MMA Fighting - The MMA Hour with Luke Thomas – Episode 448

Episode Date: September 10, 2018

On this episode of The MMA Hour, we speak to Din Thomas about coaching and cornering Tyron Woodley for his successful title defense against Darren Till at UFC 228 (39:02); Nicco Montaño about her withdrawal from UFC 228, being stripping of the women's UFC flyweight title, her health and failed weight cut (1:01:24); Valentina Shevchenko about Montaño's withdrawal from UFC 228, where she goes next, when she’ll be fighting for a UFC title next, and more (1:38:00). We also speak to jiu-jitsu wizard Eddie Bravo in our Monday Morning Analyst segment about some of the submissions at UFC 228, plus his Quintet submission grappling venture on Fight Pass (1:21:46). Additionally, we have The Weigh-in (5:55) , Sound Off (17:50) and A Round of Tweets (2:00:52). 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 It's Monday, Monday, Monday, September 10th, 2018 and Caesar is home. Welcome, everyone. My name is Luke Thomas, and this is the MMA hour right here on MMAfighting.com.

Thank you so much for joining me. I know it has been a while, but we are back in the saddle again and so much to get to. We're going to have the sound off with all of your tweets and calls. We are apparently inundated with them, so thank you for all of those. We'll get to a bunch of them today. and we've got a whole lot of guests too. Valentina Shevchenko is going to be here. Nico Montaño, I believe we have the exclusive on that.

She'll be here as well. Eddie Bravo's going to be here to talk about what's happening with him in the world of jujitsu. And then Dean Thomas as well, he was the coach of Tyrone Woodley. He has been for some time and he gave him his black belt over the weekend. So a lot to get to. As always, we take your tweets using the hashtag the MMA Hour and the number to call. 844-866-24-6-8. Yes, indeed. A lot. Now, there's a bit of a schedule change. If you're looking at the rundown on the post on the MMA fighting, I don't know if it's been updated yet. We were going to start the show with Valentina Shvchenko. We're going to shuffle things around. We're actually going to do the sound off earlier in the show, and now Valentina Shvchenko is going to be on at about 135 or so. So it'll go, in terms of guest order, let's see, it'll go Dean Thomas, Nico, Eddie Bravo, Valentina.

Valentina was first, I guess now she's going to be last. So that's a bit of an adjustment. Sorry for that. We had to make some changes here last minute, but we got it done. I am so sorry I've been gone for so long. I had a very epic vacation, but it is over. It is time to get back to work. We have to bring in my man, my aros to my frioles,

the arquepe to my pan, the chambaya to my alla. Let's go to the screen here. Let's bring in one Danny Segura. Danny? Yo-o. How are you, my friend? Oh, yeah, too-in, too-in.

You? I'm doing quite well. I came into the office today. You were playing some salsa? I was, yeah. Who was it? Was it Joe Oroyo? Who was it?

Grupo Nietzsche. Ah. You know what? It got you going. You've been fired up since I saw you. And guess what? Two iced coffees. You're going to have a heart attack.

I want you to be high energy. I don't want you to be cardiac arrest. Oh, well, a little bit of both, you know? Good weekend, I'm hoping? Yeah, pretty good weekend. OCT228 was a great car. I'm curious. Your trip, how was it? Anything combat related? Did you see any fights? The very last thing that I care about when I'm on vacation is MMA. Although I did see some jiu-jitsu gyms in Greece.

I went to Athens, Greece, and then I went to Beirut, Lebanon. And then I was just going to keep it like that. But we actually found some super cheap tickets to Barcelona. Once you're in Europe, it's actually not expensive to get around. And so we went to Barcelona, Spain. And well, anyway, it was wonderful. But no, I purposely stayed away from MMA as much as possible. I will say this. I have an update I wanted to share with the audience and with you. So we have our Caesar here made by our buddy plastic cell and we've had to prop him up because I keep forgetting the stand. Oh, I thought you were going to say you brought the stand. I brought the stand. Here it is. So let's do this very quickly if we can because we have a lot of work to get to here. How did you remember? I was in my office at home and it was just sitting there

because I always set it up and then just forget to take it. So what I did was I put it next to like my wallet and my keys and everything else. There was no way I was. I could. Let's see if this goes. And you really needed that vacation, huh? Yeah, dude. All of a sudden, you're remembering the stand. I know.

Here we go. Look at that. Finally. Huh? Nice. Bam. Nice one, right? There we go.

Look at that. And I have one more thing I wanted to add. Now, we don't have a stand for it today. We're going to put one in. But I was in Biblos. Lebanon, you know Biblos? No. Never heard.

You know the word bibliotheca, right? Yeah. Which means library in Spanish or Bible. Biblos is where one of the first Alphabets in a place was discovered. They had 22 letters there. I think when the Phoenician showed up, so the place is called Biblius,

it's actually the home of the alphabet. Well, depending on the language, obviously. Right. But I found this flag there. I got it for one. How much did I get it for? 1,000 Lebanese pounds, which is about, I don't know,

70 cents or something. In any case, I got this little flag. And if you don't know, my mom grew up in Lebanon. She died tragically in 2003, and I'd never been. I'd actually never been there. I've been all over the world, but I had never been there.

So I finally got to go, not from Biblo. She's from Beirut. But I got my little flag here. So we're going to put a stand for it. And look, everyone's like, you're American. Where's your American flag? We've got 55,000 of them on the stage here, on the set. There's my picture from boot camp.

There's me right there. We got a million of them. But I wanted to represent because it meant a lot to me. It was really important for my heritage, to be quite honest to go and see where my mom was from. I got to go see my mom's old neighborhood. Oh, she actually grew up next to the Saudi Arabia. Arabian embassy. So I tried to take pictures and then soldiers with guns got real bitter at me. So I had to leave. But...

Yeah, you got to do whatever it takes for the gram, right? Yeah. You know, I got to see where my mom grew up. You know, it's kind of crazy. So she grew up in an area called Ross Beirut. And it's not too far from the sea. And anyway, so we'll put that up here. Nice. Yeah. Kind of cool. All right. For now, I'll put that. How about... I'll like this do that right like this. How about that? Oh, well, you know what? Good enough. All right. We got a lot of calls. We have a lot of tons of calls, right? How are the calls this time? Good?

We got another lady caller. Did you cajole one of your friends into calling? No, no, no, no. I didn't. How can this possibly be? I think this caller was from L.A., if I'm not mistaken, maybe? All right. All right.

So let's do this. We will get to the calls and the tweets a little bit later. As I said, we had to rearrange the show. So we're going to do the sound off here in just a minute, right? Yep. But for now, let's do this, my friend. Let's start the show off the way it deserves to be started. It's time.

for the way in. Time now for the way in here right now on the MMA hour. No better way to kick off the show than with that. Let me show a graphic on the screen, if I may. Danny in the back, please put it up. I had sent it to you before the show. A lot of folks ask for reading recommendations, and I always want to give one.

I'm not about to do a book review. I don't care about that, per se. So the graphic didn't work. All right, well, can you put it on the screen? Instead of this one, but like the front screen? The viewer screen? No? Yes?

Potentially? In any event, there's a book called The Death of Expertise. It's written by a guy who goes by the name of Tom Nichols. You don't really need to know who he is. He was a longtime policy expert in Washington, D.C. on Russian affairs, teaches at the Naval War College and a bunch of other places. But the book was about something kind of interesting. It's about what is expertise? How do you obtain it?

What verifies it? What are its limits? What are its failures? What are its purposes? What are the role of experts in society? Now, I don't care about any of that stuff. But there was one chapter about predictions. And in the book, he makes a central argument, namely that some measure of predictions are not only

important and that you have to do them, but they might be required by the job. However, that's really not what expertise is about. Expertise is about understanding the present and then historically why things have happened. Very little of it actually is looking forward. Some, yes, but really not much. It's about looking back and trying to piece together how events transpired. why, understanding events and people, and the interactions between them, and that kind of thing. That's really what expertise is, or if you're a biologist, you know, why basic things happen

in the organic world, you understand what I'm saying. It's about the president looking past. Very little of it is the predictive future because there are so many variables. It can be hard to get things right. And you might overemphasize certain measures of your own expertise and really not understand how the future will work or how your expertise can even be really helpful. You could misunderstand that. Now, why is that relevant to UFC 228? Because Tyrone Woodley wins. You can show the graphic if you want to show the people here for just a second. Tyron Woodley wins. And I saw

some people saying things about Darren Till. And they were saying, well, the UFC got behind another one that just couldn't get it done. And of course, he did lose. But I'm not really mad at them. for getting behind Darren Till. Weren't you excited by Darren Till? I know I was excited by Darren Till. Look at his social media numbers, look at the numbers on videos that he's on, look at the crowd response.

People like Darren Till. People were interested in daring till. And then the fact of the matter is prospecting in MMA, even among experts at the UFC, is very difficult. Now, I realize they might be getting behind certain people, not necessarily out of good faith. We're just trying to figure out who's who, but out of bad faith, we like someone more than the next.

But let's put that aside for just a minute. I'm not mad at the UFC for getting behind Darren Till, for getting behind exciting contenders. It's okay. Figuring out which ones are going to be massive successes is very, very difficult. And so did this one work out on Saturday? No. I still think he's got a bright future. At 25 years old, there's still a lot more he can do.

But the point being is as follows. In terms of predicting the future, even the best organizations like the UFC, they're just going to get some things wrong. It's not possible to see into the future and understand exactly who's going to blow and who's not going to blow. But it got me to thinking about Tyrone Woodley. So even though I'm not mad about the UFC making a really big push about Darren Till, it doesn't make a lot of sense that they're not now getting behind Tyron Woodley. Now, here's what I mean. Let's go over some of the numbers and some of the facts about him.

He has chaoed Jay Huron, Josh Koshchek, and Robbie Lawler. He T-KOed Carlos Condit and Dongyang Kim. He beat the 185 title contender in Kelvin Gastilum. Now, the Mark Whart and McDonald losses do count against him. All losses do. But that UFC 161 fight against Jake Shields, you can go back and watch it. That's a very different Tyrone Woodley. You could have scored it for him anyway.

And I would very much favor Tyrone Woodley to beat today's Jake Shields. Nate Markort's not even in the sport anymore. And McDonald could be interesting. You look at some of the stats. People have asked where to see rank among all-time welterweights, Tyrone Woodley. Well, here are some facts in addition to the resume that I just gave you. Number one, Woodley has landed more significant strikes per minute than Matt Hughes. A lot of people say GSP is the all-time best Walterweight, and I'm inclined to agree,

but after that it gets a little bit murky. Probably you think Hughes is too. Maybe you think Lawler is up there. It can be a bit of a debate. But if we're talking about Hughes, Woodley has landed, has a better significant strikes per minute figure than Matt Hughes. His takedown defense, Tyrone Woodley's, is almost three times as good, 94%. accuracy in terms of his own take-down defense. He is third all-time among welterweights for knockdowns with 10.

Matt Hughes isn't even on that list. You know where GSP is? He's tied for ninth. Tyrone Woodley is third all-time in significant strike defense. Now, GSP is, pardon me, number one, because he is GSP, but Hughes is not even on that list because he's second all-time in significant strikes. absorbed. Now, what is the point in making all of this and reading all of these facts and figures and going over his resume? Here's my point. Once again, it is okay. It really is for the UFC to get

behind exciting contenders. Darren Till was, and still remains, an exciting contender. You were excited. I was excited when he beat Donald Soroni. And sure, the Wonder Boy fight wasn't necessarily going to blow the doors off everybody, but it was in Liverpool, and they showed up, and it felt like something big. And yeah, he missed wait. We all know the story, but you can't sit here and say, there haven't been times in Darren Till's running the UFC when you didn't get the Spidey Sense, when you didn't get a little tingle, when the hairs in the back of your neck didn't stand up for a time.

It happened to almost all of us. Are you really going to be mad at the UFC for getting behind that guy? And by the way, did you see the BT Sport promo they did on him? It's about as good as they come. It's about as good as they come. But here's the truth. If prospecting is hard and even experts get it wrong, it is impossible to not understand the value of Tyrone Woodley.

Look at his resume. Look at his stats. we're talking about an all-time great in that division, and that division might just be the best one in the sport. I can't forgive them for not getting behind Tyrone Woodley, not now. The future is hard. The present and the past is quite knowable. What does Tyrone Woodley need to do now to get corporate backing?

And if you're asking what I'm talking about specifically, it's the lack of Dana White showing up at the Post-Fight Press conference, Here's the truth. Maybe you watching, you know why he didn't show up? I don't know why he didn't show up. It could be there was a family emergency. Truly, I mean that. So I don't know.

