MMA Fighting - UFC 291 Post-Fight Show | Reaction To Justin Gaethje's Highlight-Reel KO To Win BMF Title

Episode Date: July 30, 2023

Justin Gaethje captured the BMF title, got revenge for a past loss, and likely earned a lightweight title shot with one epic head kick of Dustin Poirier in the main event of Saturday's UFC 291 event in Salt Lake City — the second consecutive pay-per-view card in the city to end with an emphatic highlight. MMA Fighting's Mike Heck, Shaheen Al-Shatti, and Jed Meshew react to Gaethje's spectacular performance against Poirier and his continued evolution as a fighter, Poirier now being in a tough spot and where he goes from here, Conor McGregor's thoughts on Gaethje's win, and more. Additionally, they discuss Alex Pereira's win over Jan Blachowicz and an expected booking with Jiri Prochazka for the vacant light heavyweight title, Derrick Lewis' show-stealing performance, Bobby Green handing Tony Ferguson his sixth consecutive loss, Kevin Holland's main card opening submission win over Michael Chiesa, and other storylines from the card. Follow Mike Heck: @MikeHeck_JR Follow Shaun Al-Shatti: @ShaunAlShatti Follow Jed Meshew: @JedKMeshew Subscribe: http://goo.gl/dYpsgH Check out our full video catalog: http://goo.gl/u8VvLi Visit our playlists: http://goo.gl/eFhsvM Like MMAF on Facebook: http://goo.gl/uhdg7Z Follow on Twitter: http://goo.gl/nOATUI Read More: http://www.mmafighting.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Support for this show comes from the Audible Original, the downloaded two. Ghosts in the Machine. The Earth only has a few days left. Rosco Cudulian and the rest of the Phoenix colony have to re-upload their minds into the quantum computer, but a new threat has arisen that could destroy their stored consciousness forever. Listen to Oscar winner Brendan Fraser reprise his role as Rosco Cudulian in this follow-up to the Audible Original Blockbuster. The Downloaded, it's a thought-provoking sci-fi journey where identity, memory, and morality collide. Robert J. Sawyer does it again with this much-anticipated sequel that leaves you asking,

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Listen to Oscar winner Brendan Fraser reprised his role as Rosco Cudulian in this follow-up to the audible original blockbuster, the downloaded. It's a thought-provoking sci-fi journey where identity, memory, and morality collide. Robert J. Sawyer does it again with this much-anticipated sequel that leaves you asking, what are you willing to lose to save the ones you love? The downloaded two, Ghosts in the Machine. Available now, only from Audible.

We're listening to the Vox Media Podcast Network. The victory horns are live, and they are sounding for the new BMF champion. And his name is Justin Gichi, after a sensational second-round head. kick knockout victory over Dustin Porier to cap off just a crazy night of fights, not just in the MMA world, but the boxing world as well. And we are here to react to a very memorable UFC 291 event. Thank you for joining us, everybody. I am Mike Heck still here in New York City. Just I don't even know what to say. What an absolutely incredible card. But I am not here alone. We have the Wise Words with himself.

Shaheen Al-Shadi joining us once again. Hello, Shaheen. What's up, man? I'm loving the whimsical background you got going on in this hotel room. It's very, it's very Mario Kingdom-esque. It is. It's a very, yeah, it's very designy. Not really my style, but hey, what can you do?

It's right around the corner and it's cheap-ish. So what could you do? And, of course, Mr. Hot-Take himself, Mr. No Gray area. Jed Mishu. Hi, Jed. Somebody. How was the watch party? Did you guys have fun? Oh, so much fun.

The Derek Lewis Knocko, which we're going to talk about, was really one of my favorite five minutes in the history of the watch party, but I'm sure we'll talk about that and much more. Performance of the year. I want to be clear, we don't have a category for performance of the year. But if you take start to finish performance of the year by a mile. Oh, you're taking it away from Robbie Law there already that quickly? I am.

Did Robbie Lawler stripped to his skivies and hit like 400 DX chops? Because if he did, there's a conversation to be had. But he didn't. You know what? So here we are. That is the one thing that could have made the greatest retirement of all time better is if he would have taken his cup out and thrown it into the crowd. Yeah.

Just just stripping naked and throwing everything to the fans. It's incredible. Yeah. Doing all the dances, everything that was involved in that. but boy sheim we're coming off ufc290 and how memorable that was i feel like 290 from like a technical aspect will probably be like the better card overall but in terms of just which card we're going to remember the most at least to this point in 2023 i feel like this one's and i know it's maybe recency bias but i was jacked up heading into this thing and i was even more jacked up on the walk back

to the hotel because of what we witnessed tonight how would you sort of grade the quality of the card overall, especially with how we finish things up with Justin Gitchie's incredible knockout, which we'll dive into a little bit more in depth in a moment. But this was just a crazy-ass card, wasn't it? I mean, it absolutely was. I don't know if it was better than $2.90, right? Like, that's a pretty high bar to set.

I would still have $2.90 as the event of the year. But, I mean, what a month of fights, just generally, right? Like, the fact that we got these within the same month, really just a couple weeks away from each other. Tremendous stuff. Main card was really, you know, it was everything we could have asked for except for one blip, you know,

a little Tony Ferguson fight was more depressing than anything. But other than that, I mean, this was a very fun night of fights and you couldn't have asked for more, right? Like this was a tremendous and Utah just seems to bring it. Like whatever's in the air in Utah

is just bringing out these really wild results that I'm here for it. Jed, what do you think? Because I feel like, I do feel like two nights. is the better card, like overall, like from a live watching perspective, but six months from now, if you're just like, hmm, I wonder what July was like and you just go back and you have to pick one of these cards, like, which one are you going to watch first? You're going to watch

this one first? You're going to watch 290 first. This is not even a contest. It's 290 by a mile. Are we, are we pretending? It was three weeks ago. Do we not remember getting on this program being like, is that one of the five best events that have literally ever happened. Robbie Lawler with the icon of retiree, a billion eight second finish is. And electric performance, one of the greatest performances we've ever seen the main event, the co-main event, one of the best fights of the year. Like, 290 is killing it.

And that's nothing bad to say about 291. But it would be prisoner of the moment to say that this was any level of more enjoyable. The Derek Lewis thing is sensational. That's just awesome. I mean, this was a really good card top to bottom. Hell of a July from the UFC. But I don't remember feeling like really sad watching UFC 290. And there are two moments that you could be pretty sad about on just this main card.

So not even a contest. Fair enough. I just wanted to float that idea out. Shaheen, let's talk about the main event. You joined us for the co-main event. But the main event, Dustypore, Justin Gates. You were wondering what this first round was going to look like. it was tactical, but somewhat chaotic.

You could see the intensity ramping up as the round went on. And then the second round happens. And less than a minute into the round, Justin Gachi taps into his inner Leon Edwards and delivers almost the identical finish in a main event that we got at UFC 278 the last time they were in Utah. So talk about Gagey's performance and just just him ethering Dustin Poria,

way that he did because I don't think a lot of us saw that coming the way that it happened. No, I mean, I think all of us picked us and poor you on the preview show, right? Like, I have to say, man, the continued evolution of Justin Gachie is, has not stopped being surprising to me in sort of the depths and the levels to which this guy has been able to continue evolving into his mid-30s at this point. I mean, this was a very different Justin Gachie than the guy who came into the UFC fighting Michael Johnson and just going balls to the wall at all times and just trying to try. trying to be the most exciting fighter ever to live, right?

Like, this Justin Gachey tonight, very aware of the moment, very aware of how important this was for his career. We saw an extremely technical performance in there. And I just love this man so much of just be like, I've never really trained that kick before. I never really tried that kick, but it seemed like a good time to throw it out. Like, it's just magic every time this guy's in the cage. He's now fought 12 times in the UFC as 12 post-fight bonuses.

Like, this is the levels to which this man to live. livers every time out we see every time you see him is almost unparalleled like right like we can talk about robbie lawler all we want we did a bunch a couple weeks ago but like robbie lawler had some stinkers in there jessing jacchie has never had a stinker his entire life and that thread continues through and at this point like i am very excited for whatever i feel like we have talked in the past about like justin gaiti 2.0 right like justin 2 2.0 was going to be the guy that went in and fought habib and it was going to be a pretty intriguing stylistic fight and then Habib made very short work of him.

