MMA Fighting - The MMA Hour with Luke Thomas - Episode 442

Episode Date: July 16, 2018

In this episode of The MMA Hour, T.J. Dillashaw joins us to preview his upcoming title defense against heated rival Cody Garbrandt at UFC 227 (00:20:40). Nick Newell discusses his impending opportunity to join the UFC ranks through Dana White's Tuesday Night Contender Series (00:59:50). Chael Sonnen recaps the Bellator cards over the weekend, UFC Boise and looks ahead to his own Bellator heavyweight grand prix semifinal on the Monday Morning Analyst (01:29:29). We also look back at UFC Boise, Bellator 202 and 203, and we answer your questions regarding the latest news and headlines (00:34:55). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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The meeting will begin when passenger Fisher is done celebrating. 19 plus Ontario only. Please play responsibly. Concerned by your gambling or that if someone close, you call 1-8665-3-3-2-60 or visit comex Ontario.ca. It's the mixed martial arts hour What's up, guys? It is Monday, July 16th, 2018, and this is the MMA hour. Thank you so much for joining me.

I greatly appreciate it. Oh, and by the way, Caesar's home. Fun show plan for you guys today, a busy show. Going to be chopped up a little bit differently today. It's going to go like this. Three guests at 1220. We'll be joined by UFC Bantamway champion, T.J.

Dillishaw. He will be here. One o'clock, East Coast time. He's going to preview his upcoming fight at Dana White's Tuesday Night Contender Series. Not tomorrow, but the following week, Nick Newell will be here at the, uh, was he the Westland gangster, the Oregon gangster? You know who he is. Chal Pisanan's going to be here at 1.30 for the Monday morning analyst segment. So here's how this is going to go. We're going to do the sound off at 1235. We'll do a little bit of editorial commentating, probably around 120. I've got some surprises for the set at the end of the show and your tweets at actually the beginning of it.

So a lot to get to. Thank you so much for joining me. I greatly appreciate it. And yeah, time for a high energy Monday. Let's have some fun on this show. Hope you had a good weekend. I did. I did nothing all weekend except relax,

run errands, watch some World Cup, and, you know, hang out with my dogs, that kind of thing. I kept it real low-key. So I am ready to go right now. And of course, I watch the fights as well. From the Pachial fight on ESPN Plus to, of course, all the Belvoir, all the UFC. And we're going to talk about all of that.

All right. All right. So let's get this show going. No need to waste a whole lot of time. You know this gentleman. He is the Arequipe to my pan, the arroz to my frioles. The one and only Danny Segura is here. Danny, how are you, sir?

I'm good. How about you? Well, look at that. Low energy, Danny. Low energy. Need to step in. on the mic. You got to pump it up, buddy.

How was your weekend? It was good. It was actually pretty good. Did you do anything worth telling the audience about? Played soccer. So that's a no. Watch the World Cup. Hung out.

Nothing too crazy. Now, we should clarify for the audience. We are not Eskimo brothers, correct? We are not. Yeah, that was probably the most searched term on, what was that on, like, Thursday? When did he drop that bomb? Yes.

I think about Thursday. Yeah, Thursday. Were you surprised when he said that? I'm talking about Brendan Schaub and Dana White, of course. No. Really? You were not? No, I'm surprised where it went, but I'm not surprised of like the degree, I guess. What do you mean where it went?

Well, I didn't know that's the route that they were going to take. Then next thing you know, we're going to be all searching Eskimo brothers. Did you doubt here, I'll be honest about this. When he, when Brendan put that out, I did not know what that term meant. And I thought I was, to be quite honest with you, pornographically depraved. I did not know that Eskimo brothers meant what it meant. Did you know? I did.

You did not? How did you know? Because I'm a millennial. I know. Oh, is it a millennial? term? Young, yeah. Are you lit A.F. right now, millennial? Not A.F. Just lit. All right. Well, we got a lot to get to. T.J. Dillashaw, 1220 is going to be here.

12, excuse me, 1 o'clock Nick Newell, 130, Chale P. Sond. We've got a lot of editorial content to get to in between. Before we get to these tweets, and I'm going to explain why we're splitting it up in just a second, your highlight of the weekend in terms of combat sports was what? I would go with Michael McDonald's finish. I was, you know, Duru Dantas is tough as nails. That guy's super skilled and just the way he finished the fight. I know there was a bit of, not controversy, but there was an injury there, a pretty nasty injury. But I don't think that led to the result.

Michael McDonald looked amazing. So that was a big, big player for Bellator. Whatever you have a catastrophic injury, which is what that was, it was truly catastrophic. There's always going to be an element to which people will. will say that did or did not impact the result. I'm fine saying it did. I'm fine saying it didn't. But that was after he landed clean. Had landed a hard shot on Dantas.

But Dantas wasn't done. And the way he sort of like imploded on top of his ankle is, uh, was a disaster. But I would agree with you. That was a really impressive performance. There was a lot of impressive performances. I want to start off recapping the weekend if we can. Yeah. Right.

And the reason why we're going to separate the tweets is, look, I don't know if this is going to work. This could be a disaster. right separating the tweets from the voicemails but the voicemails are so good i kind of want to keep them separate and see how it goes and the thing is we've not been even getting to the tweets hardly at all in the show so maybe if we break it up it'll be better and there's a fly in the studio pretty sweet huh yeah it comes comes with flies all right um okay low energy danny we have these tweets teed up ready to go we do and we have a familiar face coming up first okay familiar in what context uh somebody

that works on the site. All right. Let's see. Oh, I know who this is. Dbag McGee. All right, hang on. Nothing quite like a guy with a law degree putting doctor in front of his name. Got to love that. All right. So, UFC Boise was over the weekend. Let's start the discussion here from the MMA hour hashtag. JDS called for a trilogy fight with Steepay. Thoughts. Steepay's chin appears to be fading, been dropped in his last few fights and caoed by DC. Does that go back up for just a second? Does that change the math on a third fight. Let me go back and just talk about this fight for a second if I can with JDS and Lagoi Ivanov.

Now, I actually thought that Ivanov would do a little bit better than he ended up doing. I kind of thought that Ivanov would get in his face and he did eventually, but he just couldn't really put together any meaningful combinations. The takedown, I forgot, you know what I forgot? I forgot how good JDS's takedown defenses. It's incredible, right? I mean, there was never really a point where he's even tested to be quite honest with you. Not much of one, really.

So that was really good. So he was going to be forced to exchange on the feet. And I did think that JDS got busted up a little bit over time. He's certainly not the same fighter that he was before the Kane Wars. But in the end, I thought he looked okay, to be quite honest. With you, certainly back on track in that division. I don't, you know, how far from a major fight against a big name? I don't know.

But in the end, many of the weapons he's developed are still there. I do think some of his defensive liabilities are still kind of hanging out there. He still took a little too much damage for my taste. But he was able to use the jab. I thought at first he had great footwork. He was trying to find the home run right hand and it wasn't quite there. But in the end, he was able to make it essentially the fight work. It's just that Ivanov couldn't get anything really working at all.

And so as a consequence, JDS was still eating some shots. They were trading right hands on occasion, but left and right. depending on what it was, but you get the idea. Now, the question was about Steepay in his third fight. Did you see, Danny? Did you see Brett Okamoto's report this morning? I didn't. You did not see it.

No, fill me in. Let me bring you up to speed on this one. I thought this was kind of interesting. Stepe told him that he can't believe that Brock Lesnar is going to get a title shot. This is a guy that hasn't won a fight since what? 2010, and of course the Mark Hunt fight was overturned. This is a guy that was suspended for using PEDs.

Technically, he was actually not using PEDs, just banned substances. The things he tested positive for, they actually carry less of a suspension than what Chad Mendez tested positive for because they, in and of themselves, do not have performance and enhancing qualities. They merely, according to Wada, mask usage of things that actually do. So whatever, just to be technical about it. Certainly they're banned. Right. How is this guy going to get a title show over me? I deserve a rematch.

He also sort of indicated he thought he was raked in the eyes a little bit. Now, what's interesting about that, and it was brought up pretty quickly thereafter prior to this context. test, even a month ago, Steppe was saying he'd be happy to fight Brock after defeating Kormier. You see a lot of this all the time. So-and-so's like, yeah, I'll fight, so-and-so. Fight doesn't go their way and they want a rematch. And they say, how could it possibly be that this X or Y character floating out there gets it ahead of time? My thought is, I actually wouldn't mind seeing a third JDS-Stepe. I still think Stipe's game is at a higher level than JDS is. The rematch I was there for it in Dallas. Obviously, did not go JDS's way at all. I would

still favor Steppe in a third fight. In fact, let me look up the rankings here. Well, quickly, one of the main things that we noted was if you lose a fight, a title fight, you often just fall to number one contender. Sure enough, here's Stepe, the number one contender. So my thought is, if you're Stepe, let Cormier have his Lesnar fight, you're not going to stop that freight train. It's going to happen. They're not going to give him a rematch, nor frankly, should they, especially given that everyone's position on this is just contingent upon their own circumstances and whatever is necessarily advantageous to them. But I think you do Steepay, JDS3, Stepe, coming off a loss, JDS, coming off of a win, have them meet in the middle.

You can do a lot with that, actually. I'd be totally fine with that. And it could determine the number one contender. These two guys are obviously former champs, so that has some weight on it. I know there's some other contenders out there, but as far as, like, name value, these two would be right up there. Your takeaway from JDS, how do you look coming back? He looked good. He still takes too much damage, man. He does, but I mean, Ivanovis is one of these guys that will malo you. You know, this, this guy gets in your face and he will swing and he will connect. So it is a tough fight. People are underestimating him. Go back to his world series of fights. He destroyed all of his opponents in in pretty brutal fashion. Did you see his scars? His surgery scars? Yeah. He's got the tracheotomy

scar here. And then he's got whatever they did to like repair being stabbed in the heart. You know, this man, understand what happened here. This man gets stabbed in the heart, right? Have you, have you seen that press conference from the hospital? You ever seen him? I haven't, but I've read about it. He looked bad, okay? I mean, I don't want to make any Tom Hanks and Philadelphia jokes, but he did not look. He was so thin and so frail.

This dude gets stabbed in the heart, in a coma for 80 days, and is walking out of the hospital and is like, I got to get back to the cage. We are talking about somebody who is tough on a level you can't possibly imagine. I don't know people that tough. know some tough people, man. That is a crazy level of determination. And to ultimately be as good as he is, kind of amazing, kind of amazing. So any other takeaways from that fight? What did I miss from Saturday's main event? A little bit boring. There's a question to be asked about whether or not they should be having these heavyweight fights as main events. A heavyweight fight is fine if it ends pretty quickly. But there's almost nothing worse than a five-round heavyweight fight.

even when both guys are talented and they are talented I don't know that that's the best idea I think it's the worst idea but I think it might be better as a co-main than Maine. I agree, but the UFC likes to lead, you know, there's always the heavy way to learn they like to lead with that, you know, these two giant guys, you know,

so I understand that as well, but yeah, five rounds for heavyweight if it doesn't end early, it's usually a pretty boring fight. Also, can I say something very quickly to our European listeners? Yeah. Love European listeners. Okay, I love you all. I don't understand you sometimes.

So I tweeted on Saturday, hey, uh, shouts to everybody watching a cage fight in Idaho at 1245 in the morning. This was like halfway through the main event. And then as soon as you do that, as soon as you complain on the East Coast about the time, you get all these donks in Ireland and in the UK coming out, you know, well, it's like 6 a.m. here. Donkeys.

What sport do you watch in your country at 1245 in the morning? It's not taking place in Ireland It's not taking place in Manchester It's here Now you could make a point about those UFC cards That get pushed late there You are more than welcome to complain about those Those are taking place super late in your country

It's in our country And it's 1245 in the morning It is tortuous I admire everybody overseas Across the pond And their willingness to watch At freaking You know, six in the month

morning. Dedicated, determined, dependable. You're all of the above. But you don't get to have dibs on who's suffering more. It's not even in your country where it's taking place. It's in ours. Sorry, if a sporting event, Danny, is taking place in your country and you're watching, like the idiot I am at 1245 in the morning, I feel like that's a much fairer complaint than somebody who's choosing to watch something that's not even taking place. even close to where they live. Sorry. Because it's supposed to cater to that market.

That market, yeah. Yeah, this should be way earlier, especially watching a heavyweight fight at that time. I have been told by sources in the know, I tweeted this before, but for folks who may not know, I have been told by very reliable sources that the ESPN linear TV broadcasts when the UFC starts over there in 2019,

they're going to be faster than the FS1 broadcasts. And I'm told... I mean, they can't possibly be any... I mean, oh, it's MMA. It could always be more fucked up and broken. But I'm told that it'll be faster than the FS1 broadcasts, and I'm told that the ESPN broadcasts will be even faster than that, which to me cannot happen soon enough.

I am tired of that. I am tired of that. All right. What's next? Cool. So I think we're going to keep the JDS train rolling. All right, let's do it. All right.

