad with me. And correct me if I'm wrong, this one was a bit personal. You guys have trained together in the past and she asked for you and you kind of felt like she thought that she was, you know, that this was a good matchup for her, even though she was moving up and wait. And you kind of took offense to that a bit? Well, I just, when you, I get really friendly with my my training partners.

I've met you once before in Detroit at UFC 218. I was Amanda Bobby Cooper's training partners.com. And I invest a lot of myself into the people that I train with. And I just felt like I'd given a lot that I deserved a little heads up of, hey, Mal, let's make some money to mind if I ask for this fight and we can make a good story out of it or something like that. But it just wasn't that. It was, well, we've got someone on the phone.

Brian he wants to fight and I was like well she asked for it she's fucking getting it okay there was I mean the symbolism is great also because this is a sold out crowd it's in Liverpool there's a lot of famous fighters coming out of Liverpool who are fighting on that card of course most notably

Patty Pimlet yet you're in the main event and there was a time that you wanted to compete you wanted to train and they wouldn't let you in the gym because you were a girl is that true 100% Ariel when I was I was a kid growing up.

I've always been allowed into MMA gyms. This was a boxing gym. I wasn't allowed into boxing gyms. I had to claw my way into a gym for them to let me be in the gym. Yeah, my four years ago, Ariel and Brian, he both fought

on Cage Warriors as amateurs. And after we wade in, I talk of for chicken and rice. And it's mad like four years. later we're both fighting each other again fight each other for the world title so it's good to see

how far we've both come I don't think she was expecting me to bring the level of striking that I brought to the cage I think everyone was expecting me to be a bit

oversellous fight off emotion because I've never been a headline before Cage Warriors Cards 10 the Echo Arena a card is their biggest show that they've ever done.

So I'm selling more tickets and compete in front of more people than any of the other cage warriors champions have done, other than Paddy and Fisci. So that's a big feat that I have to step up and take. And like you said, no female in Liverpool has ever won a real title. So I had all of these checks on a list that I had to make sure that I took it off. You know, when I just stayed calm normally, I'm like, I'm screaming, I'm hyper.

And I just got in there and relaxed. And as I walked in, Ariel, I just seemed down until standing there, and it shook his hands. It was nice to see you, mate. I saw that. I was like, wow, what presence of mine? Were you surprised that they put you in the main event? Not at all, because Ariel, I sell more tickets than anyone else in the promotion over than Paddy. Wow.

Why do you think that is? I got fight off you. maybe I'm just a nice person maybe I've got a style that people want to watch with me there's a big background story and I've always had adversity to have to recall more there's always been something that people are drawn to when their heartstrings are kind of pulled on

but I'm just an honest fighter who leaves everything in there I want to be like a Donald Soroni kind of. So when people think of me, my legacy is, fucking hell when she got in there, she left everything she had. She was game. She was ambassad for the sport. She was a role model for her city. That's who I want to be.

And scouses, we're all cut from the same coffee. We just all love to fight, drink and watch football or soccer, as you would call it. Right. We get behind our own. and I don't know I'm sponsored I'm backed by Everton Football Club

in Paddy's defensive it's funny he's the red side of Liverpool and I'm the blue and there's so much banter that goes on

between us and it's just like when it's Derby Day I won't even go into the gym because my team always loses but we're known

as the people's club and I'm kind of like the people's champ so there's a big slope that says Everton will let you down. Before Molly won't. Oh, I love that. That's incredible. I don't know if you were on when I asked Patty about this.

I asked him how you two can coexist, given the fact that he supports Liverpool and you support Everton. And he was kind of like, well, as he put it, Everton is shite. They're not even on our level. They don't win. So it's kind of like, you know, I don't even have to worry about them.

How do you feel about that? The shit and a mistake that we give each other in the gym. He's down playing it, Ariel, but honestly, it is back in the day, half the city was blue, half was red, and you wouldn't cross certain roads to go on that side of the street. But it's a stone's throw away from each other. It's just one park that splits. Everything stayed in between Liverpool.

Boxing and the main football is what our city lives for. so it's all we really talk about. When you say that you're back by Everton, what does that mean? I know you used to play for like their youth club, right? This is going to sound horrific, but I actually used to play for Liverpool. Oh. The women's team, Everton, is better, or was better than Liverpool. But I forgot what your restaurant was.

Sorry. Oh, you said that you're back by them. What does that exactly mean? Oh, yeah, so basically when I'm fighting, they'll do loads of press on me. The players all, like, send me videos on social media saying good luck. I'm just one of their own. Liverpool won't do that for Paddy. Liverpool's like a corporate suit wearing.

Scouts just don't go to the game. It's like bankers from Norway. Whereas if you go to the Evert match, it's like the working class man who hasn't even got enough money for a tiffy but still goes because it's 13. I see, okay. Well, I'm an Everton guy. After hearing that, I don't like that other vibe.

Yeah. That's right. Sliced alone. It's Sliced alone what? He's Everton? Yeah, I'm Roy Jones, Jr. And Eddie Alvarez. Okay, well, there you go. There you go.

I don't know about Slice Stallone being a man of the people, but fair enough, at this juncture. You were emotional. as you said afterwards. And I'm wondering, because I read and would love to hear you talk about this more, I read that your father, before he passed away when he was in the hospital, that you promised him that you'd become a champion. Is that true? And is that why you were emotional? Yeah, it's one of them, it's one of them things. It's very cliche and cheesy. but it is like on the deathbed

when you're talking to your dad and it's the last conversation you kind of have with him he was just like please just don't give up on your dream no matter how hard it gets you've got to get that weird title and he was like make enough money to look after your mum and without getting too upset about it all it was like that was the thing

it was always about looking after my mum so she wouldn't have to work and stuff you know what I mean and at the wayings when I was making weight I cut quite a substantial amount in water this fight camp which I don't normally do

when I was cutting weight it just wasn't coming off as quick as what it normally does and I rang me mum up and I was so upset I was like mum I miss me my dad and he's the only thing

that's going to be missing on this amazing historic day and as I weighed in Ariel she came over to me and she gave me a box and in this box was his wedding ring and I'm actually wearing it now and she got it melted down to my side

so I just burst into tears I was just like fuck he's wiffles he's still here you know and he'd been to every single one of my fight bar the last three because he wasn't here so it was just a nice it was just really nice

he still was there he's there in spirit you know wow that's unbelievable well done and I'm happy that you were able to keep your promise to him. And you mentioned that, you know, you've been through a lot and have overcome a lot

and maybe that's why people have such a connection to you. Did you also fight, like just days after your cousin passed away as well who you were very close to? Like, this isn't funny, but the past four fights I've had, someone has died of my family every camp.

So my grandmother and 15-year-old cousin died last fight camp. The one before, My cousin died in a car crash. And it was his, in April, you know, when Paddy lost. Yeah. That weighing day was my cousin's funeral. And I had to miss the funeral.

And it was like he died in a car crash. And he left two kids. One was two and one was six months and a 21-year-old fiancé. So it was like this massive tragedy. And then my dad was sick for two years. And then he passed away. and it was like forever

people was just like being taken away from me and it was just I've never known for a fight camp without adversity and without pain and struggle

and all that kind of thing and this was the first camp area where I didn't have to work anymore I was a completely full-time professional athlete and my performance shows that and I'm just happy

that make people proud at the end of the day I think that's all it is and to show like you don't have to give up and anything can be thrown at yet and as long as you just keep going just one step at a time you're moving forward you're not going

backwards you know what I mean so I just like being that piece and that when the tough gets going I just keep going and the amount of messages I've received about people everyone knows my story and especially the commentators

who do cage warriors have done all of my fights since I was like a one or no amateur so they know the story so when I won the bells you hear Brad Walverson go off his tits

he's like oh my God because he's met my dad he knew my dad like everyone just knows and everyone gets emotional and he says

Molly weighs a heart on his sleeve and with me Ariel you know if I'm happy or you know if I hate you because my face will just say, fuck off. I don't even have to say it. Do you know what I mean? So everyone loves that about me, I suppose,

and the story is a nice story, I suppose. Wow. Yeah. There's a light at the end of the tunnel. Sure, sure. I hope your next fight camp, you know, you can break that trend, because I don't know how you are able to overcome that.

Biggers crossed. Yeah. You mentioned, 15 years old, your cousin? How did he pass away? He had a heart attack. At 15? Oh, my. At 15.

I'm very sorry to hear that. Wow. That's all right. It's just, I'm like from Irish background. So all of our, you know, there's loads of Irish. Like I have like 50, 60 cousins, first cousins. So when you have a big family, there's going to be lost, I suppose. But we're strong with our morals and we're tight men.

and we have the best time and we just have to deal of it sometimes I suppose. Do you feel like this is your ticket to the UFC? Do you want your next fight to be in the UFC? I could have gone to the ultimate fighter and I believe I would have won

an area and the last fight in October after I weighed in Graham Boyle and said, do you want me to speak to the UFC? And I said no, I deserve a weird title shot. I want that. because if I got hit by the boss or if I broke my knee or it broke a leg and I couldn't fight again.

I wanted that belt behind me just to say look what I've done, look what I've been through and look where I am. But if the UFC came calling, I'd see what they had to say. I honestly believe Ariel Abbey's anyone in the 125 pound division. I'm not scared of any of them. I think my striven's better than any of theirs and I think my will to win is better than any single one of them in there The Cage Warriors comes back to Liverpool on the 1st of September So I'd retain the belt or I'll fight in the UFC

If Darren Till brings the UFC to Liverpool May, Paddy, Fisci, Darren are all on that card That is going to be one of the best cards the UFC will ever put on It'll probably be a fight mate because the arena's small, but I'm telling you, think about four characters that we are. We are marketable. We can sell us. We're all massive characters.

And me and Darren are very striking-based. And Fisian Paddy have got unreal submission game. So I don't know. We're killing it in Liverpool after a minute. I would swim to Liverpool from here in New York. to be there. I don't care if that's a fight night. I don't care if that's on fight. I need to be at the Echo Arena when Darren Till fights, and I know that when he does bring the UFC there, that you will be on the card, that Patty will be on the car. We will be there. Yeah. I mean,

it's just a no-brainer. We've got to playroom. Oh, thank you. I appreciate that. We'll put you up here. Thank you. We'll give you some good spouse food. That's right. Any meatballs in the, in the kitchen, or is that just the story is that you used to work at Subway and you, and you, your coach gave you that nickname, right? Yeah. Guess what I had for it. Before I went into the cage, guess what my last meal was?

Meatballs? It was BMT, big meaty tasty, flaff bread. Is that from Subway? Yeah, from, yeah. Do you still work for them? Southwest sauce to. No, no way. what was what was did you like working

did you like working for subway oh I loved it Ariel I was on I was at university and I worked the night shifts at subway um because it's 24 hours here and then I'd go to to university

and then I'd go to the gym and then I'd repeat and it was tough but I used to like I used to eat so much Ariel, I would just like, I shouldn't really say it, but I'd like steal all the cookies, all the Southwest sauce.