This is almost that 3.0 level of him where he could just, again, the continued evolution of him, I am extremely interested to see what just this version of Justin Gaech could do against an Islam Mankachev, because Islam Mankachev is not Habib. He's maybe 80% of Habib. And I think that 20% there, that's a lot, right? Like, that's pretty important. I do, I am, when I look at the overall landscape of 155 right now, this version of Justin Gajic to me is by far the most intriguing matchup stylistically in person who may be

could threaten Islam who's not Alexander Volkanowski. And I'm here for it. And obviously, you know, we have some steps to go. Charles and Islam are going to do their business later this year in that rematch. I'm excited, though, man. This Justin keeps proving me wrong. And it's very interesting. And it's cool to see.

Jed, a lot of the talk on the preview show was, and even just with our primers throughout the week was, is this a lock for fight of the year, right? And I think a lot of us felt like it might not be the first. fight of the year, but it's at least going to make all of our lists. And I don't think a lot of us took into consideration that we could get a knockout of the year nominee out of this. And we certainly did. This is going to make all of the lists. It may not win, but it's going to make all the list. What did you think engaged performance? Are you surprised that it played out the way that it did? And I know this is one of those fights where we all said sort of in a cliche way,

nothing would really surprise us here. But to see the way that head kick landed and see Porreux go down in a heap like that, did you see that coming at all? Well, certainly not what I predicted. I'm not, but I'm not surprised by this because all outcomes were in play here except for boring. Boring was the only thing that could not have happened in this fight because Dustin Porey could have clubed Justin Gachie. They both hit extremely hard. The commentary made a point of, you know, Charles Olivera saying the hardest dude who ever hit him is Justin Gaci. Geci has always been that dude.

The thing with Gage is he usually doesn't swing like that hard, but he still hits. like a freaking truck. So I knew that this was a possibility. I just, Dustin Poy hasn't been knocked out. It's just not a thing that really happens to him since the Conrader fight a lifetime ago. So even, and that's the other thing.

Like, he's been tagged a bunch. You know, Michael Chandler had him hurt at various points, but he still fought his way through. Well, tough to fight your way through getting kicked right upside the head like that. So not what I anticipated. I did pick Justin Gage to win this fight, but I thought it would be a really back and forth war and not just sort of a sudden explosion. But Casey looked so good tonight, man.

Like, I don't think he's going to be the dude to beat Islam. I think what Shaheen said about, you know, Makachev, I've been saying that for a long time. Like, he's just 80% of Habib and 80% of Habib is still better than every lightweight in the world. But that is a – that helps him. The same token, I think there's some advantages he has. everyone now looks back on Gaichi Habib as a dominant display for Habib, and it was. Like you can't really rewrite that. But also, Habib was like three leg kicks away from getting folded.

Like he was having to go through fire to beat Justin Geichy. So maybe something happens if that's what happens with Makachev or Oliver, I mean, Gachi dropped Oliver like four times in that fight before getting dropped himself and getting submitted. I'd love to watch them run that back. So not shocked by the outcome. It's not what I anticipated, but I knew it was in the range. And this is just dope because Justin Gagey fighting either of these dudes for the belt is going to be electric. It's going to be real interesting to see how the UFC sort of approaches this because, Jed, one thing that you have said for months was that Connor McGregor is not going to fight Michael Chandler next.

It's just not going to happen. And of course, it's like a pretty good call too, Mike. And of course, we knew Connor was going to have something to say, but he basically laid it out like F. Chandler, let's go, you and me. And I know Dustin Geichie has accomplished a lot. And the one thing he really hasn't accomplished is winning the undisputed title. And that opportunity could still be there for him if he fights Connor. So do you feel right now that Justin Gachie's next fight?

Are you, do you feel, are you ready to put like a 95 to 100% tag that he's fighting the Mokachev Oliver winner, or do you think the UFC will pivot to this Connor, Justin Gaei fight because Connor wants it and Justin don't like the man at all. 100% he's fighting for the belt next. Gachie's not going to step aside to fight Connor unless it is a sum of money that the UFC won't offer him. Like he's just not going to do it because if he wins the title, he can fight Connor or if he loses, he can fight Connor. And you heard him at the post fight presser. He basically knows old Connor the entire time like It's just he's not going to stay.

He wants an undisputed belt and then he can worry about Connor. The Connor fight is always there for him. When you are the level of fighter, the level of showman he is, that Connor fight never goes away. So 100% he is fighting for the belt this next one. Yeah, I agree. Shaheen, interesting times here for both of these guys, Justin Gae going in there and he's going to fight for the belt.

Where does Dustin Porier go now? This is one of the big questions we had. Does the loser just get knocked out of title contention altogether? and I felt like this result kind of kept the door somewhat open for Dustin Porre because then they could do the trilogy fight perhaps for the belt of Gaichi somehow wins it, but Gaichi is saying something very interesting at the press conference that him and Poria were talking to the Octagon. They were just kind of like had a gentleman's agreement.

Let's just not fight each other again. I think that would be like a really good idea. But where does Dustin go now after this loss? Well, first I want to say, just echo, what Jed was talking about. I mean, Justin no-selling Connor in that post-presser was,

I was pretty delightful, if I have to be honest, right? Like, this is a man who has been in the Connor, like, orbit for a really long time. Now he's wanted that fight for a really long time. And the way he no-sold him

just made Connor look almost, like, really desperate in a way that was unique. And also, I just have to say the line that he spit was tremendous, A-plus, right? Like, I think he's turned me down six times,

and usually you have to lose to fight him so I don't know what's going on. you usually have to lose to fight him. Like that's pretty great right now. Justin's killing it. Dustin, I mean, this is a tough one for Justin.

We've been at a weird spot with Dustin for a while now. Even going back to the Conner fights, right? Like after the Connor fights, it seemed like, well, obviously he's going to fight for the title next. That's sort of what's been waiting for him. We were all calling him the number one lightweight in the world,

even though he didn't have that belt. He doesn't get it. And at that point, it seemed like it was really difficult to find fights for him that he would be into, right? Like he even talked about it tonight of, The Benile Darush thing kind of just didn't really do anything for him. He didn't really get up for that.

And Benil Darush is the top four, five lightweight in the world. Like that's a really important high class fight. And it just couldn't get Dustin that interested. This one, same type of thing where, you know, Dustin, was he super excited to take a fight like this? Not really. He even said it in the lead up where this is just something that sort of landed on his plate. I don't know really where he goes from here, right? Like he was very open and honest.

You have to appreciate it that he's not here to face up-and-comers. I don't see him taking someone like an arm on Sarukian or a Gamrod or even a physiov or anything like that, right? Any of these names that are maybe newer names coming up in this division, Dustin just feels like he's not a part of that same conversation with him, or at least in a way that it would get him up to do it, right? Maybe Walterway is the move. I mean, we've heard for a long time that this is a hard cut for him to make. He never enjoys making it.

seemed like this was the easiest cut. He's had to lightweight in a long time. So, you know, I don't know if Welterweight is the move because ultimately what would be waiting for him would be probably like a Kobe Covington fight and Dustin has already said he doesn't want that fight. And he's not interested in giving Colby that sort of shine, right? I don't know that

he would fit in that division either. He's not some huge lightweight in that respect. He's not going to be towering over these dudes as the same way we saw Alex Pereira tonight. It's a tough spot, man. It's a tough spot. I could see him sitting on the sidelines until, you know, Something comes up.

I don't know. Off the top of my head, I don't know what that would be, what that type of big name would be that would lure him back for another one. I don't think that this is the last time we've seen him fight, but I also think it's very possible. We just don't see Justin Porre for like a year

or something like that. Because again, the visual tonight was kind of weird too, right? Like, when's the last time we've seen Justin Poria out cold like that? Like he lost once. The only other time he's been knocked out at lightweight was the Michael Johnson fight, right? And that was 2016.