And if it was something like that, then it's a shame that he couldn't be there. But I understand. But if it's not that, then it's shameful he didn't show up. This is a guy whose resume, as I just indicated, is phenomenal. This is a guy who on Saturday, held a exciting contenders to a whopping two strikes, submitted him in the second, made it look easy.

This is a guy who's beaten the who's who in his division. This is a guy whose numbers back up him being at worst third or fourth best all time at Walter Waite, maybe even second best. This is a guy who's a family man. This is a guy who is from a rough, part of the country and found a way out. This is a guy who not only has been a good father, but comes from a good parent. This is a guy who pays for his own marketing. This is a guy

who never gets in trouble. Ladies and gentlemen, what has to happen for the lights to go on? Seriously, I mean, I don't, what else do I need to say to you? He needs to, he needs to. He needs to knows how to do media. He's one of the best analysts on Fox. He pays for his own promotion. He has a show on TMZ for crying out loud. When he wins, he wins, for the most part, dominantly. His all-time resume, his body of work, is nearly beyond reproach. And no one backed him up on that night after the fight. Why is that important? It's not just a show of solidarity. It's more important than that. The basic idea is that you have these junctures in your career

where everybody is paying attention. And having third-party validation at that moment is so critical. It's not to say that if they come out later and do something for him, that it will be irrelevant. No, that's not what I'm saying. And again, maybe there is an explanation for why Dana White wasn't there. But what I do know is, best case scenario, an opportunity was missed. a big, big opportunity.

This is a no-brainer. This is an easy call. This is very simple. And even his biggest detractors after Saturday are beginning to realize it is getting tiresome to criticize a guy who just keeps excelling. It just gets old and it wears thin

and it doesn't really work anymore. If the fans can realize that, If the media, which in large part has already known that, can realize that. Maybe corporate brass should too. And that he did it off of a 13-month layoff and held a guy who was basically a middleweight to two strikes. And he can't even get a pat on the back at a press conference. It's either a shame or it's downright shameful. And that's the way in.

All right. We have to do this. We have to change things up. There's the book, by the way. Can you put the book back up over Danny's face in particular? It looks good when it's covering him up. This is the book. It's called The Death of Expertise, Tom Nichols.

Again, it's not about MMA. It's very digestible. You can read it probably very quickly. It's only 200 pages and some change. And it goes over this predictive argument that I have been making. All right. With that out of the way, let's do it early. It is time for the sound off.

All right. Oh, look at Danny getting some byline credit. Now you can take the five minutes off the thing. We'll do the calls first. Let's do the calls first, Danny, because we can always add tweets at the end. I don't know how things are going to go later. So why don't you come up on the screen here?

Look, you can see with Luke Thomas and Danny Seagora. I like that. Getting some credit. You know what, you deserve some. It's fair enough with me. We got switch camera angles here? There it is. All right.

There we go. Put them up there. Hi, Danny. How are you? I just talked to you. I'm doing well. Do you agree with my take on Tyron Woodley? Yeah.

Yeah. I mean, the stats are there. I mean, this is the guy that's that's always fought. He's a very active champion. He shows up every time. And I understand there was some criticizing of Tyrone Woodley early on when he first won the title. And he's like, I won GSP.

I won Nick Diaz. And he was demanding certain things. But if you look at the press conference now, he's like, if anybody, whoever wants, it can get it. And he even said, I'm not going to call out anybody anymore because it doesn't matter. I'm not saying Tyrant hasn't made missteps. Everyone's made missteps. It's not the point. But the point is, again, I don't know why Dana White wasn't there and no one really does.

and so you have to be careful, but either way, it's a bit of a tragedy. Yeah, I mean, this guy just proved that he's going to be dominant for a while. He's 36, but, like, you know,

a good 36. Super solid. So what don't you want to, keeping in mind that he's probably going to be champion for a bit, wouldn't you want to, you know, prop him up

and make them, you know, feel like a big asset of the UFC, you know, and make, you know, make them feel like, you know, like one of the greatest fighters ever. And it's easy to market.

Oh, by the way, look how good he is. Exactly. Super simple. All right. With that out of the way, let's get to these calls. You have screened, then we don't have a moment to waste. Why don't you set up the first one, please?

Cool. So we have a lady's first policy here in the MMA hour. Okay. So that's what we're going to go with. All right. Hey, Luke, hey, Danny. This is M.T. from L.A. Love the show.

A long-time listener, Luke. My question is, what do you think out of all the different ways to get to the U.S.C. is the best, like, the prestigious and most advantageous for the fighters? I wonder, do the fighters get better contracts by winning the ultimate fighter? being scouted on looking for a fight, winning a contract on the contender series, or just kicking ass and other promotions and building a name for themselves,

and then being approached by the USC. Which one do you think provides the best contract terms, exposure, and distinction? And also, what are you guys thought on the Triple G Canelo fight Saturday? I have Triple G winning for sure, but I want to know what you guys think. All right. Thanks a lot.

Bye. What a great question that is, huh? Dude, that is a great question. Something I never really thought of. If you were a fighter, what do you think, and you're trying to get into the UFC, what do you think is the best way to get in? Well, given the three options that she had basically listed, which is Ultimate Fighter, Contender Series, of course, you can just be signed to a

Looking for a fight. You can also just be signed to a show, like to somebody out of the regional scene. Right. It doesn't have to be a vehicle per se. For sure, you can cross out the Ultimate Fighter, for sure, because those contracts have been known to be quite restrictive and to suppress pay. So that's out of the, I mean, yes, there's a degree of visibility that comes with it, but in terms of pay and compensation, probably not. So that's out. I don't know about the contender series, so I can't really say, although obviously we know guys like Sugar Sean O'Malley got some pretty great exposure.

So certainly it's that. But I think the real answer is if you're a John Jones and you come in and you beat Andre Guzmao and you start blowing through people, that's a great way to get paid. But the reality is the Justin Gaichi, Eddie Alvarez model is probably always going to be your best. Look at what Hector Lombard got. I won't say which fighter it was, but there was a fighter. in the UFC at the time who I was talking to back when I did the Spike TV show and they sat down to go, dude, did you see what numbers Hector Lombard's getting? And I'm like, no, he goes, I've never ever seen a check like that. And this was somebody who was very important to the promotion. I think he was getting a three or 400K for that first fight. And did it ultimately pan out in a way that he should have? You know, you can make that argument that it didn't. Point being is when

you're an acquisition, when you have to be acquired and you have some value in another organization, Danny, it's my impression that's far in a way of the best. Yeah. I mean, if you're able to make a name for yourself in MMA outside of the UFC. That's by winning a title, whether it was, you know, World Series of Fighter for Justin Gagey or Eddie Alvarez with Belta or Michael Chandler, you know, these guys, that really is the way. Because you're a champion. Worst comes to worse if negotiations don't go your way with the UFC. You're still a champion in another promotion, you know, you're getting treated well.

And, you know, you can use that as leverage to get a pretty good contract. I would put the ultimate fighter as the last at this point. I mean, how many guys have complained about the pay? So many. I mean, I think at one point, maybe the ultimate fighter, like in the first 10 season, that was like, oh, my God, if you're the ultimate fighter, that was a big deal. It was very prestigious, right? Yep. But that doesn't stand anymore.

All right. What's next? Cool. Now, let's talk about Tyrone Woodley and some UFC 228 topics. Right. What's going on, Luke? This is Dylan from New Jersey. Just wanted to get your thoughts on Tyrone Woodley's performance this Saturday night against Darren Till.

I feel like everyone always wants to write off Tyron Woodley, but in my opinion, he's one of the greatest welterweight of all time. I really think that if him and George St. Pierre fought when George St. Pierre was in his prime, it would be a lot more competitive than people would think. I think Tyrone Woodley is approaching the goat conversation as 36 years old. I mean, I feel like he's got plenty of years left. So just wanted to get what you think about his performance and where he ranks among the greatest of all time in welter rate division and the whole of U.S. Thanks a lot. Another great call. Wow, I'm very impressed. Good job, y'all. Really appreciate that. That's great. Danny, here's what I would say. I don't know where you come down on this one.

I would put him around two or three, and I would state the following. I know some folks had Jake Shields ahead of him. I don't know Jake Shields beat him, but I don't think the body of work at Walter Waite, as impressive as Shields as is ahead of Tyrone Woodley's. I don't buy that. More to the point, the real tension for me is between him and Hughes. Now, Hughes did a lot in that division. Hughes has some great numbers himself. I was very much cherry-picking in favor of Tyrone Woodley, but I'm just trying to make the case of what stands out for him. But the issue is, like, if you look at the guys Tavern Woodley has beaten, it's a much more difficult set of fighters he's run through.

Now, there are some amazing wins on Matt Hughes' resume. Folks are going to look at Hayato Sakurai and be like, who's that? Yeah, when he beat Hayato Sakurai, that was a big deal, okay? And he kind of ran through Hayato Sakurai. But the point being is there are some, you know, Gil Castillo's on there that aren't nearly the same level of title defense difficulty that Tavern Woodley has. So I could understand a case for Tyronet 2, but I'm still going to lean just outside and say 3. However, if he beats a Colby or something like that, at that point, you know, you have five title defenses, all of them being consecutive like that, I would have to leave put him second.

Yes, I mean, I think, you know, where you and I defer is I recognize a lot more and I put a lot of stock on on achievement, on accomplishment. Like if you get a prime Tyron Woodley and a prime Matt Hughes at the same time, there's no doubt Tyron Woodley's going to run through Matt Hughes, right? But it's different times. So I think, you know, with Matt Hughes having more title defenses, that just has to put him ahead of Tyron Woodley. But again, Tyron Woodley has the chance to surpass that. And challenge ESP maybe.

I mean, he still has a lot to work with. But, I mean, who knows how long he's going to be in a division for, you know? I still think GSP is markedly ahead. But to your point, I mean, you're beating 25-year-olds like that. Yeah. Yeah, you're really good. Good. All right.

Next. Hey, this is Josh from Lafayette, Louisiana. I was calling to say, do you think Till's lost in the end will be a good thing because it'll force them

to go up to 185? Hmm. Didn't you want to go first on that one? Yeah. I see you rare and to go. What's up? They asked them in the post-fight conference.

They were like, okay, so does this mean you're going to go up to 185? And he's like, that's the question. That's the real question. I made 169. The wake-out was easy. You know, so I don't,

I don't know if it'll force him to 185. I hope it does. You know. So you want to see him a 185 despite the fact of the Louis Leopold Devil's advocate. He was 169. Like there was no problem making weight. That's true.

But also, you know, Darren Till's like one of the toughest people out there and mentally strong. I mean, that guy, for him to say it was, oh, an easy wake up, it wasn't. He's just that tough, you know? And if you look at, I think when we went, Casey and Esther were at the PI with, I believe Mark Romandy was there as well. I think they were shooting Darren Till at his open workout, like 10 days out from the fight. And man, he was looking rough.

He was looking very rough. And also, I just want to add, in no way am I comparing my physique to Darren Till's. But we both are, yeah, we both are 25 years old. And, you know, something I've noticed myself, like between 24 and 25, like, I wasn't even working out. And I just felt like I was getting bigger and heavier. And I was like, you know, what's going on? And people in my jiu-jitsu is like, oh, you've been. lift and I'm like, yeah, sure. You know, so I think Darren Till is in the same, you know,

range. Same thing happened with Max Holloway. Like all these guys are making weight. But all of a sudden, they're going into a body that's closer now to like a 30 year old than it is to a 20 year. And, you know, that's dangerous. And we've seen the issues that Max Holloway has had. So I think maybe this was fine for him, but moving forward, things are just going to get a lot, you know, harder for Till. There's no denying that middleweight's a better spot for him in terms of his size. Here's what I would say, though. Did he lose on Saturday because of a weight cut? Did he lose on Saturday because of a size?

Well, he had the differential in his favor, but I mean, like, was he so drained that this rendered him incapable of fighting up to his potential? No. Like, what do I think of Tyron Woodley? I think Tyron Woodley, dude, here's what was so amazing about him. Did you not love how he came out the gate? People were like, oh, he was aggressive from the start. But right, that's not an accident. He was setting the tone right away, right away when the fight started.

He got in his face, throwing big punches, staying in there, countering him, moving, doing all the things he needed to, to the point where Till was offensively, not shook exactly, but thinking and a little bit reserved as a consequence. What a veteran smart move that is. I really appreciated that from him. But for Darren Till, like, he just lost, he even said it. The better guy won. He's just a better guy, at least today.

Maybe in five years, that won't be the case anymore. But tonight, or at least on Saturday night, it was. So my point being is, I'm not going to sit here and argue that 185 is not a better weight class for him ultimately. But if he can still make this weight in the same way, I don't necessarily see a need to change competitively, maybe for health reasons, but not competitively. That's my only argument. Yeah, I don't know.