Dos Santos looked softer and slower this weekend. Can you see him getting past the current top heavyweights such as Blades or Engano? Well, I don't know what's next for Engano, so that's a hard question to answer about him, but let's talk about Curtis Blades. As we mentioned before, you have somebody like JDS who has absolutely phenomenal takedown defense, right? So that would be a real big problem for Curtis Blades. Now, I actually didn't think he looked that soft. I thought he looked in pretty good shape. I went back and I watched the first cane fight.

No, excuse me, the second cane fight. and maybe he didn't look quite as, not quite as ripped, but he looked to be in very good shape. Remember, he had rabdo myolysis coming off, I think the first cane fight or nearer, oh, no, excuse me, coming off the second cane fight, I believe. In any case, he was known for overtraining. He's now training at American Top Team with specialist Phil Dardu. And Phil is a phenomenal trainer, so shots to Phil.

So he actually might be in a better condition in terms of not burning his body. out. The point being is this, I did not find any kind of real physical deterioration. I did see somebody who had been put through the ringer generally heading into this fight. The results notwithstanding. So actually the Blades fight, look, if they don't want to make the Stepe fight, fine. There's a bunch of other good ones you can make. If you wanted to, you could do the Derek Hunt fight, excuse me, the Derek Lewis fight. You could do the Curtis Blades fight. I don't think Blades wants that fight, but he would be beating a former champion if you got it. Actually think it's a really interesting style matchup because Blades, phenomenal wrestler, maybe the best

and heavyweight, to be quite honest with you, taking all, well, not, Cormier, notwithstanding, and how it matched up with Lesnar we'd have to see, but certainly very, very good. And then you got JDS who has lights out, take down the fence, but, you know, certainly a little bit more weathered and longer in his career at this point. So I'd be all in favor of that, but I don't think it's fair, Danny, to look at him and say, oh, well, is he, has he been ridden hard and put away wet? I still think there's some good fight left in him. Ivanov is one of those guys who's like hard to look good against. He's sneaky, sneaky tough.

And I still think he's, I still think JDS, how about this? I don't know how competitive he is against the very best, but there's reasons to believe he's competitive against the very best. 100%. JDS still look good. His job looked great. His boxing look great. His movement looked good.

And, you know, Ivanov is a guy that he's hard to take out. So he was landing some good shots that maybe you could have wobbled or hurt other heavyweights. in other manners. So it is a tough fight to look against. All right. To look good against. Let's move forward on this, shall we? Yep.

Someone's got to give some love to that crazy KO by Nico Price. Framing up the head with his ankle to finish from the bottom with hammer fists was fugging savage. Could that be replicated? Would love to see you discuss on the analyst segment. I will ask Chal Sonna to see what he thinks about it. I had a thought about this when I was watching in real time because you had not only that COO, you had the Sage Northcut one. Now, Sage Northcut, we'll get to him a little bit later. I definitely want to discuss him because I thought that was the toughest test, the right kind of test,

and the right kind of answer. But getting back to Nico Price, it sort of occurred to me, and I don't know the answer to this, but it's worth asking some MMA coaches and some fighters out there, have we gotten better at hammerfisting? It sounds sort of ludicrous to even air out loud, and maybe the answer is no, it's always been what it is. But I really kind of of wonder a little bit. I kind of wonder if there might be something to it where guys are better about placing it. Guys are learning how to generate power better in certain circumstances. I mean, Nico Price was using it off of his back and going almost like a sit-up to throw it. A lot of guys have been throwing it from bad angles. Like, if someone's taking you down, there's not much

without making a jerking off motion you can really do to put a lot of impact on it. But off your back, he was generating. I mean, you go back and you watch the replay, he put out Randy Brown. it looked like from the first shot. From the first shot he had him. So to me, kind of incredible that he was doing that. The answer is, I think in part, Nico Price is terribly underrated. He has a guy who's been showing up time after time after time, beating tough guys in interesting circumstances. I think he's very powerful.

Sage is also very powerful. It could just be good, two powerful guys who found that nice, sweet spot, and that's okay. But you always have to ask yourself, to what extent are best practices, even funny, simple, small things. really evolving inside mixed martial arts. I do wonder if the hammer fist is a deadlier weapon than it used to be. What do you think, Danny? You got to make calls? Yeah?

Yeah, let me get TJ who's up. While you're doing that, let me say a word if I can about the other hammer fist from Sage Northcutt. I was so impressed by Sage Northcutt and I'll be honest with you. Not a hater of Sage Northcutt at all. They brought him in so early. They brought him in so early that a lot of folks said, you have to wait and see what's going to happen here, which I totally agreed with.

But it was so early, it also could have gone a lot of different ways. You get a prospect that early in their development. You just don't know which way it goes. I mean, you look at him, he looks the part. You think, man, you get this guy some training skies the limit, but you don't know. You don't know which way that they're going to show the kind of, or rather, are they going to show the kind of character that's going to make them competitive?

Are they going to show the kind of skills that they need to? Are they going to develop the right way? Remember that kickboxer who came out, whose name escapes me, please forgive me, who was saying that this guy, as long as he stays in Houston, trains with his dad, it's just going to kind of be what it is. Now, I don't know exactly if that's correct, but that seems in hindsight to be maybe a little prescient.

So he goes over to Team Alpha Mail. Look at his development, man. I have to say, he was just, you know, when you're out there having tough fights with Enrique Marine, I don't know if you're ready for the big time, but that fight on Saturday in Boise, Idaho, especially after he showed some of the development at UFC Norfolk, I really thought this guy can maybe be something.

That's the first time I thought, again, I didn't think he wasn't going to be anything, but I wasn't sure if he was going to be anything either. I was sort of very neutral about it, like, I don't know. And then he comes out and looked phenomenal. He looked truly, truly phenomenal. I have to say, I was extremely impressed. He looked like he didn't panic when he got put in bad spots. He looked like, again, powerful, accurate, hard, quick punching.

There was a lot I like. about that. There was a whole lot I liked about that. And I have to say, that was the first time watching Sage Northcut where I thought to myself, he might be able to do something real special here. And to see the enthusiasm of his team alpha male teammates, oh my goodness, I was blown away. All right. Let's do this. What is the word here, Danny Segura? I'm waiting on you. I cannot hear you. When you talk, there we go. Now I can hear. All right. Let's go to our first guest if we can. He is the UFC Bantamway champion of the world.

And he takes on, or rather he defends his title against Cody Garbrand, August 4th of UFC 227. The one and only, T.J. Dillashaw is here. TJ, how are you, sir? I'm doing good. How are you? I am doing quite well. T.J., I've got to ask you about this training center, man. I've been following you on Instagram, and I went to the website today and I checked it out.

Is this the dream training scenario that you've been looking for all these years? Yeah, man, it's been fun to put it together, you know. All the living in parts just kind of saw a place. Once a like-minded people just kind of surrounded me and it's all kind of kind of happened on an accident and now it's been a blessing. All right, so let's talk about some of the mechanics here. Are you part owner? Are you like an investor?

What is your relationship to the ownership structure? I guess you're called a part owner. You know, we're not a team. is looking to rent profit, you know, the gym is looking to stay open and keep her in and care of coaches, you know. I won't be a leader as well, I'll make decisions. I guess it's almost like it's almost a partner, but I can keep going, you know? And Cubs Swanson, are you partnered with him as well?

Yeah, yeah, Cubs Swanson's part of it. One of us, but we got the same team. We've got a guy that's really helped us on a lot with, with the business side of it, Steve Martin. You know, it's been, it's been a little good to watch this and go. So the training center name, it's a play on words, but I did notice that Mark Munoz is a part of your camp, and it's got that rain in there,

and of course he used to have his own rain training center. Is it a playoff of that? What's the relationship there? Yeah, so this all kind of started off of, I guess. So Mark Munoz, back in the, He didn't want to talk me into fighting. He had a strength and condition coach named Sam Caledita. I met him by her at a wrestling clinic when I was first even thinking about getting into fighting.

Well, you know, shoot eight, nine years later, I was reintroduced to a warrant, Chalet, coach Volker and I just had a deserve train with him. He was like a mad scientist. He wanted to push my body to the next level and make some big games. And once I've seen what he's able to do with not only Mark with myself, we decided to build this. So, yeah, so he had the training lab with Mark Moody. So Mark Moombo was a gym called Rain. So it's them two combined.

It's training lab as well as raining in there, like he said, a play awards in there. And, yeah, and Mark's now the head MMA wrestling coach for the team. So it kind of got in full circle. You know, Mark was my assistant wrestling coach in college. he's the one that talks me into planning and the closely by advocate at it and like I said, nine years later now he's coaching team as well as

the single coach that he can deal with familiar women. Okay, so let's get to some of the mechanics here of this camp. It's, I'm guessing, yes, you help everyone else out around you, but is it during camp, it must be largely catered to you? Is that how it works?

Oh, yeah, to the extent. Absolutely. I mean, sure, I'm very, And I have a coach like Dore and Lova that travels out three days a week. Like I'm picking them up in the airport here now, picking up in the airport and know how much coming to be here for the next 38 and run practices and hold them for me and be a part of my camp, you know? So luckily enough, I had someone like Jones want to do that, you know. And then we've been tailored.

My last camp was completely tailored around here. I mean, we didn't have a camp named right down in the gym. And kind of created this thing. We got tailored around my last championship fight. We've kind of been the same. I would say everyone else is feeding off it and gained from it as well. That's why we built this team, you know, because we got kind of like air-picking from a huge thing.

Guys that have won our show that's a great goal to our arms and SAA. We have a lot of guys that we are tailoring around, but it all kind of started by camp, yes. So it's a collaborative environment. which I think is a fair clarification, but here's what I'm wondering. It seems like there's this new thing where yes, champions are training with big teams, but the more they can cater training around them, the better off they are a la the boxing model.

So I guess my question is, if you didn't have these services, I'm sure you believe in yourself, but the question is, would you be a world champion if you weren't able to arrange your training in this kind of way? I do believe I would be, you know. This is definitely helping me becoming a better fighter and a better martial artist. And it's only something that I believe in. You know, I'm kidding in this camp around me, but it's building something better than that. It's going to the way that Jim should be ran.

Not just James, it goes how professional fight teams should be ran. You know, we are making it, I mean, so you guys coming up when I first are fighting, you're paying to be a fighter. You know, you're putting money out of your pocket. You're not making money. You're paying your coaches more than you're making. You're paying medicals more than you're making. So we're trying to make it a little affordable for kids to train with class coaches

and not have to be paying percentages of the site purse or whatnot, you know. Creating a home base that's a gym that's not looking to make a profit. All we have is we teach you good commercial arts and then we have pro practice. You know, use martial arts program. I love the view because I like teaching the kid and giving back to the community as well. the health keep our lights on. Help pay the rent. House pay Mark Munois being their coach, you know,

coach weekly and we'll be able to fly out. So I feel it's the way that things should be done, and it's just been a fun process. Let's talk about your fight on August 4th. You're going to be facing Cody Garbrandt for the second time in his many fights. I'm wondering from your vantage point what you think will be different come August 4th.

You know, I don't think a lot is going to be different. I think I'm going to come out there and make Cody a rail in the way class. you know, and finish him. I think he's got no chance. He doesn't have a technique. It's not a good at his option to keep in the West. And he's not a top son.

We had Dominic Cruz on the show. He believes that, you know, he wasn't overly confident, but he do believe that there was an injury issue affecting Cody the first time. Do you agree or no? No, I do not agree. that's what I mean, what I see is how we came in, you know, I don't know how they're an injury that could affect me knocking it out. Okay, so then the question becomes about stakes. What do you think the stakes are here?

I mean, yes, it's a title fight, right? But is there a bigger? Is there a bigger picture? Like, if you win, yes, you keep your title, do you get something else? You know, it's when I win. It's just continuing to grow my legacy, you know, looking for the next matchup, looking for the next fight. It's going to continue to grow my name and be the best time for a fighter I possibly can. But something else comes with it.

You know, there's a lot of tension to me. I guess I get to fight at Staples Center. Really, it just comes down to proven that my past and my journey has led me the right direction. Okay, so let me say what I was thinking. Do you think if you, if and when, you win on August 4th, where does that put you in? the conversation for best bantam weight ever. Put me in the top, man. Absolutely.

I know I'm the best band way ever. You know, a full decision loss with the owner of Cruz changes everything. A fight that I ever thought I work. You know, I feel like that that changes. That changes everything. So I have the best bandit away to the world.

Do you think you have to fight him again to, I don't know, prove it to critics or to solidify it or to really drive that home? I don't think so. I think my performances have it as well as twice, and we got to see Donald Cruz and you can't even fight. You know, I mean, the guy can't even get in there anymore. So we'll see what comes up. But right now I'm going to worry about knocking Cody out three weeks.

The game plan for this, I know you're not going to tell me, but you mentioned that there wasn't a whole lot different. I'm wondering, I'm still guessing that you decided to add certain things to what you were doing to keep your opponent's, guessing, right? Like, there's still growth involved heading into this contest. Absolutely, man. No matter

if it's three matches or between fights against different opponents, you always add new wrinkles to your game. You know, there's a lot to this world of who made that I didn't show how much better I am in the coaches, you know? This fight didn't even hit the ground. You know, I don't really, but you can see my wrestling is a higher class. I'm a lot

smarter of a fighter, so all bring in a different T.J. Hiller show, but the outcome is going to be the same. You know, it's interesting. I don't think anyone has quite the combination of talent that you have. Right. On the one hand, you have Dwayne Ludwig, who as a strategist, I don't think gets enough credit, right? And a technician, I don't think gets enough credit.