Yeah, cookies are phenomenal. By the way, I didn't notice, don't think I didn't notice you say, you know, about your striking in which your striking was very much on point. There is a pretty good striker at the top of that division. Not quite the

champion just yet, but you know who Valentina Shepchenko is, I presume. You rate your chances against her very well, right? Is she not 135? Was she dropped now? Well, she's 125, yeah. Oh, I'll fucking bladder here. I don't care.

What'd you say? Blatter? I'm not... Yeah, bladder. B-L-A-D-E-R. What does that mean? Yeah. No, I... I just fill her in, do it? Okay. Not easy. Look, me and Hay would deserve to be a five-round.

fight because we've both got, we've got the heart to go and we've got chins, we don't get knocked out. I was like, I'd quite happily fight here. But I don't know where she's from like Rush or Poland or some way, but Scouts are made of the same stuff,

that hard, horrible, gritty, determined kind of person. It would just be an unreal fighter. Yeah. But you, it's not being arrogant or cocky and saying that. It's like, I can't be a fighter. and then not say that I'd beat anyone

because why would you be a fight? I wouldn't be any good if I said that. Do you know what I mean? Yeah, absolutely. So in a perfect world, what do you want next? Okay, let's have... I want to retain the 12th in September and then I wouldn't mind fighting that Madison Square Garden

or Las Vegas in November, December in the UFC. All right. I'll talk to a couple people and make it happen. Why not just give me... Give me Chefchenko in a Madison Square Garden. For the belt. And then I'll take you out for meatballs after. All right.

It's a date. I love it. Right here in New York. They've got great meatballs here in New York. You know that. Yeah. Listen, I've been three times. I'm all about the meatballs.

Okay. Molly, congratulations. Very happy for you. It's great to, you know, I don't want to say meet you because as you, as you noted, I did meet you in the back after your teammate Amanda Wan, back in Detroit, but great to have you on the show for the first time. And what a performance. You should be very happy.

Your family should be very happy. Your friends. I mean, just a great scene. And Cage Warriors was very smart to put you in the main event of that card. So congratulations. Enjoy the belt. And we'll be talking to you very soon. I really enjoyed having you on the show today.

Thank you. Here's Ariel. Have a boss today. Okay, you too. All the best. There she is. Molly McCann. Meatball, Molly McCann.

The brand new Cage, Warriors, flyweight, women's flyaway champion. What a performance. And by the way, they do a great job. You go back and check it out on Fight Pass. You can go by fight right away. Right after the event is over,

they have it broken down. Like you click on the Paddy Fight, it cues up right to it. The Fight Pass app has come a very long way. It really has. So if you missed any of those fights, if you didn't see them, if you want to watch them again,

I suggest checking it out over on on FightPass. They do a great job. All right. So that does it for the Liverpool Connection, Patty and Molly. We do have one interview left, and it was somewhat of a late edition. Saturday, excuse me, Sunday afternoon. I'm at home. I mentioned this at the top of the show, but I'll say it quickly again. I'm at home and I'm reading an article by, what happened here? I, what happened? I closed it. Oh, here it is. So I'm reading an article. I'm reading an article. article written by our colleague, Mark Romandi, the great Mark Romandi, who is really a full-time pro wrestling reported these days, but he still moonlights as an MMA reporter. And thankfully for us,

he does, because he wrote a great article on Sunday afternoon, came out Sunday morning, I should say, on M.A. fighting entitled, Click Debate, colon, Reebok pay, now a thing of the past, and was never really thing in the first place. You must read this article. And it really goes into this new, quote, fight-week incentive payment that the UFC rolled out beginning January 1st of this past year at 2018. And I will admit that I got a little fired up reading this article. And I wanted to have Mark on to talk about it a little more because I thought it was great reporting, great journalism. And really something that I'm not sure if all the fighters, because some of them haven't fought yet this year, I'm not sure if a lot of them even know went into effect. Because let's be

honest, as we talked about last week with Leslie Smith. And Leslie talked about this a little bit. we didn't have a ton of time to get into it. The fighters don't have a seat of the table. So they didn't have a say. This just goes into effect. It's not like they negotiated it, like they collectively bargained it. It's just a memo that goes out,

several pages long, and come January 1st, if you're under contract and enact a fighter in the UFC, you have to adhere to it. Obviously, this is something that doesn't happen in the four major of sports. Obviously, this is something that

proponents of groups like Project Spearhead point to and say, you know, this is employee treatment. This is not independent contractor treatment. So let's bring in Mark Romani. Let's go to the magic of Skype and say hello to our colleague Mark Remundi, who is gracing us with his presence. It's been quite some time since he's been on the program.

Hello, Mark. How are you? See, I thought we were going to be talking about the two favorite things of MMA fans, pro wrestling and Ronda Rousey today. Yes. And now you hijack, you hijack the interview, and you surprise me with this stuff. I'm shocked.

I know. You were at a pro wrestling, like an indie show yesterday, right? That's correct. I was at a bar. You're so hardcore of a pro wrestling guy now that you skipped watching the Rondorowski appearance to go watch lowly indie wrestling.

That's how hardcore you are. I didn't skip it. I didn't skip it, but I have the WWE network on my phone and on the app so I could watch it. You were watching it at the indie show? Cannot confirm nor deny that happened. Oh, my. Wow. But I did watch it before I got to watch it.

Okay. We are not talking about that, but maybe I'll get your thoughts a little later on. We must talk about this story that you put out yesterday. So I've kind of given the broad strokes here. But we need to, so start from the beginning. Late 2017 December, the UFC sends out this new, you know, fighter guideline, right? Multiple pages long. What is in this guidelines? Okay. Let's start even before that. Please, please. Let's, let's, I've been, I've been going four hours plus long, so you're driving this ship, Mark. Please educate us. All right. So let's roll back to 2015. That is the year that the UFC signed their apparel deal with Reebok, as we all know.

Now, that was also the point in time where fighters were no longer able to wear their own sponsored apparel and their sponsors' logos on their apparel in the Octagon during fight week. We know the story. you know, we were there. You interviewed Dana White and Lorenzo Vratita at the launch of this at the announcement of this. And at that time, I know you remember this very well, Ariel. What was said by Dana White over and over again was that the UFC is not making a dime from the Reebok deal. Every penny, all the money, everything, every cent is going to the fighters. So at that point in time, it was it was being portrayed. It was being publicly, they were saying, re-bought deal, the fighters are not going to be able to wear their own stuff in the cage anymore, but we're going to supplant that with money from the rebot contract. All of it, however much money

it was, I think it was $70 million over six years, all of that, every penny going to the fighters. That was 2015. Now, as the thing has gone on, you know, we know about the tier structure and we know that it goes by the amount of fights the fighter has, we know that, and we've known this for quite some time, that the Reebok deal, it wasn't Reebok paying the fighters, right? It was Reebok gave this money to the UFC and the UFC was deciding how to divvy up the money and how much to give the fighters per fight, right? Are we all, are we all caught up now? Okay. So there's that whole pot, which was called the athlete outfitting policy, right? So it wasn't, they don't like, they didn't like it being called the Reebok pay because Reebok wasn't actually paying the fighters. It was the UFC paying the

fighters, which presumably from what Dana White said was coming from that Reebok contract. Now, starting January 1st, there is no more Reebok pay, there was no more athlete outfitting pay. That pay that was once the sponsor pay years ago is now rolled up into three different things. Outfitting, code of conduct, and media obligations for the fighters. So basically, if the fighters complete all those duties wearing the Reebok stuff, going to the press conferences, the countdown shows, all the stuff they need to do, it's all in that document and court of conduct, not doing anything dumb,

not throwing a boomerang probably during fight week. If they complete all that stuff, then they get that money that was once Reebok pay. Does that make any sense now? Yes. I mean, hopefully I'm making sense, but basically now what was Reebok pay is now called a fight week incentive,

and that is that number that they get, depending on how many fights a UFC fighter has. And so there's also an, like sort of updated breakdown, right? X amount of fights, you get this amount? Yes. What is that? Correct. So to the UFC credit, they did bump up the amount of money that fighters who are newer to the UFC are getting.

So originally when this came out in 2015, it was if you have between one and five fights in the UFC, you get $2,500 per fight from Reebok pay. Now it's something different, whatever, from that outfitting policy. Now, under this new fight week incentive pay, fighters, with between one and three fights get $3,500 per fight, and fighters between, between four and five fights get $4,000 in fight-week incentive pay. And what they said in that document and in a statement to me was that most of the fighters in UFC have between one and five fights. So they up the total for the fighters who have, you know, who we're going to get the most, essentially.

So most of the fighters in the roster, which I didn't know this, percentage-wise, actually have between one and five fights. So they up that number. for those fighters. Based on what the UFC told you and, you know, worth noting that they did respond, however, there's no name attached to these statements, which I do think is somewhat notable. Why change it

from just the outfitting policy to this sort of like, you know, three checkmark thing that you have to accomplish before getting paid? Why did they feel the need to do this? Yeah, it's interesting. I'm not sure the reason why what they told me in the statement was it

was to kind of encompassing three things that were already in effect. So these are not, I mean, there was already a code of conduct. We know that there was already an outfitting policy. We know that there were already promotional obligations that that you have spiders have to do. But now those things are all rolled into one thing. So they were existing things, but now they're one thing. And they're all tied to what was once called Reebok pay, what was once called outfitting pay. It's an amazing thing because I always go back to that press conference that you alluded to in New York several years ago where we're interviewing Dana.

way we're there. We're watching it all unfold and they're talking about and of course in the back of their mind they're getting ready to sell the company but they're talking about how this is such a great day for the sport because all the money is going to the fighters and how you know the the sponsorship game has dried up. Of course, it's sort of a self-fulfilling thing because they started to tax all the sponsors. So that's why a lot of them left. They start taxing them $100,000. So now, you know, these mom and pop shops can no longer sponsor these guys, but they say all the money is going to them. They're getting sales of the jerseys and things like that. I don't know about you. But, you know, I never see anyone wearing these jerseys on the street, and you never see them in stores.

I only see Rhonda and Connor, like I see it at the Las Vegas airport. I've seen them at Reebok, but I certainly don't see like John Volante and Chris Wydenman, for example, right? And I keep thinking about how we, like, we just ate this up, them saying that all the pay is going to the fighters. Is it fair to say now several years later that that statement was not true, that all the pay was not going to the fighters and continues to not go to the fighters? Well, I mean, I did ask the UFC that, and the statement they gave me was kind of a non-answer. They didn't confirm nor deny. I asked directly. I said, is all the pay as what was said in 2015 still going to all the fighters?

