MMA Fighting - UFC 296 Post-Fight Show | Reaction To Leon Edwards' Dominant Win Over Colby Covington

Episode Date: December 17, 2023

Leon Edwards made it look easy in his second title defense when he earned a unanimous decision over Colby Covington in the main event of UFC 296. Although it certainly won't be on anyone's Fight of the Year lists, what comes next for the UFC welterweight champion, as well as Covington, will be interesting.  Following the final pay-per-view event of 2023 for the UFC, MMA Fighting's Mike Heck, Shaun Al-Shatti, and Jed Meshew react to Saturday's card, Edwards' championship retaining victory, Covington's puzzling strategy and performance, Alexandre Pantoja's successful flyweight title defense against Brandon Royval, Shavkat Rakhmonov and Paddy Pimblett's win, Josh Emmett's brutal knockout of Bryce Mitchell, Sean Strickland and Dricus Du Plessis' brawl in the crowd during the event, and more. Follow Mike Heck: @MikeHeck_JR Follow Shaun Al-Shatti: @ShaunAlShatti Follow Jed Meshew: @JedKMeshew Subscribe to MMA Fighting Check out our full video catalog Like MMA Fighting on Facebook Follow on Twitter 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 Cudullian 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, What are you willing to lose to save the ones you love?

The Downloaded 2. Ghosts in the Machine. Available now, only from Audible. Support for this show comes from the Audible Original. The Downloaded 2. Ghosts in the Machine. The Earth only has a few days left. Rosco Cudullian 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 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. For the final time to 2023, we're hearing the victory horns, and they sound. For the men who entered UFC 296 as world champions, Leon Edwards and Alexandra Pantosia leave the T-Mobile Arena still champions following UFC 296. A card that looked tremendous on paper started off with a bang on the prelims. Started off with a bang on the main card and then things kind of started to slow down a little bit.

And then the main event happened and I had to take off the holiday sweater because it kind of stuck the holiday spirit right out of me. And in the end, it doesn't matter what I think. Leon Edwards is still the welterweight champion of the world. And he dominated Colby Covington in a fight. We're probably not going to go back and watch again. But thank you for joining us for the UFC 296 post-fight show. I am Mike Heck. Got the whole crew here, the post-paper-view trio, if you will.

We have Sean Al-Shadi here, the bald brethren. The wise word smith. Hello, Shaheed. How are we feeling? Feeling good, Mike. I'm feeling good. It's only 1.30 here. So maybe I got a little.

I can use some of the energy that you may be. you don't have over there at like 4.30 or 3.30 wherever you're at. So feeling good. Yeah, we're knocking on the door of 4 a.m. right now, but we are here for you, my friends. And also, you just heard his melodious tones on the press conference show, Jed Mishue, who probably doesn't have a single take when it comes to this card, do you, Jed? Dude, I'm about to lay wood on Leon Edwards, far more than Colby coming to did. good God. This is atrocious.

Oh, well, I mean, might as well start there, Jed. Let's just let it all out here. Let's just let it all out. Why are you about to lay wood on Leon Edwards? Why is he getting more criticism than Colby? Where is this coming from, Jed? Where is it coming from? Well, one, I will start this by because you have to.

He won. No doubt about it. I thought he took three rounds. I thought he took four rounds, actually, maybe. I think I had it in four rounds. I don't know. He won the fight. We've been here before in parts where I am more critical on the guy who wins the fight than the guy who loses.

Because it's not this is this game in just about getting Ws. It is. It's the most important part. And if he had lost doing something stupid, then we'd make fun of him. And that would be tragic. Like, look what happened to Kumar Usman, right? You know? But you're Leon Edwards.

You didn't even think you were really going to get to this position and then you did. And now you're here and you have the whole of England behind you and you are being given a platform to shut this loudmouth asshole up and try and win fans. And that's what you get out there. He won and as Casey is always frequent to remind us. That is the most important part. He gets two checks. He gets to keep his belt. But like, he fought a dude who wasn't.

fighting him for 15 minutes at least arguably 20 minutes Colby just simply was not fighting him and he refused to do anything like yes he did something but like but you can try harder you can do stuff you can make an effort because and I'll hop on this because I do it all the time like one you can lose fights by just staying in cruise control like we have seen it happen so often. It is a safer plan to go out and really try and attack somebody than just, oh, I'm right here. I'm one gear above them.

I'm just going to ride this out because it didn't happen and thank God it didn't. But we had a serious conversation afterwards where I was like, it wouldn't be the most insane thing to see Colby get a scorecard here because he clearly won the fifth round, right? Like everybody believes that Colby won the fifth round. What is this? What are we? I'm not saying that you should have. I'm just saying we have seen way worse scorecards than Colby Covington winning a fight where Leon like landed 50 total strikes.