So how long ago was that? I can't do math on the fly But that's like seven years ago The visual of what we saw tonight Like that's just so foreign to us At 155 pounds That's not who Dustin has been He's been this ultra durable guy

Who gets hit up plenty often But he doesn't go out like that And he gets in these wars And ultimately he's the one who digs deep And he's the one who perseveres Maybe this is the end of that Right? Like he's 34 years old He's taking a lot of damage in his career

I think he's self-aware enough to understand it So, you know, I don't know. What's next for Dustin? I think he falls in a really weird place in this division. And I don't know, I don't see like a very obvious next matchup for it, if I'm being honest. Oh, I got you, Shane. Hit me. Hit me, Jed.

I want it. I want it. So Casey and I were talking about this in the post-fight presser. And I had the same reaction. We were talking to. It was like, hey, ain't nobody lightweight for him to fight. And it welterweight like, Wonderboy is kind of fun. Maybe the Colby.

Nothing jumped out. And then it struck me in between then and now. It's so obvious, guys. It's maybe the most obvious fight you can imagine. It's not going to happen soon. It's going to be a bit of a minute. But in, I think, like, two weeks, next weekend, there's a fight happening between one Nathan Diaz and Jake Paul. And Nate has basically specifically stated many times, I'm a boxist dude and I'm going to come back to the UFC.

I believe sometime next year we will finally get Dustin Porey versus Nate Diaz in the UFC because that is a fight that Dustin Poyer will immediately accept. And so I think that's what we're going to get. It's just going to be like next summer. It's going to be almost a full year. But I think that's what's coming. You win. You just won.

You take over Otono. I'm sorry. Mike, your show has now been handed over to Jed. That's it. That's the right call. Mike, I like my Otno point whenever that happens. So that's because it's the only fight Dustin's going to take He's just not going to fight

And that's not being critical Like maybe if Connor does come back And Connor just begs for Dustin would accept a big bag of money But it doesn't seem likely It's just going to be Nate Diaz next summer UFC 300 It might be UFC 300

It's going to be Dustin versus Nate Like that's I think that's where we're at But you don't think if Nate It does that quickly, but I don't think so either. When is, when is 300 going to be? I mean, we're at 291. Oh, is it April? Oh, I was thinking it was going to be in the summer.

So, yeah, okay, it won't be than 300. But it's just going to be the summer card, whatever the next international fight week, something like that will have Nate, Dustin. I would put a lot of doing money on that. That's 100% the fight that's about to happen. Yeah, because he's about to box Jake. And once he boxed Jake, there's nothing else for Nate really to do. Like, he could.

do the Tommy Fury thing but Connor's still wrapped up in the UFC so he's just going to be like I'll come back to the UFC I'll do my trilogy with Connor and I'll fight Dustin Portia and it'll be fine yeah that's probably the one that's probably the one for Dustin and that could be the last one

unless Gaichi wins the belt that's the only other outcome is Gaichi wins the belt and maybe they do a trilogy but that doesn't seem very likely either so I don't see them shoehorning Dustin into a title shot off a loss in this division as much as Dustin a popular guy.

Like, I just don't see that happening at lightweight. He's not Connor. We'll see. But yeah, I think it's Nate. It's just going to be Nate. Yeah, that's a pretty good choice right there. Well, that's the main event.

Let's talk about the co-main event. Boating for flight 246 to Toronto is delayed 50 minutes. Ugh, what? Sounds like Ojo time. Play Ojo. Great idea. Feel the fun with all the latest slots in live casino games and with no wagering requirements.

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Well, almost, almost anything. So no, you can't get a nice rank on Uber Eats. But iced tea, ice cream, or just plain old ice? Yes, we deliver those. Goaltenders, no. But chicken tenders, yes, because those are groceries, and we deliver those too, along with your favorite restaurant food, alcohol, and other everyday essentials. Order Uber Eats now. For alcohol, you must be legal drinking age. Please enjoy responsibly. Product availability varies by region. See app for details. Alex Pereira, getting it done, Shaheen. You watched it on the watch party, and I thought, even re-watching it, because I had to go put the timestamps in, I watched the second round back on the watch party, and I was like, oh, my God.

like electric, I felt like we're this close to my prediction ringing true of Pereira landing a big flying knee in round two after getting up from a takedown. Turns out the fight went another round and a half. And Pereira was able to kind of keep Plohovich off of him. And even when Pallovic shot takedowns late, he was able to stifle him. And from the second round on, if Plohovich did get him down, Pereer was able to get right back up. So while it would have been very cool for my prediction to ring true, and I probably would just, there's nothing would ever top that moment in my career. I feel like this result was actually better for Alex Pereira.

I think we learned a whole hell of a lot about this man and the improvements that he was able to make. Sure, altitude played a factor. Yang got tired. But Alex Pereira, winning by decision against Janbovich was not on a lot of people's bingo card, Shaheen Al-Shadi. What did you learn about Alex Pereira tonight that you didn't know before? I got to say, Mike, screw fight of the year. Those three minutes where it looked like your very specific prediction was about to come true

was the most electric three minutes in MMA for me of the entire year. I was on the edge of my seat. I wanted that so badly for you. And it looked like for a second, we were about to get it. I really, I really wanted that bad bad for you. No, man, I mean, it's, it's, I agree with you. I was incredibly impressed by that. And I'm just generally incredibly impressed by Alex Pereira

and sort of what he's been able to do at this point in his career. Like this man, I know you said it on the on the post show or on the presser show, Jed, because I tweeted it. But like Alex Pereira is speed running a potential Hall of Fame UFC career in record time in a way that I've really never seen anyone ever do it. And it's absolutely absurd when you think about it. Because less than two years ago, this man was fighting the immortal Andreas Mickelitis as just like this weird novelty.

And losing to him. He was losing to it. Stupid. He was purely like this curio, like this really just fun novelty on the undercard of this pay-per-view. We're like, hey, maybe this will just be like a fun thing we can talk about until he inevitably loses and we don't get the Izzy fight. And now, like, less than two years later, I think it's like 20 months.

UFC belt hanging above his mantelpiece can call himself the only middleweight to beat Izzy in MMA, in MMA. in the UFC, one of only two light heavyweights now to beat, yeah, nice, to beat Yombe Kovins in this division's post-Jones era. And he's one win away from becoming the eight two division champion in UFC history. Like, that's a hell of a resume for anyone, much less someone who has less than 10 MMA fights on their resume. Like, it's, it's nonsensical. It's ridiculous. It makes me so much more fascinated to see this like rush of glory champions

and contenders who are just like rushing over to MMA now to see like hey this work for this guy maybe this doesn't work for us too like maybe we're about to enter just a really fun era of cool kickboxers doing cool kickboxing things but tonight was impressive man like Yombovitz is no one's fool

and Alex Pereira went in there I thought he showed really improved takedown defense he stopped five of those eight takedowns pretty decent submission defense in that first round he was thrust into a really tough spot. You have to imagine Glover to Cher has been putting him in that spot for quite a bit in the preparation for

this. He made it out of it. And he really just outlasted Yon. And we were talking about it on the watch party. But those calf kicks, man, the way he just choose these dudes up with those calf kicks is brutal to watch. Like, I am stunned.

Jan was still moving in the way that he was by the end of that fight. Otsboro versus Yere is the fight this division deserves, right? Like, That's the title fight. That is a fight of the year contender on paper, if I have ever seen one. Those two Tasmanian devils are just carry like the best version of unpredictability and the death touch and all of it. Like that is a matchup that screams chaos in the best possible way.

And I'm so excited for it because it seems like finally this 205 pound division is sort of getting out of the malaise, the weird, curse nature of it that befell it in this post Jones era. Like, I feel like we're there. We're almost there, right? I love that you just said the division's getting out of the weird cursed era when for the second time in less than a year, the light heavyweight champion is vacated about two days. But that's what I'm saying. But this next one is tremendous.

This is like, this is my most anticipated for the night of the year maybe. No. I agree that it's fun. Like it's, but like heavyweight hadn't been fun for years. When John was the champion, and like heavyweight sucked for like much of the run.

Now we're having some fun. Terrible. Now we're having fun. We're about to watch Alex Perreou, a boop, Yeri and become the champion. It's going to be incredible. It's going to be the funniest damn thing. Yerri is going to throw a spinning back elbow and get booped midspin and it's going to be incredible.