And they really did not have an answer for me. So I don't know. It does not seem that way from what we were saying. I mean, it seems like that was just kind of PR at the time. That's just what they were saying. And it may be, I mean, again, when Dana was saying that stuff and when, Lorenzo was saying that stuff years ago, it was, to me and to everyone else, it made it seem like it's Reebok money. I think even Dana used that phrase, Reebok money, uniform money,

is going to go to the fighters directly, right? And that never actually ended up happening. It was an outfitting policy and there was a whole thing. So it wasn't quite what it was, it was kind of spun to be early on in 2015. And now it's totally different, you know, three years later. If you're a fighter in the UFC and you read this, how do you react? I mean, so I mean, I would be upset because to me, there is that direct progression that goes from, if I'm a fighter, I'm getting my own sponsors in 2014. I'm maybe, maybe I'm a fairly big name fighter. I'm on pay-per-view cards and I'm on Fox main cards.

I'm maybe making six figures per fight in merchandise sales. When I did the reporting on this story in 2015, Mike Roberts from M.A. Inc. said, He thought that between 85 and 90% of fighters were going to get hurt by this Reebok deal. So I'm doing pretty well as a fighter in 2015, you know, managers busting their busts to try to get me sponsorship money. That goes away. So now I'm getting the Reebok money. I'm at $5,000 per fight, $10,000 per fight.

So I'm losing, who knows how much, $60,000. I don't know, maybe less, maybe more. So that money goes away, but I'm still keeping on, you know, the Reebok stuff is at least consistent. I don't got to worry about going to get my own sponsors anymore. I don't got to worry about my manager going to do that. Maybe I don't even have a manager anymore. That kind of stuff has happened to in the UFC. But now there's no longer really a guarantee that you even get that money.

It's not Reebok money. It's not outfitting policy money. So now you have to make sure that you're good in your personal life. You can't get arrested. You can't get that kind of stuff. You can't say something stupid on social media. They may fine you. They may sanction that money.

So to me, the progression goes from I'm getting my own sponsorship money. I'm doing really well to now there's this arbitrary money that I might get after every fight. Kind of like a fight-night bonus. That's essentially what it is now. It's no longer an obligation that the UFC has to give that to you. It's kind of like a bonus. That's really all it is. Yeah.

And you can even take it a step back and say it starts with, you know, like willy-neely, you can have whatever sponsor you want. Then your sponsors are getting taxed. You know what I mean? Like it even started to – and we're talking about in the span of 10 years. You know what I mean? It's not like we're talking about the spend. Yeah. You know, we're not talking about like 50 years ago. I still maintain that there's going to come a time in 50 years where we'll look back on decisions like this where like these, you know, these pretty big decisions and policies were being rolled out without any input from any of the fighters and say to ourselves, like, how did this happen?

Because I just feel like they continue to sort of push and push and push and push. At some point, I feel like the fighters are going to break. And this comes out around the same time that, you know, Project Spearhead. is launched by Leslie Smith, Cajun Johnson is now a part of it. They announced last week that Ally Quinta is a part of it as well. And Lucas Middlebrook, who we talked about last week, most famously the lawyer for Nick Diaz when he had his issue in Nevada, do you feel like this is a great benefit to them? Do you feel like this is going to help them in their quest

to get those 150 signatures that we talked about last week? I asked Lucas Middlebrook for this article about that document and what he said was that that would be for them, for a unionization effort, that would be Exhibit A to show to the National Labor Relations Board that UFC fighters are indeed employees, essentially because when you have an independent contractor relationship, this is what Lucas Middlebrook said, there's no, there's no discipline process, really. It's you terminate the contract. You know, if you're a contractor, it's like, oh, I'm going to dock some of your pay. If you don't, if you don't do this, Ariel, no, it's like, if you're a contractor, that's it.

It's either yes, it's either you're contracted or you're not. There's no discipline. There's no finding. There's not taking money away in that way. Now, of course, what I think the UFC would probably say to that is this fight week incentive pay is not the fighter's salary. This is not your fight first. This is just a bonus that we're giving you. We don't even have to give it to you. It's an extra thing that we're giving you. So yeah, we can fine it if we want to if you do something stupid. That's probably what I mean, if I were, I'm not even a lawyer, obviously, but if I were the UFC, that's what I would argue. But of course, Lucas Middlebrook and Project Spearhead is going to say that this kind of a contract is what a unionized league or a unionized, you know, a group of athletes

would collectively bargain. That document, that whole thing they sent out would be something that would be collectively bargained. Yeah, I remember when it came out and ESPN reported and Lawrence Epstein of the UFC had this quote saying that their heart is in the right place. And, you know, they're bumping it up a little bit for those lower tier fighters. and I just don't feel like, you know, our heart is in the right place cuts it. You know, I really feel like there needs to be a discussion, an open discussion where someone from the fighters on behalf of the fighters, but again, this is one of those things where it seems like the media is talking about it more than the fighters.

Unless they're talking about it behind the scenes, you don't see a lot of people come out. You know, there's been what, over, you know, probably close to 10 events so far in 2018, and you don't see a lot of fighters saying like, what the heck, what's going on here? You see a little bit of things here like the John Dotson situation, Tiago Alva's saying he only got half his show money, et cetera, et cetera, but there's not a lot of pushback, at least publicly as it right now. And you can understand they're still employed by the UFC or getting paid by the UFC. Maybe I shouldn't say employed because they're not employees per their current status. But I just, you know, was reading that and I was just like, well, this is another

this is another feather in the cap of anyone who's trying to unionize these guys and bring them together. Do you think Project Spearhead is the one? Do you feel like this one's going to be different than, you know, MM, AAA or the PF? Fade, do you get a different feel about them or is it too early? How do you feel? It's, who knows? I really don't know. I mean, I've talked a lot of fires about this over the last two or three years and there is essentially what it is that I think that a lot of fires are probably like if it happened, but no one really wants to put their foot forward and be the ones to make it happen publicly except for Leslie Smith and a few others like Hayden Johnson and

L.I. Kinta. And I get that. I mean, I understand. You don't want to put your neck out there because at the end of the day, this is how fighters make their living and they don't want to be retaliated against and they don't want to get put on the shelf or get cut from the UFC. This is how they feed their family. So I totally get it. I understand. You got to look out for yourself first. But if there were an effort like this, I don't think there's any way that it wouldn't help fighters.

I mean, just like that thing you mentioned, Ariel, about John Dodson, not getting a show money. There needs to be something collectively bargained, like an actual policy about what happens if your opponent pulls out at the last minute. This happens all too many times. There needs to be something written down somewhere that says, all, well, if your opponent fails out the day before the fight, you still get X amount from the UFC. Stuff like the EA sports video game, how much do fighters get from that? Right now, I don't think they get very much, if anything at all. These are all things that get collectively bargains in, you know, when there's a union. And the one thing that going back to that interview that you did with Dana

White at the Reebok announcement, is he said, well, all the leagues have this, you know, have an apparel deal. They have a uniform deal. The NFL, NHL, NBA, what do all those leagues have in common that the UFC does not? They're all unionized. All the players are unionized in those leagues. Yep, well said. Before I let you go, since it's a very hot topic, and it's something you know a lot about your great when it comes to this,

the finish on Saturday night, Jeremy Stevens, and Josh Emmett, your thoughts on how it actually went down, and if you disagree, how should it have went down? Yeah, I mean, look, right off the bat, that is a really, really tough spot for a referee to be in. Because you really can't win either way. When it's a, when it's a bang, bang situation like that and your damn rigliata, if you let it go, then, and it is an illegal knee, then people are going to be complaining about that.

The fight finishes. It's a disaster. If you, if you pause the action, then it ends up missing or, you know, the knee misses, it wasn't an illegal knee, then you get killed too. So either way, there's really no good, I mean, there's no, there's no thing that he can do that will not cause criticism later on. But from talking to referees like you did, it seems to me that it wasn't illegal knee. It did seem to at least graze on the way going up. It hit on the way going down, certainly. So it may not have done much damage, as Josh Emmett said, but it's an

illegal knee either way. At that point, the fight probably should have been paused, even if it was to give a verbal warning, like, hey, watch, you know, watch the down opponent. At the very least, And if you didn't think it didn't do much damage, then you could do that. You can just pause the fight and say, watch the grounded opponent, maybe stand Emmett up, have the doctors look at it, at the doctors look at him to see if he can still go into, you know, go forward with in the fight. He was in pretty bad shape. The elbows, I didn't think, I mean, looking at the replays, the slow motion can kind of, you know,

mess with you a little bit when it's in real time. It looked like he was moving, you know, maybe he was in transition and the elbows hit while he was in transition. I don't know about those, but I thought the knee was illegal. And probably Dan could have done something. more, paused it, verbal warning, something. But again, that is an incredibly tough situation to be in it as a ref. I don't care what fans say on Twitter. That's very hard to figure out in real time. Yeah. And I don't think anyone, as I've said a couple of times, is calling,

even though some fans, you know, like to run and assume this, Jeremy, a dirty fighter or a cheater, anything of that nature. I do think that the lesson here is that there's a major problem in our sport when it comes to the rules. And never before has it been so clear than while, at least for me, watching the post-fight show, and Jeremy Stevens is talking about a rule that doesn't even exist and clearly confusing two rules. And I know you spent a lot of time covering this stuff, but to me it's amazing that 18 months after, you know, these new rules were rolled out, that we still have major commissions that haven't, like Nevada, like New Jersey, that haven't adopted them. And then you have other commissions like

California like Florida that have adopted them. There's too much confusion. You reported about Boston 220. Some of the fighters early on are telling old rules, new rules later on. I mean, it's just, to me, this is madness. And there's just, there's too much ego involved. I believe that there should be a national commission, that there should be one commission. You have one commissioner. You have, you know, you build it. We're not going to reinvent that wheel here today. But I feel like they're, like this idea that there's unified rules. There aren't unified rules. It doesn't exist. Some are using replay. Some aren't using replay. I mean, it's just madness. And I feel like, like never before has it been, you know, so apparent that this sport is fractured than Saturday,

listening to Jeremy Stephen sit there. And oh, by the way, sit there on the desk, explain this, and no one even correct them. So it's clear that the other people who were involved on that post-fight show and the producers did not recognize that he was talking about the wrong thing. Very apparent that there's an issue here, right? Without a doubt. And, like, I mean, I would be all for some kind of a national commission, some kind of national overseeing body because in what other sport does this happen?

that there are issues in the NFL with, you know, what's a catch and what's not a catch. That's fine. That's all well and good. But these are issues that in the course of the fight can work toward someone getting injured when they shouldn't be, someone getting hurt, maybe not protecting themselves in the right spots in the course of a fast sequence. Something's got to be done about it. I don't know.