It's just with the whole thing of him going blind and just looking at him very already drained 10 days out, like I just don't want to see him at 185. And even in the buildup, I mean, he's getting, yeah, 170, my bad. Even in the buildup, he was getting ready for a title fight, and there was tons of talk of him, like, openly saying he was going to go up to 185, and that to me is a red flag. So I think he wants that shot again at Woodley, because I feel like he's not happy at all with his performance.

And he even told him, like, you know, to his face, he's like, yo, I want that second shot. But, man, I think 185 is his move. And the other part, it's interesting to me is, like, you talk to people like Cyborg, where they were trying to make, well, she making 140? Right? Yeah.

And if you talked to her trainers back then, they would say the amount of road work she had to do to get it. Like, this is the amount of just, I'm just working out just to keep my weight down. It has no functional value for the fight itself. It's just for weight management. It was an absurd amount of road work. So you can cut that out and how much fresher would he be, right? Yeah. And knowing that stunts your growth as a fighter, because if, you know, you only got 24 hours in a day.

And if you're allocating all that into cutting weight rather than working on technique, you know, adding new tools to your arsenal. So it definitely can stunt your growth. Sure enough. Cool. So now let's move on to, let's keep talking about Till, actually. Hey, it's Rudy Roo. I'm calling from South Oklahoma. And my question is, if Till does move up to 85,

after suffering that loss from Woodley at 2-2-8, who shitty phased and why. So let's say Till decides to go up to 185. How would you match them up? Boy, that's a great one. So let's look at the rankings right now. This is always kind of helpful. However, you want to assess how good they are.

look at middleweight. So I would say outside the top 10, right? Because you need some kind of introduction. You've got shoe face at 11, Tiago Santos at 12, Uriah Hall at 13, Elias Diadoru at 14, Christoph Jokko at 15. I think somewhere in that Tiago Santos, Uriah Hall, shoe face, somewhere 11 to 13, to me would be a great one. Maybe if you wanted to go outside of that, just for purposes of making them earn their keep, you could. But I think that would, I mean, you're going to tell me a fight against shoe face wouldn't be interesting. A fight with Uriahaw. That'd be fun.

Tiago Santos isn't a bruising morat. All of those would be good. So that's kind of, to me, giving him a shot in the top 10, not saying he couldn't beat those guys. It's not an issue of, I don't think he can beat him. It's not that.

It's that, you know, you got to work your way up a little bit. Yeah. So that's a nice way, I think, to start. I think so. I would love a fight with your eye at all. I think that'd be super exciting. And down the line, imagine Adasania versus Till. Oh, my God.

Be fantastic. Yeah. Orsada sign. He's sitting at 9. Yeah. And even Brad Tavares, you know, I just wouldn't feel comfortable giving him a Brad Tavares fight. Maybe he wins. Maybe he blows the doors off Brad Tavarez.

I don't know. I just, don't you agree with me that 11 to 15 slot? That's really where it should be. Because he was a title to contender, one division down. That does mean something, but not enough to just jump the cue on guys like Shoeface. Bro, Shoeface has been in their grinding. You know what I mean? And on top of that, I mean,

regardless of the loss, Till's still a very valuable asset to the UFC. He's young and he's got a huge fan base. So, you know, you don't want to do what they did with Francis and Gano, you know, and match him up with someone as tough as Derek Lewis. You know what I'm saying? You want to build them up. You want to give them a little bit of confidence. So don't put them in the top 10, at least 90.

Very quickly, though, that gets back to my way in argument. People are going to say, oh, well, they rush these guys. Look, some of them have been rushed. Yes, some of them have been rushed. No, I'm going to stop you right there because the next question is exactly about that. Okay, fair enough. You got it. Go ahead.

Yeah. All right. So how do you know a prospect is ready? Great question. Hi, Luke. My name is Chinmay and I'm calling from Mumbai, India. Big fan of all your content and the show. So thank you for that. So my question is, at what point do you know a prospect is ready to go to the next stage? Specifically in the context of three people, Francis and Ghanu, Darren Till, and Zabit, who's now asking for a fight with either Aldo or Chad Mendez. Thanks. Boy, what are...

Hey, how employment are my organization skills, man? Oh, yeah, they're really good. And great minds think I like, too. Boy, I got to say, these questions are phenomenal. Yeah. drop the money on international calls. You can always send us an MP3 to that email. I was like, my man's calling from Vonnage or something.

He's got good. By the way, fun fact, Danny Sigura, I was born in India. Did you know that? I did not. Yes, I was born in New Delhi India. Interesting. My sister was born in Beirut. My brother was born in Paris, and I was born in New Delhi India.

There you go. All right. So on to the question itself, how do you know a prospect is ready? There's a lot of things you're looking at, right? One of them is, who are they beating? Sort of you can just sort of say, what does a resume look like? The other one is, are they looking different fight over fight? Can you see clear progressions?

Zabit, to me, is showing progression in some areas. Some areas, I still think I'd like to see him clean things up a little bit, but fight over fight, he's beating tough guys and looking good doing it. You're looking for that. You're looking for how are they training? Are they with a good camp? There's just a few ingredients about who are they beating and how are they doing it, which I know sounds very, very imprecise and unhelpful,

but consider someone like John Jones, didn't know who they were. You bring him in and he just not only beats Andre Guzmanel, but beats him kind of easily. Then you have him again, Stefan Bonner, he's throwing spinning back elbows. And you say to yourself, my God, this guy's got no experience. He's doing this. He's learning off YouTube. There's something going on here. There's a ton of natural ability.

He can already beat these guys basically blindfolded. You watch him progress fight over fight and that maturation, that skill development, all of it becomes just sort of blend together. So how do you know a prospect is ready? The truth is you don't. You don't. you can argue that Angano was rushed. Dude, Engano was out there knocking people's blocks off. And I didn't think that the Lewis fight was all that tough for him

relative to guys he'd already fought. The question, and I made this point before, was I thought they let him go too long in the Steppe Miochich fight, which is a completely different scenario. That's taking care of people in making sure they don't take too much of a beating, which is another sort of thing you can look at, like, has a prospect taken a lot of damage or not at something else. But I guess you're just trying to figure out how good are they and what are they showing you in an iterative sense fight over fight.

If they're beating better guys, but they're doing it the same way over time, you should have some pause. They're just taking guys down the whole time. And you can say, well, Habib does that. But Habib does a lot more than that. I'm speaking more of sort of like a John Fitch type. It should give you a little bit of pause about their upside. But the reality is you just don't know. You want to see them have enough requisite experience.

And by the way, Darren Till's got what, almost 20 fights? People are like, they rushed him. Well, they rushed him relative to his age, but not so much his experience necessarily. And Francis Ngano, they rushed him relative to his experience and not his age. Or, yes, a little bit differently. So anyway, you get the idea. Danny, what did I miss? I didn't give a very helpful answer, but it's a bit of an eye test.

I would actually something you missed, and I would actually argue that Daryntill was a bit rushed. Because, sure, you can give him a million fights. but part of it is also giving him different looks. I mean, if you look at his last two fights, it was Stephen Thompson and Donald Serroney, both strikers. You kind of want to get him against a decent wrestler, and then if he kills it there, then you go, okay, well, maybe against Woodley, he could do well.

But Woodley took him down, and he had no answer to that. So you want to give them different looks. Right, he did, but I mean, he couldn't get back up for a while. I know he was probably rocked and all that. Those elbows, in fairness to Dyrton Till were nightmarish. Yeah, they're quite rough. But you want to give a prospect different looks. You want to see how he does against the jihitsu guy, a wrestler, a striker, different types of strikers.

And then you know how good he really is. If you just give him the same opponent all the time, you know, you're just getting one look. So this is a great point. You're right. Like you begin to see how good someone is. Look, eventually everyone in MMA gets hurt. Everyone in MMA finds somebody who's got something on them. Maybe not the entirety of the skill set, but something of an Achilles heel.

and the point being is you have to give them all these iterative tasks so that, yes, they look in an iterative sense better than the last time, but that they're answering for, excuse me, all these many variables that happen as well. I'm trying to think of a good test in that. John Jones is the one, obviously, sort of the one that stands out. I would say Habib's a good version of that. Connor McGregor's a good version of that insofar as, and I made this point before, people early on in his matchmaking were saying, well, they were giving him favorable. matchups. Well, sort of, sort of. Here's my point about that. Early on, I think they did. I mean, giving him Dennis Sievers and Diego Brandeus and whatnot, these were absolutely favorable to him. But the entire time, he was working on his overall game. And look, once you get to the point where you're fighting the Chad Mendezes of the world and you're fighting the Joseados, unless you go on some terrible losing streak, you can't go back anymore. You have to fight the guys

in that space. So my thought was, I thought the UFC handled it right. give him just enough room to breathe while he gets better on the rest of his skill set. You're going to say this is preferential treatment. Yeah, sometimes it's worth giving a guy preferential treatment. If they can reward that preference in the end, which I believe that he has tenfold. So about time you have to fight the guys who are super elite and there's no going back, now you're ready. Now the rest of those portions of your game have been brought up to speed. Now you can do big things.

And I really believed that that's what they had done with him. That's a really good version. And Brandon Vera for a while was a bit that guy. When he beat Justin Isler, that was impressive. And then they gave him Frank Meir, and he ran through Frank Meir. I thought Ferrisi over Doom was a bit too much. And then, of course, the wheels came off the bus a little bit on that one. But there was a time where you saw that sort of iterative growth.

That's a good version. Frankie Edgar got a nice iterative buildup so you could see fight over fight, these bigger guys, these different skill sets. Yeah. All right, so here's what we're going to do. We have Dean on the line. We did not get to all of our calls. So what we're going to do is we're going to go to Dean

and then after that, we'll do all the rest of our interviews. At the end of the show, we'll finish up on your calls and finish up on your tweets. I'm sorry about that. We had to rearrange the show last minute, but we're going to make sure we get everything done. Now, with that being said, joining us now is not only a UFC veteran himself. You can see him on Dana White's looking for a fight,

and he was the coach who awarded Tyrone Woodley his black belt on Saturday. He is my friend and yours, the one and only Dean Thomas is here. Hi, Dean. What's going on, man? How are you? You shave just for me. I'm amazed. I shave just for you, man. Well, you know what I'm saying? I can't grow up here. Mine is way too great. I see you got a little gray popping through too, but mine is way too great. Yeah, you know what? I just don't have any shame anymore. That's really the difference between you and me. I just don't care.

Yeah. I ain't dare yet, homie. I ain't dare yet. All right. You still have a youthful smile. Thank you so much for joining us. First of all, let me say, congratulations. Your impressions of how Saturday went. Darren Till being held to just two strikes, it couldn't have gone much better. Yeah, we're incredibly proud in the camp. I mean, Tyrant executed perfectly. And that's the type of performance that we were expecting out of him. I mean, we train a lot, and we've always wanted that type of performance from Tyrant. And I think he delivered it this time with perfect execution, and we're just so proud of him. I mean, he did everything we asked him to do.

You know, one of the things about being 36 and still this athletic is that you get some of the veteran understanding of the game. So talk to me about this. I saw him coming out and people like, oh, he came out aggressive, which he did. But it seemed highly strategic to me. It looked to me like he wanted to offensively set the tone right away. He wanted to get right away, not in a vandalese-silva sense in Darren Toll's face, but to let him know that the offense was going to be coming early and often. And I think it had an effect.

Yeah, for sure. I mean, I don't think anybody expected that. I mean, this is what I'm saying. It's like, we prepared Tyrant to do that in some other fights, and it just didn't work out. But when you put that pressure on Darren, I don't think he expected that. You know, you expect Tyrant to back up and wait and wait and wait. So we said we really need to get in his face and make Darren's Hill work.

You know, we knew he cut a lot of weight. We knew he wouldn't be able to work for five rounds the way Tyron was prepared to work for five rounds. So we said we need to get to him early, you know, start creating. angles and not allow him to get that left hand off. So then that's exactly what Tyrant did. He got in his face, took away the angle of the left hand, and everything worked out in our favor. Let's talk worst case scenario where Tyrant still wins.

What were you expecting from Darren Till? If he still wins. Right. Still wins, but like the worst case scenario inside of a world where he still wins. You know, I was, you know, if Tyrant got hit with a couple of left hands, that would have been the worst case scenario. You know, he got hit with a couple left hands and still been able to, like, pull out a decision

or something like that. Because, I mean, Darren Till is a dangerous fighter. I mean, we were pretty concerned about some of the assets that Darren Till possesses. Like what? But in no mind that I ever think that Tyrant couldn't beat him based on, you know, the weight difference, the height difference,

or anything like that. It was just a matter of being able to execute. I mean, Tyrant's a short guy. He was at a disadvantage when it comes to height, but we knew that Tyrant possessed the speed to be able to get inside fast. And like I told you the other day, being shorter can help sometimes

because you take away some of your target. So with Tyrant's foot speed and being shorter, he was able to take away that target and Darantel was never able to get that left hand off. You know, it was interesting, though. The one time where the height disadvantage really showed itself was when those outside trips were being attempted. It looked like a kid trying to climb a jungle gym.