Plus, you've got, you've got all, you've got David Taylor in there. You've got all kinds of high-level wrestlers, Jake Varner, I'm told, is over at training center. Right? So, like, who else has that kind of, yes, people have very talented melding of different aspects of martial arts, but that seems a little on the unique side to me. Absolutely, man. I feel like that's what I've kind of built my career off and just being so well-rounded and you don't take the pipe wherever I can.

Whatever I want to is that I can keep my point of guessing, you know? I feel like being the best martial artist in the world is always keeping your point of guessing on what you're doing. You don't know if I'm taking you down or if I'm kicking you in the head. You know, you don't know what I'm really going to do, and that's what makes the best. You know, if I can keep you guessing, keep you on your toes, you never going to be able to be a bit be able to be your best stuff. Before you get going, I appreciate your time here,

because I know you got a lot of things to do, but that would be remiss if I didn't ask you about your thoughts these days on MMA fighters' attempt to unionize. Are you still in favor of that? I know you were involved briefly, however long it lasted, with the double M, AAA, or MMAAAAA, whatever you want to call it. But what are your thoughts today on the necessity and the value of that? I haven't heard anything about it.

I don't really know what it was going on. in the world of that. The sport is very new, and I'm sure that it definitely will happen, you know, just like within the other sport, but when it's thrown and getting more and more popular, I'm sure at some point in time it will happen. You have not heard of Project Spearhead? No, I haven't.

I haven't been in the loop. Wow, okay. I don't pay much attention to me here or what's going on. I'm kind of, now that I've got my second-uncle kid, my life is solely around family and enjoying life outside of fighting, you know. Once I'm done trying, I'm not doing practice. I come home. It's even hard for me to watch a lot of the fights unless there's some of a teammate or a buddy that I want to watch fighting.

Because I try to escape. I try to escape to the MMA when I'm not at the gym, you know, because my life is MMA, my life is fighting. So I don't really pay attention to much of what's going on. I don't pay attention to my opponent's got to say. I don't pay attention to much other than what I'm doing. You know, they're selfish, you know? No, no, I understand.

And I know you got your businesses. You got the, what, Flavor Republic? You got this training center. You got a lot of things going on. I get it. But I'm just wondering, as a necessity, do you still believe that whether there's this effort or that effort, that some kind of effort is still needed? Yeah, absolutely.

And by the way, do you know what happened to the double M AAA? Like, how did that whole thing go away? No, man, I don't know. You know, I'm not sure if it was like a grudge match between, you know, two big corporations of CAA and WM. I don't really know how that all ended out. I just feel like it wasn't heading in the right direction. I feel like there's some wrong motives.

So I kind of sneak clear of it after I got that feeling. before you go also on that card Demetrius Johnson is going to face Henry Sohudo for the second time Yeah Predictions for that I think I think my mouth is just a little bit

Tomorrow around in quick I mean I was impressed with soon He's been looking at a lot of fights He's gotten a lot better He's got a lot more comfortable on the speed We're kind of honing to his own power So I think he won't be a lot more of a dangerous fight For Demetius Johnson in the first time

But I still think that Demetrius is his speed and his intelligence. And within this one, it's going to be a little bit too much for him to understand. And so let's ask this. When you win on August 4th, does a win make a fight with Demetrius Johnson more or less likely? You know, it's definitely setting itself up to it's going to happen. It's funny that we're on the same card. You know, I thought me had to beat me just, we're going to fight this fight. I figured if we were trying to line this up in April, but when he had to get his shoulder surgery,

And so that fight wasn't able to happen. It wasn't able to line the fight up. But now it's kind of funny enough that we're still fighting on the same card, you know? So, I mean, the stones in the lining, we will see. All right. Well, TJ, I really appreciate your time. Congratulations on the new addition to your family and all that. And congrats on the Training Center, the Training Lab, excuse me.

It looks like a pretty phenomenal place. We appreciate your time. Absolutely. Thank you very much. All right. There he goes. So here's how we're going to do things now. We're going to change them up a little bit because we have to accommodate the, I'll just be real.

We have to accommodate the schedules of our guests. So I would love to have the sound off at the end of every show, but that just ain't reality. So let's do this. It's time now for the sound off. All right. This is where we take your call. So we go back to one, Danny Segura. There he is.

I don't know why you're pointing to the sky. are not a gangster rapper. You're giving me an intro, right? I expected better, Luke. Sorry, I am not a master of ceremony. Real quickly, who do you like, T.J. or Cody in the rematch? Dominic Cruz was here last week. He thinks Cody's going to take it. I don't know how much the injury hindered Cody. I know it was a very big deal and he was traveling, right, to get it fixed. And T.J. got dropped in the first round of the first round. Yeah, he did, but just, I feel like T. T.J. has more tools. Cody's primarily a boxer. T. TJ can mix things well up with kicks and that's just a huge advantage and we actually saw that in that fight.

So I think it could go either way. They proved that they can knock each other down. They can hurt each other. But I think TJ has more tools to get it done. I think he does too, but that raw power and athleticism. And if the Cody who fought Dominic is making the kinds of reeds that he made in that fight and he brings that to the TJ fight, all bets are off. All right.

Let's get to these calls. We don't have a moment to waste. How were the calls this time? They're really good. I feel like the calls. People love. They keep going up and low. You know what, let's be honest.

The tweets. They could be better. They could be a lot better. They could be better. But the calls? Yeah, when you got the option to leave a call, I think most people would rather pick that than tweets. We've got the PFL of calls and we've got the UFC. Excuse me, we've got the PFL of tweets and the UFC of calls, right?

Yeah, I mean, you can mouth breathe on these. Yeah, we have the world series of fighting of tweets. Come on, tweeters. Let's get better at this. All right, let's get these calls. Set this up, please. Let's get this going. Cool.

So the first one is about something a bit controversial that went down this weekend and last weekend as well. Okay, let's hear it. I'm Derek from Ohio. And my question is about iPokes in MNMA. With the last two weekends of fights, just showing how beneficial they are, from the Policosta fight to the Daniel Cornea fight, and referees just refusing to take points. I think Policost, they got like five warnings in no point was ever taken.

Is that a problem you think there's a solution to, or just something that will always be a problem in MMA? Thank you. It will always be a problem. Thank you, Derek, for the call. it will always be a problem to the extent that penalties are not enforced. I'm not one of these big believers that thinks that the reason Kormier won was because he raked the eyes of Stipe, certainly not intentionally. And even if he did, and I'm sure that he did.

And I'm sure that it hurt and I'm sure that affected him. But in the end, I would still pick a healthy Korme against a healthy Stepe-Meotage. But yeah, I fundamentally agree. Here's the thing. Go watch a college wrestling match. Now, I know some of you might be like, I'd rather have Liquidibola chucked in my eyeball. I understand. It's a sport not necessarily designed for entertainment, but just do me a solid. Pull up one on YouTube, wait until March when it comes around. Here's what you'll find.

You'll find the referees play an extremely active role in defining how that match goes. Now, I understand in a tournament they'll wrestle several matches. You know, they have matches throughout the course of the year. You have these dual meets. You'll have these tournaments. I'm not saying that we need to empower referees to the extent. that we empower referees in collegiate wrestling. Here's what I am saying. This whole, where I'm going to be a wallflower and I'm not really going to get involved

because I don't want to, I don't want to taint the purity of this contest, man. Please get rid of this old-ass idea that needs to be jettisoned like a bag of urine from a Dave Matthews touring band, a bus. I mean, this is a old idea, clearly what needs to happen is some degree of proactive behavior on the point of on the on the on the responsibility of referees to get involved they

there needs to be more action now I understand we have a bunch of referees who are really bad and you could say but they could ruin it I get it but they're already ruining it by not getting involved by not taking points by not I think frankly we should have more standups to be perfectly honest with you certainly at least more separations when there's clenching along the fence line and people aren't doing things. How we enforce that, we can debate. Exactly the contours of how we put this together, we can debate. But I actually believe, Danny, I am not at all in favor of this idea where the ref shouldn't

be involved at all. That's exactly how you get somebody who just, maybe inadvertent. I don't know that Polo Costa is a cheater, but you could exercise a greater degree of responsibility in these fights. I absolutely believe 100%. we need referees more involved in fights, not less. Yeah. And as soon as the referees start taking points off,

you'll see less cage grabs, less eye pokes. And I don't necessarily think somebody's out there doing it intentionally, but just keeping the hand out there, you might not want to risk it just because you know you might get deducted a point. So the refs need to be on top of it. On it. I want them on it. I think you should get one accidental warning. If deemed that it was an accidental eye poke,

you should get one warning and that's it. And you tell them next time it's a no- I'm even fine with them going at the beginning of the fight. Like if it's a main event or something, the referee going backstage will say it's Herb Dean, so it's before the fight on camera. They do this on HBO all the time. You'll see the referee that whoever's the referee in the main event

will go backstage and he will say to those two jokers, here's what's going to happen. You do X, I'm going to do Y. You do Y, I'm going to do Z. Whatever. So that they know. So you go out there and you start putting your hands in his face, man. They already know.

It's like, I do not mind. Take a point. get involved, push the action. I'm in favor of it. Yeah, for sure. And I think maybe an M.A., the refs should be a little more lenient just because, you know, in boxing,

you have the whole glove, so it's almost impossible to poke somebody in the eye. Yeah, but there's headbutting, clinching, there's all kinds of ways to cheat in any kind. But it's easier to be to get an accidental eye poke, you know. There are, but there's two major problems. One is taking points for misconduct, again, intentional or not. And the other one is for stalling.

I am absolutely in favor of, getting involved for people who are stalling. And I know that's controversial. I know a lot of people are like, I don't agree. I don't care. I have watched way too many martial arts and way too many combat sports to say, well, we should just sort of let stalling work itself out naturally. Man, fuck that.

Get involved. Yeah, if nothing's happening, call it. All right, so let's move on. We didn't touch on the tweets about some of those stuff that happened over the weekend. So let's track back on that. Let's do it. So this is about Chad Mendes. Oh, good call.

My name is John. I'm calling from New Jersey. I'm curious about Chad Mendez. I'm wondering what the UFC does with him next. I mean, is he eligible after being suspended to fight for a number one contenders fight? Or does he have to work his way back up? Is a fight with Jeremy Stevens something that we should look forward to after Joseo or is Steven fighting for number one contender?

That's what I'm curious about. I'd like to see Chad back at the top. Okay, okay, okay, we get it. I mean, he's just kind of rambling at that point. It's a great question, actually. I appreciate the call. So here's what I would say. Well, first of all, Jamie Stevens is a savage,

but he's got his work cut out for him against Jose Aldo. Let it be known right away. But if he gets past it, maybe you can make that Chad Mendez fight if you wanted to. I thought that winner of a Miles jury was super impressive. And what I really took away from it was, like the whole psoriasis cream thing, like I'm not a pharmacist,

but the pharmacist I did talk to told me that was not a plausible explanation. I went over this extensively in my live chat. But you guys also know my opinion about performance sentencing drug use in sports. I think we had the World Cup happen over the weekend. You see what they announced? There wasn't a single positive test at the World Cup. Yeah, it must be because no one's using, right? No, everyone uses in that sport and nobody cares.

It's the same thing in basketball. And you can say whatever you want about the dire consequences of performance sensing drug use being involved in MMA. But this is what happens when you treat 50s. fist fighting like a sport. The realities of trying to eradicate or control it are no less easy. So you're still wrapped up in the exact same harms and problems that come about with anti-doping in track and field as you are in MMA. You cannot eradicate it. And to control it, you necessarily have to cause all kinds of harms, not least of which is total invasion of the lives of athletes

and getting other things wrong. Now, getting back to Chad Mendez, maybe he used, maybe he didn't. The psoriasis cream thing does not seem to me very convincing, but I don't really care that he that much that he used. And especially because he did serve out his two-year sentence. To that point, I thought he showed no signs of physical drop-off. I thought that characteristic power was right there. I thought his speed was right there. Beating Miles jury is absolutely no joke at all.

It just depends where he gets ranked. I don't know where they're going to put him, Danny, but there wasn't a whole lot of tape. Maybe his cardio will fade if he goes into a longer fight. There certainly wasn't some issues about his ability to take punishment, coming out of that Frankie Edgar fight, he got iced with that clean. Was it a left hook, I believe? If I'm not mistaken, whatever it was that put him down,

maybe those issues are still in play, but they were in play before the break. They would not go away. Even with time off, they just wouldn't be exacerbated. They would just be status quo. My whole point is, let's see what they put them in the rankings. But the major takeaway for me from Chad Mendez was, what an exciting reintroduction into the UFC's featherweight division.

I was so glad to see him back. I was so glad to see him look like that. I feel bad for Miles Jury, who I know has been trying to climb the ladder for a long time. But that was stupendous. What a win for him. Welcome back Money Mendez. He looked fantastic.