I don't see the commissions who have not passed the new rules yet caving in the ones who don't want to do it. I think Nevada will eventually do it. I think that's going to come up. soon in the next few months. And I don't see the ones who were in favor of the new rules going, rolling it back. I don't see that happening. So I think for the foreseeable future, it's going to be, it's going to continue to be disjointed. And that's to the detriment of the fighters and to the referees. The Dan Murguega, who we just spoke about was on that

car in Boston when the rules got messed up by that, by that commission. And he was telling fighters early on, not his fault, because that's what, that's what he was told, that there were the new rules, then they had to go back to the old rules because someone messed up in the commission. It's just, unbelievable. It's just not. good. The sport is, the sport's a $4 billion sport. I mean, it has too many eyes on it. These things can't happen. It's Bush League. Frankie Edgar is fighting in the Comey event.

He's asking me if it's the old rules or new rules. Sitting right here. It doesn't, you know, it's just crazy. It's unbelievable that this is even a thing. It truly is. All right, before I let you go, you watched it, you have opinions on it. It's what you really want to talk about. Grade, Ronda Rousey's

second appearance, the signing, slamming Triple H, the whole spiel. And by the way, the irony of it not only being at T-Mobile Arena, sight of her last fight in the UFC, the loss, two men, the Nunes, and the place where her biddle rival, Chris Cyborg, is going to be headlining in six days,

and they're calling her the most dominant field. I mean, like, it's just amazing how these stars have aligned here that it happened in that arena, of all arenas. What did you think of round two of the Ronda experiment? I would give it like a C-plus, B-minus. And so I think in pro wrestling, the key is to engage the crowd and get the crowd behind you. And I thought when she first came out, there was a mix, right? I mean, there were chance of Ronda Rousey, but I thought there was also some vitriol against her, too.

I thought there were some booze. But by the end, I think the crowd was engaged. She put her blade through the table. All the physical stuff I thought was really good. I think that's going to be a big strength for her, her physicality and her athleticism. And even the mean mugging, I thought I thought was good. I thought that part of her acting was good. It's just a matter of her adjusting to talking like that

in front of 18,000 people every night of these live events. It's not an easy thing to do. I mean, Mike Skills is a really key part of WWE. You need to have that. You need to be smooth, and she's just not there yet. You know, she's not experienced yet. If you compare it like Stephanie and Triple H and how they talk on the mic to how Rhonda was talking on the mic,

it's a vast difference. But, you know, those two have decades of experience and she does not. I think she'll be fine. I really do. my question is how will the fans receive her moving forward? Because as we know Ariel, MMA fans don't seem to be very happy with her. If you just look at our comments on our stories, MMA fans are very upset with her.

They don't like her, which, I mean, I'm a little confused about all the reasons why. And then pro wrestling fans probably are on the fence about her because maybe they watched her in M.A. Maybe they liked her performances. Maybe they liked, you know, her persona. But she's coming into their world and she's getting pushed now ahead of. some of the women who have paid their dues on the roster for a long time. So it'll be curious to see.

And I guess she'll be on Monday Night Row tonight. Oh. We'll see even more of a... How excited are you? Are you live blogging it? I'm not live blogging it. Oh, hey, by the way, you see my Andre the Giant? Oh, yeah, Roots of Fight.

Look at you. Right on your side is that documentary. Must be nice. Yes. April. Jason Hare. My man produced it. Can't wait.

I will say I have a fundamental primary. problem with the whole premise of the whole thing from start to finish because first they show her arriving and she's got this smile on her face and she's like, I'm so happy to be here. And it's like, once again, you're playing pro wrestler. You need to be coming in there with the frown, with the scowl and being like, get that camera. Again, I think Paul Heyman needs to be by her side. My client is not talking to any of you schmose. Get that camera out of our face.

We'll talk to you when we're ready to talk. Like, I really think that Rhonda needs to be the heel in all of this. Rhonda has that in her. Remember UFC 168 when she refused to shake Misha Tate's hand. Like she knows how to play to the crowd. She knows how to be a heel, and then she needs to tap into that. Not the happy, go lucky, shy Rhonda. And then she shows up, now, I will say they made the adjustment.

She was wearing a leather jacket that fit. So I think that that was a good adjustment because she didn't look like a kid. But as you mentioned, she's not talking on the mic properly. So she seems just like very timid and whatnot smiling. The back end was better when it got physical and all that. But here's my fundamental problem with the whole thing. Rhonda Rousey is an Olympian, right? Rhonda Rousey is one of the greatest female athletes on planet Earth today, regardless of what happened in her last two UFC fights.

Why is she concerning herself with a 40-something-year-old executive mother of three? She should be rolling through the women and the men. You need to book her like she's a killer. She needs to be in 15-second matches where she's just jumping in there flying arbor and fishing. Like the fact that they're putting her on the same level of Stephanie, to me, almost devalues her. Okay, maybe you don't want to put her in there against the champ right away. but like she needs to be in there against the killers, not against someone wearing, you know, a suit. It doesn't make sense. It makes her into a celebrity as opposed to like a real athlete, in my opinion.

You don't bring in, you know, a blue chip prospect to go up against an executive who's not an athlete. You know what I'm saying? It almost brings her down. I think it's a big mistake on their part to do that. Yeah, I don't disagree. I think she needs to be a heel as well. And I think she's even said in the past that she likes playing me here, you know, even during her MMA career. I think that maybe maybe this will this be a one-time thing it's her introduction I don't want her to be put over some of the established

WWE female stars just yet so I'm kind of okay with doing a Stephanie McMahon Triple H angle and don't forget she was getting over on you know a 6 foot 5 very impressively built man not just Stephanie so she threw AAA's through a table too so it wasn't yeah but we know

we know what we're building towards here right well I mean I think that and Dave Meltzer reported this is that they're almost looking at this like, what could be the modern day Stone Cold Steve Boston versus Vince McMahon, Ronda Rousey versus Stephanie McMan and kind of do that whole, where Stephanie's trying to hold Rhonda back doing what she wants to do. And it could work, it could work, it could not work, but I'm curious to see how it all plays that.

You're going to be there. I'm just being honest. I don't know. I'm sorry. You're going to be there, right? I will be at WrestleMania. Yes, I will. Mark Romundy.

New York Sun. Mark Romney, skipping UFC 223, and he's pointing to WrestleMania. I mean, oh my gosh. If you have a New York citizen card, yes, go ahead. To be fair, I booked my trip to New Orleans before I knew that UFC 223 was going to be that day, and in Brooklyn, and I'm very upset about that. It's actually the day before, so you could make it to both. That week.

Sure, sure, sure. You know what I mean. Right, right, right. All right. Yeah, well, I look forward to your coverage later on tonight, Monday Night Raw. Is it four hours now or is it still, it's three still? It's three. Pre-show.

You get the pre-show, you get the post-show, right? Sure. No, no pre-show. You don't get the pre-show anymore? On WW. Yes, stop lying. Stop lying. All right, Mark.

Thank you very much. Great job with that article. I urge everyone to check it out. Keep up the great work. Great to have you back on the show. Thanks, Ariel. There he is. Mark Romandi of MMAfighting.com. All right.

New York, Rick, I missed it. Said that he's disowned Mark as a New Yorker. He is skipping out on UFC 223 in Brooklyn, of all places. Habibir Magamatov's again, Tony Ferguson. Go-A and JJ is Rosenominy and he's going to WrestleMania. How about that? All right. What a great show.

What a great day. So much more to go. You've sent us questions using the hashtag the MMA Hour. I do presume, yes. But before that, Mr. New York, He has spent the last four plus hours combing through the internets and gathering the best tweets of the week. We like to call this Rickspicks. You know what it's all about.

We go live.tweter.com slash MMA fighting. We go exclusively on Twitter in a matter of moments where we present to you the MMA after hour. Rickspicks, your questions, all that and more. We'll have a blast. Go to live.com.com slash MMA fighting. If you're watching on YouTube, Facebook, MMA fighting, minimize all that. Go exclusively on Twitter.

The link is on my personal Twitter account, or you should have the page bookmark by now. Live.com slash MMA fighting. The MMA after hour starts right now. All right. The MMA after hour time. No time to waste. We've gone very long today.

We've had so many guests from around the world of MMA. What a great day it has been. So that means it is time for everyone's favorite segment. It is time for Ricksbex. And your minds, MMA fans. It's time for Rewa. Rick's picks. Rick's picks are lots of fun, and his hair isn't a bun, because it's, you already know what it is.

Ricks Picks. Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, it's the moment you've all been waiting for. 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. I was waiting for the Canadian flag swoosh and never came. Thank God. I outlawed that. What happened? Just like I ban Mark Riemondi from New York City, I ban the Canadian wipe from Rick's Picks.

Where was it? Nope, not there. It doesn't exist. Can we get a Canadian-American double-souche? Wow. Out. Cut. Ban. I actually went back and watched it last week because I thought it was such a nice little... A nice tribute to... No, a nice little addition, you know, some...

We'll get some wipes, but... It ain't going to be the Canadian flag. Oh, no, Austin, no, traitor. Yes. Oh, my God. Austin, no, we've lost them. Oh, my. How are you, sir? Everything good? We're wearing the glasses today, I see.

I realized, I wanted to take them off, and then I realized reading some of these tweets is going to be tough without the glasses. Okay. The vision is going, Ariel. The vision is going. Wow, look at you. All right. I'm older.

Well, the floor is yours, my friend. What do you have for us? We have a... You know what? I'm not even going to tease it. Let's just get into it. Okay. I was going to give some kind of summary of it, but you know what?

We're just going to get into Rick's Picks this week. We start... We saw this a little bit earlier, but had to shout it out. Patty the Badi, winning via Flying Triangle. Now, do you have a beef with this being dubbed a Flying Triangle? Well, I mentioned earlier. I mentioned, I said, you know, is it really a flying triangle? triangle because it seems like the finish

actually is the arm bar and it seems like he really has to lock it in on the ground but I don't know I mean he actually kind of admitted himself that you know he just went to the arm bar to kind of speed things up a little bit but whatever it was beautiful it was and the crowd reaction

by the way that takes an incredible amount of athleticism you know to to do that absolutely so we don't see these every day no we don't but shout out to Patty the Batty getting it done The Baddy the man. A personal favorite of our own page back there, right? That's right.

I mean, he doesn't love the Batty. You know, Paige was requesting maybe like a little shout out from Patty. Oh, my bad. But we'll save that for his next time. Actually, my son, Oliver, is sick today from home. And I haven't had a chance to even look at my commuter throughout the show because we've had so many Skype interviews. I do believe we've had all the interviews. That's correct.

No phoneers. Is that a record? There was a week, very recent. It was either last week or the week before that we had all about one on the phone. Yeah, yeah. But it was more guess. So I think... Anyway, she's actually, like, giving me, like, running email commentary about the Patty interview.