I mean, Darren Till looked huge in that regard. Yeah, and that was another thing, too. But one thing that people don't realize is Tyrant does have long arms. So Darren Till wasn't able to get his hips fully away from Tyrant because Tyrant has long arms. So he was able to get his grips behind Darren. But he just wasn't able to get his grips and create the angle that he needed to get those trips off. And Darren Till did the right thing. I mean, he's not a dumb fighter.

He's not a, you know, a scrub. He knows exactly what he needed to do. Let's talk about after Saturday. It looks to me like the world is finally starting to come around on Tyrone Woodley. Have you noticed that even some of his begrudging detractors are saying, you know what? Maybe this guy is better than I thought. Yeah, and I think that people are starting to realize. I think that everybody, here's what I think, Luke, I'm going to be honest with you.

I think that people were just upset with Tyron. You know, I don't think that they ever, you know, didn't think he couldn't. didn't think he could fight. I think they were just upset with him because they know what he's capable of. I mean, up until the second Stephen Wonderboy Thompson fight, Tyron was just tearing people up until that fight. Then those two fights, I think he just disappointed people, and they were upset with him. And that's when they started, you know, really bad-mouthed him. And the fact that he was coming out and just kind of complaining about his position in the game, I think that really just kind of exacerbated everybody's, you know, viewers.

with him and said, you know what, we don't like this guy. But I think his performance on Saturday and his stance now that, listen, I don't care who you put in front of me, I'm just going to fight. I think that's what people want from Tyrant. And I think that's what turned everybody's opinion of him around. Yeah, so it wasn't just a performance, right? It was afterwards at the Post-Five press conference. They're like, who do you want next? He was really agreeable. He was like basically anybody. It might even be at UFC 230 because he didn't take any punishment. And every time I call somebody out, people don't like it. I don't blame him for doing that, but I think that's a pretty sober assessment of reality. Did the criticism ever get to him or how did it affect him low these

many years? I mean, it's always affected him. You know, there's times where, you know, we have to take his phone away from him. You know, it affects these guys. These fighters, everybody thinks that they're just, you know, these warriors and these animals, but fighters are some of the most sensitive people that you'll ever see or ever meet. And it affects them. I mean, they get out there and they train their tails off and then they get in the cage and they fight. They make themselves so vulnerable for the world to see. And then people just take that for granted and start talking trash about them. And it affects them. It affects them heavily. But I think now is it time retiring as his maturity as he's evolving as a person and a martial artist, he's starting

to become more mature and say, you know what? This may be a time where I have to just, you know, give to the fans what they want. And that's for me to just shut up and fight. You know, it was interesting in researching this interview. I went back and I watched this fight at UFC 161 against Jake Shields. It was a very, very close fight. It went Shields' way via split decision, but probably could have gone either way. I scored it a draw.

Apparently, I looked it up on MMA decisions, shouts to them. In any event, he had a totally different corner. I think it was Liborio and some other striking coach. When did you get involved with him? Well, here's the thing. is like not a lot of people know this, but I've been involved with tyrant since 2006. I cornered him in his last two amateur fights. And then, but I didn't become a staple in his camp until he fought, it was one of his

strike force fights. I can't remember exactly which one, but it was in strike force. But I missed a couple of his UFC fights and the fight with Jake Shields happened to be one of them. But I was still always kind of in his corner and we trained a lot together, but it wasn't until he started really making money to really provide for me to come out and be his, you know, his main guy. You know, he just couldn't afford to have me out for all those fights. So when did he start to have the ability to afford to, you to come out?

I know you guys, correct me if I'm wrong. Did you guys not have a podcast called Deez Nuts? Yeah, we still do. And here's the thing, we have stickers for that. And Tyron put a sticker on Matt Serra's back and he wore it for the entire day. He didn't even know it was on his back. But yeah, we still kind of have that podcast, but we don't really, really exercise it that much.

But to answer your question, Luke, it wasn't until, like, the Rory fight is when I think, you know, I was with him for the whole camp of the Rory fight. And then after that fight, it was kind of, like, understood that I needed to be with him because, you know, he just, a lot of times he just needs to stay focused. And I'm one of the only human beings on Earth who could probably keep him as focused as he'll be. You know, he did look focused. You mentioned that these guys are sensitive. I don't think that's exclusive to Tyrant.

It's a lot of fighters who are that way. And he did look a little bothered by the fact that he was the underdog, but the right kind of bothered, where it was the kind of bothered that enabled him to dial in for this fight. I just felt like it's not good necessarily deemed to be bothered, but he seems like a veteran at this point who knows how to channel all of that into productive performance. Yeah, and that's what it was, too.

He was bothered by it, but it wasn't that he was. the underdog. That was never the case because he's been the underdog in the last four of his five fights. So that wasn't the case. The case was really that he knew that he felt kind of pressured into taking this fight. He knew that it wasn't really the right time for him and it might not even have been the right fight for him. But he felt like he was kind of pressured into this fight. So he said, you know what? I'm going to keep my mouth shut and I'm going to show the world what I'm made of. And that's exactly what he did. That was exactly the way he prepared for. And he also, and this is one thing that I think helped this fight too, was it.

he understood what Darren Till was capable of and respected it throughout camp. You know, some of the other guys, you know, were like Damia Maya or even Wonderboy. It was like we knew that we had that puzzle to us all, but he never really felt like those guys could hurt him and put him away and embarrass him. But he knew that Darren Till was able to get off. He knew that Daryntil could embarrass him. So he said, you know what, I'm not going to let this happen. I can't afford to lose the position I'm in now, the position of that the world treats me, the way the UFC and everybody treats me,

I cannot lose this fight. If I lose this fight, I was saying like if Tyron loses that fight, he might as well retire. So he was at a do or die position. Why would he retire if he loved that fight? They're going to push him way to the back. If Tyron loses that fight,

they would have never given him a rematch. They would have never, he would have had to fight. Every top guy coming up, he would have, his next fight would have been Usman and then Leon Edwards and then Sonia,

Ponzoenibio, he would have never been in a position to get back to that title. So he cannot lose. You are a black belt and jiu-jitsu under who? Who gave you your black belt? Ricardo Laboreo gave me my black belt in 2007. 2007. Did you get it in the ghee? Yeah.

A lot of people don't notice about me, but, you know, when I had my own, I had my own academy for 12 years, a couple, multiple ones. And I only did a ghee program. I did not know that you actually had a school. I knew you had your school. I didn't know it was for 12 years. Why did you, very quickly, why did you decide to get out of that business?

Well, just because, you know, I had the opportunity after the ultimate fighter, Black Ziggins versus American Top Team, American Top Team wanted to hire me on full-time as a coach. And I figured it was, you know, I liked working with pros anyway. And I just said, you know what, I'm just going to coach full-time. And I just gave up my schools and just decided to coach full-time. All right. So you got your blackboard into Laboreo in 2007. Obviously, you have a bunch of famous wins via submission in the UFC.

Let's just start with the basic question. Why did you decide to award Tyrone Woodley his black belt on Saturday? So, and here's another thing, too, is a lot of people don't realize that Tyron trains in the ghee as well. I did not know that. And even if he didn't, he's still, his grappling is still up there with the best of him. In fact, I told him the other day, you know, I do all the drilling with the guys. And prior to this camp with Tyron, the most vicious guy that I drill with is Antonio Carlos Jr. Who's a world champion in Jiu-Jitsu.

Tiren felt worse than him as far as transitionally and his pressure and just his ability for control and finding submissions. He felt worse than Antonio Carlos Jr. Now, his jiu-jitsu ability is, it exceeds the Black Belt level. The reason why I gave it to him was because he was supposed to get it a couple of years ago. go from Ricardo Laboreo, but for whatever reason, it never happened. And I figured it would be a good experience for him to actually get this if he wins on Saturday night. So I said, you know what, I'm going to give him his belt if he wins.

I knew he was going to submit him. I had no doubt in my mind that he wouldn't submit there. And so that wasn't the submission I thought he would use, but I knew he would submit him. All right, a couple of questions. What submission did you think he was going to use? I thought he was going to get him in a rare naked choke. Okay. So take him down, make him force him to turtle, and then go from there?

something like that. Yeah, yeah. And you don't, and in MMA these days, you don't force guys a turtle, they give it to you. You know, most guys just don't know how to capitalize off of it, but this is something that we work a lot on,

and that's our sequencing to chokes from that back position, and I figured all he needs to do is give him the angle, and if he got the angle, tiring would have choked him out. Is the, is the Dars something he typically goes to? Yeah, he likes the Dars. I mean,

and that's one thing that, you know, as a wrestler, you know, he's traditionally, a wrestler, they have that squeeze. They know how to just bring it in. So I knew when given the opportunity he was going to have the squeeze

for that. So that's one of his moves, just personally one of his moves. That's really interesting, though. So you would have given him the black belt. Let's say, remember that right hand that dropped Darren? What if that had like one punch, K-O. Do you still would have given him the black belt? Yeah, I would have given him to him. Because like I said, and a lot of people are like, well, he just submitted,

he submitted a white belt. I mean, it's not, it wasn't that victory, the security, That was just the moment that I wanted to give it to him. So whether he won or not, I would have given him the belt anyway. I see. What did he say to you backstage if you don't, I mean, I don't know if you can share the details. Maybe you can just paraphrase, but did he give you any kind of indication? He was saying, I think he told Megynolevy he cared more about that than he did the UFC belt.

I'm wondering what you think it means to him. I know it meant a lot to him because I know how much he wanted to be a black belt. I mean, Tyrant is a traditional martial artist through and through. I mean, he really likes, he really loves doing Jiu-Jitsu. I mean, and I know how much it means to him to want to be a black thought, and I don't think that he was one expecting it then. And I don't even know if he knew how he would get it at this point, you know, because he's fighting, he doesn't really have a chance to, like, put the Ghee on maybe as often as he likes to.

And I know in the jih Tijuana, that's kind of like the thing that everybody looks for. You have to put the gie on. So he doesn't really get those opportunities as much. But in the most opportunities, he gets to train and grappling, is with me. You know, so I'm a third-degree black belt, so I'm, I think he deserved it and he earned it. Yeah, and I have no doubt that he deserves. I mean, look, you got these guys who are D-1 wrestlers.

Forget very good D-1 wrestlers like Tyrone Woodley, and you know as well as I do. Two years of Jiu-Jitsu on the mat, they're at a minimum Purple Belt level. And he said he's been training Jiu-Jitsu since, what, 2005 or six? I have zero doubt that he's a blackball. I just sort of wonder, have you ever awarded a black belt? A, it's anybody else, and B, in the context of, I know it wasn't because of the MMA fight. The MMA fight was really the occasion, but like that, versus on the mats in front of everybody at Jiu-Jitsu class. So I have four black belts that I've awarded.

Two of them you wouldn't know. They just, they were my students from for a long time. And the only other blackout I've ever awarded was Daniel Weichel from Bellator. Yeah. You gave him his black belt. I did not know that. I did, yeah. And did you give it to him an MMA fight or on the mats?

I gave it to him on the mats. Okay. So this is a bit of a unique thing for you then. Yeah. Yeah, this is the first time I've ever done this. Wow, crazy. Let me ask you a few more questions about Tyrant if I can. Look, I said this to the outset of the show. I don't know why Dana White was not at the post-fight press conference, and I hesitate to speculate.

But here's my point was, if he wasn't there because he had some kind of other situation he had to attend to, well, that's a shame, but I could understand. If not, it's just shameful to me. Because you get these big wins like this, and that's the right moment for the head of any organization to come out and pat a guy on the back and tell the world, set the narrative for this. What do you make of Dana White not being there? You know, being on the show with Dana, I know how hard he works. I know his schedule, and I know he keeps everything really tight. So I will never speculate that he didn't show up because he disliked Tyrant or didn't want tiring to win. In fact, when he came into the cage, he kind of gave me a nod and was like, good job.