And the division needed that because there's been so many, you know, young guys coming up that perhaps, you know, they're very skilled but don't have a huge name value, don't have a bunch of history. Chad Mendez is still game and he's got tons of history. So you can make pretty big fights with him. So I would just like to point out. out. Cup Swanson's fighting

Hanato Moikano pretty soon. August 4th, the U.S.U.S. 27. I think the winner of that would be perfect for him. Great call. What's next? All right. So let's go Sage Northcut now. Team Alpha man. Hey, this is Big M from Big Eye, Big Mike from Indiana.

A couple of quick questions. First, your thoughts on Chad Mendes' performance. I felt it was pretty hesitant up until the big shot landed. Just kind of your thoughts on that, what you might see him doing next. And two, what about Sage Northcutt? Do you see him as ever being a true contender or more of a perennial stable in the undercard?

Thank you. Yes. Hashtag mouth breathers. So real quickly, the last thing he mentioned about Chad Mendes was he did look hesitant. Well, right, he's been off for two years. I would expect some degree of hesitancy on his part. I have no real issue with that.

And once he got going, he was cooking. So that's that. About Sage Northcutt. Well, it's an interesting question. People keep asking, what's this ceiling? What's his ceiling? None of us know. If you want to have optimism about it, by all means, do it.

Here's what I would say. Rather than asking about his ceiling at this juncture, it's not like a John Jones where, like, they come out when they're 21 years old, and they're just blowing the doors off these top-ranked guys. That's when you can begin to ask, wow, what really is their ceiling? This is much more an incremental climb up the bottom of the ladder. So it's not necessarily crazy to ask, well, how many rungs up the ladder is going to go? It's just not the most appropriate question now.

To me, that was a big deal for Sage Northcut on Saturday because the question is, was he just going to be a perennial staple of the welterweight division? You know, that's not nothing. And by the way, a few fights ago, I wasn't even sure he was going to be able to do that. I didn't think he wasn't. I don't know if he was. It was very much up in the air. That fight against Zach Otto taught me, yes, this guy can hang around.

At a bare minimum, he can hang around. But the upside, you ask that question this moment when they're out there beating the showguns of their division, when they're out there beating the Ryan Bader's of their division. That's not what he's doing. He's climbing that ladder very, very incrementally, one rung at a time towards the bottom, and he's trying to work his way up. That's still huge progress. We're so used to the Habib Numbaghem Germadovs who come in and,

just blow the doors off people. The John Jones is come in and just blow the doors off people. Sage did not come in blowing the doors off of people. He came in, I think having some stumbles, changing weight classes, changing camps, figuring things out. Now, now we have a baseline. And that baseline is, can he compete in the UFC's Walterweight Division? Yes, yes, he can. Can he beat ranked opposition? I don't know. I don't know. I'm curious to see. I'm curious to see his development, because I think those guys at Team Alpha Male are doing something pretty special with him. but Danny, this is my point. You can't ask these questions about upside

until you know much more about him. And I know he's been here a little while and he's been in two divisions and he's been fighting at big cards, UFC 200 and the like, but I like that they put him in Boise. I like that he's at Welterweight. I like that he's at Team Alpha Mel. But these are foundational changes.

These are not catalysts for the top of the division. Yeah, I'm something, I was very critical of Sage Northcutt because I didn't think he was living up to his hype. But again, the kid is just 22 years old. I mean, I'm older than him, you know. So you don't know, you don't know how he's going to look in the next few years. I mean, in three years, he's still going to be a kid. He's going to be 25, you know. So he's got so much potential that's yet to be seen.

And we'll find out what he really looks like in the next few years. But as you said, he's doing everything right. He's with a really solid team, a team of veterans that can really. really shape him into a really good fighter. And on top of that, you know, he moved up a weight class. He talked about how bad it was moving to like, getting down to lightweight. So he's doing everything right. And so far, he's looked great.

I have to say when he got rattled and hung on, I was, I was impressed when he got passed and didn't panic. And then, you know, he's got these like, he's got the real Ronnie Coleman bicep where he actually has the two heads of the bicep you can see. And that's fine to look at, but it doesn't do fuck all for you in a real fight. be quite honest with you, you're not out there doing, you know, isometric holds or, you know, strict bicep curls on a cable machine. Like, you need functional muscles. And most functional movement comes in compound lifts. Anyway, either here nor there. The point being is he's got the

beach muscles. But this time, he showed me the right kind of balance and the right kind of strength for the functional positions. Frank Trigg used to argue Matt Hughes might be stronger than me, but I'm stronger in functional strength. I don't know if that was true or not, but there is a difference between the two. It used to be for me that Sage had good gym strength. Now I'm starting to see he's got that gym strength translating to all of those scramble positions and defensive guard positions that he needed before. Plus, dude, when he gets people up against the fence, his hand speed. Whoa, this is, but this is what I'm talking about. It's foundational. Let's see what he can build upon now that he's starting to put these things together. And I think,

lay off the kid. He's not John Jones. He's not. But that doesn't mean he can't be something special, but that doesn't mean he's going to be either. Let's see. But so far it's pretty promising. And I would say in this fight, it's the most improvement he's done from fight to fight. I mean, he looked really really. The biggest issue for me for Sage Northcutt was that if he had a game plan and he could stick to it and it spoke to his existing strengths, he was fine. But if he got out of that game plan or he had to use something that wasn't a strength, he'd be kind of screwed. He showed me that that wasn't true on both counts.

Yeah. And you want to see prospects go through aversity. Sure. Absolutely. How they react. Cool. Keep playing them. Play these calls.

Let's go to Tough. Your favorite show, right? I couldn't tell you anything about it. Hey, Luke. This is Edgar from Houston, Texas. Loving the show. I had a quick question about tough, the world renown and world known tough. Season 28 just got announced

We have Robert Woodaker versus Kevin Gathlum I haven't watched tough since Season 11 or maybe 10 or so I was wondering Let's say they said Okay we're doing our last tough Season 29

It's going to be D.C. John Jones Would you tune into that Or do you think we should just let it die At season 28 when the Fox feels over Or would you say hey Let's put D.C. John Jones in a room together? every day. Let's see what happens. All right. Love to hear your thoughts on that. Thank you. Bye.

Thank you for the call. Shouts to Houston. Good people there by and large. Well, I mean, there are miscreants in every town, I suppose. But generally, Houston's a wonderful place. I covered one of the Kimbo fights there, so it was pretty good. What I would say is, I would probably tune in a little bit, or I would catch replays or highlights that made it on social media. I don't know that I would do much beyond that, because would really I'd be caring about as the fight itself. We know that they're, pardon me, we know their interactions would be poisonous,

and we know that it would be ugly, and we know all those things. Some of that would be fun to review, but that's not a reason to keep the show alive. You can just make the fight and put together some of the kind of separate series. In fact, I think some kind of programming innovation is due. Remember when the ESPN deal was announced,

they promised some innovative programming that would be announced at a future date. What better opportunity to do that between maybe two of the best fighters ever, with maybe the best rivalry ever in MMA or certainly UFC history. So is it a reason to keep that corpse running? No, no, it's not.

Would there be some value if they did, I suppose? Any objections to that? I agree with that, but I'd like to piggy back off his question and ask you, would it serve? Because everybody's been talking about how tough needs to change, how it's no longer, you know, draw and all this. Yeah, it needs to be changed. It needs his throat slits.

Do you think it's worth it to bring it back every now and then, though? When there's a really heated rivalry, say, John Jones, D.C., do you think then it's worth it? Because it might not be worth it for a guy like, you know, Steepamiochik and Daniel Cormier, because you know you're not going to get any sound bites or anything crazy out of that. Is it worth it to keep around to throw in, I don't know, every two years or something like that? When there's a really good rivalry. I don't care.

I don't care at all. You're done with tough? I'm done. Yeah. It had a great run. Don't get me wrong, but I'm done. It did. It's story.

Super done. All right, let's move on. Okay. Now we're going to go merge a little bit of UFC and Belator. All right. Hey, this is mouth breathing Mike from Connecticut. Again? Again.

What do you think the likelihood is of Brock Lesnar eventually competing for Belator against Fedor Emilianenko in the fight that the UFC was never able to make? Those Brock's contract with the WWE allow him to compete in MMA or only the UFC and who do you think wins that fight nowadays? Thanks. Couldn't tell you much. about his contract because I don't pay attention to that kind of stuff. But certainly he'll be allowed to compete in UFC. I would imagine if Belator or Viacom threw him enough money, they would. They would probably put that on pay-per-view. But I don't find that as likely. He's, what, 41 years old

now. He's going to make a boatload of money fighting Daniel Cormier. I mean, never say never. I thought, I never thought Mayweather would fight McGregor in a boxing match. So this is a sport in a not merely an MMA, but in combat sports generally, it's a side of sports where the bizarre and the unusual come to life and frankly have great purchase over our attention. But I don't, I just don't see that as overly likely. So is there anything necessarily prohibiting him? No, I don't think so. Is there anything necessarily enticing him beyond what opportunities presently exist? Like, where could he make the most money? You can make the most money in UFC. Where can you get the most high profile fights? The federal one would be interesting, but generally,

speaking, it's in UFC. The interesting part about that, though, Danny, of course, is that there's no USADA in Bellator, which makes Brock a better fit for that if we're just being candid, but whatever. The big money is in UFC, and I think he... Do you think that fight's still big? Because, like, in 2010, that would have been huge.

Now, given Fedor's... Would you say big to find big? I mean, Fader is definitely towards the end of his career, and he's had some tough losses. Let's say if he goes out there and loses the Chelsenon, then he doesn't look good at doing it. Obviously, Brock Lester would be a huge mismatch. match. What would you say then? Do you think it's still a big fight good enough to promote?

You know, it's funny, Tito Ortiz is 43, and Tito versus Chuck is sort of considered, you know, a past its due date kind of fight. I think it will still do well, but, you know, you've seen the belly aching out there from parts of the community. We talked about it on this show. Brock is 41, but I don't think he has quite the drawing power that he once did. But at the same time, you think, like, what's the difference between being Brock at 41 and Tito or 43 and there's like drastically different reactions to them while they're still belly aching about Brock. The answer is that Brock takes long enough absences to still say, feel fresh-ish,

not fresh, you know, you kind of smell the milk, it's like, it's still good enough to drink, still good enough to put in your coffee. You might get a stomach. Yeah, you might, but it's, you know, you don't need to go to the store, right? You don't need to go out there and do that. It's that kind of a thing, I think, with him. And so his absence, heart grow fonder, I don't know, but it doesn't damn. damage his brand as much as constantly overdoing it.

Now, Chuck has been gone a long time, but Chuck's concerns were so medically related that that's been a little bit different. Plus, what is he, 47 or so? Yeah, 47. He's long in the tooth. So, again, would Bellator do it if they could? Sure, how much would sell on pay-per-view?

I don't know. Three, four, maybe five? Really? Yeah, I don't know. Five seems high, but maybe three or four. I agree. That's all you have to say when I'm done. So I'm going to get literally the next guess.

I'm going to play the next question. Okay. And you're going to get our next guest. You take care of that and I'm going to get the guest. All right, let's do this. Okay. Okay. Okay.

Okay. NMA. I'm from Israel. I was wondering, hi, look. Hi, Dany. I was wondering, I was wondering, asking you guys, what is the most

anime ever? Five that makes you the most emotional. Like you were crying, screaming in anime history. Thank you. Love the show.

Bye. Now, I didn't get where he was from. I couldn't tell if his accent was French or Japanese. And I don't know if that's racist or not. Oh, well. Here's what I would say. If I can just be, if I can just, oh, he's from Israel. Ah, okay, okay. Somewhere in between, I guess. If I could just be totally candid with you, I've had a number of those moments, but the, the biggest one I ever had, had to be, without a shadow of a doubt, it had to be Brock Lesner versus Shane Carlin. for sure. Heading into that, my heart was like beating out of my chest because you just had these two,

and I mean this not as a pejorative. I mean this in the greatest way a man can say it. You had these two gorillas at the peak of their powers. And, you know, I know Shane ultimately had the cardio issues and Brock had the comeback. But when he was, I mean, go back and watch that fight. Shane Carwin brought the thunder. He lowered the boom on Brock Lesnar. I was like, there's a famous lab blog of me where I did it,

and it's like the super embarrassing lab blog because I'm like, LOL, OMG, you know, like a teenage girl reading Tiger Beat in 1995 or something. I couldn't believe how, how it just, what an epic beatdowner was and how, and then the shots were landing so hard. And then for the comeback in the second round, and the arm triangle wasn't even all that great. He just kind of he-maned it. That to me. I've never lost my breath before. I needed a cigarette when that fight was over.

So there you go. All right. Well, I don't know how to make a transition from cigarettes to this, but let's just do it. Joining us now on the hotline is a man who will, well, it's not quite his UFC debut, but it's something like it. He's going to be fighting for a UFC contract, not tomorrow, but the week following when he takes on, what is this gentleman's name, Alex Munoz, for a shot at an opportunity in the world's elite fighting organization. You know him, you love him. Nick Newell is here. Nick, how are you, sir? Look at that smile. Hey, how's it going?