And she doesn't often watch the show. She's saying, Oliver's tuning in. Patty Pimbleau, what a name. I love Patty getting the trolls. Can they understand anything about Patty? Like, can they understand what he's saying? She says, I love Patty getting the trolls. Can he get yours?

Why can't we see his forehead? It was a very tight shot It was a tight shot Very tight shot Yes Yes Patty the Batty from the Echle

What's that? What's that page? Oh she's feeling Paige's getting a little territorial Over Patty the Batty Who doesn't Listen

I mean Look at the way The crowd reacts to him We're looking at it right now Or we were looking at it Yeah yeah I mean look at that crowd Yeah

Love me some Patty Okay From the great Caposa on Twitter Ahmed Aliev knocking out Magelmed

Sigid Ali Bekhov spinning wheel kick completely flatlined Dang Let's watch this again What's up with the thing with the legs

afterwards Is he helping them out? Yeah, getting the circulation back I thought he was doing the wheelbarrow The hair comes Bang

Clean Super clean Wow Trying to help him with the circulation Very kind of Super clean knockout from Fight Night Global 83. Thanks to Caposa, the sage of MMA Twitter.

Here I thought this was pretty cool from the UFC. We see Jessica Andrage meeting her idol soccer player Marta, who happens to play for the local Orlando women's soccer team. Incredible. I love this because as, you know, if it's not about Liverpool, then it's not in my soccer lexicon. It's not really like entering my mind space, but I know Marta and this was super cool. And they're effusive about each other.

So I thought it was nice to see. Also, Jessica Andrudge. Very tough fighter. I mean, incredible. What a performance. And you know what? I think we will ultimately kind of forget about this performance from Tisha Torres because she was on the losing end of it. But it was probably the closest fight that can be.

scored a 3027 if that makes sense. I felt like every round she was really active, really engaged, throwing enough that you could really justify something one way or the other. Andrage kind of took over with the power later in the fight. But a really good performance by Tisha Torres, even though she was on the losing end. And I think, unfortunately, it'll be the type of thing where we don't remember that because it was a losing effort, but I think she deserves recognition. because she had a game plan and stuck to it

and really didn't make it easy for Androche. She was attacking at all times, countering well. But kudos to both women. I thought it was a fantastic fight. Amen. Here we have... I noticed you didn't give kudos to Brian Kelleher.

You know what? It was funny how you tried to railroad me asking if I offered him congratulations on his fight. And guess what? Oh, I did. Took care of it. I know he did. Oh.

This is great. This is fantastic. Olivier Aub and Mercier from Fight Night Orlando, obviously scrapped from the card, not in the best of spirits, but still having fun,

still partying, and homage to Nate Diaz. Also, is he wearing a fanny pack? Yeah. Incredible. I mean, what else would he be wearing? Look at that, get up. Look at the little Westwood Pan sign.

The whole thing, the whole thing is flawless. I think he's got some more fans after this one. I'd like to see the Diaz brothers kind of engage with it. Probably not happening. But I don't know. Speaking of the Diaz brother. Oh.

Shout out to Nick Diaz. What? Getting in the drinks game. What? The official drink of Nick Diaz, Hemp 2O. It's incredible. Kick it up a notch and max out performance. Everything you need crammed into one bottle,

providing the punch you need to get through the day with ease. What? And then a bunch of two. tags for the Diaz brothers. The official drink of Nick Diaz. Now, I was hoping it would be the official drink of the DS Brothers

and Nate could get in on the game, but, you know, do your thing, Nick. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, do your thing. Now, I like a couple things about the... Wait. Yes. There's something, is there more? Oh, my God.

Damn! Look at that. That looks like the, uh, the Kermit. Ice tea logo. Oh, you know what? It does. Dan, look at that. Suck it. That Nick Diaz on the, on the lawn chair.

getting his hemp 2-0. What does that mean? There's actual hemp in it? Well, hemp is not an act, like, there's not an illegal substance or a, or, or a, no, I just don't, I just don't understand. Active substance in hemp. It's incredible. Okay, can I, you can't go back, eh? No.

What, the kick? Well, no. One of the hashtags was Olympics. Another one was exclusive. Now, this one is stay. The spelling could use some work. Yeah, it's like, I mean. Hy-tated.

And what is cookies? Cookies SF? You know what you can do is if you're trying to ride a wave, right? If you're trying to look for some popular hashtags, you just start tagging it and then maybe people come upon it. But shout out to Nick and Hemtoe,

the official drink of Nick Diaz. Getting that money. Okay. What everybody was waiting for, us to talk about female MMA fighter entering the world of pro wrestling. Here we have No, not Ronda Rousey

Jessica I Oh yeah Is that Gilbert? Whoa, check this out I mean this is kind of cool actually Oh wow That's Jessica I right there That's Jessica I

Dang Footage courtesy of Cleveland Knights Championship Wrestling On February 9th Oh Oh no Oh no And she's still fighting.

Yep, yep, yeah, yeah. Here we go. It turned out to be a distract. Look at that smile on Jessica's face. All right, now she's out of hair. Wow. That's Jessica I. Doesn't look anything like her.

She changed her hair. Look, you got to get glammed up for the dressing appearance. She got the swag. Shout out to Jessica I. Look, innovator. Pioneer. Eric Bischoff. All right.

This is going on. It's incredible. Because you got too much. We got too much other wrestling to go to. Oh, man. So. Oh, here it is. This is the wrestling portion of Rick's mix.

Can I tell you what the best part about this is? That like she just stands. Okay, this part right here, right here, right here. Where she flips the hair back? No, no, no. Where she stands there, like motionless. There. Like, yo, there's someone in back of you that's about to hit you.

You can't just stand there. Don't just stand there. She's admiring her work. Oh, come on. That was the knockout blow. She's standing there admiring her work. Rookie move. Oh, here it goes.

You messed up. Oh, you done messed up. Shout out to zombie prop for capture. Who do you think you are? You're fired. No, she didn't fire her. She signed the contract just yesterday. She's channeling her and her daddy.

Now, did she miss the table? No, what? He's laying in the middle of the table. What are you talking about? Was it a clean? I think we'll get this again in a second. You know what? I like this.

This was good. Yeah, but what's up with the font? Like, does it have to be, you know, size? Why was there a size? 90 font Rhonda Rousey on the contract Ronda Rousey's contract is just the biggest possible writing of her name. All it says is Ronda Rousey on it. Nothing else. What is she actually signing? I mean he went in to say that

Okay here we go here we go here's a slam right in the table. A little bit off You know what she meant to do it she wanted to spike him on his damn head. A little bit off no no she wanted to do it. Can we rewind that? No we can't come on but we can talk about the fact that she didn't have anything added to a rider or anything Rhonda doing it the old-fashioned way she wants to earn it. or stripes. What do you think? Do you think it's

Stephanie, Rhonda? What I've been seeing online and hearing in podcasts and this may be a little bit outdated is they want

to do Stephanie, Triple H, Rhonda, and somebody like the Rock. Is that not what you've been hearing as well?

Yeah. Which was that angle that they had at WrestleMania. Let's get away from from the actual

in the ring stuff. Here we go. Lazy the Savage. I like how Lazy the Savage has become like part of the entourage on camera. He's the official media guy. He's got the video,

he's got the photos. It's amazing. No. But tell people who are behind those masks. So we've got Daniel Cormier. Daniel Cormier is on the right of screen right with the gold necklace.

Next to him. Top left. Yep. Bottom left. I don't know. It was Ciazza. I thought it was Ciazzi. It is my Ciazo.

What are you talking about? Oh, you're talking about middle. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, that must be Darren Wynn. Yeah, because I know Rosendo is behind. You know how you know it's Rosendo. The shortest one there. Three-fix six.

Easy. I'm just saying. Don't give that as official height. Easy. Don't break K-fave. But UFC fighters showing out over at... Oh, Darren Winn, there's the name. Oh, and Camacho is there, too, who's also part of Cormier's team.

I said this to you before the show. Ronda Rousey owes Daniel Cormier in particular a massive debt of gratitude because he has put her over and he has told the rest of the MMA community that it's okay to be happy for her. It's okay to root for her success. It's okay to cheer her on. Here's the UFC light heavyweight champion who's about to fight for the heavyweight title, who in my opinion is one of the greatest fighters of all time. In the front row, losing his mind, leading the cheer, Ronda Rousey, Ronda Rousey, alongside King Velasquez, who never shows any emotion whatsoever. Michael Kesa there, two ultimate fighter winner. It's amazing what he has done for her unintentionally, just because he's that big of a fan and he's legitimately happy for her success. And there's a trickle-down effect there. And I hope she recognizes that what he's doing for her. It's really amazing. I said this to my colleagues on Saturday. And to me, again, it was clear after watching, you know, everything that went on Fox from Orlando. I have never met a star with such a small ego. You don't see people at the top of their games

sitting in the front row acting like that for someone else. The guy has no ego. It's unbelievable. And I thought that came through when they were arguing about the stuff with Dominic Cruz and it certainly comes through here.

So I know that the thing is like, oh, you know, Dana Kormier, Dana Kornay, but what more can you say about the guy? It's amazing. Maybe a little break from that when he got called out by Alir Latifie and then went into business for himself. Well, no, but you see, he played it perfectly.

Yeah, he did well. I'm only kidding because he actually said, I'm not going to do it. And then he did it, which is straight into it. Which is endearing. Great call out by Alir Latifie. Literally going over, I want you, Daniel Cormier. And Cormier, not able to respond in the cage, but able to respond on the microphone. Can I say that maybe I thought it was a swing and a miss?

Who are we talking about? For who? On Latifi's part. Tremendous win. Fantastic win. Need to have a different name other than Daniel Cormier. It's just too far. It's just, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's,

and, and, uh, and, uh, and, and, uh, and obviously, he's not calling out Alexander Augustus Singh, because that's a long time friend and teammate, but I'll give props to Shemotkar Sandu for this one, because I saw him say it first, it should have been Luke Rockhold. Dan, Dana Corme, I'm coming for you. Welcome. Welcome. Well, I'm welcome Luke Rockhold, who's your teammate. Now, a little time. Now, little Time has passed since the knockout. Little time. Literally last week. No.

No. No. By the way. By the way. By the way. I said that he nailed it last time and all of a sudden it's, nope. Rockhold has done interviews. He's come out.