I mean, of course, everybody's going to speculate that he didn't like it, but I know, like I said, Dana keeps a very tight schedule. I know that he was leaving. I was talking to the security guy afterwards saying, man, we got a flight to catch. And, you know, and sometimes Dana's just like his schedule, he's tired all the time. So, like, you know, I don't want to use that as the excuse, but I just know he keeps a tight schedule. So, like, that's the only reason why I could say he wouldn't be at the press conference. I would like to see. He would like to see. him come out with a statement now and congratulate Tyron, that would be good, you know, because it's easy to criticize fighters, but, you know, when they show and prove, when they show up

and give you what you ask, it's, you know, I think it's only right to give them their props. Tyron Woodley's just an amazing guy, right? Like, he's maybe the best analyst on Fox. He's one of the best welterweights of all time, a jihitsu black belt, a family guy. He has a show on TMZ. He pays for his own self-promotion. He never gets in trouble. I don't know if this is the corner that he needed to turn to get promotion. But geez, Dean, if this is not, I have a hard time understanding what might be. Listen, and don't forget about his mixtape he got coming out. And the single he got dropped in the Gis Philippa. You're right. If this isn't the right, I mean, he does movies. I mean, he's one of the most unique guys I've ever met. And like his energy, if people really knew him,

everybody would like him because he's so charismatic and charming. But, you know, the problem is, man, it's just hard to get past some of, you know, some of what he does at times, you know, when he starts to talk, you know, because, like, he just, he wants everybody to get on his side and see what he's doing, and it may come out wrong at times. I think that's what it is. We were talking at the top of the show about where he ranks all time among Welterweights. You and I spoke about this on Friday.

My sense now in looking at the resumes is Matt Hughes has more title defenses and certainly did a lot for mixed martial arts. but I'm, it's just hard to say because Tyrant doesn't have as many title defenses, but the ones he has are over fighters who are for the most part way better. So after Saturday, where would you rank him, second or third or something like that? And what do you think he has to do to get into an argument about being the best Walter weight of all time? I think, you know, at this point, I'm going to have to say second. Um, I think that if he beats, and like, you said, I think his resume speaks

for itself. When you think of the guys that he has beaten, you know, even it has come up between like Carlos Condit, Kelvin Gastilom, Robbie Lawler. So like, oh, he's beating all those guys. But I think a couple of more title defenses will solidify his position. I think that's all he needs.

You know, a win over Kobe does, I mean, to me, I think Kobe's an easy opponent, to be honest with you, but just on the resume, he kind of needs that, just so he can have more title defenses. But and maybe even Usman, but if he gets those two,

then he's the best of all time. Why is Colby an easy fight in your judgment? Just because Colby is, he doesn't have, well, first off, he doesn't have anything that's dangerous to Tyrant. You know, he doesn't have the ability

to knock him out with one punch if Tyrant slips. He doesn't have the ability to choke Tyrant out, like take him down, take his back and choke him out. I don't think he has that ability. The way Kobe can win that fight is to obviously grind him out.

And I don't think he can out wrestle Tyron to get him to that point. So to me, that's kind of an easier matchup. Is that the one you want to see next? And do you think November 3rd, if they make it UFC 230, is that too soon? Or strike while the iron's hot? November 3rd, I don't think it's too soon. You know, Tyron didn't take any damage. He's healthy.

He's mentally in the right place. I don't think it's too soon. If Tyrant can do it, as long as it don't interfere with his rap tour schedule, I think it works. How would you rate Tyron as a rapper? Grade those bars. So here's another thing with Tyron. He is incredibly intelligent. And he's a student of a rap game.

So when he wraps, like he really puts a lot of effort into his lyrics. He's still working on his delivery a little bit, but I mean, that's coming with practice. And he can tell you that as he practices and he's in the zone, you know, his delivery is fresh. But his lyrics are up there. His lyrics are tight. I saw him on Sway freestyling. I don't know if it was a freestyle, but it was pretty good. It was pretty good in the end.

Yeah. And that was kind of, you know, he's gotten a lot better since then, to be honest with you. Like, he created 30 songs in a year. Wow. And he's always in the studio. Like, that's his release. Like he likes to just go to the studio and rap. You got to be like DJ Clue on his records where you'd be like, oh, no, stop, stop, stop, stop.

You got to be that guy on the record. Somehow, somehow I got to get in there and be in the background. I don't know how, but somehow I got to do it. Well, you know what? It seems like you guys have an incredible relationship. It was a near flawless victory on Saturday. Dean, you're one of the good guys in the sport. I really appreciate your time today, and I can't say it enough.

Congratulations to Tyrant and to you as well. Thank you, man. I appreciate it. All right. from one nice person to another. I believe this is the first time outside of her Instagram post that she has spoken about this. Let's go to her now.

I hate to say this, but she is the former women's flyweight champion of the world, the one and only Nico Montanio, joins us here on the show. Hi, Nico. Hi, Luke, how are you? I'm doing well, Nico. It's nice to see you.

I guess I'll start by saying, number one, thank you for making time for us. Number two, let's just sort of talk about your health. How are you today? And then, you know, the doc said to take a couple of days off and I get back into it. But you definitely emphasize on, you know, your kidneys weren't failing. They had already gone. So he said to make sure that I just used back into it.

All right. So you're back at home now, yes? Yeah, in Albuquerque. Okay, back in Albuquerque. All right. So let's back up a few steps here. If we can. All right, first things first.

You felt fine all the way up until when? Thursday night, really Friday morning, because I had been cutting. So the last thing I had to do Thursday was a little media thing with the corner. Well, not the corner of the people who were the commentators, about 3.30. And then right after that, I was like, okay, let's get on this weight cut. So around four is when we started. and then that night, or I should say the next morning, 1 a.m. is when we took a break

because it was like pretty hard to get any more sweat going. And so we took a break at one, started to get going again at five, and then by like six or three, this is where I at least track of time because it was just going downhill. But after that, after that is when I just started feeling immense pain. And, you know, I've been through pretty tough weight cuts before and I've always made weight about it, but this one just wasn't anything. comparable. Yeah, so just for a records keeping stake, you've never, up until Saturday, excuse me, Friday, you had previously never missed weight, correct? Exactly. All right,

so things went downhill and how did they go downhill to the point where you got taken to the hospital? Um, I turned, like, it turned back quick, you know, at like, at five, I had put my suit on and I sweats on and some sweet sweat and I was like, you know, we're making one, twenty I mean, five, it's ridiculous. Like, this never happened. And I was so motivated to do it. So I went for, like, a 15-minute run, you know, did what I could. And then, like, okay, got a little split going, which was pretty tough.

So I was like, let's keep this going. And then we hopped in the sauna. And then my back was just, like, it just felt like sheer, like, stabbing pain. And then my stomach kept cramping, but it was definitely like the heat that set it off. You know, that little jog was kind of, I mean, it was hard, but it was. I was able to do it, but then I got into the heat and it was my kidneys, my back, my lower back and my stomach were just in pain. And we got out and I was about to try and cocoon, but then I started dry heaving.

And I was like dry heaving all over the floor right there. And there was some folks that were staying in the hotel. And there were just like some, you know, some regular folks, never heard of the sport USC at all walking by telling us like, I'm calling the cops. You guys are being ridiculous to like my. boyfriend who was helping me cut weight and the guy who was running the documentary. Because they just had no idea, you know, they're like, what is happening? And they're like, no, we're fine.

We're just trying to make weight. And they're like, this is ridiculous. We're calling the cops. We're calling the security. We let the front desk know. So at that point, we kind of just had to mosey on back to my room, which was an effort in itself. And then as soon as we got back, that's when one of the UFC people were like,

Like, you know, I'm worried about your kidney. So let's go ahead and take your vitals and let's see what's happening. And then the stretcher came in from there. Again, I think that was from. Oh, do we lose her? But they were there. And then they loaded me up on the stretcher. And all right.

So we lost. Yeah, you're good. You're good. You're good. You're good. We lost you for just a second. So you said the people came in. They took your vitals.

They put you on a stretcher. And from there, they took you to the hospital. Did I get that right? Yeah. You got that right. Okay. So you get to the hospital. hospital, and I'm assuming they treated you, what were the doctors telling you at the hospital?

They were saying that my kidneys said shut down. And like I said, they weren't like, your kidneys almost shut down. They're like your kidney shut down. And your sodium levels are way too high. And when you have an out and imbalance in electrolytes like that, I forget what the term is called. And it's not necessarily cardiac arrest, but it could lead to like heart muscle tissue damage, what could ultimately lead to death. And so they're like in a situation like this, like, they're like, who knows, you could have probably waited in, but who knows, like, if you would have waited 30 or 30 minutes or an hour longer than, I mean, it was 50-50 at that point. How long before you started feeling better?

I took a while. It took me a couple of IVs. My back is still hurting. I was trying to carry the back, my backpack through the airport security. yesterday. And it's just like my back is still pretty tender. But it just took a couple, a couple of bags of saline and making sure my sodium levels were back at it. So I drink a bunch of orange juice because they're saying that that's good electrolytes without a lot of sodium by, I don't know, by ceremonial wayans, I'd say is when they let me out. And I was good. I was released from that. at any point were you speaking with any UFC representatives while you were in the hospital, or was anyone in your team speaking with any UFC representatives? I think there was my coaches talking to a couple of people. I wasn't, obviously. I just shut my phone off starting the night before because during a cut,

I just don't want to talk to anybody anyway. So they were talking to some UFC people. one of the UFC PI people were helping me out through the cut and came over and just was making sure I was okay. My boyfriend had talked to, that wasn't anything with the UFC, that was just a journalist. But yeah. Okay, a lot to unpack here. Was someone from the UFC helping you with your cut? The UFCPI.

They were basically in charge because here's what I'm trying to get at. If I had to ask you why the cut failed, given that it never failed before, to what extent, is it something you could have done? To what extent did you think you got bad advice? No, I think it was just the amount of time. You know, I came in a little heavy because I was trying to race the clock to be on weight for this fight. And I knew that from the beginning. I knew I was going to have to sacrifice a lot of my performances in the gym during camp leading up to it because it was just about making weight. this whole camp was just about making weight.

So when you say it was so much of the camp was about making weight, you're suggesting that this fight shouldn't have been in September. It should have been, I don't know, October, November, something like that? Absolutely, yeah. And I tried to ask for it.

I tried to push for it, but if the threat of getting my belt stripped was, you know, was that, you know, if I hadn't picked September, there was a threat of getting my belt stripped, so why just give up then? So they told... So they told you, if you don't take the fight in September,

we might take your title away? Essentially. You know, not in such bold wording, but... Yeah. Okay. And so you accepted the fight, and then again, as you mentioned, you came in... By the time you started your cut, how heavy were you?

I came on Tuesday at 144. Oof. That is... How much are you usually that time for a fight? I was 141 last time. That was a little heavy to, again, coming off of the tough show and pretty tough cut. You know, it's all just kind of my biology at this point. It's kind of hard to guarantee anything until I know my body's cooperating and not rebelling.

Yeah, so let's talk about the context here. And then I want to get into the title being taken away in just a minute. But you had noted in your post on Instagram that you believe that there's been a metabolic effect, not only with you, but with other fighters who have competed on the ultimate fighter. We know after the ultimate fighter, you had the tonsilitis, you had the broken foot, you had a number of immune system problems. It sounds like you believe that you're not over that. Yeah, you know, I think it took a while for it to get a kickstart.

Hopefully I'm okay now. You know, these past couple of weeks, I've been feeling like an athlete. But it just happened to be these couple of days. of last weeks that everything started to get going to where I could, like, make some educated guesses on where my weight was going to be and how I was going to feel that day. Up until then, it was kind of just like, I don't know. I don't know. Hmm. This might sound like an indelicate question. I don't mean it that way, but given what has happened to you biologically since that time on the show, including the removal now of your title, how do you look back on your time on the Ultimate

fighter. It was good, you know. It, um, it was great in a sense of getting to get my name out there, obviously, get my story out there. Um, and just getting to know the girls on the show. You know, I can take, I can look at it from either perspective. Obviously, I'm going through a little bit of a chronic, um, wave of just bad, bad luck right now in terms of health. Um, I think the show was the catalyst for sure with all of this. Um, but like I said, hopefully now I'm back to, I'm back to it. You know, I was asked then, I was asked right after I got out of the show if I would do it again. And then I said no. And that's just my honest opinion. I had fun for sure doing it. I don't technically regret it, but I wouldn't do it again. Hmm. All right. Let's talk about the title now. How did you find out you had had the title taken away? Instagram. I was scrolling through Instagram.

I was scrolling through Instagram and I saw an interview with Dana White saying the title has been stripped. And I was getting out of the hospital and I was like, oh, already then. And your reaction, did you believe it? Were you in shock? Yeah, yes and no.

I mean, like I said, from the get-go, it's kind of understandable that they want to get things rolling. You know, it's just sad that they have to do it on behalf of my health. And I suppose I could have said no to the fight in September and had been stripped then anyway. But I still would have looked like I was scared or something, you know, and I already had a bunch of people on the Internet being crazy. So I just wanted to show people that I was making an effort and being proactive about taking up this fight, knowing that it was still going to just be up in the air about making weight and that was going to be the biggest issue.