I'm just stunned that this is the lead take. I'm just surprised this is the lead take away from this fight, but please continue. I didn't mean it. So no. The actual takeaway isn't even this. This is just I'm more mad about this after the presser because the actual takeaway is this man is committed to being boring and I don't understand it.

It is so not like coming off the Kamar Usman headkick, he had all of the goodwill that could possibly be put into a person. It is this triumphant moment. It's a great story. It kicks ass. The promo released afterwards or whatever, the cut of you're letting him but like that is so, and it still hits like in the chest.

And then he comes, he has a tough fight with Kumar Usman. But then he does this and then he gets up at the presser. It's like, I don't know, like whoever, who's when the UFC's post-fight tweet of you is a photo of you with the belt and the best quote they can put up on you is, let's see who's next. What are we doing? You are not this boring of a person. I refuse to believe that a man who ostensibly has family and friends who love and care about him is this uninteresting. But he refuses to be interesting in any way.

It was like he could have just leaned into the yeah, Colby is like a real piece of shit. And like this was a very tough week and I'm emotional about it because that is at least connective and affecting in some ways. And then he gets back there. He's like, I don't really want to talk about Colby. Like fuck him. I don't really want to talk about who I'm going to fight next. I don't care.

I'll fight whoever. I'm going to beat GSP's record. Like no, you're not. And if that's the only thing that you think is a hook, what the fuck are we doing, man? Like you have to know this. You have been in this game for too long to know that you can't be this boring. Just let the people in. Please, that presser was a nightmare to watch.

And it makes me not want him to be champion, despite him being very good at fist fighting. Just give us something, man. You are not this boring. I refuse to believe it. Jeanne, please, your reaction to what you just heard. What the, how is that the take? How is that the takeaway from this fight that? You do shit about talking about Colby being old and shitty.

Dude, here's the reality of what just happened, what we just watched. Colby Covington said some of the most heinous shit that I've maybe ever heard in over 10 years of covering this industry at that press conference. It was, say it was spoken like someone who hasn't held their dying father in their arms, frankly. Like the way that people were kind of given leeway to the crap he said, which is like a lot of you haven't gone through personal problems if you aren't finding issues with this. And then that man came in there and backed up precisely zero of any of those words. You don't like that fight? I didn't like that fight either. That was a really boring fight.

That's not on the champ, my man. That's not on the champ to do anything about that. The champ won four rounds in a row. He won every single minute of that fight for the first 20 minutes of that fight. And even got like a couple disrespect takedowns just to kind of do it to prove to, hey, like, dude, you ain't got anything on me. That's not on Leon, my guy. That's on the guy who's supposed to be coming in here as this cardio machine, as this all-action fighter. It is a great irony to me how this fight played out because how was this framed for months for us, right?

Back in March, when Leon defended the title against Kumar Usman, we were told that Kobe Covington deserves the title fight. When Dana-Wi sort of laid the seeds of what 2023 is going to look like for this division, it was very much in the way of, well, Kobe Covington deserves this and you all understand that. And we could read between the lines, right? Like, we're smart. We follow this. We understand, like, it was not deserves, because the word deserves doesn't make any actual sense. If deserves was how this sport worked, Bala Muhammad wouldn't have to have a 10-fight unbeaten

streak to even begin to sniff this conversation. Whatever. It was not deserves. It was Kobe Covington's going to be the bigger draw. It's going to be a nasty lead-up, and it's going to be a more entertaining fight. And those were sort of the three takeaways, right? And two of those were certainly right. This is a bigger fight.

Objectively, you can say it was. it was a much nastier lead up. But it was not entertaining. It was incredibly uninteraining because Dana, it was right. Kobe Covington looked old. He looked slow. He looked like a 35-year-old who's past it,

who basically probably sat out the remaining years of his prime, a guy who very much didn't deserve this whatsoever, who has zero signature wins, who has zero wins over ranked Welterweight's currently, who is 0 in three in title fights now, and who put on one of the most flaccid performances in a title fight that I can remember after the extreme amount of shit that he talked for the entire week about all of the things that he was going to do and all of the action that he was

going to bring. And he did none of it. That's not on Leon, my guy. I'm sorry that Leon in his press conference wasn't firing off the bangers that you would have liked him to. But at a certain point, this man just kind of like kind of went through it over the past couple days over, you know, the father that was murdered when he was 13 and all of a sudden he's having to reconcile a lot of this before a very big fight. That dude put on a masterclass for a performance for the most part. He did not lose any part of that fight until he

decided like, hey, I'm just going to grapple with this guy just to do it. And just frankly, credits of the champ display poised and sort of put on the game plan that he did in that spot. This is not on Leon, my dude. This is on Colby who put on a terrible terrible performance in what is probably the last

opportunity he will get at this title and was the most undeserved opportunity he has gotten at this title. we have this conversation frequently and it's always this like i'm always on the exact same side of it here it's the same shit with isy like you know why i'm not taking this out on colby because he lost fuck him i got like his punishment is that he loses and the loss stays with him forever but it takes two to make a shit fight and leon did it he won again that is the most important part of this of not taking that away.