He's at the ultimate fighter. He's training. Time has passed. There is a massive difference between, you know, last week and this week, seven days later. And Alexander Gustafson is not a former champion, A. B. he wasn't called out before the fight and only responding after he got knocked out so that's very notable in my opinion

here's Alir Latifi who's the perfect kind of opponent for Rockhold to debut at 205 with saying hey Kormia I'm coming for you I know you're occupied so let me beat up your friend boom you're getting the fight no doubt about it swing and a miss welcome welcome to the right side of this welcome to the right side of this also not tagged lazy living up to his name you can kind of make out Travis Brown there in the very top left corner who was also featured

obviously not prominent in the picture but Travis Brown there supporting as well with the rowdy shirt. He's in that picture. Yeah, he was in the very top left like mini, many, many, mini. Not quite front row

which is interesting. Well, Cormeet's got the juice. Interesting segue here. Dana White pictured here with the beast Brock Lesner even when it's not

an MMA personality we're getting into that I mean sorry even when it's not a wrestling personality we're getting into the wrestling personalities clearly signaling something during Ronda Rousey's expected debut

on on Wembe programming to sign her contract how small does Dana look next to him hey it's amazing most people would look small next to Brock Lesnar I mean you know what he looks downright big

compared to how I would look next to Brockles. It's gigantic. Now this, I do believe, is... Is this a sign of something? This is UFC HQ with the writing in the back. So... WWA in Vegas for this show. Yes. Brock Leicester's contract runs through

WrestleMania, which is in April. There is mutual interest. Try to find out how this meeting went. Of course, we all remember what happened the last time I reported on Brock Leicester, but that did not deter me. But no, I know there's mutual interest, I know the door is open.

I know that he still has six months left to fulfill if he does come back from his suspension, which froze after he withdrew from the testing pool. I know that the UFC would love to have him back. I know that he's interested in coming back. I know that he's about to become a free agent. And I also know that a picture like that, even if he does not sign,

even if he has or if the UFC can't afford him, or if they don't have an intention of signing him at the end of the day, is worth more than the price of gold. because as I've said, countless times at this point, 2018 is the year of buzz for the UFC. They just need the buzz. They're in the midst of TV talks. They need people speculating as to whether or not he is coming back.

So they need to go into a meeting on a Monday morning saying, see this picture? See who we're talking to? I also noticed Dana White talking about Nick Diaz. Did you see that recently? Saying that he has interested. This is what it's all about. Floyd Mayweather, Nick Diaz, Kana McGregor,

all these guys and more. Brock Lesner, of course, just the idea of them coming back, I mean, them coming back would be phenomenal, but just the idea is very valuable to them right now. Do I have any doubt that they want it back? Sure. I mean, like, they, of course want them back.

I have no doubt. But even putting this out, like, compare this picture to less than two years ago with the whole, you know, UFC 200 thing. Yeah. The reaction to me reporting that an hour before it got out and then coming out with this, there's no secret here, right?

compare it to how closely that secret was kept to now just putting this out with no follow up. February 26, 2018, right now, today. Brock Lesnar fights again in the UFC, yes or no. Are you asking me?

I'm asking you. Now this is not based on any reporting. This is just strictly a guess. I told you everything I know about the situation as it currently stands. What is my guess? What is your guess? Yes.

I think I agree with that as well. And by the way, one more thing about Brock Lesterner must be noted. No one negotiates better than Brock Lester publicly. I think he would want this picture out more than anybody. Better than him. Remember UFC 184 he's sitting there. Remember the time in Vegas. A plaid suit.

Beautiful of flat suit. He does this all the time. Every time the contract is up, he flirts publicly. He plays footsy publicly. I mean, he does this every single time. And he's so good at it. You bring two people to the dance. Why not?

And you know what's amazing about it? He's otherwise a very private person. But when it comes to negotiations... It comes to making that money on the negotiation. And he always gets his way. And he always gets the big bucks. Smart man. Very smart.

Okay. We'll continue talking about Brock by way of Kane Velasquez. He's posting here in his mask saying it was his first W-D event. I could feel at home here. Brock Lesnar, he tags him. I wouldn't mind taking another belt from you. And also, hashtag don't call me Nacho Libre, which is funny. Kane Velasquez teasing.

maybe chasing Brock Lesnar over to the wrestling world. To which Sage Beckett from the WWE says, Belts hold up your pants. Around here we have championship titles. And then she hands the mic over to Paul Heyman. To which Paul Heyman says, thank you, Sage, for handling my light work. No need to pass the mic back to your humble advocate.

He's care of business with expert precision. And he drops the mic. To which Kane Velasquez rounds this all out. by saying, this is crazy. I don't drop, I don't mic drop, but I'll drop Rock Lesnar

and use that belt to hold up my pants. King Velasquez with the flames, with the fire on Twitter. What's happened to King Velasca? Yeah, I don't know. If this is truly Kane

handling the accounts, that's what I was, that's what I was most impressed with here. The whole Twitter back and forth thing has gotten a little bit overdone. Everybody's, you know, firing social media shots. I get it.

That's the current environment. And I'm guilty of, of highlighting it myself, but I'm more impressed to just Kane Velasquez knows how to use Twitter and is lining him up and still has his sights on Brock Lesnar. Good for him.

You know, not to beat a dead horse, but it is somewhat timely. In the words of the immortal, Connor, who the F is Sage Beckett? I don't know. Okay. Like, is she... Here, let's find out.

Is she like the reporter type person? is she I can't say I've heard that one before I think I think it would be appropriate to give her due would be nice Sage Beckett wrestler currently signed to WWE performing

at an NXT under the ring name Sage Beckett I mean that takes a lot of chutzpah for an NXT competitor to talk to one of the greatest of all time like that but I guess you got to shoot your shot Sage well it gave us in unfilter yeah

gave us Twitter Kane Twitter gangst Kane. Okay. Sticking with the AKA theme here, Meeb Narmaga Madov posted this to his Instagram. Showing,

let's bring the audio up on this. Showing Daniel Cormier what happens in the locker room before he comes out. That's great. Explicit language warning. Come on. Lady.

Kick this fucking guy's ass. Let's go, D.C. I love that. everybody else just still, calm, quiet, silent DC, maniacally pacing in the locker room.

I believe him and then he wins. He talked about this. The way he did. Yeah, we had the cell phone footage, I think, of him. I like how Cain's in the

back there checking the message. Well, you know what? Kane is probably tweeting with Brock Leicester. He's probably checking what's going on in the world. Oh, my. But DC fired up.

Then we go to a D.C. rival. Wait, wasn't this a video? Why is this not playing? Oh, well. Video here of John Jones powerlifting. Wait, not sure, but I think it was a lot. Just looking at

Oh, here we go. I don't know why the video took so long to play, but here we go. Don't count the days, make the days count. Where's Luke Thomas to weigh in on his form? I think he has already. Oh, yeah. Of course he. Boom, like clockwork. John Jones getting it in. boxing in the garage,

power lifting, hearing, what is it, tomorrow? I think we've got... 27th, correct. I think we've got some John Jones news abound. He's getting ready for it. Oh yeah, boom.

The shape. Bang. Well done. Joe Schilling, Bellator, M.M.A fighter and kickboxer, calling out Rampage Jackson, but highlighted because of the way he called out Rampage Jackson.

What? Posing with Vanderle Silva saying that he should fight Rampage Jackson, but the, clearly the gangster Photoshop skills by Joe with the little mustache that he added to Vandrelay. I have no idea. Maybe I'll ask him about it, but I would watch Joe Schilling versus Rampage. Yeah, I'm sure Rampage would love it. Yeah, Rampage is always talking about wrestler hump in his leg. I think getting in there with a true kickboxer like Joe would be a good alternative

to that. I'd like to watch Schilling versus Rampage. But shout out to Joe with the Photoshop skills, the Microsoft paint drawn on mustache for Vanderlai. Can he make heavyweight though? Is the question? Joe Schilling? Can he make heavyweight? Yeah, I think he'll be okay. I think

maybe they try and do it at light heavyweight though. Joe competing and kickboxing in the 180s. That's it for Rick's picks this week. But we've got some questions on the let's do it on the other side. Oh, you know what? That's not it for Rick's picks. Late submission, I'm going to try and bring

this up right now. Because somebody told me they'd be disappointed if I didn't feature this. Okay. So I'm absolutely required to feature this. Ain't nothing but against a party. Okay, here we go. I haven't watched this. So I can't vet it. I'm a little bit scared

but we're going to watch. Oh, this is our own Guillermo, yes. Look at this guy. Oh, the Brazilian Peace. Legend. Oh, that's it. You know what? I'm a little disappointed. What? Look at that guy walking around. That's like a modified...

No, because there was no... Let's... Billionaire's shot again. It's only one slide on the... See, I was... I thought he was going to slide back, do another drink on the other side, and then, you know, back and forth a few times. One slide... One slide... One slide into the drink. With his chest out like that with the Rio de Janeiro mountains in the background. What a life over there are they... No, you know what? Let's see one more time. One more. time. One more time.

This is the number of times he should have done it in the actual video. You go back and forth. By the way, do you think he has to go? To the spin? Yeah. No, I think that was a little bit of flare. Like clockwork, Kyrgy Lamer weighing in. Don't hate near, Kirk.

I featured this and I'm disappointed. You know what? I'm disappointed. How about that form? Did it happen at the same time? Does he start at the same time? Did he get a, oh, he beats him to it. Look at that.

Boom. Beats him to it. On his knees. Doesn't even chug as fast. You know what? The other guy chugged better. Get out of here. Don't be a hater.

That was phenomenal. I just love this part right here. No, because he beats the guy to the table. The low five, too. He beats the guy to the table and they finish the drink at the same time. Better luck next time. Boom. Disappointed.

And still. Disappointed. Brazilian beast. I expect better. We'll get Danny Segarra in there. He'll make it work. What a life. Okay.

Now that's truly it for Rick's picks. Only kidding. Shout out to Kilarame, the man. Okay. Let us feature some questions from you guys. He says, by the way, no need to drink that fast because he already beat the guy. You know? Hashtag.

Who is the guy, by the way? Let's get some contests here. Poor soul. And why are you doing this on a Saturday? It looks like fun, but maybe make it a little more difficult. This is what happens when people don't have kids. They do things like this. question from

MMA fighting actually because Ariel Hawani did not do a question of the week You know what? I was so fired up about the Jeremy Stevens Josh Emmett situation that I just couldn't

because people were like oh way in you know they were saying like do a poll on whether or not it should have been a DQ point and I just have to be honest and I'm not trying to be like bourgeois here

but or bougie as the kids say I just got the impression that a lot of people didn't know know the rule. Like I couldn't believe on Saturday how many people didn't know the rule. Okay, well, we're going to get into that in these

questions. So it's like, what I'm going to ask you? Why don't I just educate you? Damn. Drop the mic. Okay. MMA fighting Twitter account asks, which former champion slash current pro wrestler would you want to see back in the UFC?

The options were Ronda Rousey, Brock Lesnar, both or neither. 40% of the votes, Brock Lesnar 40% of the votes neither dang 11% both and 9% for Rowdy Ronda Rousey

Are you surprised? People really wanting to see Brock Lesnar back in the UFC or neither they could do without both 80% total for that Interesting Rock Lesnar or none

Probably a lot of haters weighing in who aren't being truthful I mean Ronda Rousey as you know has been discussed did not go out in the best way She didn't address the fans of MMA. But that's her greatest crime. Brock Lesnar failed a post-fight drug test and, well, actually, one that was...