I can't wait for it. It's the best. Well, I mean, Jen. 10 fights. This man has 10 M.A fights. What the, what the hell are we talking about? As the wonderful Coposa tweeted earlier this week, or,

tonight, sorry, not this week. It's really fun to watch Alex Pereira prove that MMA is a fake sport. MMA isn't real, and it's not, oh, you guys think for 30 years this is what fighting is? No, MMA's fake, and Alex Pereira is proving it. It's great. It's the best.

Now, Jed, I listened to No Betzbar, and even when this matchup was made, you felt like this is a really kind of bad matchup to introduce Alex Pereer to the division, and you felt that you picked Yon to win. You felt Yon would go. go on and just kind of wrestle him the entire time. It was going to look very similar to the Izzy fight.

It was something that you brought up. To see how Alex Pereira fought in the first round was not great for him, but to see him come back. And as Shaheen said, just outlast Jan Bahovic and not just go out there and just ether him, just win a 15 minute decision and get the job done. What did you take away from this? Were you surprised that the fight went down to the way that it did? Because I would expect that you were.

Super was. I don't know. Like, Jan Bojovich is one of the best defenders of kicks in mixed martial arts. He's really good at defending leg kicks. That's why Magamundankalaya have, like, struggled so hard because he couldn't kick him. And Perrero just kicked their shit out of him. Like, just relentlessly took his leg away, which was shocking to me. This fight did feel a little bit like maybe Jan underestimated what gas tank he would need to implement this strategy

because he was breathing really heavy after five minutes of full control. So, but I mean, incredible performance from Pereira who looks to the best he has looked on the ground thus far, because he hasn't looked good in the stuff we've seen, was able to defend himself that first time. And then once Yan, once Jan was no longer an offensive threat on the floor, then it was, he was immediately just getting to his feet, getting away, you know, resetting. I scored the fight of draw. I'll rewatch it and see because I still sort of think that that first round deserves more love than it gets. But you give a 10-8 first round? Yeah. I always give a 10-8 if you do nothing. And Alex Pereira had zero offense, so I think that's worth a 10-8. Even with no damage? Like, yeah, because you don't have to have damage. I say this like it's a requirement.

If you have all three of them, damage, dominance, and a duration, then you have to give it. You can give 10-8s if they're only two of the 3Ds. And I think if you, I think if you put a dude entirely defensive for five minutes, that that is worth, should be worth more than a regular round score. But I don't begrudge anyone who gave it a 10-9 for MMAfighting.com. I officially scored it 10-9 because I knew that's what the judges would do. I want to re-watch it because I think there could be an argument that Yon actually won the third because as I was watching it, it felt like he was scoring a lot too. The optics were just terrible. But it's not like Pereira really ran away with the third.

It was really close fight. Yon thinks he got robbed. I think that's insane. But, you know, incredibly impressed with Pereira regardless. Like this was a fight that is difficult for him. You know, Magum and Ankleyev is maybe be the toughest dude for him in this weight class. This was not an easy fight and certainly not an easy debut at 205. And he showed a lot of resilience.

If there were five, you know, two more rounds, they've just finished Jan. So I'm super excited to watch him boop year. It's going to be really fun. I love Yeri and he is going to get booped. And it's going to be incredibly funny. Yeah, that fight is going to be. phenomenal. I'm very excited for that. We had Kevin Holland. I'm sure we'll get to that in a moment. Bobby Green, Tony Ferguson,

Youser, but I think we need a new category for the NBA fighting year and award Shaheen. And you mentioned it on the watch party and I think we should all vote to add this on. Free agency announcement of the year goes to Derek Lewis without question. This is, I mean, just everything about it. I just don't think I could say enough great things about it. but then to do all that and then announce that I'm a free agent was just incredible stuff. Derek Lewis won tonight and he may have won the year with what he did in that like five or six minutes of time. Oh, that was that that was the, okay, yeah, I agree.

I mean, you're not wrong. You're very much not wrong. Tate it up. Tied it up. Yeah, I mean, we talked about Robbie Baller having the greatest retirement of all time. Derek Lewis just had the greatest free agency announcement of all time. That was tremendous. Do it went in there flying need this.

dude's head off in 32 seconds, took his pants off, threw his cup into the crowd, did a, like, 4,000 DX crotch chops, and then just kind of told everyone like, hey, I'm here for sale. Like, that's great. That's A plus five out of five, 10 out of 10. No notes. Like, you just crushed it, Derek Lewis. And this is going into a fight where, like, you heard a lot of people kind of low-key calling for Derek to make this a retirement fight.

Or like, hey, man, you kind of, you're past it. Maybe we do this as the last one. If I'm Derek Lewis, I'm, I know he said he wants to go back to the UFC. I'm sure UFC very much wants him back. He's beloved character over there and an all-time knockout leader. Can't forget that as well at this point. But if I'm Derek Lewis, I'm staring hard at PFL and that $2 million payday to fight Francis, right? Because what, like, bigger fight is there for Francis sort of once he comes to PFL and does the MMA thing over there?

Like there is anti-delisia or whoever wins the heavyweight tournament this time around is not going to be a bigger prize or a bigger fight, I should say. than the Derek Lewis rematch. Even if that first fight sucks, like I feel like we all would go into a potential rematch knowing that there's no actual way that they're going to do this again to it. It's like this is, they're going to,

there's no way that this could happen again. Like we would kind of expect that to be a better fight just inherently because any fight would be a better fight than that first one. If I'm Derek Lewis, I'm eyeing that hard because there's no way in hell the UFC's going to pay him $2 million over the life of whatever his next contract is.

Yeah, I kind of feel like, I kind of feel like the UFC's, like not the place for him because of what sort of lies ahead of him like who's he going to fight Alexander Romanov there's a two fight that's where he's at right now there's a two step process to this that where we can live out all of our dreams and everyone can be happy and Derek can have tons of money step number one Francis and gone two million dollars winner or lose who cares two million dollars is two million dollars that's tremendous number two make all of our dreams come true go over to BKFC he is the most big game way to go fighter he is the

me KFC heavyweight to ever live. That's all I want to see is just hip swanging and banging on like five foot eight big fat guys and then fighting Ben Rothwell as well. Like all of that tremendous. Like give me as many five foot eight to five foot ten super hairy big fat guys for for Derek Lewis to just go put them ungloved meat paws all over because that just sounds that sounds to life. I would also accept Derek Lewis versus Jake Paul in a boxing match. There is a zero percent.

Jake Paul does it. If we're talking about our dreams, and I like to think this is a place we can talk about our dreams, then I would throw that one there. Yes, and I'm sure you agree with all of that, Jed. Jed, it was kind of a sad start to the main car. We had two finishes to start the main card, but kind of sad, right? Tony Ferguson, we didn't know. We felt like they were sort of pat, like he drops Bobby Green in the first round, and we're

like, oh my God, like this might happen. maybe Tony gets back on track. And then Bobby just kind of tore him apart the rest of the fight, puts him to sleep with the arm triangle late in the third round. And then right before that, Michael Kiesa returns to the cage, first fight since the Sean Brady fight in November of 2021. And he, while durable and landed a couple of decent comeback shots on the feed, this was one-way traffic for Kevin Holland.

Michael Kiesa did not look great in this fight. What did you think about the first two guys? What did you think about Ferguson and Kiesa in particular? Tony Ferguson fight is what I expected. The sad part of that fight is not the fact that Tony Ferguson lost. That was written in the stars. Anyone who could take off their hope-filled glasses knew what was coming. The sad part is for some of us, we had Bobby Green by decision tickets at plus 120.

And if Tony Ferguson doesn't roll for that idiotic need, bar and then get tapped with four seconds left in the fight or whatever were cashing those tickets. That was a tragedy. The opener, Michael Case apparently retired and didn't tell anyone and then still picked up a paycheck. We've all been there. Look, you put in your two weeks, you're like, I'm just here. I'm just cruising. Let me just collect that.