But I'm not going to just foist flowers and roses on him because he could have made that interesting. Like, could have done something instead. Dude, that fight was uninteresting. It was. To me, I threw it out in our private channel. Like, is this the most uninteresting fight since Carla Rose? And I think it probably is.

I mean, we've had a couple really bad Izzy fights in between that, that you could throw in there, or at least one, the Canaaner fight. I'm not sure the timelines on the Tory fight, too, where that matches up. It's up there. It's in the conversation. But again, to me, that goes on the guy

who's trying to come in and take the belt in what is probably the last chance to do so and who just told us for a week straight all the incredible things he was about to do.

And he did none of those. Are you telling me Colby Covington lied? I don't believe that Colby Covington lied. That's again. It's just, yeah, Colby's part of space he lost.

And I don't, like, that's the thing. I don't even really care to talk about Colby. It's really bad fight. He's not very good anymore. He's old and he was on a two-year layoff and that's where it is. Leon's our champion and like give me something.

Please, man. Just do more. I don't need this to be the case for you. We'll talk about where this goes for Leon in a moment. But, you know, basically. I don't care. Whoever's next. Whatever.

The one prediction I felt confident. Why is the champion to call out a contender? That's not his job. It's actually, because it's way better if you call out contenders. Like the history of the sport has shown when a champ selects and brings a contender up, that gives them cachet as opposed to I'll fight who's ever in front of me. Great. Let's just speak in nothing but like pre-canned lines.

Who gives a shit about that? Pick one. Make a rival by choosing it. Like it's so much better to do that. I am very sorry. Look at what is happening with Iliott's post-by-press conference. No, but I'm saying, like legitimately, look at the, the heat behind Iliate Taboria and Alexander Worganowski.

And there are other parts of this too, but a legitimate part of it is just Volk said, hey, I'm going to fight that dude. And now we're like, yeah, you're going to fight that dude. You're going to fight that dude real hard. Like, it would make this way, like Leon's going to end up fighting Belal and now the promo we have of it is, I don't care, I'll fight whoever, whatever, as opposed to be like, Balal's been putting in that work, baby. Like, I was in Belal's spot for years.

I deserved it. I didn't get it. And now Bala is in the same spot. And you know what? I'm not going to sit down on the rest of this division like other people did. Belaw, come on up. It's your time to get this work, son. Boom.

That's not a hard promo to cut. You just do it and it makes it better than I don't care. I'm going to beat GSP's record. My man, you're 32 years old. You just ain't going to do that. Do something. This was, it was so, oh, what a flaccid way to end 2023, boys. For like 10 minutes in, we've used Flacid twice to describe the main event.

Yeah, it's never really a good thing. Yeah, because it's a very appropriate word. Yeah, it was tough. And I guess the one prediction that I had that actually came true is we knew, we would know in the first seven minutes what this fight was going to look like in its entirety, and that's exactly what we got. Was Colby going to get going? Was he going to do anything of substance to force Leon to respect his style?

and he did not at all. And you guys brought, Shaheen in particular, you brought up the Israel-A-Sahdi-Jar-Kan-Ir fight, and this is exactly what that reminded me of because Leon was preparing for a version of Colby that said a lot of things that said, I'm going to do this,

and I'm going to do this, and then he did none of it, and he basically handed Leon the title back on a silver platter because of this performance. He basically gave Leon the easiest possible fight he could have. Everything Leon would have possibly drawn up for a dream scenario here. He got in spades. He got a clear, easy path to victory.

I was a little surprised, Shaheen, that heading in, after the fourth round, I was just like, all right, maybe now his corner is telling him, hey, you know what? You fought great. You fought patience. You stayed within yourself. It's round five. Go kill this dude. Like, just go put him out.

He ain't going to hurt you. He's got nothing for you. Just go put him out of his misery right now. And then he just kind of took the round off and survived and won. And yes, that's the most important thing. But, I mean, how do we grade Leon's performance? And I'm with you. I don't blame Leon wholeheartedly for this, but it does take two to tango.

This is all Colby, and he basically handed Leon a win. But how do you grade Leon's performance? And are you surprised that he came out in the fifth round and didn't kind of put pedal to the metal and put this dude behind him, like, legitimately for good? I mean, it was a C. It was a C because he did what he needed to do to get the win, right? Like, we don't need a sugarcoat it and act like this was some spectacular performance. It wasn't, but it was a thorough, like, dominant performance just in the spectrum of he won pretty much every minute of that fight until he decided that, hey, I'm just going to try to do this thing that may or may not work in the fifth round.