I'm glad to be back on the show, and I'm glad to have this opportunity in front of me, of course. Yeah, man. So how are things, like you're, what, seven, eight days removed? Are you feeling, does it feel like any other fight? Yeah, I mean, right now this is my 18th fight. So, you know, I'm not as seasoned as some other. guys, but I definitely would say I'm creeping into veteran status. And I'm feeling super comfortable.

I'm feeling really great. You know, my body's always been like kind of an issue, but everything feels good. I'm running on all cylinders, and I had a great camp. So, you know, when the, when the day comes, I'll be ready. I'll be ready to fight. And I can tell you that I work my ass off and I'm hungry. So let's talk about your body, which sounds like a really strange way to. to phrase the question, but here's what I mean. You know you had some physical issues. You talked about and it was why you retired to begin with. How different was your return fights camp and this fight camp relative to the camps prior to your retirement? I had to figure some things out. You know, I had to really learn a lot. First off, I had to take a step back and just kind of breathe. You know,

I was getting a little frustrated because I thought, like, when I started fighting, my goal was to get to the UFC. that's what I wanted. And I just thought it was never going to happen. So, you know, I always pride myself as being, like, very mentally strong, but I felt a little defeated. You know, I wasn't really happy with the way things were going. And, uh, and my body was run down. And, and I had to take a step back, breathe and kind of reassess some things. And, and I wanted to make sure that when I came back, I was ready for MMA at the highest level. So I took those two years and, and I really trained the entire time and focused on the things I needed to focus on to be ready for if that shot were to come.

Do you ever get sick of answering for the congenital amputation? Here's what I mean. I know some folks have said to me, well, how much were his injury woes a function of that and him having to adapt his training? But I don't know why that would be the case, right? Because every fighter you know has some degree of injury woes. So do you ever get tired of having to answer for it in this ever-present way? way? Yeah, I mean, I hate, you know, sometimes being the guy with the one-handed fighter, but it's

something that I can't escape and it's something that I've kind of just come to terms with. That's what I'll be known as. It's a part of me. It's not what defines me. Definitely, I will say this, that I did have to really, really work very, very hard and come from almost nothing to get to where I am. You know, I lost my first 17 wrestling matches. And while every, was out having fun going to parties and stuff. I was training all summer long and getting better. And that started from when I was 14 years old to all the way now. I'm 32, you know, and I've never really stepped back.

I had to reassess some things. And when I took that break, I was still working my technique and stuff like that. but, you know, it's always going to be something that people say. And I've just kind of come to terms with it. That's the way that things are. And your injuries, though, they were what? They were back related? Yeah, my back, my neck.

You know, I had some knee problems, but they're all feeling good right now. You know, obviously I'll still wear a brace just because I'm, like, kind of scared, but, I mean, there's nothing wrong with it. Okay, let's talk about what's coming up next Tuesday. I'm sure you've seen the show, but forget about that for just a moment. Does this feel like the culmination of everything? Like, does the gravity of the moment, are you aware of it? Are you wearing it every day?

Not really. I have a lot of things going on that keep my mind and keep me really busy, you know, and I think it's a good thing. I definitely take a lot of time to recover and relax and do all that stuff that I know I have to do. But, you know, I own my own my own gym now. So, like, I have that and I have my training. And my wife and I are expecting our first baby in November. So, yeah, yesterday we found out I would say it's going to be a boy.

So that's cool. but you know I have these things and some people would say all these are distractions but for me I think that they're they're great things and it helps me be more focused and stay more on top of what I have and what I have to fight for in the past I was you know younger I didn't have anything to worry about I wasn't really you know I just think staying busy is a great thing and and I'm not letting the moment get to me I think that I I've busted my ass and I've done everything I think that I should do and can do to get ready for this fight. So there's nothing in the back of my mind that really worries me because I'm going to be 100% prepared the best of my abilities come next Tuesday.

You know what vibe you have right now? You've got a bit of the dominant cruise after he beat T.J. Dillishaw vibe, which was as soon as all those injuries that had sidelined him for so long, it was when he was ready to let the title go. that's when he was the most ready to take a step forward in his career, when he wasn't obsessed with certain milestones or titles. You seem like maybe you were ready for the UFC before your retirement, but I don't know, you're coming back, the degree of wisdom you now have as an older man, healthy again, now seems like actually the best time to make this run for you.

Yeah, 100%. You know, I just have a lot of things going on my life, and my life outside of fighting is fantastic. You know, I have such a great life and such a good support system that, you know, I don't really feel the pressure. I'm going to go out there and I'm going to punch a clock and I'm going to do what I have to do to get the job done like I've done many other times before. And that's the way that it is.

That's what I got to do and I know what I have to do. And I'm going to get it done. Do you think the MMA community is on your side or do they want to see you fail? What do you think? I definitely have. It's either people are hardcore with me or hardcore against me. There's no like, oh, yeah, he's okay. You know, people either really want to see me win or really want to see me lose for some reason.

I think that for the most part, people have my back and they want to see me win. I would say it's a good story. You know, obviously I have a good story with me. It's a good meter of what people facing a certain obstacle can accomplish. I don't think anything that I do is or what I failed to do would be a measure of what they can't accomplish. But I know where I stand in this sport and I know that there's going to be a lot of eyes on me. And if I win, it's going to be bigger than anyone else that's ever won on this show. and if I lose it's going to be worse than anyone has ever gotten it on the show.

And I know that, and I knew that going to this camp, and I knew that when I accepted the fight. So for me, that was extra motivation to make sure that everything goes right, and I'm on point for this fight. And I'm telling you, Luke, it's going to be something else this Tuesday. It's really going to be something else. I had a full camp, all 100% focused around me. everything that I did was watched and looked over and revised or corrected.

And I just feel the best I've ever felt going in a fight and the most confident I've ever felt going into a fight. Let's talk about your opponent, Alex Munoz. What do you know about him? I found out a little bit about him. I had my wrestling coach looked him up and he's, I guess he's a good wrestler. I think he won a national championship. maybe in high school and he was a D1

wrestler so I mean obviously wrestlers are always the toughest fight for anyone everyone tries to always avoid them but for me I welcome challenges and I welcome tough fights and and I've wrestled and trained with people that are more accomplished

than him and I've been able to take them down control them, submit them, outstrike them, stop their takedowns so for me it's not a matter of really who I'm fighting It's just about me showing up and performing. I'm sure he's very hungry, and this is a good opportunity for him. And, you know, I feel like maybe the UFC were like, oh, we got this guy who's an up-and-comer.

It was a really tough fight, and we're going to see if Nick's the real deal or if he's not. And I kind of welcome that. That's kind of the fight that I wanted, and that's what I'm looking forward to, is fighting a tough guy like this. and I think style-wise he's going to get really discouraged and it's going to be a very tough fight and I imagine that I'm going to have to maybe go through some tough times

but I've never had trouble earning what I want to accomplish and getting what's mine the hard way. Yeah, I was going to say you kind of alluded to it there but if you could clarify a little further, it sounds like you feel like this is a fair matchup. Like you got a fair degree of difficulty in an opponent.

Yeah, no, I think he's, I think he's very tough. I think he's good, you know. I think it's cliche to say, oh, my opponent sucks. I'm going to destroy him. I'm going to run through him. And, I mean, you know, it could be a tough fight, but I'm ready for that. I'm ready if it's hard to dig deep, and I've been training to take him out. You know, he's a fast starter.

He comes forward. He tries to finish quick, and that really doesn't bode well against him. someone like me, I fight well against people like that. So for me, it's, as soon as I saw that, I was like, oh, this is a great fight. This is, this is what I've been looking forward to. I'm hungry for this. This is what I want. So I couldn't, honestly, I couldn't be happier with, with the fight. You know, I think it's a, it's a good fight. And I'm looking forward to it. And it's very motivating to to have it, you know. So do you watch the show at all,

the NOS Tuesday Night Contender Series? I watched the highlights. I have UFC Fight Pass, but I mean, on the East Coast, I train till about 9 o'clock, and then like 9.30 cool down, and then by the time I get home,

it's 10 o'clock, and the show's over, you know? So I, I shouldn't be saying that, but it's the truth. So I watch it, I usually, I watch it like either afterwards or I just kind of watch some of the highlights. All right. The reason why I ask is because there's an interesting way

to get a contract on there. Now, it's not true that if it goes into the third round, you can't get a contract. We saw a guy last week get that very thing. But it does appear to me that the sooner that fight is over, the better your chances. So I'm wondering, does that reality, affect your game plan where it's not just about winning or losing,

it's about winning a certain kind of way and with a certain kind of speed? Yeah, I do notice that. I do follow that. And obviously, whenever an East Coast guy fights on that show, I watch it every single time. No, it doesn't really make a difference to me. I'm going to go out there and I'm going to win. I never really try to finish fights fast.

It just happens. You know, I have 11 first round wins and then two more as an amateur. So I've been known to take people out pretty quick and good fighters too. So I think if I come in level-headed and calm and I can get it done, you know, as opposed to someone that's just coming out like a bat out of hell trying to finish quick because they want this contract. I'm just trying to win. I don't know if you saw it.

I forget which fight it was. but Dana White was speaking to the media. It was not the most recent one. It was several events ago, but I can no longer keep them straight, despite that being my primary occupation to do so. Anyway, long story short, Dana White was asked about you,

and he was saying, yeah, you know, look, if Nick goes in there and destroys this guy, I look like a genius. And if you lose, there will be bad press about how you let in a guy with this condition. Let me ask you about that argument. I have found that argument

to be total bullshit from day one, in part because of what happened, with you and Justin Gachie, like this, this tidal wave of criticism that was supposed to happen when you lost, right? It never materialized. Do you, are you surprised that in 2018, this is still a thing people trot out? Yeah. I mean, obviously, people always talk shit whenever someone loses, you know, anytime a fighter

loses, oh, retire, or you should be done, or he should have never been in there. And it's the same with me. They just use it as my arm, you know, and I think that Dana is putting too much weight into what people that are just going to talk trash about him no matter what have to say. But all the knowledgeable people, I've never heard one fighter that's in there and knowledgeable, say, oh, Nick doesn't deserve a chance, he's going to get hurt. No one says that. All the fighters that I've trained with, especially know that I'm ready.

And the high-level ones out there that I've trained with know that I'm ready and I'm good to go. and people's, I just don't really care about people's opinions. I don't care what people think about me. I never even really looked at myself as being that different until I became popular from fighting and people are telling me what I can't do while I'm already doing it. And when I lost to Justin Gagey, you know, that was a good fight. But he won and the world kept going and kept turning. And my next fight for WSOF, I was a co-man event.

and the place was going absolutely insane. And afterwards, everyone started to leave. And, like, the announcer was, like, begging people to stay. Like, please stay. We got a great main event. We want everyone in the crowd to be here for the main event, but everyone just left. And that's a testament to the kind of crowd that I bring in

and the people that want to see me. and my draw value and I don't think it goes down anymore with a loss for challenging myself. I feel like some people look at me like I'm the only fighter in the world that's not allowed to ever lose a fight. If I lose one, then I should never been fighting in the first place, which is ridiculous. All I want is an equal chance like everyone else, and I want these tough fights. And, you know, maybe I do have a little bit of a chip on my shoulder. but, you know, it has nothing to do with me having one hand. It just has something to do with me being a competitor.

Two-part question, how's the weight? And secondly, what is your theory for why no one has ever missed weight for the Contender Series show? Because they're hungry. They're young and hungry. And sometimes these guys in the UFC, they get content, and maybe they don't train as hard as they should or something like that. You know, you never have to worry about me missing weight. I think I'm not the biggest 155 pounder, but I'm on the bigger end.

I think it's a reasonable weight class for me. And, you know, I made 150 before, which I thought was a big mistake. That was a horrible, horrible thing. But 155 is a good home for me, and I'm going to make weight. No problem. I'm already under 170, and I feel, I feel great. When do you leave for Vegas, by the way?

Saturday. Saturday I head out to Vegas. Right on. Okay. Hey, I was told, I don't know if this is true, so please correct the record. Is it true that you have, you've not advanced past the Nintendo 64? Like, you just gave up on video games at the 64. Is that true?

Yeah, I don't know where you heard that. I gave up on, um, Well, now I've given up because it's just too much. I just don't have enough time. I just love Nintendo 64. I have a collection. I have probably close to, probably have like 80 games maybe and 64 games.

I have an Xbox 360 and a PlayStation 2, but I just didn't like them the same. And then eventually I just kind of gave up on it. And I'm like, I'm just going to play games that I like. So I'm a big time, 64 guy. And if anyone wants to play me, you know where to find me. By the way, I just bought, I don't know if you've seen these.

I got the retro NES, the Nintendo system, but it's like not much bigger than an iPad. It's super small. It's got 30 games built into it. It's like the greatest purchase I've made, 60 bucks. Can't go wrong with it. You got to get it. Yeah, I have a modded.

I have a modded old Xbox, not legal. But it has like every Nintendo, Super Nintendo game on it. but I hate not playing it on the original controller. So that would definitely be something I'd have to check into. And by the way, why are you a cat guy? Does that mean you're not a dog guy? No, man, come on. That's wild.