What that tells me is, people don't care. People don't care about failing drug tests. They don't. Is there a double standard? I think so, for sure. I think Brock could get away with almost anything. And people would still want to get him back just because of what a spectacle it is. Also, you know, we have to take into account.

He didn't lose. He didn't get manned. handled on the way out the door in this instance. He actually, you know, beat a game Mark Hunt. And yeah. What do you think Mark Hunt's thinking when you see that picture of Dana? Can't be happy. Can't be happy.

That was the first thing that came to mind. I think he's thinking of all kinds of expletives and putting things in the butt, as he would say on the show regularly. Needles, needles in the butt. But I cannot be happy with seeing Brock Lesnar highlighted that way. But who knows if it's a sign of things to come may or may not be back, but at least there is interest. Okay. Sort of.

First question. What if Dan, in this case, Dan Mergliaata, thought the knee missed? This person, Ryan Bach saying, oh, actually an OG from the original Rick's picks, saying it's not illegal to quote unquote throw a strike, but only to land an illegal strike. I don't know if that's actually true. Well, I mean, like, you could fly all over the place. if it doesn't land, it doesn't land. I think the referee has discretion, though, if there's intention. Yes, exactly.

He could say, yo, you know, like, if you're going around, like, trying to headbut your opponent, you're missing. Yeah. Or you're,

you're, you're trying to poke somebody in the eye or something. They're sizing up their cup, you know, there's an issue there. And this individual does bring up a good point. Because I did reach out to Dan McGliada to either come on the show or speak.

And it's not the first time, that there's been some controversy with a migratica call. Most refs at this juncture if you're doing this long enough. You're going to be involved. It's such a thankless job. It's such a tough job.

But say this. And I'm happy that this individual brought it up. Mario Yamasaki is one of the more controversial referees. Sure. In the sport. Without question.

And I noted this after the latest controversy. He always responds in some way, shape, or form. We may not like the response. We may think it's crazy like the word. But he always responds.

And I think that there's value there, there's accountability there. And I would love to hear. If that's what he thinks, sure. If he thinks that it didn't land, great. I do believe that the replay would show otherwise. But if that's truly what he thinks, okay, explain to us what your line of thinking was. Is that a slippery slope? What do you mean?

Is the referees in a, I think the referees are put in a very difficult position here. where the rules are not clear to not to, the rules are not clear to even the participants of the, of the sport. And there's different rule sets for different things. It's not akin to other sports where, let's say, after an NBA game, the referee has to justify a call.

The rules are, everybody knows these rules. They've been established. They're set. If we ask referees to justify calls based on rules that are not clear to everybody involved, are we opening the door for every single thing that they do to then be overanalyzed, scrutinized, used against them? If the rule set was uniform across, I would have much less of a problem. Then being able to say, well, this is what I thought.

Here's the rules that outlined that can be easily cited. I think there could be a reluctance from the referees. And I would almost understand it to talk about a call because the rule sets are so misunderstand. by the general public, let alone fighters don't even know them, let alone everybody else who's watching this sport. In this case, again, worth repeating that a downed opponent

is illegal. Yeah, under old rules, new rules, whatever. I don't really see where the controversy is because again, as we've watched it, and I know we have the benefit of replay, but even while I was watching it live, I was like, oh! And even the broadcasters who are close, but not in the ring, obviously, or the cage,

they even were like, oh, appear to be... So, I just think once and for all that that warranted a pause in the action. Fair. And I would love to hear his side of it on any kind of platform. And then I see a lot of people who are, you know, assuming what he thought. And you just can't like, oh, well, of course he thought this and that. Like, no, no, no. Until I hear from him otherwise, I'm only going to tell you what I think and what people who I have talked to have said. And yes, it comes down to the confusion. There confusion, but there really shouldn't be confusion

in this case. Yeah, I agree. This is illegal under both. Now, Jeremy Stevens kind of made the situation worse, I think, in the post-fight interview, because he clearly was confusing the the new rule and two rules. He was like confusing almost two things. Yeah.

And in a weird way, double down on his intent. Yeah, intentionally throwing an illegal strike. And yes, I've seen everyone say, and I agree with you, and you say like that, that didn't end the fight, that didn't do the most damage, but it's still connected.

Even if it didn't connect. Even if it didn't connect. But it did connect. No, but even if it didn't. But it did. But even if it didn't. Your point is it did connect. Yes.

And that's black and white. Black and white. But even if it had not, Josh Emmett is getting up or trying to get up or making a movement with the assumption, knowing the rules, that he will not be struck at that time by a knee. That alters what he's going to do.

and the need landing or not landing in that scenario is there's no doubt that that's illegal that it we can't we can't have one person understand the rules in the cage and one person not understand the rules in the cage and that come into play without being the person not understanding the rules being penalized in some way for that and it's unacceptable

I don't have such a big issue with you know there aren't that many analysts out there and most of these analysts are still active fighters and the sport is still so small that they're all going to have a connection to each other. In this particular case, Dominic and Jeremy are friends and they actively trained together. But I really do feel like Dominic could have done a better job

of being a little more impartial in that case. I mean, the argument that, well, it happened, so it can't be illegal if it happened and the fight is over and there's nothing we can do about it, to me, it's hogwash. Like, you just can't... And like just the whole demeanor, the whole tone of the whole thing,

I wish I could have been up there and just to remind him that this is illegal under both sets of rules and just because the referee didn't call it doesn't make it legal it just makes it an illegal blow that was ultimately missed by the referee and there's nothing more to it.

He got away with it sometimes the fouls get called and there is again no distinction as to the severity of the foul and you can compare it to any of the force It's an impossible game to play. If you're offside by five yards or by a fraction of a yard, it's still the same penalty. Yeah, that's an impossible game to play if you go, well, this is not as much of an eye poke.

This is not as much of a grind kick. No. You can't do that. It was clear as day, in my opinion. It was clear as day. He is literally like setting him up for that knee. And then he says afterwards, I was waiting for his hand to go up. So you acknowledge that you were trying to illegally hit the guy.

Our next question from David actually asked about those two points. So you went into this a little bit. Does Dominic Cruz lose any credibility as an analyst based on that? He doesn't lose credibility in my opinion because we know going into it. Like we all know that they're friends. We all know that they're teammates. I just personally think like if I'm producing that show, we could do better. We could do better.

And by the way, I do believe that everyone kind of deserves some blame there because no one even spoke up and said that that's illegal under the old and new rules. But the question is how many people even know that? Man, this is your freaking job, man. This is your job. Like, we're all talking about it on our Slack channel. It's Jeremy Stephen's job, too. How many people actually know this?

And this is why the referees, I think, are putting in the terrible spot. Yeah, you know, it's interesting. I was watching this with my wife. And someone said that, you know, it's asking a lot of the referees to be on top of this sort of thing. And she's kind of like half listening, half watching. And she goes, did he just say, asking a lot of the referees, and I said, yeah. And she said, isn't that their job?

Yes. You know what I mean? Like, that's what you signed up for. No doubt about it. Making the tough call is why they get, why they get the money that they're not. If it's an easy call. They don't get the big bucks. Yeah.

If it was all, you know, hey, these fights play out exactly how they're supposed to play out. This guy gets a decision. This guy gets knocked out and there's no controversy. There's no difficult decisions. Then it wouldn't be a job. But at the same time, I feel like they're starting behind the eight ball here. with the way the rule set is set up. There needs to be a much clearer picture for the fighters,

for the referees, for everybody involved here, so that this doesn't, there's no ambiguity to this. You could say the whole it's asking a lot thing. Sure. About the punches before the knee, that's super tough. That's just a uniquely tough. People are moving. Is he moving into it?

Is he defending? You know, like that to me, I didn't even notice that. DC brought that up after the fact, and I was like, damn, those do look close. Clear. But those are tough. Like, the guy's in motion, trying to get out of the way.

But the need to me is clear as day. And I maintain that Emmett actually did a service to Jeremy Stevens by ducking, by moving out of the way, because that thing, if he was truly out of it, that thing really could have landed flush. And that would have 100% been a DQ. It's okay to say the following two things. simultaneously, it's okay to say it's a difficult job and the call was botched. It's okay to say both. It's a difficult position to be in and that the call was wrong. Would love to hear from him. Would love. And I feel they need to say this again because people run and say like, oh, why are you hating? Why are you?

Dammeriguata is a sweetheart of a guy. I often actually sit right next to him on the plane on the way home. We always fly into the same airport. He is so nice. He always has a smile on his face. He is a veteran when it comes. comes to MMA officiating, I'm not knocking his character or, or him as a person. I do disagree with the no call and I'd love to hear from him. Well, when you guys sit on the next plane, yeah, this should be fun. Talk it out. Yeah, this should be great. Okay. Scott asking, will the name Henan Burrow be remembered years into the future? Let's spin this out a little bit. How will Henan Burrow be remembered years into the future? A clear decline. Yeah, but he's not the following his reign on top.

I think this is a very drastic one though. To go from what many were considering and the UFC was considering one of the best pound for pound fighters. A pound for pound great to now not being able to just get it done against anybody seemingly in the division. Obviously not taking away credit from the people that they're beating him. But the fall from grace has been drastic. It's almost like he fell off a cliff.

Is that, you know, if he's, had been fading, I think he'd be remembered more favorably. I think now we're entering territory where Hennon and Burau is going to be remembered as I don't know, an illusion maybe. I'm thinking this is hurting his legacy

a great deal, actually. I don't know, it's kind of like those Johnny Hendricks situations that we've seen as of late and we've seen them. Hendricks declined. Hendricks didn't fall off completely. I mean, look, nothing is exactly the same. You know, you look at the loss. The loss was

I actually think it was handled poorly on a couple levels. The loss was the loss. And T.J. Dillshaw, the first one, UFC 173. T.J. Dilshot was better that day. There's no doubt about it. But I think, and I remember talking about this,

the turnaround was too quick. It went from May, UFC 173 to UFC 175 in August. So it was essentially a three-month turnaround after he was beaten very badly. I mean, three months is nothing for a fighter like that to recover and then, you know,

get back. into the shape, new game plan, et cetera. And of course, misses weight, bangs his head, horrible weight cut, total mess of a situation, can't fight a 177.

I don't know if you ever recovered from that. I really don't. And so I almost feel like you can go back to the decision to just run it back back quickly. They rushed him. He needed to take time off. Like you see some athletes get concussions.

You know, some of them miss a year. And here we were rushing this guy back on three months' notice. notice, and then on top of that he's cutting weight and he bangs his head while cutting weight and slips in the bathroom. It's very possible that he's never recovered from that. So, you know, I think of that.