I don't know. It was a C, and it's fine because that's who Leon Edwards is. Like, the Kamar Usman headkick, for the most part, kind of threw everybody off the scent of who Leon is. Like, this is who this guy has been for a long time, right? He is a very technical, very sharp, all around just badass, but who for the most part is kind of like a point fighter. Kind of like this guy who will just will his way to decision wins that are not memorable and you're not going to go back and rewatch him at UFC Fight Pass. This is just kind of who he is. And maybe some people forgot that because the head kick was so spectacular.

And even the rematch, you know, even the rematch wasn't like that great of a fight, right? Like somebody, please correct me if I'm wrong and jump in here if I'm wrong. like this is just who Leon Edwards fight. He's not the one who's in the last title opportunity that he's probably ever going to get and by far the most undeserving one. Like he's not the one with the onus on him to try to do everything in his power to change the course of his life. Two things.

I am not going to let you sit there and in the same breath say badass and then point fighter. Those two things, they don't work together. Don't miss the truth of that. Don't miss because I, objectively, Leon Edwards is a badass fighter. He is all around spectacular in every area when he chooses to be.

And you can tell me I'm wrong, but do you wholeheartedly believe he is not a good all-around fighter? Because he is very good at pretty much every area. I'm bucking at the term badass. It's a great fighter. I'm bucking at badass. Badass is that. It doesn't have to mean entertaining for your, for what you want.

I feel like it does. It super does it. If a game or here, he'd put up a poll and be like, what does badass mean? because I don't think it just means like technically proficient. It's like, you're a badass, you know. You fucking rock the shape. And that's not.

And he is. I will also, the second point, which is more more important than us arguing syntax here. The Usman fight makes this look like, I don't know, like this makes it look like Altonaosa. It landed like five times the amount of strikes.

That was a real fist fight that happened. Not that thing that we just witnessed. It's like I think it was good. I'm not saying I'm in the minority because I've been in the minority. I was in the minority when we did this for Izzy's runs in the cannoneer fight. It's just like it's a D minus. It is a pass because if you pass, but it is the lowest possible pass because every other aspect of this was a total failure. What's just hilarious to me is there is a 99% chance that of below Mohammed fight tonight would have

so much more entertaining. Easily. By far. And that was the crux. It's a little Leon, too, I don't know. That was the crux, but he would have tried to fight. One would hope. Well, he's going to get his shot.

Maybe. Maybe. Maybe. I think that he will, but they refuse to say his name. Dana White's even tonight wouldn't commit to it. So it's just like, you never know what these guys. here's my last thing on this then we can go to wherever you all want to go to

if this weren't the main event when would we be talking if we were talking about this fight card in order of things that happened that are notable and it's not by main event card down is this like the fifth thing we talk about

like is it just like man that fight sucked that feels like a huge failing when you are being like this is your opportunity to do something major and instead it's just like, it'd be better if we just forgot about this happening. I think it would probably be like the seventh or eighth. It depends if we're including Sean Strickland versus the BDP,

which is probably the best fight of the night. That's just so bad to me. It's like the charitable way to view it is Colby Covington is an opportunity for you to get a broad thing. Dana had the note at the presser. It was like, yeah, when Colby started saying all the bad stuff,

our pay-per-view buy rate just jumped through the roof. Like, this is an opportunity for you on the big, platform as the dude holding this coming off these oosman things trying to see where he's at like oh maybe he has turned a corner and he's not point fight mcgee and instead he's actually a badass and you come out and do this like this is such a wasted opportunity and that is why i'm giving leon such a bad grade here i get it we'll see what happens with leon whether it's belal whether it's shafcott which i'm sure we're going to talk about and how about colby jed because as you said You know, you go to the press conference.

Colby shows up. Does Colby things, Jed. And then immediately, first sentence after the question he was asked was he already had a name ready to go. It's Wonderboy. I'm going to go fight Wonderboy. Another 40-year-old man. That is stunning to call out a 40-year-old man who lost the contender fight rather than the actual man who won the contender fight tonight. No, no, no.

No, no. You need to be real clear here, Shaheen. he didn't just call out the loser when specifically asked if he would like to fight Shavkat the guy who won. He's like, the guy who's probably the next in line after below. That doesn't make sense.

I think Wonderboy makes more sense. Give me that 40 year old. Say what you will and a lot of it was a name and I found it honestly like quite charming that for all Colby was doing his stick. The reporter's

largely we're just ignoring him and being like, all right, so like back to questions that we care about here. It was better presser because that's, and that's at least a gimmick that's funny. Like, this man is living the bit of what was the entire conversation around me from MMA, you know, energies. I was like, oh, I've, I've won win over a currently employed fighter. It's RDA who's a lightweight and was kind of old when I faced him. and all the other dudes I've beaten were past their sell-by dates.

Now that I lost to a guy who's not old, I would like to call out a guy who's old and also a historically good matchup for me. Like, that's good prize fighting is all that is. Oh, shouts to him. That was well done. Dude, it's great. And that's probably what he'll get.