I like dogs, okay? I don't hate dogs. I just love cats. I love my cats. And I don't care what anyone says. And people that, people talk trash about cats come over my house and they're like, oh, your cats are cool. I'm like, yeah, man, we just chill all the time. And they sit on your lab.

and you don't have to take them outside to go to the bathroom. One second, one second. Yeah, yeah, bring him. Oh, hell yeah. By the way, I'm an owner of two dogs. There he is. Look at him. What's his name?

Boba. Like Boba Fett? Yeah, after Boba Fett. He's not much of a bounty hunter, is he? Yeah, he's kind of a little baby. He's a good cat, though. He's very friendly. All right, what's the biggest misconception about cats?

that they're mean, they don't like people, they don't follow you around. This guy follows me everywhere, and he's hanging out with me all the time. I just, I don't care what people think. I don't care what people have to say about me, you know? And I love my cats, just like I love fighting. And people say, I shouldn't fight, you know, or this or that. And people say, oh, well, you don't like dogs. Like, of course I like dogs.

I just like cats, too. You know what? We got to let you go, but I wanted to tell you this. I'm supposed to remain objective in this role, but that's not real. No one really is objective in this role. I certainly have not one thing against Alex Munoz, and if the fate decides that he's a rightful winner, then so be it. But I have to tell you, Nick, I've been watching your career for a long time.

I met you in studio at M.A uncensored live six years ago. It would be nice to see you stick it to the haters. I will admit that on air. Yeah, it will be nice. You know, it's easier said than done, but I'm making it easier. easier to be done every day when I'm out there busting my ass to get it done. And confidence is definitely on my side. And I have some great momentum and I have a fantastic team.

I had a great camp. And I couldn't honestly feel like all the pieces are coming together for a great performance. No excuses one way or the other, right? Yeah, hell no. You know, I definitely, I've lost so many times in wrestling and in life that, I've learned it's made me appreciate winning that much more. And it's made me learn how to do everything right to make sure you do win. And it's helped me keep a level head.

And the better man's going to win. The better man's going to win on this day. And nothing against him. It's just that I'm ready. And I'm ready to really put on a show. And I think I'm going to surprise a lot of people. And I'm going to certainly surprise him. Tuesday, July 24th.

People say this all the time. This is the most cliche thing that anyone ever said, ever. You've never fought anyone like me. You can't train for someone like me. Every fighter says that, but how many fighters is that true for? You make a compelling point. I can't wait to watch it. Nick Newell takes on Alex Munoz, Tuesday, July 24th, on FightPass.

As part of Dana Weiss Tuesday Night Contender Series, it's the main event, no less. Nick, can't wait to see your fight. Thank you so much for your time, and your cats are cool, man. Thank you. I'll come visit you after I win. Yeah, come in studio. That'd be great. Yeah. All right, buddy. Take care.

I'll see it. There he goes. All right, man. What a guy. What a guy, right? I met him in studio. God, he was there in 2012 in Times Square. He came in studio and I won't say which fighter,

but another fighter grabbed him by his arm on the congenital amputation and kind of looked at it like, like he didn't know what to make of it. It was a very, I don't know, a direct way of meeting Nick Newell, this person did. But look, I don't know Alex Bunoz. I'm sure he is a tremendous guy. I don't wish anybody ill will.

The right man should win. But in an abstract sense, it would be kind of nice to see him stick it to the critics. It really would. But he's got to earn it. He's got to earn it like everybody else. Now, we're going to be joined by Chale Sons. in about seven or eight minutes or so.

But I wanted to make a comment if I could, not about this fight, not about the stuff from over the weekend. And we'll get to some of the Bellator results, by the way, when Chale is on because we haven't even talked about that yet. And there's a couple of things I want to talk to them about. But I want to make a comment if I could. There was a bit of a common theme from the weekend. You had Chad Mendez coming back.

You had Giudo Santos coming back. Now, Chad's case, again, I have mentioned that I am not particularly bothered. I think this idea that people who use are dirty and people who take performance-sensey drugs, if in fact he did. Again, I don't know that the psoriasis cream thing is all that plausible, but this is an ancient way of thinking that really is not supported by the evidence anymore. But in any case, he did his two years. But he's back, right? JDS was hemmed up in a totally ridiculous scenario. Ian Kidd, a bloody elbow has highlighted what had gone wrong for him.

I recommend looking that up. But I just want to point out here, I don't bring this up to not, I don't bring this up to argue that the penalties are not harsh. In fact, they're too harsh. But I do bring this up to point out that these fighters are so perseverant and patient. and there is some reason to acknowledge as much after the fact. Here's my point. You look at Tim Means.

You look at Yuel Romero. You look at Josh Barnett from this past weekend. You look at Chad Mendez. You look at Junior Dos Santos. What do you find with that? Some of them may have used. Some of them may have not used. Many of the ones I'd mentioned, in fact, really all but one.

fought their charges, right? JDS fought them. Tim Means fought them. O'O. Romero fought them. Josh Barnett famously fought them being totally exonerated in the end. And nevertheless, many of them still lost time, some more than others. In the case of Josh Barnett, well over a year, he lost. But what does it tell you?

It tells you that the system that we have right now in anti-doping, it is in desperate need of reformation, it is archaic. It is a zero-tolerance policy that can't possibly work. It won't work. You can mark my words now. It will fail. It is destined to crumble. But in the meantime, by being zero tolerance, it is incredibly punitive, incredibly punitive, often in unfair ways against the meanses, against the Barnets, against the JDSs, in a manner that should not be the way that it is. And I have said, this about their money, I will say this about the anti-doping, because I brought it up with Reebok, I brought it up with everything else. As upset as I am about the current state of things, the fighters have a responsibility long term to fix this. I can raise as much hell as I want. I cannot fix it. Everyone else in the MMA media can raise as much hell. They cannot fix it. Fighters, if you are listening, if you are watching, the cavalry is not coming. It is not coming.

If you want things to be better, you have to fix them. But there is a bright note that should be acknowledged here. And that is, whether you served out a suspension that was fair or not, there can be life after you sought a punishments. It is not to say that those punishments are fair. It is not to say that the system doesn't deserve reformation. It is not to say that there is something absolutely borderline, well, I won't say criminal,

but certainly, deeply unethical about this system being forced on fighters and them having to live inside of it with very few rights. All of that is true, but it is also true that these fighters show incredible perseverance in dealing with it. I mentioned last week on the show in light of what happened to Max Holloway, A very different scenario.

But nevertheless, there is a common thread there. We ask way too much of these fighters. Too much media. We don't pay them enough. The amount of training they have to do. The amount of active recovery they have to do. The amount of specific kinds of training they have to do. The volume they have to do.

The travel they have to do. And then we put them out there in fights. And we don't really have cornering that takes long-term injury into consideration or even what it might mean to have short-term problems as a result of a breaking an arm or whatever. the hell else is going on. All of these things are true. We are breaking these people. We are breaking them. But what you're finding is, even through all of those challenges, they are persevering.

And so whatever happened with Chad Mendes, I don't know, but it was great to see him back. And Junior Dost Santos exonerating himself, it was great to see him back. And it just, I just wanted to take a moment on this show to tell those guys the ones who have pushed through and the ones who are to come and will have their name dragged through the mud and will have to prove through some kind of investigation that they did nothing wrong other than trust even in the case of Junio-Santos a well-established point of sale that there can be life when you come back you can rise again you can make this happen and I don't need necessarily to tell them that because they are showing that perseverance without any kind of coaching from the outside, but I was sort of heartened by the

return of them. I was heartened to see that they had made a pushback and more needs to be done, but that was an important moment, I think. All right, it is time, ladies and gentlemen, we step away from what we've talked about and move into another segment right here. This is the Monday morning analyst. Joining me now on the hotline to get this going as a man who was calling the fights for Bellator 202 over the weekend. I mean, this guy, is everywhere. You can catch him on Ariel and the bad guy from our former colleague, Ariel Hawani on ESPN Plus. He's got his

own podcast. He's got a crazy YouTube channel. He's fighting for Bellator. He's doing everything under the sun. The one and only, Chale Sonnet, joins the show. Chale, how are you? Luke, I am awesome. What's going on, man? How do you sleep, Chale? And better question, when do you sleep?

I hate it. I don't like sleep, and I hate days off. Days off are my least favorite thing. If I look at my calendar, say I've got nothing to do the next day. So I like to stay busy, man. I prefer to participate. All right, so you did a great job commenting. I thought you and Sean Grande.

Was that the first time it was a two-man booth for you guys? Yeah, I haven't got to work with Sean. I mean, I've worked with him. It used to be he, Jimmy and I, they both went, Sean to basketball. Jimmy went over to the UFC. So I've never worked with just Jimmy. And I loved it. I mean, or Sean, rather, I loved it.

He was, you know, he's a pro and he was fun. House Thackerville, by the way. I like it. You know what? It's so funny. I can hear that in your tone, and so many people do not. And I don't know anything about it. I mean, they talk about like the smoke casino.

I don't even notice it. I have known. My aunt used to smoke. I don't know. I love it. I love going. There's a direct flight for me. A little pizza restaurant in there that's open until three in the morning.

I get a kick out of going. All right. Let's start, to me, the most impressive performance of that night. You had Michael McDonald defeating Eduardo Dantus at 58 seconds into the first round. Now, we'll get to the injury later. But my God, Michael McDonald, what power he has to the point where he thinks his left hand is now broken. I believe that it is. And what he said, Shail, was something quite interesting, which was, my body simply is not an appropriate vessel for the power it can generate.

Have you ever heard of something like that before? I've never heard it like that. And, you know, as arrogant as it sounds to reread that, he was just trying to answer the question. He was just saying, look, I hit too hard. And I can tell you this, look, I've never broke my hand. But the reason I've never broke my hand is I don't hit hard enough. So, I mean, there is a reality of that some of those power punchers. And you'll remember back to the early 90s when wrapping your hand in some organizations was illegal and in some was optional.

The wrestlers never wrapped their hands because they didn't hit hard enough. They didn't have to worry about protecting your hand. It's just a reality. So, yeah, it does appear. I mean, he broke his right hand in his previous fight. now he's broken his left hand in this fight. There's only 58 seconds. I believe him.

I think he hits too damn hard. If he's going to be six surgeries deep on his hands, is that too many to continue fighting? No, I don't think it would be too many. At the same time, I don't know that it would be too many. I just, I don't know that there's an actual rule on that. But he might have to change his style. You know, the guy can wrestle really well, you know,

to tell a fist fighter to go into a fist fight and not throw as hard as he can is a little bit ridiculous. However, if he keeps on breaking his hands, he might have to do just that. So I'm not really sure what he's going to do. I've always thought he was a really good fighter. He was one of those guys when Scott Coker signed him. I knew there was something special going to happen there. You know, his was different.

I don't know if you heard about his signing. It was nothing like Machita, where, you know, he's got a top manager and Ed Soros that could make a phone call and boom. And all of a sudden, Machita's names on the table, and you go back and forth and get a contract. And it wasn't like that. McDonald disappeared. He was in California. I think he was, you know, maybe working at a gym or training something like that. But he was gone. He left the scene. He didn't even have a contact to Bellator. Belator got on a, went and found him. I think it was Mike Kogan, went, drove out there, found him and said, hey, what are you doing with your life? And how come you're not fighting? Basically went and recruited him. A lot of people don't know that story. I think it's a compelling story. That's the only reason he's even in there. He was like, I didn't know you guys wanted me. So yeah, we do want you. Let's get a contract. He said, okay. That's why he'd be out of the sport completely. Yeah, which is a shame, because it would have been a shame, rather,

if we had not had a chance to see his career fully materialized, although I guess we'll see what happens going forward. But speaking of Eduardo Dantus, what do you make of that injury? First of all, I mean, obviously it's gruesome, but how much of a role did it play ultimately in the outcome? Yes, you know, so Dantas is so good. If he's not out there defending a world championship, he's out there fighting for world championships,

This was like his first three-round fight in a meaningful period of time, many years. I just think he's great. But yeah, so for the fans, they didn't see it, they're on their feet, they're trading punches. McDonald's Clips, and when Dantus goes down, and we didn't know this at the time, we just knew we went down in the fight needed to be stopped. Watched it on replay together. McDonald, all of us together. I missed it.

He meant everybody. When Dantus goes down, he rolls over his ankle, and it was just nasty. You know, Krokop had done this to his leg. Gonzaga kicked him. But it turned out Krokoff's leg was okay. But if you'll remember, when we all saw the replay, the way the leg was, we're going, oh, my gosh, that could have been terrible. And it was for Dantes. I read this morning on an internet feed that it was broken and that he's going to have to have surgery. We knew something was very bad, but whether it was dislocated, you know, it's all discombobulated, but we didn't know if that it meant that

it was separated or a break. His side is now saying it's a break, and he's got to have surgery today. What's the worst injury you've ever suffered in a sporting competition? Yeah, so nothing that would compare to this. The most painful was, I think, a broken nose, and that wasn't even all that painful. It ended my practice for the day. Getting it reset, it did hurt very bad. But that's it.