Just get that check because he wasn't there to fight. I don't know what that was. That was an absolutely, it was one of the worst performances I've seen this year, like that I can think of off the top of my head. Kiesa looked petrified. I said this in the pressure show. It looked like Keesa thought he was fighting Francis and Ghanu, like from the jump of, if he hits me at all, I'm going to physically disintegrate.

I must, I must dive for the legs immediately. The super weird performance, he since came out and says he's going to dust himself off and fight again. I'm not sure why. Maybe you just don't want to go out like that, but that was. was horrific so that looked like that man should not fist fight anymore he's doing quite well as an analyst i don't know Kevin holland i can't tell if he looked good or not because it cases look so bad so a bit of a tough hang to start the card in that regard and then you know what the tony

ferguson and there was very much a world where we went kieza looking awful tony ferguson getting slept at the end and to derrick lewis getting knocked out by pizal thank goodness for Derek Lewis because if that was the three that we had, this could have been the bad five cards. But, you know, stand up fat pat, let's go. And then I can sort of forget about those other two fights because those fights, when you said at the top of the show, we'll go back and look back on this. I will, I will not.

This is not an event that I'll be like, oh, I'll look back on the main event. But the other parts of the main card are just like entirely forgettable, certainly those first two openers. I don't know about entirely forgettable. But yeah, I understand where you're coming from one of the first two fights. Shaheen, as the longtime driver of the Tony Ferguson train, give us your thoughts on what transpired tonight. Come on, man.

People are going to ask for it. It's time. Man, you know what sucks? Because I've been thinking about this, obviously. As we continue this slow agonizing march towards the Reaper for this man, it's it's it's it sucks that Tony Ferguson at this point in his career has essentially

I don't know how to frame this but like it is a great tragedy to me that he is so thoroughly come to represent the cruelty of the fight game in so many different respects right because like watching a Tony Ferguson fight used to be one of the most fun viewer experiences in the sport right like it was just it was a different it was an aura

like an atmosphere it was just you knew you were going to have a really fun time regardless what happened. And now this man, to me, can't walk into an arena without just like this overwhelming, looming sense of dread, just almost like filling the air for all of us to be like, man, I just really hope this doesn't get really ugly. And so you combine that with the fact that he already is like essentially the quintessential tragic figure of his era, right? Like this is a man who I for a long time called him the best lightweight in the world, the uncrowned champion of the best division in the entire sport. At worse, he was a top two lightweight for like a good four or five years of his

prime. At worst, he was the second best lightweight in the world for a long time. And he didn't get his opportunity ever to fight for an undisputed title purely because of politics, purely because whatever the Connor McGregorification of the game was at that point in time. He had bad management, who also happened to manage Connor McGregor at that point in time. Like there are just a lot of circumstances. is it also just bad luck, right? The cord tripping, all the different times we didn't get the Habib fight, all of it. Like, there are so many elements to this

that parlayed themselves into this man's just extraordinarily bad and tragic luck that he suffered over the course of the very prime of his career that left him now as this guy who had one of the longest win streaks in UFC history and yet he somehow didn't challenge for an undisputed title. Like, it's just, it sucks, the moment's clearly passed, and now we are left with someone who essentially, embodies like whatever the worst version of this guy is going to be the last one around him

to understand that this is done and he's just it's going to last much longer than it really should and so the fact that again all of this wrapped up like it the fight game is a cruel place and in no ways is it is that cruelty more strongly seen than in tony right now just with every all those elements everything wrapped up into it it's a bummer man it's a real bummer that that that like a top five lightweight of all time one of the great exciting fighters of this era this is sort of what we've come to with him I hope that this is the nadir of it

I hope that this is the saddest moment for it and that whatever he could if he can pull off some sort of UFC can match make him somebody and then say hey this next one's your last one and people around him can get around him and say hey man this next one probably should be your last one you do not look like Tony Ferguson in there anymore I hope that happens and he can pull off

Robbie Lawler moment and we can celebrate this man for who he is and he can spend an entire week, entire two weeks in the lead up to that fight with people telling him how much they care about him and how much his fights meant to them and having that sort of moment. I just don't know if that's going to actually happen because I think that he's the type of guy that is going to ground this into dust and just keep getting up and keep trying over and over and over again and it's just going to get really, really uncomfortable to watch. And I hope I'm wrong. I really hope I'm wrong.

But I mean, this is someone who all week was saying five fights to a title. you know so i don't know the whole thing's a bummer the whole thing was just a really big bummer if i'm being honest like it really put me in a bad place and then derrick lewis uh saved the day before as this card kept going now tony's just six fights to a title she needs he didn't say ufc title could be a lot of titles out there oh no stop that stop that it sucks yeah it's tough him and Joe Loseon UFC 300 there you go

double retirement fight we could celebrate one of these guys it'll be all good yeah like people keep throwing out the Jim Miller thing and it's like I don't even want to see I'm fine with Jim Miller I don't even

I don't think that's competitive you're not going to give it he's going to he's going to lose to anybody put him in there he cooked he cooked anybody who is not me is going to beat him like give him Jen

look if If you want to do it, UFC, I will, I will, I'm morally opposed to fighting for you as an organization, for a number of very obvious reasons. I'll do this one. I'll take that L for Tony, if that's, if that's how you want to set it up. But I think instead, we should just let him fight forever because then BJ won't have the most losses in a row in UFC history. There's the idea. That'll make me happy. There's the idea.

Bring back BJ. Do the BJ fight. I'm here for that. I can accept that. Here's the thing, though. You, Mike, you said 300 retirement fight for both. That'll never happen because Tony is never going to be like, I need to hang it up. And he's just going to fight forever.

And so he's not going to do that. I'll fight one last time. He'll fight until no one will employ him. I think that that seems pretty likely based on all of the conversations he had this week about being back. And I got bad people out of my life, et cetera. He's going to fight forever. And it's the worst part of the sport. Well, it's not the worst part.

there are other war sports. But it is a very, very bad part of this sport. Can we get CM Punk back in here? Maybe Mike Jackson, you know, somebody? Mike Jackson's already booked. No, you know, after the business in Iowa, he can maybe come back and do a favor for Tony. Maybe Nico Price is just the guy to fight these legends in their final fights.

I do not want to see that. I think you guys are going about this the wrong way. Here's what you have to do. because, as I said, he's not going to take the lesson. You're going to have to beat the lesson into him. You give him Max Holloway. You just say, Max, let's do it. And Max will physically injure him to a point that even he will have to acknowledge,

I'm out. This featherweight just beat the brakes off me. I'll tell you what, it won't happen. I'd watch Tony Connor. Connor's pretty cooked, man. Connor's pretty cooked. So, like, I'd watch that. I would be for it, if only because that means Tony gets his, like, monster payday,

then he never got because he was supposed to fight Connor 40 different times. And realistically, Connor is the single man that derailed Tony's career the most. Sure. But think about this. Like, yes, Tony's cooked for sure. But if Tony can simply survive five minutes, he will win because Connor cannot fight after five minutes. He just can't do it. So it's an opportunity.

I'd watch Tony Connor. I think that's the fight. Do that. I think B.J. I mean, Michael Chandler. Bring in B.J. back. That's the one.

Everyone's clamoring for it. Future governor of Hawaii right there. He can't. He's too busy. Can you imagine if they made Connor McGregor versus Tony Ferguson before they made Connor McGregor versus Michael Chandler? Sheesh. You would love that.

It made me really happy. I got to say, I've never been a big Connor guy, and I don't like a lot of the things he's done outside of the cage. But in this instance, huge fan. Huge fan. What's E.K.C. doing right now. Can we get him in this fight? Oh, I don't know.

UKC has a good chance to beat Tony. It's competitive? Yeah. I'm clean. You're older than Tony? You're older than Tony. I am actually older than Tony. Yeah.

Yeah, I got little of us wearing his hair. Yeah, I'm down. All right. I'm in. I'm in. Maybe that's the idea. Tony could fight Clay Guida. Like that's...

I don't want to see that. Winnable? I don't want to see that. I'm looking at lightweights now to find somebody that Tony could fight that wouldn't be awful. There's not a lot of them. Not a lot of options out there, boys. All right, let's move on.