He'll probably get that fight. And it'll happen. and then we'll move on from it. I mean, I just don't know. There's just nothing to say about this fight anymore. Like, there really isn't. It just wasn't good. I think Colby looked outside of, like, obviously bad.

I think it was pretty clear to me that Colby Covington is old. I think Ringruss probably played a role. I'm still not, like, I'd still wouldn't shock me if it came out that he had an injury that he came into this fight and was sort of like trying to work around and hide it because it kind of the way he fought, but I'm willing to believe it was just ring rust. But even when he started going, he just looked old because he is old, 35 or whatever, about to be 36. So yeah, he's he has now passed his sell by date as well.

So it's at least a little better with the, with the Wonderboy call out there, at least a little more on the same plane. I mean, that's that's the main event, I guess. I mean, boy, has everything broken super well for Bilal Muhammad? Like two months ago, I'm like, there's no way he's getting a title shot based on how this all plays out and just each domino has continued to fall every single way. I think he does end up getting it, especially if they end up going to Manchester or whatever, which I wouldn't be shocked if they did that.

Even Leon said it, put me and Tom on a card and then it doesn't matter. Leon can be boring old Leon, as you say, Jed, all he wants. But in Manchester, he's a hero. And the crowd is going to go bananas for him and Asmel. And at that point, it doesn't even, yeah, it doesn't even matter who he fights on that card. So can we just have Shavkat be the champion? Not that it would be that much better, but I don't. Oh, God.

What is Welterweight even? What is this weight class? I mean, I'll tell you what Welterweight is. It's, we're all just waiting for the man who's going to take that title to take that title. Because realistically, this is Shavkats belt and we're all just waiting for it. It is, but it's not like Shavkats is particularly a hitter with the mic in front of him. Casey and I were talking about this off air. And it's like, here's the thing.

I can, like, you could absolutely convince me that Shavkat is a legitimately boring person. Like, how little he speaks, it makes me think that like, oh, he might just be one of those dudes who is just super simple, just has like a very few things. Like he would not have great interpersonal skills in any capacity. He's just doing his thing. I got tolerance for that. I'm really confident that Leon would be like a nice dude to have a beer with who has thoughts on stuff and can be interesting. But as soon as like it becomes a. important for him to be interesting. He's like, no, I'm good. I would like to say the

lamest thing possible at all points in time. And that is, you were in the wrong profession, my man. You've got to, you've got to find a way to connect with fans because he's clearly not. He's doing pretty okay for himself. Is he? I mean, he's great. Yes. The answer is yes. He's great at the fighting. The answer is yes, because for five years of this man's life, he was told at every turn that the two best Walter whites in the world were Kamara Usman and Colby Covington and that he didn't stand the freaking chance against either of them. And now he holds wins, three wins combined over both of them. And he never has to fight either of them again.

And when we talk about them in the historical conversations, we will bring up those wins in the fact that Leon Edwards had an actual title reign where they were title defenses. So yes, he is doing pretty okay. He's doing great at the fighting part. I'm really not convinced he's doing great at the prize part of this. I mean, he's going to eventually he's got to get guys that. are going to help him. I mean, shop on how now? He's already gotten three guys. He's got three guys he's got three. He got the Nate Diaz fight. Oh, I forget about the Nate Diaz fight. That's true. You got the Nate Diaz fight, two Camaro fights and then Colby. He got like big money for all of those

and he's had to do very little of the lift on it. Like he's doing pretty solid. At the same time, think about that. He fought all those people and still is not a star. Like, come on. You're the I'm only one worried about that right now. Not everyone can be a star, man. Most people aren't. It's fine. You could just be interesting. I'm just,

I'm sorry that you were so thoroughly disappointed with his post-fight press conference. It's so boring, man. It's so boring to sit there and listen to talk. Well, I mean, look, look, Jed, Alexander Pantosia showed up to the press conference, and he had a, you know, also deeply. Not interesting.

But he's a very nice man. Don't even begin to slander that, man. And this is ridiculous at this point. He's not deeply uninteresting, but he's not that interesting. But he's a very nice man. And I like him a lot. He planted seeds for like six fights. He did great in that.

He put his whole division over. Every single one of them. He put the whole division over. Every name that was mentioned to him, he's like, hell yeah, I want to fight that guy. I can't wait to fight Menel Cop. I can't wait to fight Brennan Moreno again. I can't wait to fight him here Al-Bossey.

All of them are good and all of them are exciting. He did great. I'm proud of him. Way to go, pants. Flyweight's so damn fun right now. I love this. I love Flyweight right now. It's so good.

Every way you match make this, it's so fun. All of these fights are just so electric. No wrong way to eat this, Reesis. Yes, good stuff from Pantosha. The fight was technically really, really good. I don't, maybe it didn't live up to the like straight fireworks, bananas brawl. But I actually enjoyed it. I thought it was a really good technical scrap.