I've been really, I guess you would call it lucky. You've never, like, separated a rib or something like that? Yeah, I guess I have, and that hurt pretty bad, too. I would put the nose over that. I had a fight with Nate Marcourt, and he broke my sternum, but that sounds a lot worse than it is. It was like a fracture, and the pain wasn't all that bad. The nose really hurt. This might be a weird one.

You want to know what else hurts is a broken finger. I shattered my thumb one time, which just meant it's broken in at least three places. That hurt really bad. But I think in the world of injuries, fighters would go, man, you came out all right. So let's talk about Chris Honeyhook Cut, who's also on this card. You know him as well as I do, runner up at Edinburgh, incredible wrestler, right? But where is he in that space at middleweight in Belator?

Like on the one hand, he's made incredible improvements. On the other hand, I thought he'd be a, maybe it's unfair of me, but I kind of thought he'd be a little bit further along. Yeah, I don't think that's unfair. I don't mind those kind of discussions at all because he's got to hear him. And what he's missing is very hard for me to say. Athletically, he's a talent. Mentally, he's a talent.

You know, he works hard. He prepares for fights. He just took out a two-time Olympian over the weekend. And I don't think most people knew that. It was a situation where, you know, bringing the right attention and getting the right phrase is part of the game. And it's really hard to do. And it's kind of a hindsight issue, whether it works out or not.

For the guys that it works out for, they act like there's some kind of geniuses and understand how to promote a career for the guys that don't. we dismiss them, but it's neither of those things. You go out, you do the fight you can, and you just hope that it catches on it. People know the stories behind him. So I thought that Honeycutt looked great. I think he looked great in his whole career. I thought he beat Lovato Jr. for that matter.

I thought the judges said that one wrong. So I think he's close to undefeated. I know that he's a real talent by watching him, but as far as catching on and getting that attention and getting those accolades, that's tough. Sometimes that's up to guys like you and I, Luke, to make sure we tell the story to everybody else. Yeah, well, I've certainly interviewed him a number of times.

I think highly of them. I would just like to see, I guess, a little. I don't know. I don't know what I'm looking for exactly, but I feel like something's missing, and I can't quite put my finger on it because it's not like he's having, like, boring fights. I agree with you.

You know, I think that Anthony Smith over in the U.S. is a good comparison. Maybe he's coming out of his show, now he's going to fight show gun at the main event. But he's another one of those guys where I look at, you know, Monday morning after he fights on the weekend ago, hey, guys, why are you not doing more with him, right? he's the right age. He's the right look. He's definitely the right look. I mean, if that guy doesn't

look like a cage fighter, who does, he's the right style. He's got the finishes that you guys covet so much. What's going on here? And I do feel the same with Honeycutt a little bit, but it's only something that you know after the fact. It's only something where you go, hey, wait a minute, we miss this. That should have been promoted higher. So, yeah, I agree with you that something's missing. And I think he could steer himself just a little bit with, you know, certain callouts and look for guys that could get them a little bit more attention. But skill-wise, I'm impressed with the guy. I was having a point earlier, if you disagree, by all means, please tell me.

But there's this notion in MMA where we kind of... Oh, I think you know I will, Luke. I think you know I will. Sometimes I have to tell guests to disagree because they don't want to, but fair enough, I know you know how this works. The point being is this, that we have this expectation in MMA that we want referees to be wallflowers and not and not make talk. the purity of a natural fight.

And I don't buy that at all. My point was if you watch collegiate wrestling, the referees, the good ones, they are on the whistle. Now, I don't want them that much involved, but I do believe there's a case. This is an entertainment product at the end of the day, and we don't do enough about stalling anyway. Should referees be more involved or less involved? Yeah, that's an interesting one on stalling.

I think you're asking that because her Dean stops some action recently and told the guys to engage. Luke, I don't know. And here's where I'm coming from. I just don't know what the statute is on that. I remember seeing referees a couple of times happen over Belts or the weekend, too. But when a referee steps in it says, hey, I need more action, you got to engage more. I'm just wondering, per the commission, is that a rule? In wrestling, it is. We call it stalling and you must be going forward. And the referee can warn you and he would take points. I don't know in fighting if that is a statute. And if the referee has the right to do that, I just don't actually know. the rule on it. And so it does set a little bit awkwardly with me when a referee is influenced by the crowd and uses the crowd to influence a contest. I just don't know if that's within their parameter. Let's assume that you could write the rules. How would you write them for a referee's responsibility for stalling in mixed martial arts? Yeah, tough one, huh? Because in wrestling, you cannot go backwards. I don't know if people don't know. If you go backwards in wrestling,

you are now stalling. You must be coming forward or standing your ground. So it's pretty easy to define. But that's not the case in boxing, right? Sugar Ray Robinson never went forward. He even ran five miles a day backwards. Muhammad Ali liked to go backwards. Floyd Mayweather likes to go backwards.

So you can't just dismiss going backwards of a fight. It is effective, particularly if you get the other guy to chase you. So my point being is going backwards doesn't mean you're stalling. So what does? And of course, we know it when we see it. We see guys resting up against the fence. We see guys resting in certain positions looking to advance, not looking to do damage. But I do hear misconceptions, too, that if you're not looking to finish the fight,

you know, finish the fight is like the new dialogue. But I can remember the first time Dana White said it in 2005. Everybody in the room cringed. You know, finish him is something we only saw in Hollywood up to that point. And that was when a guy was about to get his head chopped off. It was like this vernacular where everybody oozed and crissed. as we were trying to get the sport legalized in all the states. New York was a big holdout.

Now, not only is an accepted term, it's used, and now not only is it used, if you're not finishing by the effect, you're ranking. So it's very weird and very funny and very interesting how that dialogue changed. I guess the point I'm trying to get at is now I hear announcers. I hear people say, well, you're not looking to finish. There's a part of me going, yeah, that's not actually a rule. That's something that Dana has said in 2005 was resisted. has now caught on and now with me believe land, you guys are acting as though that's a rule,

which it's not and it never will be. Because you imagine a government agency that does oversight, writing in that you must finish or be trying to finish your opponent. Like that's, that sits very uneasy with me. And I'm not approved on these things. But that doesn't sit well. Yeah, I would share your, your concern there. One thing I had talked about earlier in the show that was raised by one of our tweeters was this notion of the hammer fist. You had two hammer fist finishes this week, one by Nico Price right off of his back, and then another one staged Northcutt in a more traditional circumstance. But the one by Nico Price was really interesting, totally off of his back, almost from like a somewhat of a guard position. First shot puts Randy Brown out.

Incredible, incredible shot. Here's my question to you. Are people getting better at hammer fisting? Is that a thing? You know, we're now practicing it in the room for a couple of reasons. You know, first off, that part of your hand is pretty solid. We all make fun of the karate guys that are out there breaking bricks and doing these other things. But the bottom line is that part of your hand is really solid. It's also the part that isn't covered by the glove. A palm strike, I think will be the next one, you know, to use your palm and realize that part isn't covered or padded.

So, yes, it is a thing to answer you there. But secondly, I agree. Nico Price, that was amazing. If I may tell you, the hardest I've ever been hit in my life was by Damien Maya. And if you can picture this position, he's in guard, I'm on top. He reaches for my far arm like a very traditional basic camora. He doesn't get it when he reaches. So now his body's turned, right?

He's turned his body and his shoulder to get the Camarra. As he resets his body and comes back to center, he comes back with a hammer fist, get me in the face. Luke, he knocked me out. I mean, even though I didn't go to sleep, I was done. It took like two days before I could get the feeling back in my leg. And it was sneaky. I didn't know it was coming. And at the same time, that was my only experience with a hammer fit.

But it was harder than hell. Hmm. How much has the science of ground and pound developed in the last five years in your estimate? You know, for development, some of the positions are different. Like, you know, we usually just get on top of a guy and then it was kind of a free for all. I mean, it wasn't really trained in specific. The most, the advanced guys, a Randy Couture, Tito Ortiz, would pin guys into the fence and then sit up and start using the elbows. But they did at least have the strategy of pinning him in the fence first.

But that was like high level. As simple as that sounds, the guys that were as forward-thinking is to pin him in the fence before you started using the elbows were really advanced. Now you're seeing stuff like Kavidna Morgimov is doing stuff with his legs that I think some people are missing. He's on top. He's trapping legs with his. his legs to immobilize the opponent. And then he started to his ground and pound. So I do think that it's advancing.

I think some of the wrist traps and the arm traps to open your opponent and stop them from defending are getting better and better. But it would be tough for me to glamorize it too much. It is kind of a position where you just know what to do. People just understand that. If you're on top of a guy in a fight, it's pretty easy to sit up and disengage and start raining down. But the other side of it is it's also kind of easy to defend. You bring your hands up, you defend, you roll left, you roll left, right, so the referee knows you're okay.

You wait for the guy to get tired and stop. Aside from Michael McDonald, who in your mind, all of combat sports over the weekend had the most impressive win? Would it be Koreshkov? Would it be, I don't know, Chad Mendez, maybe even Sage Northcutt to an extent? Who really stood out to you? Well, Sage surprised me. I would have to say that in fairness, but I got to give it the junior. You know, overall junior to Santos.

particularly just because it was five rounds. And he did go in there with a guy. He said this in his post-fight interview, but it really was true, and he deserved credit. The guy had only lost one fight in his whole life. And Jr. went out there, and he held up the pace. I thought holding a pace at 25 minutes and still going hard and still attacking when you've been on the shelf for a year.

I imagine he dealt with some depression and some embarrassment and the fact that he was able to shake it all and come and perform like that. you know, he called out Stepe, which I liked. You know, I don't know what else to do with Stepe right now. I think he either given back to Cormi, which isn't likely to happen in the world of fairness, or why not Jr. You know, let's see that part three. So I thought he just did everything right.

I got to give it to Junior. Speaking of which, Stepe had mentioned that today this morning, you told Brett Okamoto that he wanted a rematch with Cormié. I don't know. Like how much of that first fight do you feel? like is not repeatable by Cormier? Yeah, I mean, Cormier definitely caught him. You know, you call the lucky puncher, however that's, I mean, he did catch him.

As I close minds in a vision, that fight, you know, for five months leading up to it, I sure didn't see a knockout on the feet in the first round by Daniel Cormier. I would be stunned if anybody cashed a ticket at a Vegas casino having made that bet. And so I do think that if Stipey made more of that and said, hey, listen, I'm not disputing, it was fast, I'm not disputing, I lost, I'm saying he got lucky. I think he needs to bring the focus and attention to that because I think it's a fair argument. I also like what he said. I mean, it makes the most compelling argument. He just said, I deserve it.

And that's the one that's going to be hard to resist. It's like, yes, Stipe does deserve something. I don't know that he's ever asked for anything. I'm a supporter of D.C. getting Brock. I realize that Brock participation is not warranted. I support it because D.C. wants it. I do think Daniel Cormiate deserve something for all the trials and tribulations that he's gone through, for all the opponents that he's fought at different weight classes at different organizations.

If he's got one ask and he has the opportunity to give it, I think that we need to give it to him. But the same argument would hold up for Stipa. I don't know that he's ever asked for anything. So don't completely ignore him. Let me ask you about something you did on your YouTube channel, and I think it was on your podcast as well, but I caught it, I caught it on YouTube. You had an interview with Colby Coventon. I've interviewed Colby a number of times,

but it's far and away the best interview with him ever in my judgment. I will give you credit for that. It was really, really good. Thank you, buddy. What do you make of Colby? You know you get compared to him a lot. Let me tell you where I'm coming from on this. He and I could not see the world more differently,

but the fact that everyone is enraged by him and or wishes to deny he's doing anything tells me he's doing exactly the thing that people say he's not actually doing. Yeah, so he's the first guy in fighting. In many ways, he's going to reinvent the sport. And is that for better or worse? Time will tell, and then you can decide. But people are going to start copying.

He's the first guy, Luke, ever, to come out and say, I'm just here to entertain you. So, yes, it's an act, and yes, it's a performance. But here it is, and you guys seem to enjoy it. He's the first guy. The only guy that ever did that in wrestling was The Rock. Everybody else stayed in character and held the old K-Fay montage, montage. But he's the first guy to come out and go, I'm just going to look and entertain you. The UFC isn't going to bring me cameras.

I'll hire my own production crew. I'll pay them, but I'm going to get this content recorded and out to the masses. They're scripted promos. He'll admit their scripted promos. Another thing that only the Rock would do, nobody else would ever admit to. And I think that he's having fun. I've noticed that he's 11 years old. It's going to be very hard for him to do anything that upsets me because I just understand it a little bit differently.

But I do think we're going to see guys start to copy him. I think he's an innovator in many ways. And again, is that a good thing or a bad thing? We'll find out. But he does get credit for coming in, for me at least, from coming in and changing it. You know, he is the first guy I've ever seen Luke who has hired his own camera companies to come and go, hey, U.S. You're not going to do this for me? Great.

No problem. I got some money. I'll make a phone call. I'll set the shot up myself. I think it's interesting, and it's clearly working. So why are people trying to tell me that it's not? I don't know. You know, you will hear that.