Gabriel Bond theme, quick submission win. 15-0-15 finishes. Roman Kabulov, incredible headkick knockout. No bonus for him. Jake Matthews, Darius Flowers, was just wild and wacky as we all expected. Uros Medich, good finish in Matthew Semmelsberger. A lot of people felt that it was sort of an early stoppage.

I think there's a case to be made. I didn't completely hate it. Miranda Maverick, nice bounce back, smart decision to take that fight with Priscilla Kachua, who didn't get a single point taken away from her despite many, many, many, many infractions. throughout that fight. So quick aside.

Can I have a quick aside here? Absolutely. I'm going to throw this at you. Throw this back at me if you, if you disagree. Priscilla Kachewara, the Hussimal Paul Harris of this era. Ooh. I mean, it's, I get where you're going for. I don't, I don't think it's, I don't think it's, I don't think you can, I don't

think you can really invoke Paul Harris until we really get another Paul Harris, you know. Like she's she hasn't repeatedly tried to injure somebody after the bed. Didn't she try to gouge an eye out? Yeah, one time. That's a one time. Also, that was during the fight. She was trying to escape with an eye gouge.

It was Julian Robertson, right? Yeah, it's not the ref trying to pull her off. He's like, no, I'm sorry, you mistook me. I'm intent to break this man's appendage. Like, it's just not the same. Paul Harris was the same, like, coaching. You know, she's from the same coaching tree where like you have Bill Belichick coaching tree. Game respects game.

Yeah, game respects game. She's looking at it. She's like, yeah, I see what that man does. I want to incorporate some of him into me. He's got some ideas. He's got some. They're levels. They're levels.

And Paul Harris is maybe the greatest villain in the history of this sport in that regard. This episode is brought to you by Peloton. A new era of fitness is here. Introducing the new Peloton Cross Training Tread Plus, powered by Peloton IQ, built for breakthroughs with personalized workout plans, real-time insights, and endless ways to move. Lift with confidence, while Peloton IQ counts reps, corrects form, and tracks your progress. Let yourself run, lift, flow, and go. Explore the new Peloton Cross Training Tread Plus at OnePeloton.ca.

When I got a great deal on a great gift at winners, I started wondering, Could I get fabulous gifts for everyone on my list? Like this designer fragrance for my daughter. At just $39.99, how could I resist? This luxurious wool throw for my sister. This gold watch for my partner? A wooden puzzle for my niece? Leather gloves for my boss?

Ooh, European chocolate for the crossing guard? At these prices, could I find something for everyone at winners? Stop wondering. Start gifting. Winners, find fabulous for less. Well, that is UFC 291. let's bring in maybe Tony Ferguson's next opponent, E. Casey Liden, we'll pull up a few questions, and then we'll get on out of here because it's pretty late.

It's pretty late. What we got here? Let me see. Let's see. No, but really, what did they give me a hilarious? Dustin might win the questions. Go ahead, Gene. Can I just give credit to the two minutes of my right here?

He's the only Dustin who won tonight. Blow blow. I was just going to give you credit. And now I don't even want to. Can I give credit to the two men to my right here? When that man, I've already forgot his name, Ryan Smith. Was it Ryan Smith? That's the most generic name in the history of names.

It's a pretty Utah name. Very Utah name. When Ryan Smith walked up there and then like you two spent like, I don't know, a good 30 seconds talking about how you didn't know who this was and trying to figure out who this was, went to him, realized it was just a Utah commercial and then came back to you guys be like, realistically, none of you are here to hear that. That was maybe your finest work ever. I have to just applaud everything to do with all of that.

Like, that was just, that was your Derek Lewis moment tonight. A plus five stars, 10 out of 10, no notes. Was that the same guy who was at the media day too? I have no idea. I didn't watch. Older gentlemen, part of the commission. Oh, no. He's backwards hat.

No. Or backwards hat. Very cool. Ryan, Ryan is not part of the commission. He's the owner of the Utah Jazz. He's just a spokesperson because they didn't have Dana or whatever. They were just like, here, here's this, hello, fellow kids. I have a backwards hats and I'm here to talk to you about how great Utah.

I'm just a billionaire of a backwards hat. It's a little unemployment to the backwards chair too. And be like, yeah, that's really get down with it, kids, you know, type of thing. Yeah, because a media day, just all of a sudden a random older gentleman, sits down at the table and talks about, oh, we're so excited to have the UFC back here in the commission. And then he's like, if you guys have questions for me, please ask away. And obviously, like, people are you?

Yeah. He had a longer scrum than Justin Gaichi had at Media Day. Oh, Ryan Smith definitely had a longer scrum than Derek Lewis, who was in and out extremely quickly in the post-fight presser, and maybe Pereira, who was not there very long either. Like, they did a full-blown Utah ad read for like 20 minutes. It was a long time. Sheesh.

Utah sounds like a great place, guys. Look, they paid millions of dollars to get the opportunity to make that ad read. And then Casey was like, hey, we should just go back on because that's this. So every time they come to Utah, we're getting pretty wild cards. So if this is going to be just a consistent thing every year, we're going to get some pretty nasty stuff going on in Utah. I'm here for it. Yeah. The last Utah card was bad.

The last Utah card was awful. But it also gave us like an all-time highlight. It did, but if that miracle doesn't happen, instead it gives us an all-time terrible fight card. So I don't know. I think, I mean, they're going to keep coming back because Utah's going to keep paying them. So, yeah, get used to it, everybody.

And we'll keep talking over Ryan Smith telling us about the great tourism. industry of Utah. Can I ask you two gentlemen of questions? Super fun to not drink. Can I ask you two gentlemen a question? Because I already know where Mike stands on this. We talked about it on the watch party.

If you were the lucky fan in the Utah crowd who catches the Derek Lewis Cup, what's your move? What's your next like 15 seconds? Yeah, I'm not catching that. Okay. Catch it. I'm assuming it's warm. It's definitely.

Definitely warm and sweaty. Warm and sweaty. What are you doing? Because Mike said give it to a kid and I don't, I think that's the world. I think it's illegal. What I was, no, what I was, I was comparing, what I was saying was,

I was comparing it to catching a foul ball at a baseball game. If someone wants that ball or in this instance, that cup more than I do, then I'm just going to give it to him. Because I, I'm just like, what am I going to do with this? And I'm not going to like,

put it on eBay and sell it. Like, what am I going to get for a Derek Lewis-Worn cup? Maybe something, man. Maybe there's somebody else. Probably more than you'd think, honestly. That was a classic moment. I think you could get something for that. Yeah.

So that's... If someone really want to, come on, let me have it. Let me have it. I'd be like, you're fine. Take the fucking cup. You got to think there's like an hour and 15 minutes left of you just sitting there holding the cup. Like, the card's not done.

Yeah, that's fine. I don't want to have a backpack or anything. You can't, it doesn't fit your pocket. You just... No, you don't have a backpack. You can't you didn't come to this fight with the back back. Yeah, you just hold it. Here's the thing, Shane.

You actually nailed it because I don't think I'm going to catch it anyway. Like, I think I just would be like, why would I try and grab that? But if I did end up with it for whatever reason, that's an iconic thing. We talk about it in the damn they were good. What's a piece of memorabilia? There are many pieces from Derek Lewis's illustrious career. But look, it'll be weird. And the night of, it'll be weird.

But in like 15 years to be like, I'm the dude. who owns the cup, Derek Lewis heaved into the crowd in Utah before thanking the Mormons and talking about how he's going to go have relations with his wife. Like that would be a, like, it's not a thing I'd put up behind me on the wall tomorrow. But like, if I had this in 20 years, you'd be like, what is that? And when I told you like, okay, that's kind of sick. Yeah, there's a very clear. It's also kind of sick.

I don't know when it is, but there's a very clear tipping point in the timeline where It ages super well. It's like a cool thing that you have suddenly. It ages super well. So it's like a fine wine. You got to store away for a little bit. Derek Lewis's warm cup is like a fine wine. Of course.