And Pantosia just. Do we think he could have taken Fighter of the Year there? No. Two and O? I don't think you get it with two and O. I mean, they're very, very good wins.

To me, it kind of feels like it's Strickland. I mean, one of Strickland's wins, does that matter? Does the Abis win matter at all for Sean Strickland? Also, Sean Strickland's just getting into fights in the crowd.

I'm going to docking points for that. I mean, first of all, even though that's actually the best, We can do a really thorough technical breakdown of that whole thing. Because if you just watch all the various videos, there is a lot of fun stuff going on during that whole drink. It's Sean Strickland thing.

It's interesting to say the least. If I could just go, I'll give you a quick top three right now. Because one, if you look at Bruce Buffer in the background right after Sean jumps on him, his disappointed dad headshake is just, it's a plus. He's so disappointed in everything he's watching.

The buff is here for your professionalism and he's not here for anything else. Number two, Sean Strickland telling Gilbert Burns kids, hey, like, can you please, like, move over a couple seats and be real polite with it and like waiting for it and then just flipping the switch to crazy? Like, that's amazing as well. But really, like, the winner is Cheeto because Cheeto Vera, just in the background, having the absolute time of his life. Like, he was born to be in this exact moment at this exact place is the best thing ever. And I love it so, so much. I'm a big fan of unmentioned in your thing, Volk standing on a chair to see, like, kind of a way. far away. He's standing up on his chair

in one of the images. I'm like oh, that's just the best. This is adorable. It's so good. I mean, it's very telling that the biggest storyline to come out of UFC 296 is Sean Strickland versus Drickus 2 plus C at UFC 297.

Like that's the biggest thing that's come out of this, which is super weird the way this fight card began. Shafkar-Ikmana finishes Wonderboy Thompson. Wonderboy to his credit, good takedown defense. Had some moments on the feet. Shafcott took him down and almost literally broke his jaw with like a submission. Wonderboy had a tap with around five seconds left in the second round.

So good performance from Shafka Rakhmanav. Does he get him a title shot? Not sure. I liked the celebration at the end, the whole flipping the money thing, making it rain. There is a little personality there, Jed. Come on. He smiled. There is an aura to the man is smiled.

He has a hat. That's his personality and that's okay. You know what, man, you don't need personality when you're like Carlos Condit reincarnated with this finish streak. Like this dude's finish rate is frankly obscene in a way that like we haven't really seen since. Carlos Condit at Welterweight. Have 18 fights, 18 stoppages, like of 18 wins at Welterweight. When you're like actually fighting real guys now is fucking incredible, man. That doesn't happen.

Because here's what usually happens, right? And we've seen this a thousand times. The guys will have like he'll be like somebody will be like 13. and no with like 12 stoppages on the regional scene and they'll come to the UFC and they'll start getting a couple decisions here and there and then you know they'll start to fighting top 10 top five guys and it's a lot of decisions and a lot of like hard fights shafkats just running through fools 18 of 18 that's ridiculous and he's like up the ladder now like he's fighting real dudes even hamzaa shamaa when he fought gilver burns like needed the judges at that point shafkat doesn't need

those judges it's crazy to be able to keep this going and i think we're losing sight of that because there were a lot of people talking real, real silliness after this. Dude, I preach. I'm not here to say that that is the best Shavka performance. So you can make an argument for it. And the first round is maybe wasn't the most thrilling. But the amount of backlash this man got for doing something literally no one has done before

is astonishing to me. Like, oh, oh, no, Shalang, no, Bilal did it better. Like blood went to the cards with Wonderboy, my man. Shafcott didn't need them. Didn't need a third round at all. Like this is, I think we have, we're starting to, maybe we expect it too much. I got it. It was like, oh, yeah, he does it to everybody.

So no, this is insane. And like, I'm totally fond of blog in the title shot. I think he deserves it and should title shot. But Shafka's the best wall to wait in the world, dude. Like, this is nuts. Ooh, see, we go back to that question I asked on the preview show. Would you end UFC 296 believing that the best welterweight in the world was one half of that main event? Was any part of that main event?

And now you're here to say that you think John Mottoff is the best welter in the world. I lied to you because I said of Leon 1, I would give him his due because he deserved it for the, and he does. He hasn't been beaten by anybody that's not Kamar Usman in like a decade or whatever. And then he beat Kamar twice. Like that's an incredible run. But you win that fight in that manner against the guy who I don't actually think is good at this stage of his career versus Shavkat doing that to a guy who's certainly not like the AA plus like apex of Stephen Thompson. But still just tuned up Kevin Holland. Like still a good fighter and still when people have been beating him, they hadn't done that to him.

That's the best dude in the wait class, man. I can't wait to see him get his day in court, but he's the best dude in the way class. That's so disrespectful. There's a difference. There's a difference, right? Because the best guy in the way class is the guy who's proven it against the best fighters consistently. And that's Leon Edwards. You have to give him.