I'm not going to eliminate everything that he did. He was great while he was on top. It's unfortunate that he never got the fight against Dominant Cruz, that he was an interim champion for a couple of fights, that he was defending an interim belt. I think in hindsight, that was tough, but they were in a tough spot with Cruz, always thinking that he was going to come back. but you know to me I put him more in that

Hendricks category he had a run and then he had the drop off and there's a few things that you could point to that maybe affected his drop off yeah I looked at the records it's not a it's not a terrible comparison it actually is kind of apt the difference I think though was that there was a narrative forming around Hennon Barow as the all time

like he is an all time great he is a number one pound fighter I was in the midst of the Dana White John Jones feud they were trying to discredit John Jones none of us believe that none of us believe that And now the expectations have to be significantly lowered. Okay. None of us bought that.

I certainly didn't. Nigel saying, I think it's a disappointment that Edgar versus Ortega is only three rounds. Do you think there could be scope to expand the criteria for five-round fights? Example, number one contender fights, it's too important to potentially have a split decision or close fight. What do you feel about? Yeah, I get it. I'd love to see this fight as a five-rounder. I will say this.

The UFC is very, very, very reluctant these days to label any fight as a number one contender fight. And I'm actually surprised by that because they were. want to put all kinds of labels as far as rankings go. Yeah, exactly. But they never do it. You notice that? They very rarely do it. Part of the reason for that, of course, is that Dana White does less media, so he's not sort of pressed to label these fights. And I also think part of the reason is they don't want to, you know, back themselves into a corner. Yeah, you're committing to something. But this, I mean, this is a very clear number one contender fight. It's an easy one to label. I'd like to see five rounds. Yeah. Sure. Yeah. I wouldn't hate it. It's just they never label

fights, number one contender fights, so they're never going to do five-round co-made events for that reason. It's just, they don't want to do it. They don't want to commit to it. I do think that with this new TV deal, something needs to be done about the rankings. And I remember seeing, I think it was our friend Jedi Goodman who

pointed it out that they weren't even updated as of last week. I don't know if they've been updated since, but maybe they've even done away with them because I think that the rankings are really doing more harm than good for the UFC. Guys are, I mean, look at the I think it was, Does it say when

there are a lot No, it was okay So it says Wednesday February 21st So they have been I guess they were Like a day later or something

But Which division is it A welterweight Check out the Welterweight division Woodley Wonderboy RDA

Covington Robbie Lawler Damian Maya Mazvedal Darren Till Kamaro Usman Neal Santiago

Panzanibio and then Donald Trone is number 11 What do those 11 fighters have in common, including the champion Tyron Woodley? What do they have in common? None of them have a fight book. And you have guys like Gunner Nelson who are trying to get in there.

You have guys like Ponziadibio trying to get in there who's on the cusp. I think that, and there's some reasons there, like one guy's injured. But like, you have other situations where RDA is saying, no, I don't want to fight this guy. I want to fight that guy. Or, you know, Usman is trying to fight Covington. Yeah. Covington is three and Usman is eight. I mean, that's a fight that would happen any day of the way.

week in the old days. And so I feel like the rankings are doing more harm than good. I agree with that. Thank you. Final question. What's going on with Ariel's beer today? Looking a little shaggy. Hey, really?

Getting called out. Can we go full screen on Ariel's single? Let's see that beard. MMA beer. This guy is a notorious troll. Is it looking shaggy? I don't know. What do you think? Listen, I think this is your way. you probably wrote this thing because I call you about your beer.

That's my alt account. No, I mean, I'm not one to talk at the moment. I'm a little scragging myself. A bit of a mess, if we're being honest. No, you know, I just look, I have a prepubescent beer. That doesn't mean there was a time where it was like very nicely cropped. Like now you've got the Jim De Anvil Nighthart thing going. What is up with that?

Why you go so pointy there? Do you explain me that? That's just the way it grows. I don't know, man. How often? No, it's not the way it grows. It's very clear that it's a, it's very clear that it's a, a lot longer on your chin.

Look, I don't make... I don't make the decisions here. Yeah, you do. You do. You actually do. How often do you get a trim? These days, maybe like once a month, not even. Well, maybe...

Once a month and a half? No, I go once a month. Yeah. You should probably do, like, every two weeks. No. How often do you get your haircut? Around that. Oh, okay.

Once a month? It's a combo package. It's a combo package. Do you regret the decision to shave the sides? I do. Wait, how long you think? Not because I don't like it, but because now I can't grow the sides out. Otherwise, it'll look so goofy when it's like mid-level.

How long are we going to keep this up? So, this is... Oh, breaking news? This is... Oh, my God. I'm about to get really excited. Please, tell me. I recently looked in the mirror.

Oh. And... Yes? I had to pluck six gray hairs out of my... Not exactly the route that I thought you were going to go. Well, look, what it told me is, whatever it told me was. I love gray hair. Go ahead.

No, see, I want either all gray or no gray. Okay. When you're picking out, you know, nearly 10. That's fine. It might be time. I'm seeing the, I'm seeing the light at the end of the tunnel. And I'm going toward it. And I think we may be in for it soon.

It was depressing. The whole thing gone? Well, I can't do a half measure. Or, you know. I could shorten it, but I might go back to the baldy. I might just get rid of it all. And maybe we'd donate it to charity. I would be so happy.

But I think it's time. Not yet. Personally, your dad now, come on. Act the part. Not yet. Oh, get, you know what? You work for Vox? I'm sick of this.

I watch you for years fawning over people with their beards and hairs and blah, blah, blah. And all of a sudden now it's like, get rid of it. You know what? No. No. That should tell you that I know a thing or two that I've devoted my life. I've devoted my life. You don't know anything.

To facial hair and actual hair. You're biased. You're a biased. You're a biased hair journalist. I know. I know when it's time to, you know, listen, one of the great lessons in life that I've learned is no one to hold them. No one to fold them. What do you know about poker?

What do you know about gambling? What do you know about poker? Tell me. It's time to fold them. You know what? That's a rough way to end this show, but I'll take it. I'll take it. I'll take it.

All right? When I was in college and I attended spring training 2004 Montreal Expos, I couldn't get into Canada on spring break around this time, actually almost exactly around this time, like the first week of March, I couldn't go back home from Syracuse because my visa was being processed. So I wrote a letter. I took the letterhead of my student radio station, the one I did my morning wrestling show and combat sports show on every Sunday that no one listened to. except for my mom and sister. I took their logo and it was in a broom closet. No one really actually oversaw the station. Took their logo, wrote a letter to the expos and said that I've been assigned to cover your spring training in Melbourne, Florida, Space Coast Stadium. And can I get credentials?

They replied, yes. And I was off to Melbourne because I knew it was going to be the last spring training in the history of the Montreal Expos. And I couldn't go home, so why not go there? And there I was with my recorder and my, my pack. quaking in my boots, so nervous to be there amongst people that I idolized and fellow journalists. Well, I wasn't a journalist, but people that I looked up to as journalists. And on my first day there, within minutes, I walked into Frank Robinson's office, Frank Robinson, the Hall of Famer.

One of the greatest players in the history of the major leagues is the manager of the Montreal Expos, and he's sitting there holding court, you know, being surrounded by maybe like two or three writers. There weren't that many beat writers. And he's talking about the spring training game that just completed. and I walk in and he stops what he's saying and he looks at me and he says, son, what is wrong with your hair? And I had a massive afro at the time, just a complete abomination. It was completely out of control.

He said, son, you need to get rid of that thing. The next day they were on the road playing somewhere else in Florida. I had nothing to do. I went to a local strip mall, found a barbershop, and shaved it off to this length. the following day come back to the stadium he sees me from the outfield

75 year old Frank Robinson comes jogging towards me starts rubbing my head and say look at you good looking guy this is a much better sight I mean there's so much

the hair you shave the hair this is your moment right now this is your Frank Robinson moment do the right thing get it done imagine

imagine how successful you could have been if you had that hair I mean it's you know the mind listen to the words of Frank Robinson thank you

Thank you. We'll see you next week, hopefully with a new haircut. A few other things before we go. Pitcho Manga loses in his return to action. How about that? Beltor 200 has announced their 200th show. I could do a whole hour on this. Beltor 200 is happening in London.

Great place. Love the O2 Arena. And it's going to air via tape delay. This is one of the few times that Beltaire can actually put on an event that means something as far as like the number is concerned. We don't know what 1962 or 165 or 158 or 73 or 23 or 24. We don't know what any of those numbers mean. It doesn't resonate, but Bellator 200 is something, and we're going to air it via tape delay? Really? What a disappointment. What a massive disappointment.

Edson Barbosa versus Kevin Lee is going down April 21st in Atlantic City. That is the main event for that card. Marlon Marais versus Jimmy Rivera is finally happening June 1st in Utica, New York. How about that? And Honaldo Jacques-Rae Soza is fighting Kelvin Gaslam on May 12th in Rio de Janeiro. Also speaking of Utica, Sejaro U Banks versus Lauren Murphy, I'm told. UFC is returning to Dublin, Ireland, May 27th. That is very exciting. And last but not least, as I mentioned earlier, UFC, Bellator, LFA, KSW, Cage Wars,

and Deontay Wilder, all in action this weekend. Do not miss any of it. I dare you to watch it all. We're at a time. I'm off to Las Vegas. Not right now, but on Wednesday you can hit my music because it's time to get the heck out of here. What a day it has been.

So much to unpack. Another busy weekend in the books as we get set for another busy week to come. As New York, Rick mentioned, tomorrow is a very important day for one. Jonathan Jones, he has his hearing in California, hearing some rumblings about what he might get as far as a punishment is concerned. But we'll find out tomorrow. And then, of course, he has to face the music with Usada as well. So a very interesting time.

But maybe hopefully we can gain some clarity as far as we'll find. as what John Jones's future is looking like. Is he going to get four years? Is he going to get one year? Is he going to get two years? We don't know. Hopefully tomorrow we can start to kind of understand what he's dealing with. I want to thank everyone who stopped by today.

I want to thank everyone who tuned in. Appreciate it very much. Another fun day, another fun show in the books. Thank you very much to Derek Lewis for stopping by. Always, always interesting when Derek Lewis stops by the show. Always interesting when we talked to him. This time, I felt like he had a bit of an edge. But it was good.

It was fun. I enjoyed it. Thank you very much to Mike Pyle. And congratulations to him on a great career. Casey missed it. He announced this Saturday will be his retirement fight. And we appreciate him coming on the show and announcing that. Thank you very much to Gilbert Burns.

All the best to him. Good luck in April. Thank you very much to Josh Emmett. Hopefully he feels better soon. And what an unfortunate situation. But I appreciate him coming on. Thank you very much to Ardum Lobov. Good luck to him.

Congrats to Brian Keller. Thank you to Frankie Edgar. Congrats to Patty Pimlet and Molly McCann for stopping by. And thank you to Marco Mundy for stopping by as well. Back next week, same time and place until I say, pay somebody else.