That's a man. Derek Luce's warm, sweaty cup is like your hair when you're trying to grow your hair long. Like there's an uncomfortable stage. And you've got to get past the uncomfortable stage. Very much. I'm just saying when we inevitably do the dam on Eric Lewis, the

Fador Soror of Absolute Victory Award, the cup will be mentioned. It will absolutely be a mentioned item. So I would keep it. Or a thousand percent keep it if I caught it. What if you weren't even looking? It just like hits you. It just lands in your beard as you're holding your beer.

And you put out a poll and we'd get a lot of votes on this. Well, here's the thing. If I go with like a bunch of buddies and I'm already six beers deep into this card, I'm a thousand percent trying to talk one of them into it doing a shooy all. the cup. There were a lot of shooys being done in that crowd. I'm like six buddies and we're all drunk and be like, come on Pete, do it, do it. And we'd be having a real good time. Is Pete, I don't know who Pete is, but he seems like the guy who would do it. You just immediately went to him. Pete is my generic person name. If I'm just like, need a stand in. It's one of the names I always go to.

All right. What a start to the questions, by the way. Huge fail. of this. Good work, guys. Hey, credit Shaheen. That was awesome. I don't want to mess up there, but. Is Tony Ferguson about to be the Bigfoot Silva of lightweight MMA? At least he apologized.

Yeah. Is that accurate? Is that, are we going that route? I hope not, man. If we're doing this still two years, three years from now. Is he in some random Russian org, you know? It's not a good time. He fought in France last time, Big,

and it was a decision loss. So that's an improvement. Yeah. No, the answer here is yes. I mean, look, he was at least somewhat competitive with Bobby Green, who's a top 30 lightweight, probably. But, yeah, he's not beating anybody good anymore. It just is what it is.

Yeah. Yeah, not too much. Yeah, not too much to say. Yeah. It just makes me sad. If you just been around this sport or combat sports in general, this is just how it goes for a certain subset of fighters who are very. very, very good.

This is a particularly cruel one, though. Just considering everything. Tony never made that payday. Never got it. He never got the payday. Which I'm glad that he got an idea's one recently of like getting to. Yeah, right. Yeah, I guess he'd get a little bit of something.

Yeah, you're right. It's still bad enough. Yeah. On a positive note, we didn't talk about this gentleman at all. How scary is Gabriel Bonfee him? Dude's real good, isn't he? He looks exceedingly, exceedingly solid. Really fun prospect.

Keep developing. I mean, I knew that that was like, I think I may have picked on one of the things we were talking about this week by sub was just the most obvious outcome because it's got a really good gilly. But, I mean, he jumped on that thing immediately. That gillie was nasty. Always the way. Always jumped to gilly. Always. Dustin didn't jump to gilly.

Lost. Coincidence. Well, I'll let you figure it out. Wellterweight needs it too, man I don't know that Welterweight has a like Like obviously Shavkat But I don't know there's a lot of like really interesting Young prospects coming up at Welterweight right now

So I mean JDM and Jerry Yeah JDM Gary like you could name a few But it's not like some big reserve like lightweight has It's in featherweight Yeah well But yeah I mean yeah It's great to have more

And he is he looks really really good Yep Um I kind of felt like Roman copy life got screwed out of bonus tonight. Who got them? The bumping? Oh, all main cards. The main card finishers.

Jeez, yeah. Gay, I mean, Gachi and Lewis both absolutely deserve it. Card change that matters. If you want that money. I'm, Kevin Holland kind of just doesn't deserve it because of how inert Michael Kesa looked. I don't really have any issues with it. Again, it's just dumb.

Stop doing post-5 bonus. just bonuses for finishes. It's, we don't have to relitigate that. It's incredibly done. Yeah. If you'd like to incentivize excitement, just do bonuses for all finishes.

How cool. Honestly, one of the best things, what the best thing is done in forever. Like, Herb still got it. Yeah. Vintage Herb at time.

Granted, it would have been impossible to really second guess with the way that all flew out. but great great work from her yeah broke up the double play very nice the only bad refereeing that i can remember on this card uh and i will acknowledge that i was not paying attention for the maverick cashier fight uh all that much but um not taking a point in the uh vicious eye poke on um what was that fight the ferguson fight no no no the other one well no the ferguson fight was also really

really bad actually the ferguson fight was really awful That was actually a really big moment in that fight. It was like a moment in that fight. We didn't really talk about that. Yeah, that changed the fight. That changed the fight. Absolutely. I kind of joked about it on our Slack channel,

but I think it was kind of true. That gave Bobby Green a big break. And what happened right before that? Was he dropped? You got dropped a minute before. Yeah, he got a good two-minute recovery. And then after that, it was pretty much all downhill for Ferguson. so yeah yeah

i poaks matter what was the other bad i poke tonight maybe i was there was something else that was happened oh the it was the weird there was the weird thing yeah that whole thing was super weird Darius Fowers Darius Fowers

it's got to be such a weird position for you if you're a fighter and you're just hearing you hearing Joe Rogan repeatedly basically call you a coward like on the broadcast It's got to just like I can't imagine understand it And even in the post-fight interview

We brought it up again Yeah even Jake Jake man That was pretty bad And Jake's like No I think I kicked him in the I think I kicked him in the crotch It's fine

And Jake was like No I think Yeah Rogan's gotten really bad about that lately And here's the thing Like I actually kind of agree With what Rogan was trying to say there I was like

Yes that did hit him low That probably by technical definition of foul, feels like the actual damage that occurred came not from an illegal thing, but the illegal, like, actual incidental. And so it puts you in this weird gray area. But being so definitive with like, this guy is a cheater and a coward. F him is like, you're a commentator, homie. Like, that's not. You just, and it feels like it's been happening not just with Rogan with a bunch of dudes. Dominic Cruz is really bad about this stuff too. It's just like you have to have some level of professionalism and objectivity if that's your role.

Like, do better. It's not hard to just be like, huh, well, I assume that that guy's not lying. And that's just a weird one. Like, presume that they aren't lying. Give them the benefit of the doubt. And I never understood that. So I was like, these guys are our modern day gladiators. Oh, you're a cheater.

You know, instantly. Like so quick to do it too. So quick. And so absolute about it, too, it was like, it was bad. It was bad. I will say, because when we're doing the watch, I can kind of hear the commentary. It's just like in one ear and it's kind of low. The moment where they replayed the commentator reaction to Justin Gagey knocking out Dustin Porre was wild.

Like, D.C. just had this like look of concern. Rogan just had this look of shock. and John Anick was just exploding. Like, you got to see all these different emotions just kind of come together. It's not like your typical fight reaction where Rogan's, like, throwing DC in the chair, and Anick's screaming and yelling. Like, you get to see, like, the utter shock on Joe Rogan's face and the somewhat, like, heartbreak for DC because of the relationship he has with Dustin Porre.

And then Anik just being Anik, that Boston side of him coming out, just enjoying the violence. Like, it was a really cool replay to watch. at least for me, I was like, wow. Like that just kind of encapsulates, like, all the different emotions you can feel after a crazy moment like that. It was nuts. Let me find some more question. We'll take like one or two more. We talked about PFL going after Derek Lewis, right?

That's the obvious. Yeah. I'm surprised. Nothing about Wonder Boy. I saw. God, I love to you. See. What petty.

petty people. I don't know. I don't know if we've confirmed this or not. I know Mike, Mike Vaughn tweeted it out. Unconfirmed, but it seems pretty likely to be true. So it's just like, you know, you don't want to rant out. You don't want to rant on it. We can confirm it, but it's just if this is actually the reality of this situation, especially like given Stephen Thompson's background of having this happen to him with Derren Till and what happened after that, where Dary and Till like suffered no consequences, what's whatsoever and went right to a title shot and then Wonder Boy hasn't come close to like even sniff in a title eliminator since like come on man that dude did his job he invested a ton of money

probably into a three month training camp he left his family flew to Salt Lake City fulfilled every fight week obligation you put in front of him he hit the contracted weight he did not sign to fight at middleweight he signed to fight at welter weight he's 41 years old a loss is like slamming his window shut for good like you already budgeted out the money to pay both these dudes the show the showpers is like you're just not going to pay him yeah at least uh the other one the other fighter who had to fight someone that was overweight by a couple pounds uh cj vigar he even said oh uh i had to take the fight i can't afford not to you know and luckily i guess wonder boy you know if his own uh karate dojo or whatever he has

the carolinas um he was he could he has enough money but yeah it's unfortunate but what is next one dude yeah it's just stupid if you get put in a position where you're do options or either you don't get paid despite fulfilling your obligations or you fight with the disadvantage at an age where you just can't afford to lose a fight. Like, what do we do? The UFC can't afford it

easily, easily. They won't even notice it. Dude, next February, we're going to get another next February we're going to get another update off of an earnings call that Damon Martin's going to write for this website about how 2003 was the most lucrative year for the history

of endeavor in UFC. Like this is it would be depressing if it wasn't so unsurprising. Yeah. Somebody's got to pay for acquiring WWB. 20 million dollars or whatever the purchase price is. You think this could come out of R.A. manual's pocket? Hell no, it's not.