No, that's a champion. At that exact moment. To say otherwise, the speculation, if they book Shavka v. Leon tomorrow, I'm picking Shavka. And Shavkat will probably be the best-d-way class. But he has not proven it yet. So you cannot pronounce him as such. That's cool. So when we do a trial-bock combat for my life,

I'm going to take Shavka and you can have Leon and I'll be alive. No, no, no, no, no. Like I said, I'm trying about how he's the best as you die. I'm good because when I do best, it's trial by combat. Who's the best dude? Let's get crazy. Shavka's the best dude, man. Like, Leon is the champion, deserves to be the champion.

you know, the greatest. Sure, he's more accomplished. But if those two dudes settle up in a cage, I don't know, pretty sure Shavkat's not going to win a tepid decision over Colby Covington, pretty sure he's going to fucking finish him because that's what the man does. My question to you is, what's the Shavkat fight? Because he's going to need one more. Like they're going to, I would assume they're going to do this below thing.

So he's going to need one more and it's probably going to be like a top five guy. And obviously, Colby's not going to take that. fight. So, because Colby would be the, the pick, right? Like, that would be the obvious pick. You can't fight Burns, right? Well, Burns is book now. He's fighting JDM in Miami.

Oh, yeah, you're right. I think Chuck, now Luke A doesn't have a fight, but they are also, like, they also trained together. So it's going to be tough. So I've got just sit and wait. Yeah, that's, that's kind of what I'm thinking.

Way in is the backup. up. Sean Brady? You're next up. Maybe you do Brady? Yeah, that'd be fine too. If the UFC wants to do it, I think that they could be fine holding him. Is Camaro out of the question?

No, actually. Shouldn't do that, but I'd be fine with it because I think Schofcott will win it. If Camaro wants a welterweight title shot, that is the way to get it, right? Are we really signing up for Leo? on Usman 4? No, but if Camaro just goes fights in Wittaker,

just go fire off Whitaker, man, just do that and that's fine. Well, Whitaker and Costa are probably going to. Yeah,

that's what it's looking like right now. So, yeah, we'll see what happens. There's a couple of things I do want to touch on, and then we'll go to fan questions

since it's almost 4.30 in the morning here on the East Coast. Talk about the good things that happened. Well, I'll start. Depending on your view.

Yeah, and I'll start there, because the main card kicked off with Josh Emmett versus Bryce Mitchell, and you want to talk about something that at least looked tepid for a little bit. If you watched the watch party, I even said, boy, do I want to give you some thrilling play-by-play, but literally nothing was happening between Josh Emmett. Two strikes landed in that fight.

Yeah. And then about 10 seconds after that, we screamed and stood up, and it wasn't one of those like, boy, that's a Derek Lewis flying knee and then a whole bunch of punches knockout. this was Josh Emmett landing flush as hard as he could towards Bryce Mitchell's head moving forward as hard as it possibly could and the way that Bryce Mitchell hit the canvas and the way he just kind of stiffened up

and the way that the camera went back as he was like shaking convulsing convulsing all that like that was one of the scariest knockouts I have ever seen. it really was nasty and man Josh Emmett even a 38 years old can still hit like a truck and he just obliterated Bryce Mitchell that was friggin scary Shaheen what was your reaction you hear that shot land you see Bryce go down they say it on the broadcast he looks like he's convulsing down there and then they take the camera shot right at it it's hard to be like wow that was a pretty crazy knockout it just automatically goes to man I hope Bryce's okay this it was just so scary Dude, that's one of the scariest knockouts I've ever seen, just in terms of, like, the reaction to it, right? Like, I remember back at, I think it was WEC 53. There was a really bad one, and I can't remember the specific fight.

The guy's name was Stone. It's bummed me out right now that I can't remember it. His last name was Stone. Oh. And he got, like, slain. That was Eddie Winland. That was that, Eddie Winland, the K.O. slam. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

It was a slam, K. And after it happened, the guy is his name. They weren't throwing it on, they weren't putting it on the TV, but I was in the arena. And it was the first live fight I had seen. And the guy was like just going into crazy convulsions. And like there was real worry cage side for like 30 seconds that like something very serious was happening. And they ended up having to like stretch her amount. And that was probably the worst one that I had seen in a long time.

And this is right up there, man. I mean, this was the best bright hand a human being has landed in MMA in 2023. Right. Like that was disgusting with how with the proposal. And then the sound, too. Like, that was the thing. That's always the thing, too, with these, like, really bad knockouts is you hear the replay and the sound.