But yeah, it was definitely pretty sad. It was disheartening. I didn't want to have anything to do with the UFC for a bit after that. You know, my short temper was self was like, F this, you know, you just almost died for a company that doesn't even call you to make sure you're alive. So it was kind of like personally, it was kind of just like, We'll screw you. On a business level, you know, if I can see it from a different perspective, I can see what they have to do or they feel like they have to do.

But just the inconsistencies with a bunch of things like this is still pretty disheartening in terms of, you know, what's going to happen with my career? Am I going to want to stay in the UFC? I'm going to want to stay in the UFC just to fight Valentina eventually. But, I mean, with anything else, it's just like, what else is the motivation? What else is a motivator? Have you personally spoken to any management inside the UFC, upper level management? I texted Dana and then he wrote me back on Instagram.

I texted Dana right after I got out of the hospital. And then he texted me back on Instagram last night. I said to call him today. There's been a couple of people reaching out, you know, like a lot of the tough producers. I get that the UFC is just this huge system and there's a lot of intricacies in that. I'm not trying to get anybody on bad terms or anything. Everybody is so nice to get this whole thing developed and all these fight cards going. So there's not like any personal vendetta with anyone personally.

So I just am pretty angry and upset with the UFC as a whole. I don't even know who to be upset with, but those words or those letters are definitely upsetting these days. You mentioned Valentina Shavchenko would be a remaining source of competitive fuel for you. I know you've seen this, but I wanted to read you in for the audience's sake a small portion of a statement that she had put out saying, quote, the following. I had asked for a fight in October knowing this and had some legit people on the side also asking in my behalf. However, the matchmaker and whoever else only gave me the September date. Sorry, this is you. One second.

I want to read this out here. So with no other choice, with the internet taking a lying bully, Valentina, I was forced to accept the date and have the threat to get stripped away. You have called her a lying bully. You've also called her, I believe, quote, an egomaniac and said the things she has said are completely false and nowhere near the truth. Specifically, what has she said that is not true? That she's been training three times for me and I've backed out three times. this was the only fight that I've ever signed a contract for. There was the talk of the July card, but I turned that down ASAP because I was, as soon as I heard of that opportunity, I was just coming out of my tonsillectomy.

Like, I still couldn't work out hard because it was still, like, there's still sutures in my mouth. So that is completely false. I don't know where she's getting that. I don't know where she's coming up with. I backed out because I was scared during the week, during this past week. You know, I did everything I could, and this documentary is going to show it. What do you make of some of the larger statements that she's made that she knew you were going to back out? And she had not full confidence exactly, but that she sort of saw this coming.

You know, I think she lives in Lala Land for a reason. I think she really wanted that to happen, you know, unless she. She's another Miss Cleo, and she could have a side job, because she was good at that. But I think she was hoping for it, you know, I think she's a little scared, excuse me, a little scared to fight somebody like me. I think deep down she was actually really hoping for it, hoping this fight wasn't going to happen, so she could have more ammo to be a cyber bully, and she wouldn't have to face me in the Octagon. And let's now look ahead to the future. You have noted that your health is on the, on the, on the, amend, but there's been some chronic issues low these many months.

When you think about the rest of your 2018, what do you think it looks like? Right now, I'm going to be as proactive as possible. I told the PI, I told people, I told everyone there that I'm going to be enough there as soon as I'm ready, as soon as it's capable. And then we can get some tests going

where it can be in terms of weight, you know, how my body's going to be able to manage itself, on adapt itself. properly to my used to be walking around weight, you know, 142. So, yeah, you know, just being proactive and showing my face there so that people know that this is something I'd like to keep pursuing for absolutely with no hesitation. And you're going to speak, I think you said you were going to speak to Dana White later today?

And so, you know, he asked me to call him, so I'll do that. And what is it you intend to say to him? I don't even know. You know, this is kind of my first rodeo in the USC. This is like, welcome to the UFC. You have nothing to compare it to. So I'm not sure what even to ask or how even to just go about any more business questions, you know. I just want to know why, I don't know.

I don't even know what I want to know, you know, not necessarily going from them. You know, like I said, if I ask the question why he got strips, I'm sure they're going to come up with the logical reasons on their behalf, on his behalf. But it just, you know, as humans, I feel like we've got to look out for each other and at least be nice. So hopefully it's a good conversation in that sense. So ultimately, when you look back on the stripping, you sort of seem like you're halfway there. Like you understand a little bit of why they do it. But do you believe it's unfair? I do. I do believe it's unfair. I believe it's unsure that the way it was done with me finding out on Instagram and also the way that their inconsistencies are. They made so many interim belts, but this one was just stripped due to health precautions. I mean, there's so many interim belts that were made due to health precautions due to injuries. And there's just no inconsistency. So what's there to rely on?

Well, I know this has been a very difficult period, Nico, for many months, given all the different health elements, and now this one being added to it. I know it's been a difficult time. Is there anything you wanted to say to the fans of MMA as we part ways? No, you know, I think I threw everything out on Instagram. If you guys like to keep up with my story, definitely follow me on there in our Montaigneu. But to, like my loyal fans, you know, I'm really happy. to see the support that's backing me up with this. It really wasn't my attention to do that.

So if a lot of people had to change your schedule around to meet this fighting date and it fell through, you know, I, like, I'm sorry that everyone did that and it didn't happen, but, you know, there's so much I can do. I kind of don't want to even apologize because I, my kidney shut down. Like, this is my livelihood. Like, I tried. I tried everything with everything respect against me. not only be honest, but it was the help that was being brought on by, like, the matchmaker, you know. It was just kind of a sabotaging move.

Well, it's an unfortunate event, I think, to put it mildly for all the parties involved. I know this is a difficult period in your career, Nico, and it requires a degree of strength to share your story. So I wish you nothing but the best in terms of the rehabilitation of your health. And thank you for spending some time with us. to give us your perspective. Thank you, Lou. I appreciate it. Okay, get rest.

All right, well, certainly interesting, but we are not done yet. We have many guests to go. Joining us now via the magic of Skype is, what do you want to call the sky? Black Belt and Jiu-Jitsu, wizard, pioneer, innovator, and now one of the great promoters, frankly, of professional Jiu-Jitsu.

You know him, you love him. The one and only, Eddie Bravo, joins the show. There he is. Thank you. Thank you. Yeah, no problem, Eddie. How are you doing? Doing great. Can't complain. Life is good. You've got so much going on. I noticed that you have the Combat Jiu-Jitsu World's shirt on.

You've got EBI, I think 17 coming up. You've got Quintet coming up. You are quite the busy man. Tony at the UFC. Yeah, even that too. How do, be real, Eddie. How many hours a night do you sleep? You know what? There was a sleep expert on a, on J.R.E a couple weeks ago, and he scared the shit out of me. He said, you got to get at least nine hours asleep every night. I'm like, shit. No wonder I feel like shit all day, because I get like six, maybe seven. I don't know how healthy that is, but I got to say, Jiu-Jitsu looks like it's never been healthier. You mentioned Tony Ferguson. I want to get to all the stuff you're doing in just

a minute if I can. Tony, have you seen him training through his rehabilitation, through his knee injury, how's he looking? He's looking great. He's done everything possible for his rehab. He's got the leg sleeves that are like compression leg sleeves. He's doing the red light therapy. He's got his own gym and he has like all this recovery equipment and his work ethic is the craziest of all time. Like I don't know anybody that could keep up with him. He's he's a savage. And you know, It's no surprise to me that when he fights in the octagon under those big bright lights and under all that pressure, he never breaks. And his cardio has never been a problem ever. He's a machine.

He really is. Now, did you give him his black belt? Yes, I did. Okay. We were talking about that earlier. Have you ever given a black belt to somebody? We had Dean Thomas in the show. as you know, he gave Tyrone Woodley his black belt.

Have you ever given it to somebody in the cage? As Dean was telling us, it wasn't that submission. He was going to give it to him anyway. But I'm wondering if you've ever done it that way. Yes. Ben Eddie, he was a brown belt when he fought black belt. Nick Holmsteen at EBI. I forget, I get the numbers confused, but it was the EBI, the last 145 show, the one that John Callistine won.

We had a special combat jiu-jitsu championship match between Ben Eddy and Nick Holstein. And I was waiting for the right time to give Ben his black belt. And that was the perfect time, him beating Nick Holstein for the belt. So he won the Combat Jiu-Jitsu, the EBI Combat Jiu-Jitsu, Bantamweight belt. and he got his black belt in Jiu-Jitsu as well. So, yes, I have done it before. Let's talk about some of the things that are happening inside. We're going to get to this quintet, which, of course, will be Friday, October 5th.

You're a part of that. Also, EBI 17 middleweights, as I understand it, that's in all-combat jujitsu event. But very quickly, I'm sure you saw Tyrone Woodley's d'Arst choke over Darren Till from Saturday. Your assessment of his submission? It was perfect. No. Till probably did. didn't think he would go for a submission.

I don't know if we've ever seen Woodley go for a submission in the UFC. If Joe is correct, that was his first submission because Joe talked about it. I don't remember him going for submission. So Till probably didn't think he was actually going to sink it in. But the guy is a high-level wrestler. And most high-level wrestlers, they usually have a, high-level dars in their game because it's basically a three-quarter Nelson, but you just turn it into a choke.

So it didn't shock me at all. All right. Let's get to some of the things that I would love to pick your brain about. Now, you've got this thing, Quintet, October 5th. It'll be the day before Habib versus McGregor, which I want to talk to you about as well. But it's going to work like this. It's Team Sakaraba, Team Polaris, Team 10th Planet. That's you.

And then of Team Alpha Mayo. Josh Barnett's going to be a part of it as well. Your team, Gio Martinez, Richie Martinez. I'm going to mispronounce these names, so please, I apologize in advance, Eddie. Is it PJ Barch or Bark? Barch. And then Adam Sacknoff and then Amir Alon. Did I get those?

Exactly. Amir Alam with an M. Alam. I apologize. I knew I was going to botch one of those, Eddie. Eddie, talk to me about the state of professional jiu-jitsu. You got fight-to-win pro out there, EBI is out there doing it. Now you've got Quintet.

like you have been one of the guys at the forefront of professional jitsu for a long time. You competed in Meta Morris. It seems like the market is as good as it's ever been. Yes, it's as good as it's ever been, but it certainly has a tremendous room, a tremendous amount of room for growth. Because it just, you know, financially, you know, all those shows that you mentioned, we're just like breaking even, you know what I mean? So there should be a bigger money fights. There should be. But at this point, there isn't.

But we're growing. You know, everybody that's involved right now in the promotion of these events is doing it as a passion project. Because ain't nobody making real, you know, significant money. No jiu-jitsu event has survived yet. I mean, you know, most like metamoros went down. EBI's still around, but, you know, we're basically just trying to survive. And, you know, so yes, the sport is bigger than it's ever been. But there's a long ways to go if we're all going to survive.

So make the argument for me if you can because some might say, well, part of the reason why professional jiu-jitsu is sort of fly-by-night is because at the end of the day, it wasn't designed to be a spectator sport. Maybe you can make it that way, but it's not so easy. To that, you would say what? That's perfect, man. That really is. All we've had before when it comes to competitive jiu-jitsu is the points format.

And the points format will never look good on TV. It just won't. People are trying still. It just ain't going to happen. We've been doing points tournaments for a while. And, you know, these style events like jujitsu events, They're nothing new. Hickson had a show called Bushito back in the day. Rico Chipparelli had a show called Professional Submission League.

They all went down because they were all a point-based system. So the only hope we have, the only hope for Jiu-Jitsu as a spectator sport, as a viable spectator sport, profitable, is the sub-only format. And that's why Quintet is blowing up right now is because it's a submission only format. The points formats are like chess. You know, chess is a prestigious game, but you'll never see it in a pay-per-view format on cable. Right. Let me read these rules for folks a minute. I know what the difference is between Quintet and some other professional

Jiu-Jitsu outfits, namely Suckaraba named it himself. It's five-on-five, but it works this way. Two guys from each team start off competing on the mat with either one is eliminated by submission. You can only win by submission. The winner then stays to face the next member. So if you win, you just keep going through other guys or after eight minutes, the time limit expires. Both guys are eliminated. The process plays out until five members of one team are eliminated, handing the victory to the other team. All five members of the winning team, then all return for the finale match

against the winner of the other semifinal fight. By the way, you could say, well, just have a heavyweight go against everybody, but the team must collectively weigh under all five, 943 pounds. So how do you strategize who goes first? Gio Martinez and Richie, two of your most celebrated students,

but there's a big difference in size. How do you strategize around that? Well, the way we did it in Quintet, too, was we put PJ Barch first and Boogie second, G.O. 3rd, Amir 4th, and Adam Sacknoff, our biggest guy last. You know, you could really just, you could just, there's a bunch of different ways you can do it, obviously. But PJ, he just, he wrestled his whole life and I felt that his defense, is incredible. And I just thought that putting PJ first would be the smartest move.