It's going to go out of the other people they could take that money from. So that's an interest right there. Wonder Boyvers. Wonder Boyer versus JDM, no, no effing chance. that that fight happens. They're not going to offer it to Wonderboy, and Warner Boy ain't going to take it. I don't know who Wonder Boy is going to fight, though.

There's two options. He's either going to fight. It all depends on how the UFC views this. And if Mike's tweet is true, they're going to feed, like, Sean, he's going to fight Sean Brady. He's going to fight a grappler, which is going to take him down and sit on him. And Sean Brady is, will be available at a certain point to fight Wonderboy.

The other option, except the fight. Which is just a spot behind him though. It's not like incredible. I just don't think one. I don't think one more accepts the fight. And the only other option is somebody made for like 11 years. Yeah. Like 11.

Oh, no. Usman's a great one. Do Usman. Yeah. That's it. It's it. It's a one. Yeah.

I like the Usman one. Yeah. I think it works for one. Wonderboy would take it. Think that's a good. Oostman would definitely take it. Yeah. Just do that one.

It's a big fight. Yeah. That's a great move by refusing to fight and probably getting wrestled by Michelle Pahedah. Now you get to fight Kamar Luzman. Good. I love to move. MVP, MVP always possible. Oh, I forgot they're going to buy MVP because they're definitely going to get MVP. So, yeah, actually, I accept either of those outcomes.

I think they do. Pereira MVP maybe now. Wonderboy said that they're going to punish Pereira. Yeah. I mean, Wonderboy said at the media day that he's not going to fight MVP because they're like their friends. Oh, are they friends? Yeah, yeah. That makes sense.

That makes sense. But maybe the UFC just like forces him to fight MVP. Well, you didn't fight Pereira. You got to fight this dude. You have to fight your friend. Sorry. They can just do karate touch kicking. It's fine.

Yeah, you know, people think they want to see that fight, but I don't think they do. No, it would be terrible, but it would be fun. It would have been really awful to watch Wonderboy fight Pereira if it was going to be Capora versus karate. A fight would have sucked all the ass. Ferrer was going to tackle him. so it would have been fine. If I would have been miserable, Wonderboy staying four yards away

while Pereira tries like a spinning capoeira kick that doesn't come within a country mile of him. Fight would have been horrific. If Lewis gets resigned, his type of where his most logical matchup, God. Oh, man. That's kind of the problem with Derek Lewis resigning.

What's, what do you do? The rematch everyone asked for it. I was like, having these guys fought? Yeah. There's a very obvious fight for Derek Lewis. is if he resigns, and it's Jayor Zina Rosenstrike. Yeah, that's the one.

If he resigns, that's the only fight you possibly put together. Which is exactly why you don't resign. It seems really unlikely that Derek Lewis is going to resign because he can just sign with the PFL for one fight. You'd be like, hey, guys, I would like to accept the one fight offer for $2 million

and then go do whatever else. Don't say whatever. Like BKFC is not the whatever else. You don't want to. with whatever else is. I think I'm the one who said Derek was to be KFC first. I know. I'm with you.

But, you know, if he wants to play the field a little bit, get that love, I'm okay with it. But go get your $2 million first. And do it now so you can go to Saudi and you can sit, you know, ringside for Francis versus thing and be like, oh, Francis lost. But now he can find me in the PFL smart cage. Woo. It's pocket porter after he beats junior tafa. Oh, wait, wait. You know I'm here for any of all Parker Potter.

I mean, two guys who have taken their, you know, their nutrition seriously, they're taking their workout seriously, they're more spelt than they've ever been in their entire careers. I mean, just the build to that's going to be incredible. Derek Lewis isn't going to know who Park Porter is the entire time until after he fights them. It's just going to be fun. I would also, I will say, I don't think it's going to happen. That's fine. I would watch Derek Lewis versus Jelton Almeida.

Like, what if what of the barbecue BJJ of just standing up is, is kryptonite's Jeltenhammeda and he can't do anything? He's like, he just keeps standing up. I don't understand it. I'd like to see Derek Lewis tied to Abbasah, too, because that first fight was insane. It wasn't, I mean, it wasn't that long ago. I'd like to see that in BKFC.

Yes. Yes. See that BKFC. Ooh, you might have just got the correct answer. All right. We're getting a little, some negative feedback from the Usman thing. Break it down why this is a good fight. Why would Wonderboy want to fight Usman?

Because he would get a title shot if he won. Yeah, thank you. I'm sorry. That's what Wonder Boy is about right now. Why do people want to fight former champions? Yeah, he doesn't want to fight the number one ranked guy. Of course he would take that fight. Like, if there's anybody he would.

would fight it would be Usman. Yeah. Because they haven't fought him. Who else? Does he want to fight Gilbert Burns again? No. Like, why would he want to fight any of the other dudes this weight class? Does he want to fight Shofcott?

No. Yeah. At least fighting Usman gets him, like if he wins, even if it doesn't get him a title shot, which it would get him a title shot. It's a massively significant victory for his career in a way that beating below Muhammad is not. It'll be, would it be his best,

it'll be his best one of his career, right? am I wonder what you I would say by a large margin beating cars is Johnny is Johnny Hendrix

the best win of his career probably at the time of it just melting him in round one I mean based on timing Ronnie Johnny Johnny Hendrix was still real maybe Rory I don't know

the Johnny Hendrix loss was like right after Hendricks beats Matt Brown and we still think that he's got it because he arguably should have beaten Robbie in their rematch. So it's probably Johnny Hendricks based on time. I mean, if we're just talking like wins that have aged the best, knocking out Bobby Knuckles is pretty damn good win for Wonderboy.

Yeah. But yeah, I would say it's Johnny Hendrix is probably the best one in his career looking at it right now. Man, he really does have a solid career. A lot of very quality wins. Yeah. Could you do Kevin Holland Wonderboy? We just saw that.

They just, Oh yeah, never mind. What the hell am I talking about? It's like 3.22. I'm done. Yeah, speaking of it. Could you do Kevin? Well, you actually could.

In fact, they did. Seven months ago in Wonderboy won. Kevin Holland didn't shoot takedowns and got the brains batched out of it. I think Wonder Boy and Michelle Pereira, that'd be a good fight. He should set that up. Yeah. Yeah. could also do that.

I think we're good, gentlemen. Yeah, I think we're good. Yeah, I mean, I'm at it all-time low, and I don't know if I could dig myself out of that hole. And speaking of matchmaking suggestions, make sure you join me. You always win on a low note. Yeah, make sure you join me in six hours and 40 minutes

where I do more matchmaking. So I'm sure you're going to wake right up and tune into that after that terrible pick. But forgive me. We all make mistakes. But thank you all very much. UFC 291 in the books. If you want to go back and watch the reactions to the watch party,

there's timestamps in there now, so you can go check them all out. And now we're getting ready for another busy week, everybody. We got Jake Paul versus Nate Diaz, whole crew going to Dallas. We got UFC Nashville, Corey Sanagan versus Rob Font. And then they're back in the apex the following week. So at least you get a crowd and all sorts of fun stuff.

So thank you all for joining us for Jed, for Casey, for Shaheen. Hi, I am Mike Heck. Good night, everybody. love you. Love you guys. You only love the guys, Shaheen. You don't love all of them? The royal guys, you know?

It's a royal we situation. You're listening to the Vox Media Podcast Network.