That is one of the stages of this. You know, I remember going through it, too, and I had some advice from Rowdy, Roddy Piper, who said, hey, over time, they're going to love you for the same stuff they hate you for today. And, you know, sure enough, if I wasn't delivering vitriol at times, they were disappointed. the same stuff that they hated me for. And it's just what Rod Piper had told me, it turned out to be true. And so, you know, fans aren't always going to recognize. The fans don't even know what they want to touch.

I hear fans say that they don't want the talking and all these things, but zero of those fans are watching these shows on mute. Even they don't know. It's a subconscious thing. They're not aware that they is what they like. The fight takes 15 minutes. The buildup takes 90 days. It takes that for a reason.

You and I are on this show with your massive audience for a reason, and we're not throwing punches at one another. So fans themselves don't even know what it is they like and what it is they want, and they don't need to. The fans get it. That's not an insult. Fans get a pass, but it is up to the performer to be able to see through that and deliver his message.

Chale, you're one of the best. You're one of the brightest. Your YouTube channel, by the way, is just phenomenal. If you're not, if you guys haven't checked that out, you really should. I mean, it's just perfect YouTube content delivered several times a day, it seems like. I can't even keep up with all of it. But you're doing a lot of good things. Chale, I can't wait to see your fight with Fador whenever they find out that's going to be.

And I really appreciate your time and insight today. Thank you very much. You're a good man. See you, Luke. All right, there he goes. JLP, Sondon. Stopping by the show. All right.

We have just a few minutes left. So I wanted to do something. I got to give a shout out to somebody. Let me pull up my on Instagram straight flexing. My Trinidad James thingy. Hang on. This gentleman did something really nice for the show. So I want to say something nice about him.

Okay. You guys, do you got to follow somebody called, you know what? I'm not even following him until now. You got to follow somebody on Instagram called Plastic Cell. Plastic Cell is the guy you got to go to. He did something for the show. Now, you guys all know that I start the show, the radio show and this show, by saying Caesar is home.

Where does that come from? Well, technically it comes from Planet of the Apes where Caesar whispers in, what was that doucheback's name? Danny Seguro, what's the guy's ear? What's the guy's name? He's the, and Caesar goes, Caesar is home. James something? What's his name? I keep forgetting.

James Franco, that's who it is. James Franco. He says it in his ear. But that's really not why I brought it to the show. I brought it to the show, and I start every day with it because of my favorite rapper, rest and peace, Sean Price. There's a line from Price and Shining Armor, and it's Indeed the Grown, Squeeze the Chrome.

Please Believe it, End word. Caesar's home. That's where it comes from. And I just thought that was one of the coolest things I'd ever heard. So I always start the show with Caesar is home. Well, check this out. This man, plastic cell, made something for me. We're going to put it here on the desk or up here somewhere or ever.

He made, and he signed the box. Now, I left the stand at home. I'll have to bring that next week. But he made a figurine, and I'll take it out of the bag here, of Caesar. Look at this, from Planet of the Apes. Is that not the cool? thing you'd ever seen in your life. Now, it has a stand. You can see there's two holes in the

bottom of the feet. So it's not going to hold for right now. Again, I'll bring the standup next week. I apologize, Mr. Plastic Cell. He made this. The details in the face. I'll take a picture and I'll put it on my Instagram feed, Luke Thomas News. And you can see that it's absolutely incredible. So let me say, go follow Plastic Cell on Instagram. We're not exchanging money. This is not an ad deal. It's just somebody did something nice and I want to thank him for it. We're going to put this on the desk. I love guerrilla imagery. Shouts to Calgary Barbell. They use it. Um, just, and again, my favorite rapper uses it. I just love guerrilla imagery. And this is just, just the absolute coolest. So, we'll put this up here. And it was a twofer. He said that. And check this out. I'll take, I'll put this

on the stand as well. Rory McDonald, after the, uh, loller fight. Huh? How about that? Incredible, right? So shouts to plastic cell, what a guy or lady, I'm not even sure who it is, really, to be perfectly honest, but pretty incredible stuff, I have to say. Now, Danny, if you could pop on the screen here, that'd be nice. I don't know if you can or not. Can you? Yes? I'm here. Let's see you on the screen.

There he is. What do you think about Caesar? It's pretty sick. Actually, the Planet of the Apes is one of my favorite movies out there. And I'm talking about the original one. Like the original, like Cornelius? Charles Heston, yeah. Walking like this?

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And they could barely move the lips. Yeah. Because, like, you know, they had the whole... And then there was the Mark Wahlberg version, but that sucked ass. It wasn't bad. It was kind of... Oh, no, no, it was bad.

The one where Caesar goes, Caesar is home. Your boy was in the theater, fist pumping and donkey kicking, boy. I was... I don't know. I love gorillas. What do you want me to say? Yeah, those movies are sick. Do you ever listen to Sean Price?

No. You listen to rap at all? Yeah, some, but probably some that you've never heard of, maybe. I don't know. Well, I listen to someone. Is it the kind where the rapper's pee sitting down? Maybe, I don't know You don't quite get that

My wife doesn't like rap Because she says there's too much slang Is there too much slang? There is, but that's... So you came to this country a little younger than she did So it's a little bit different In any case, I love this, I love this lot But we have two more additions to the studio today

You do? Yes One very good one, one, not so... Now, I don't know where to put these So I'm willing to listen to Any kind of advice on this Okay But the first one is, here we go.

So here, I'll give you some advice on that. So that one, you can put in the trash. The Columbia one, you can hang. Why would you, why would you, why would you spoil that? Oh, God damn it. Will you, Jesus Christ. Hang on. Look at this.

Look at this beauty, son. Look at that. Huh? We got to put that in studio, my friend. Look at that thing. Greatest club in the world, yes? Yes, yes, it is. Look at that crest.

All right. And you ruined it because I don't know what's wrong with you. I had another one. I didn't say anything. You just already told me. It could be an analytical-majorito one. You don't know. No, you said Columbia, donkey.

You ruined it. You ruined it. Well, a surprise. Here, we're going to add this to the studio as well. This is more to your liking, isn't it? Yeah. Honestly, that has to go by default next to the Aguardiente. Oh, that's a good call.

So I got this in Bogota, Colombia. There's this, what would you call Montserrarte? It's like the super high... Take Cathedral. at the top of this mountain, right? At the top of mountain, yep. And it's weird because people like are super religious there. I've seen people walk up there on their knees.

Yeah. Like genuflecting and like asking for, because they're asking for blessings essentially, right? Like mom's sick and that kind of thing. But there's a gift shop at the top and I got this there. Shocker, they still had soccer memorabilia. At the top. There's soccer stuff. Dude, you know it's hilarious?

I'll drop my wife off to go vote at like various elections. And you know the Columbia polling station because everyone outside is where, soccer jersey. The jersey. It's the funniest shit ever. You can wear the jersey anyway. Yeah, dude. And it's like an ID card.

It's got nothing to do with the actual game. Neither here nor there. So I got that there and we got to figure out where to put that. Now, I don't know where on this. I don't know. Menagerie of goodies. This is going to go. But you're right.

We could put the Columbia one next to the Agua Diente. I don't know what to say about this one. Here's the last thing though. And my wife brought this up to me too. She goes, you don't have anything for the U.S. team. What are you going to do? I've been so bitter at them for failing to make the World Cup, but you know what?

We got to get over it. We got to let that go. But I don't want to get another U.S. scarf. We got to get something else. I don't know what that is. I don't think we have space to hang a jersey, but we got to represent Los Los Los Santos Unitos in here. I've got my Marine pictures looking like a handsome G.I. Joe,

which I know it. If you don't know that, this is for folks who may be able to be able to be. not know. This picture here is me at boot camp in my platoon, and that up there is me at 18 years old. And if you look closely, my chin is swollen because I had taken, we did rifle manual, where you ever seen those guys in the military, they take their weapons and they do, they like lock it into certain position. Yeah. It's called rifle manual. And I had, I had jacked it up and my drill instructor came by and took the handguards, which is the sort of the longer end of it, M16-82 service rifle, and he jammed it into my face.

And so what happened was the front sightpost hit my chin, and my face exploded. So on this picture, if you look, the left side of my chin is all effed up. I didn't know it was bad because when you go through the child, it was right outside the child line. You can't look down. And so I was going into the chow line. And the corner of my eye, I can tell everyone's serving me food is like, look at me, horrified.

And I get to the end of the line and this other journal structure who I didn't know, pulls me out. He was like, hey, hey. Why are you bleeding? Like it's my fault or something. And I was like, so this recruit did not know he was bleeding. And I looked down and I was covered in blood. Oh, man.

Covered in blood. I never told that story because I didn't want to get that drill and structure in trouble, but it doesn't matter anymore because that's actual abuse. Long story short, they cleaned it up and then put something on it to hide it. But you can actually see that day I got hit in the face with a front sight post and it blew everywhere. Did you get wobbled? Did I get wobbled? No, because I was so afraid.

I was so afraid. I was like too afraid to be wobble. Plus, it didn't like rock my brain. It's just the front side post is like, it's like a little piercing needle, like kind of right there on my chin. Okay, okay, yeah. That makes sense?

Yeah. All right, what do we miss? We miss anything? We have a couple more questions from the soundoff if you want to tackle them. If you have a minute or not. How many left do we have? We got two more.

Quickly. We can play one. Play one very quickly. Cool. This one is about being an MMA fan. I think it's a good way to show. Let's do it. Let's do it. Hey, guys. Hey, Luke. Great job on the show. You're doing amazing. Darren from Toronto calling. I just wanted to call and get your most recent definition of what a hardcore MMA fan is.

I'd like to consider myself a pretty strong fan. I watch every UFC event that happens. Every flagship Bellator event or tenfold Bellator event. But with so many events happening, so often now, it's hard to keep up with everything. you still have a regular life. And I just like to know what you guys consider a hardcore MMA fan. Thanks a lot. Once again, you guys are doing a great job. You're killing it. Keep it up.

Wow, what a great call. Very, very nice. Thank you so much to that gentleman for great question and the kind sentiments. I've always said, remember, it's very easy to send somebody a negative thing. It's very hard to send someone a nice thing. So when someone sends you a nice thing, they're taking an extra special time another day to do that. The answer is it's so different from when I was coming up the last 10 to 12 years. it was at there was a time where you could watch just about everything now maybe not live but it was

pretty easy to get there was a pride every so often there was a UFC every so often and then you could go to your regional mma in your hometown and that was more than enough now it's like how would I define it I don't know that there it's like pornography with the supreme court you know it when you see it kind of a thing but there's not any hard and fast rules about it I would say if you stand up and watched five rounds of somebody fist fighting in a cage in Boise Idaho on television yeah you're probably a fight fan. That to me would be enough. If you know what the PFL is and you're reasonably interested in it, if you even watch any of their undercards, you're probably a hardcore fan at this point. I think

that's a generally good rubric. I would agree. Yeah. There's so much MMA going on these days that you can't fault people to miss stuff. And sometimes you feel like, man, maybe I'm not a hardcore because there's so much happening that is hard to catch everything. But yeah, if you're staying up and watching some event in Boise, Idaho, I'd say you're a pretty hardcore fan. last call. Let's do it very fast

and I got to get out of here because I got to get up town I got to do three more hours of radio All right last one This is specifically for you All right

Hey Luke It's Ben from College Station I was listening to your show On Sirius A couple weeks ago And heard that you were If not friends with Ryan Hall At least friendly

And I was just wondering If you knew of what the state of his career was Because we haven't seen him Fight since December of 2016 And I was super high on him from ultimate fighter. Thank you and keep up the good work. Great question. I reached out to him recently. I have not heard back. We're not beefing anything. I do consider him a friend. I don't see him all the time or anything like that. But he's been to my house to watch pay-per-views. This was before he was

in the UFC. You know, his one of his underlings, Seth Smith, a black belt in Richmond, Virginia, out of upstream BJJ is a very, very good friend of mine. So I do consider myself very friendly with Ryan Hall. I do not know. I do not know. I know he was looking for some fights. And And a couple of the right ones did not, in his mind, I think, come his way. So I think he passed on those opportunities. And I don't know what his current situation is. I've been trying to find out. You know what I'll do?

I will reach out to him and see if I can figure out what the hell's going on. Because I did see him at the very first IBJF DC open. And we talked then. And I don't, he had the same update, which is he's still looking for a fight. But yeah, I would love to see him back. Yeah, he kind of fell off. And he's quite enough streak. He's still training.

He's still training. Is there enough five-fight wind streak? Yeah. Six-fight, I'm out there. I think he's been helping Kenny Floreen a little bit. Like, he's out there. He's still putting in work, Wonder Boy Thompson, too. So he's still training.

I'd love to see him back, one of the best. All right, man. Good work today. Oh, mediocre work for you. I know I did great work, but, you know, you did all right, all right. Thanks. I appreciate it. High energy.

It's a high-energy Monday, Danny. All right, thank you, buddy. Don't forget, call our number 844-6-6-8 for future calls. You can use the hashtag the MMA hour. and until next time. Thank you guys so much for watching. Stay Frosty.