But, I mean, we could put Geo first, you know, and Geo might take out a whole team. So it's really hard to say which order is best, you know, especially since you don't know the order of the opposing teams. Like, if you knew the order of their, then you could really strategize and really put some more mental effort into it. but when you have no idea how your opponent is going to line up their team, it's really just guesswork. Now, as I mentioned, that'll be October 5th in the Orleans Arena and Orleans Casino in Las Vegas, the day before Habib versus Connor. I know on EBI 17, I think that's going to be September 29th, right, Eddie,

at the Muscle Farm HQ in Burbank, California, alive on Fight Pass as well. Now, that one, the entire thing is combat jiu-jitsu. Let me ask you, is that going the way you? you thought it would when you introduced open palm strikes? Absolutely. People love it. Combat Jiu-Jitsu was the format I was trying to push before EBI. I've actually put a couple Combat Jiu-Jitsu matches together before EBI was even thought of.

That's the format I really wanted. But because of the striking, you have to get the commission involved. With sub-only, the commission has nothing to do with it, so you can just put on a show and you don't have to, you know, you don't have to get approval from anybody. But since there is striking in combat jiu-jitsu, the commission had to get involved. And back then, they didn't know what it was. Hold on. They didn't know what it was.

So I wanted to do combat jihitsu on open mats, not in a cage. The commission wanted to have it in a cage. They, you know, basically said you had to have it in the cage. And I said, oh, okay. And I wanted one 10-minute match. They said, no, we'll give you three, two-minute matches. And I'm like, three, two-minute rounds. Sorry, three-two-minute rounds.

And I thought, you can't have a grappling match with two-minute. So, you know, we pushed it to three-three-minute rounds. And that even sucks. But we accepted it. We tried a couple matches. We had mixed results. So at that point, I thought, you know, let's just do stuff only. So then EBI was born.

We did sub only. We did about 10, 11 shows. Then at that point, I went back to the commission. I said, can I do combat jiu-jitsu now on open mats? And at that point, they were like all for it. So then combat jihitsu got approved. And then we started introducing it a little in, you know, as special matches in EBI. And then people just love it.

So then, you know, I did combat jiu-jitsu worlds. and we did two eight man brackets, and that went, that had, you know, that has like half a million views on my YouTube, you know, and then no EBI shows that I ever had on YouTube had, you know, 500,000 views. So that people, you know, there's a lot of submission only shows now. There's a bunch. There's, I would say, 30 of them now, you know, so it just, it just, now is the right time to do EBI the way it was originally intended.

And that's with combat jiu-jitsu. And, you know, kill two birds with one stone. Do, you know, I'm going to do what I planned to do initially at the beginning of all this. And it's time to step it up. You know, now that there's all these other submission-only shows. And I love them all. There's so many of them out there. Finisher's, ultimate mat warriors.

There's so many on it invitational. You know, now it's time, you know, to step it up and do combat jubisers. Jitsu. Whenever we're going to have a male combat or a male show, we're going to do combat jihitsu. When we have female shows, we're going to stick with submission only. That's where EBI is headed to now. Got it. We're a little bit short on time, so let me pick your brain on just a couple more topics very quickly. As I mentioned, the quintet will be the day before Habib versus Connor. You're a ground wizard. What are you expecting from Habib and Connor if it does go to the ground. There's this conventional wisdom that Habib is going to

run over him, and maybe he does. But I often thought that the guard work we saw from Connor against Nate Diaz was actually short-lived, but pretty good. What are you anticipating in the event that it goes to the ground? Well, everybody's guard so far hasn't been good enough for Kabib. You look at Raphael de Sanyos, Etzen Barbosa, Michael Johnson, all these guys nobody, nobody has the guard to deal with Khabib, especially since, you know, most of the guys that Khabib takes down, they're running on the ground, which means they're trying to get back up to the feet. They're trying to use the fence to drag themselves up. So they're basically

running from the ground game, you know? No one's really stayed and faced Khabi head on on their back and that's what Tony's going to do. Tony's not going to be one of those guys trying to drag himself up and trying to just, you know, crawl their way, you know, spend the whole round trying to get back up while he's getting mugged. Tony's not going to do that. If he gets taken down, he's going to attack him. He's going to square up and attack him. So Khabib's got to worry about Tony's ground game because Tony has a lot of firepower. So does, does Connor have the most powerful left hand ever pound per pound probably but that does not translate to guard work so um odds are if if connor gets dragged to the ground it's not going to be a good night for him it's going to be a long

night well it's going to be a great night october 5th when we get to see quintet in las Vegas i will be there eddie i can't wait to see it and what your team can do and of course EBI 17 middleweights from the Muscle Farm H.Q. Burbank, California, September 29th, both Quintet and EBI 17 will be on Fight Pass. Eddie, I always appreciate your insight and can't wait to see what you guys have on Fight Pass. Thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you. All right, there he goes. And we are not done just yet, ladies and gentlemen, with one more interview to go. She was scheduled to fight Nico Montaigneau on Saturday, but it all fell apart in the end. She is known as Bullet and she joins us now on, I think, on Skype or the phone,

even sure which one. She's on Skype. It's Valentina Shevchenko. Let's go to her now. Hi, Valentina. How are you? Hello, Luke. I'm good. Thank you. I appreciate you making some time for us, Valentina. I don't know if you had a chance. Did you hear what Nico said on our show? Not much. No. Well, there's a few things I want to get to with that. I just wanted to ask if you had heard, but let's backtrack a bit. How are you feeling? You are, I believe, the first fighter in UFC history that within 25, hours of a title fight, you have twice had an opponent fall out. How are you feeling? So now, feeling much better. Yeah, it was very first-taking for me to hear this notice on Friday morning, but now I'm very focused on my next step, and I just can't wait when you see it will come back with a new name, new opponent for me, so I can start my preparation again

for the for this fight of the title how did you find out that nico uh was not going to be able to weigh in uh so in the morning i had the last part of my weight cuts i had one pound to lose and i did morning training i sweat a little bit and before we i was ready to go for official weighing My manager, Roger, he came to our room and said this news. So he said that looks like it will be canceled. And I was like, no way it's happening again. How frustrated were you? Of course, it's totally not what I wanted.

I wanted to fight. I wanted to finally have this belt in my hands and just perform me to show everything from me that I was prepared for to show my skills, to show my technique, to show everything. And first that I had in my mind, it was like replacement. We have to find any replacement. Or is it like 100%? And I was, for the evening of the same day or Friday, I was not totally relived. It's done.

I was hoping that there is still possibility to find any replacement for make the fight happen. Now, did the UFC offer any names as potential replacements? I know that they was contacting with top five athletes from my weight class, flyweight. And unfortunately, it was not enough time to make them wait for this fight. So I know that they was trying to do everything their best to make it happen anyway. I don't know if you heard, Jessica Andrage, who fought in the co-made event, she said that she would have been willing to take the fight. At any point, did you hear about this?

You know, already after when the thing was a little bit more calm, I heard something that it was one of the possibilities, but I heard as well that she was one of the first one. who chanced in with commission, and that's why they didn't allow because she was too light for this fight. Oh, you're right, because she's a natural strawweight. This report has been on a flyweight title fight. All right. I am told that the UFC gave you at least some money. Is that true? Yes, my manager there was speaking, they're contacting with UFC, so I never was worried about this part because I know exactly UCC taking care of all. their atlifts and this is part that I'm not worth it all.

Did they pay you your full purse? Like if you had one, did you make the same amount as if you would have one? I'm sorry, can you pick this? In other words, in terms of how much they paid you, was it the same amount as if, let's say you had fought and won? You know, this question, like I didn't follow up with this one, so I know that I know that they are will cover everything

so I didn't follow up with like okay make the payment right now this is this is not what I'm worried about I know that if they are saying their words they will continue with their words and everything what they are saying

so I'm more like worry not worried but I'm more exciting and more waiting for the name This is for me more important, the name. Yeah, let's talk about the name. Fair enough. Fair enough.

Let's talk about the name. What card are you looking to get on first? Do you think you could get UFC 230? For me, sooner it's better. You know, like, I'm a fighter. My initial purpose is to fight. Of course, everything is important to, like, answer the media, to speak, like, build, create, like everything that we are doing before the fight.

But what is our initial purpose? It's a fight. And of course I want to fight sooner. I'm ready right now. I'm in good shape. So I prepared. I'm still motivated. I didn't lose nothing that I had like a few days before.

So this is what I know that you see now. In these days, maybe hopefully this week, they will come back with some, maybe exact dates and maybe with already with some names, exact names. So I just wait and I know that they want to do it before the end of the year, but maybe, I don't know, November. For me, it will be good like right tomorrow. But let's wait for what they have on their mind. A lot of people have said, oh, what a great opportunity to get you in an MMA context

because I know you guys have fought in Mouitai. and I'm sure you've heard this from other interviewers about fighting Yuanian Jacek. Now, I'm going to guess that your answer to a potential fight with her is a very strong yes. Yes, why not? Because like my response, every time it was

and now it's the same. We have our history with Joanna already in MMA. And now we have opportunity to start to create our history in MMA, mixed martial arts under U.S. rules. Why not? Do you know if the UFC is interested in that? I don't know yet because I still didn't speak with them about names. I don't know nothing yet about opponent. But for me, it doesn't matter who, I'm ready for anyone. And I really want to

fight with a fighter, with opponent who wants to fight, who will be able to complete and do everything professional. And I would be very happy to have more professionals to face me. Yes, because in this case, I won't be worried about having these problems to having someone pull out in the last minute. So you mentioned that you were supposed to fight, of course, Nico Montaania. We spoke to her earlier, but as you may have seen, I think on Saturday night, Sunday morning, she put out a statement on Instagram. I want to read just a part of it, quote, This is her talking. Quote, this was the only time I signed a contract.

So the statements that this egomaniac, she says you, has said, are completely false, a nowhere near the truth. Her idea of reality is so far-fetched. So the fact that she trained for me three times must mean a couple of things. Number one, she's obsessed with me. And two, she has too much time on her hands. Not only has she been disrespectful and jealous of my efforts and accomplishments and also blocking me on Instagram during her first fight, but the fact that she takes pride in kicking a person

while they're going through surgery and having their kidney ship down demonstrates what a martial artist should not be. Your response to that, please? It's make me laugh so hard. So it's the most funny post I ever heard in all my life. So now she has all the time to speak. So now she can post everything that she wants, everything that she want to create, like to invent,

and everything. But her action showing the same. She had enough time to prepare for the fight. She was only she, the one. Only one who was responsible for weight cut is number one. It was she. She knows her body. She knows that is it like how it's react.

And she was, she had to be able to make it. earlier to start her weight cut, not coming for the fight week like 20 pounds over. It's crazy one. Even for the boys, they're cutting much more than girls. It's crazy to come like 20 pounds over for the five week. You have to start your diet earlier. Be professional. You have to be responsible about what you have in your hands.

But this is like total irresponsibility. It's total unprofessional things from her. And now, like, complain about everything, making fold the sense that everybody has fault, that she now, like, she gets what she deserved, and actually, in fact, and now complain about everything. But how I say, what's the first purpose of the fighter?

Why she was signing for UC to fight? to make fight fight happen, to make responsible to be healthy for the fight, to do her main job. Did she did it? No, did she do her main job? Did she fought? Did she fight with me? No, she didn't do it. So what was she now talking about?

She now can't be whatever. She can have all her, like, health issues, to fix, and she will have all time in the world to fix it. and I don't know how much time she has to come back and feel her comfortable to walk in the lighter ways. I don't know, one year, two years, three years, and she was hoping to hold the bell this time. No, things not happen like this in this world. This is high league sport. If you are not able to hold this responsibility and hold this pressure, you have to step out and make to do the job that fighter has to do for the people who are like ready to do it, who are ready to fight and want to fight. This is only one answer, but action is action.

Speaking is speaking. When you are speaking good, it's okay. But your action, you have to follow. Follow your words if you want to show that you are a real fighter. She has said that the reason she accepted the fight in September was because she more or less felt that if she didn't take it in September, that they might have taken her title away. And she wanted it in October or November.

And that's why she couldn't make weight properly. Do you accept that as a reasonable explanation? Of course not. As far as not because when we just started to speak about possible fights, first that came from their training camp from her team, that she maybe will be ready for the fight in May, early June. Then you send me contract for July 28th, and I signed my part and we was waiting when she will sign it.

And she is the first one who starts to speak about July 7, having this like contract for July 20th. She started to speak about fighting in International Flight Week. And she is who the one, like, offer this September date. And I said, okay, September, you want September? Let's do September. I was waiting for so many months. I can wait one month more. So this is how it was really happened.

Now she can invent whatever she wants. And she will do it to, because she don't have nothing to do now, she don't have a fight. She don't have to fight me. She don't have to affect me in the octagon. Now she will speak much more than she did. Lastly, let's say you win the title in your next fight, which I think is probably likely.

and let's say Nico works her way up as a contender next year or something like that, would you be willing to face her at some point down the line if she ends up being the number one contender, or do you not trust her to make it to fight date? No, she has to deserve the right to fight for the title now. She has to fight, she has to prove that she's come back and she's like really deserved it. and she has to prove it. She has to face the real big names. She has to face this, like, she has to test herself now

because she gets UC belt very soon, and too, it was very easy for her. She was receiving, like, and she just cannot appreciate it enough. That's why she was so irresponsible about her weight cut. Maybe this is the fact that why she's acting like she's acting. But of course, in the future, doesn't matter what, doesn't matter what fight, she will have to prove that she is a fighter, and she is not just a speaker.

Well, I am sorry that this has happened to you not once but twice, but you seem like you're in good spirits. I hope that they are able to find an opponent and a card for you very soon because I know that everyone wanted to see that fight and they want to see you get an opportunity to fight for that title. Valentina, thank you so much for your time, and we look forward to seeing you fight this year. Thank you very much, and I want to say,

I want to say for all fans who are supporting me, who wanted to see me fight, who was coming for this fight, and I know a lot of people, they were coming, because I received and I took pictures after the fight, and everybody was saying, like, we were hoping to what this fight happened. So I just want to say him, thank you very much for your support.

I really appreciate it. So it doesn't matter the things that didn't happen our way at this time, but I'm very focused and I'm in very good shape and a very good mood for the next fight. And I hope we will have some good news for you guys. And next fight, it will be with real person, with real person who wants to fight. and we'll finally fight and make this fight very excited, very beautiful, very, like, expected, and we will show who we are,

and I will show that I will show what I have to show, everything that I know from martial arts, and finally, the good fight and good spirit. We are looking forward to it. Thank you so much for your time, Valentina. Take care. Thank you very much. Good day, too. Bye.

You too. All right. There she is. Let us go back to my little Colombian friend in the back, Danny Segura. Throw him up on the screen here if we can. Let's see. Let's see. There he is.

All right, Danny. We just did about a gazillion interviews. I wasn't sure if they were all going to happen, but they did. Yeah, they did. They did. So good work back there. Very quickly. We still have to get to the tweets.

Are there any other calls that we missed as a matter of record keeping? We missed. We got plenty to go. So I don't know if you want to do tweets now or do a couple of calls. Let's do this. I have limited time because, as you know, I have three more hours of radio to do. Fun. Let's do, pick two calls. Okay. There are some evergreen ones, save those, but there are some really timely ones.

Sure. Let's do that. Well, we just wrapped up with Shafchenko, so let's talk about her. Okay, do it. Dave from Point Pleasant, New Jersey. I just wanted to know who you think Valentina Shvchenko should fight. for the woman's flyweight title. At this point, I think she's pretty much hands above everybody in the division.

I think that she would literally annihilate anybody who's in the top 10. I mean, is the only answer at this point bringing someone in from another weight? What do you think? To me, if you'll recall, Nico Montanio's run at, well, she got the title, but her run generally has been a bit snake-bitten. You'll recall she was supposed to fight Sejara Eubanks. Sejarra Eubanks actually out of Washington, D.C. They call her Sarge.

And she was supposed to fight Nico Montaigneur had a weight cut issue, I believe. And so they brought in at the last minute, Roxanne Monaferi. She just got to win Sadjariubanks did over Lauren Murphy, I believe. So I would go with her. I think she's probably the most deserving contender.

I think she's ranked pretty high in that division. That to me is my answer. Danny, you got a different one? You know, I guess, yeah, Eubanks is a good option. Some people have thrown out the Yana you and J. chick, you know, I mentioned it on the MMA beat. It's not a bad idea, not a bad idea.

I'd be open to that. Yeah, I just have a bit of an issue of her cutting the line, but, you know, promotionally, I can't deny what it would do. Yeah, and at this point, I feel like anybody you plug in into that equation is basically fine. I think the biggest factor is getting Valentina to fight. She's the rightful person to be challenging for that. I have to say, though, if Nico finds a way back to the cage, you can stay healthy and can

win and earn a title shot. Yeah. assuming that Valentina's champion, which I think is a fairly safe assumption at that point, kind of size to see the fight. What a grudge match, huh? Oh, yeah, that would be something for sure. All right.

That would be a nice buildup. We have a few other questions, but I'm going to pick this one just because... Time constraints, yes? Yeah. So let's talk about some tooled vets. Hi, my name is Bill O'Brien. I'm calling from Newfoundland, New Jersey.

I just had a quick question for you, Luke. I just wanted to know your favorite Diego Sanchez and Jim Miller fights and memories. And also actually, if you think that training with the high-level grapplers from like Kenzo's team has helped guys like Sterling and to beat Megad Merritt-Sharraf. All right. Thank you for taking my call and have a great day. Jersey in the house. Yeah, I think let's answer the first part.

I don't know if we want to get to the second. Sure. I forgot. The second part was about the grappling, yes? for, what was the first part? I'm sorry, I forgot. What was your favorite memory? Diego Sanchez is a very easy one.

Number one, when he walked out to La Bamba. Again, I mean, this deeply cultural moment that he had. Because La Bamba is the interesting song because it's for the Hispanic Americans who lived in America. It's not a song that's like, if you're from Colombian, that someone is here playing. It's actually from those people. So it's a really important song for that community.

I gave the chills, but really it's not that, actually. It was after the fight with Martin Camman, his face was a disaster. And there's a famous scene. They have it on video. I don't know if there's anywhere you can find it, but I remember seeing it. Both Dana and Lorenzo went backstage to go see him, and his face was nearly falling off because it was so cut. And he was talking about his croissant, heart. And they were just blown away.

And I was too. It was as if nothing had happened to him other than his face was destroyed. it was perfect Diego Sanchez. Yeah. I liked when he brought the mariachi band into the Octagon, remember that? I don't actually. He did.

It was one of his early fights. The Nick Diaz fight, I mean, early Diego Sanchez, when he was undefeated, the Joe Riggs fight, he just looked like a killer, man. He was fun to watch. And remember when he walked out with the cross? Yes.

And he was just like, the Jake Ellenberger fight. I mean, he has so many good moments. For Jim Miller, I'm not sure. He's kind of had a bunch of good ones. Joe La Zon fight. Joe La Zon fight was a good one. He had a, who's the Brazilian guy?

He armed barred, I forget now. He's had a bunch of really good ones. Nothing that was like quite as antick filled and crazy. Yeah. But nevertheless, pretty good. I'm sorry, I'm doing Jim Miller a disservice. I'm not a fair historian of Jim Miller. Was it Diego Fajara that he armed barred?

Who was it? I think so. Here, let me put it. I have forgotten since then, but obviously, you know, you're 30 fights deep. Some of them get lost a little bit in the shuffle because that's so, such an incredible body of work. What do you have here? Who was the armory? It was fairly recent.

All right, this is terrible air. Yeah, I don't know. I can't. We can come back to it. Oh, Fabricio Camois. Camois. That's it. Camus, yeah.

All right, well, look, maybe we'll have some time next show to get some of these other questions. I apologize, we couldn't get to all of them. The show got kind of, I don't know, got a little bit. We had to change everything at the last minute. But we worked it out, Danny. We did. Oh, no tweets then, I guess. All right.

Well. Do you have time? Yeah, I got time. All right. Yeah. What? You guys are just killing the tweets. We're getting the tweets in. All right.

Let's do it. Five minutes of tweets, okay? A round of tweets. Let's do that now. All right. Let's do it. You got five minutes. Let's go.

Put it on the clock. Put it on the clock. Here we go. We're waiting. We're going to figure this out in real time. It's all good. I'm waiting. Put the clock up there.

Put the tweets up there. We'll make this happen. I got to take care of our tweeters, Danny. Yeah. Hold on one second. All right. All right. Here we go.

Here's the clock. Show him tweets, dog. We'll get this going. Here we go. Hope you had a great time on vacation. I'm happy you are back and I look forward to the MMA on the MMA beat. Well, thank you, Buretic jossop.

Is that a real name? I don't know, but I have to say, I appreciate everyone's patience in my vacation, and I'm back and ready to rock next. Okay, why no comments from Dana after UFC 228, no summary at Presser and not even the customary backstage interview with O'Levy for FS1

or for the UFC channel, for that matter. Seems ridiculous, but any chance this is related to his relationship with Tyrone Woodley. As we discussed previously, I have no idea. I don't know why he didn't make it. Maybe it is a really good explanation, in which case, as I mentioned before, it's just unfortunate that he couldn't be there. But I think you heard what Dean Thomas had to say, you got to get out there and you've got to do something about it. You got to send some kind of message publicly about how great he looked because he did. The guy deserves more than just a

ceremonial pat on the back. He deserves to have some wind at his back as well promotionally. If not now, then never, right? So next. Okay, with fighters like Till and Ganu, does the UFC push their up-and-coming stars too far too fast, or are the divisions thick enough that they don't need to focus as much on cultivation of stars because the new fighter will fill the void? It's a little bit of both. Here's the problem. There is a bit of the UFC, as I mentioned before, part of just getting, part of identifying a contender is just difficult, right? Even if you have good intentions. But the reality is also that these guys do get pushed a little bit too far too fast. And there's a lot of different things happening. Nico Montaigne said she wasn't ready

to fight in September. If you believe her, I certainly take her at her word, she wanted it in October or November. But I think the UFC said, no, we have a card we have to fill. Remember, they wanted to do Colby Covington versus Tyrone Woodley. And thank God, Tyrone Woodley won because they still can. But because he wasn't ready, they just went ahead and made the till fight. You're noticing that the fighters who can accommodate their schedule, they're getting preferential treatment in terms of booking. But I don't know if that's ultimately good for them in the end. In the end, what they need is that appropriate amount of maturation to get their skill sets in order and to get the right next fight as they develop.

And I think if you have to constantly fill a calendar full of shows, getting that properly manicured is going to be difficult. Next. I've seen a lot of people describe Till's loss as embarrassing. Considering the improvements fighters such as Whitaker made when they moved up, How do you see Till's future playing out? Thanks. Yeah, he's 25 years old. And look, it wasn't a great showing.

I don't think it was a disaster or embarrassing. I wouldn't say that either, but it was not a great showing, right? You only landed two punches and in the end, I don't think even he would look back and say it was a good showing for him. It wasn't. It was not a good showing. But, but it would be super, super foolish to suggest that that is the utmost limit of his ability. it would be super foolish to say even in his next fight, he wouldn't show dramatic improvement.

It would be super foolish to say he couldn't be a title contender. Look, you got to call balls and strikes. Was that a good performance? It was not a good performance. And I don't think that's any big secret. And I don't think that's being unfair. It's being fair. It just wasn't great.

It wasn't great. But it wasn't a disaster. He did take some big shots, but he didn't take anything so substantial. He didn't tear an ACL. He didn't break an arm. He can get back out there, get a few stitches, is take a little bit of time to figure out what he needs to do right the next time

and get back out there and do it. He's got plenty of time to get better. He is probably going to go up to middleweight, where it's his division where I think he can grow the right way. He will be okay. It's fine. And it's only embarrassing in the sense that I know he probably fell well short of his own expectations and maybe some other people's as well.

But look, you make yourself vulnerable to the world and sometimes good things happen, sometimes bad things happen. But it's all about writing that next chapter. Next. Thoughts on Eric Silva signing with Belator and him being an alternate in the Walterweight tournament. Don't have a whole lot to say other than it makes sense for Belator. They want to make a bigger splash into Brazil. He's exciting.

Makes sense. Next. Can the Anthony Pettus fight be considered a tune-up fight for Tony Ferguson? No. Do you think Pettus would deserve a title shot if he beats him? Big fan from Brazil. Thank you, Gustavo. No, a tune-up fight would be somebody who you just know the other person could beat and it would take a miracle for them to lose.

That is not who Anthony Pettis says. He's a formal title contender. That would not be fair at all. In fact, I mean, Attorney Ferguson, that's a very tough fight to come back from. There's nothing to tune up about it. Would Pettus deserve a title shot if he beats him? I don't know. Not of Dustin Patti, he beats Nate Diaz.

But close. Next, one more. True or false. Roy McDonald definitely is not the best welterweight in the world because he was dominated his last two fights in the UFC. No. I would say that's false. He has undergone a lot of healing.

I think he's continuing to get. get better. He too is still young, what, 27 years old, something like that, maybe even 26. So maybe at that time he wasn't the best welterweight, but these things all fluctuate. It's like stock. All right. There we go. Now we are done. Big thanks to Danny Segorah. Big thanks to everybody in the backstar for my vacation, but it's over. And until next time, everybody, stay frosty.