The sound it made with Josh Emmett's fist connected with Bryce Mitchell's skull was, like, the sound of, like, a cantalote being dropped from a high building. Like, it was just really gross. Like, man, that was nasty. And Bryce is already out here tweeting and making videos, so I'm glad he's okay. But, God, damn, that was scary for, like, a good 45 seconds. Yeah. And Joe Rogan was screaming.

man that I agreed with Joe. I'm like, why is this man on his feet? Like, why is he still standing? Why is he still walking around? And why, like, why is he not on a stool right now? Like, you got to sit this dude down. It was just, I agreed with everything Joe was saying there, but Jesus, Jed. That was nasty.

Dude, it, it sounded like, like a baseball bat getting broken. Like, it was a crack, like, just no bullshit, not trying to, like, you know, do anything weird. There was a moment where I was like, did we just see the first death in the UFC? Because I think we all know that at some point it probably, like just law of large numbers, that's a thing that's probably going to happen. And that would be a really tragic day when it does. And I was like, that might be it. This is going to be awful. I don't, I'm not ready to do this part of the thing right now. Really glad Bryce Mitchell's up. I hope he never fights again, frankly. just that's that's a life-changing

K.O. right there. And yeah, when Josh in it at the end was like, I'm the most powerful feather way in the world, dude, no one's going to argue the point. You got it. You know what? Jesus. You got it. We, we all

accept that statement as fact for you. And to me, that's the chaos of the year. If you want to put Israel versus Alex Pereira, I totally understand that. you know what that means etc i totally get that

uh and that's a it's a terrific chaos i have no issue with that being your one but i don't that's that's the chaos of the year i got i thought i legitimately thought a man died um so that feels like it's the k o of the year

well so i'm i'm interested do you say that because we're about to do award season over the next couple weeks here and to me there's three very obvious standouts for k over the year right it's izzie and then it's Robbie Lawler with the greatest retirement of all time and then now it's Josh Emmett too because you have to include this man

in this conversation and I don't know I don't want to be feel good KEO of the year I don't want to be reactionary because I mean there's more that goes into these awards than just the highlight right it's the stakes it's sort of the circumstances

and I think those other two certainly have more in that regard for Izzy that KO meant so much for Robbie Lawler again greatest retirement of all time. We've never seen anybody go out quite like that. I'm not sure tonight. Like if I had to do my rankings tonight for K with the year, I'm not sure the order of those three. And I think I'm going to need a couple of days to think about it and marinate in it. But I'm really not sure. Like you just proclaiming it right now is surprising to me. I'm really comfortable putting it ahead

of Robbie Lawler's. I love Robby Lawler's K.O. It's going to make the list. That feels more like, you know, like I said, the feel good moment of the year. Like, you know, we did the damn on Robbie and it was this awesome piece of it, but I don't, the aesthetics of that CO, I, there are no, there is no CAO that has better aesthetics than Josh Emmett's right there. That is it. Now, like I said, I have zero issue you put in Izzy Pereira over that. That's a okay, because it's a very aesthetically great COO. It is a more meaningful CAO, certainly. And, you know, that part of it weighs more heavily on you. I'm fine. And maybe if I sit down and rethink about it, I'll settle back into Izzy, which is my front runner at the time.

But dude, that's, it's bad. That's the second most aesthetically perfect K.O. I've ever seen other than the Francis uppercut, which is, I think, the most cleanliest, like perfect punch that has ever landed in fighting. What a knockout. It was. Scary, scary stuff. And the last thing I want to touch on before we go to the peep, Shaheen, I think you're

the perfect guy to discuss this with Tony Ferguson versus Patty Pimblet, it happens. I don't know what you're talking about. It happened, Shaheen. Patty Pimble gets the victory. Unanimous decision. Was it the performance Patty was set out to get? No.

But a win is a win. He had the corn rows, long layoff. He just needed to get back in the win column. I thought he handled the post fight very, very well, putting Tony over as a legend and everything that happened there. But Dana said, Tony, you got to be done. That's it. Like, I want to see him retire.

I don't know if that's what's actually going to happen. But for moments, Tony looked like he was alive and ready to go. And then Patty just heard him real bad in the first round. And that's kind of what's been the story of these Tony fights. He has moments. We think maybe this is where he starts to turn things around a little bit. And then a big moment changes the trajectory of a fight. And that's kind of what Patty did and goes on and wins the unanimous decision.

So your reaction to Patty Pimbled's victory and Tony Ferguson's performance, and about as good as he could get in terms of the matchmaking at the moment. It was a worst case scenario. Right? This was my least favorite booking from the UFC of 2023 from the moment. It was first announced for this very reason because this was so predictable because it was a worst case scenario for this fighter who was so meaningful to the history of this division because he did just well enough.

he is too tough for his own good that it's going to justify doing it again. And I know Daniel White's out here saying like he wants him to retire, but that's not saying Tony Ferguson's going to retire. That's saying I want him to. That doesn't mean anything. Tony Ferguson's probably going to fight again because that's who Tony Ferguson is. And this is the BJ Penn thing. This is just BJ Penn all over again.

And Saturday night was just BJ Penn all over again. It was a guy who was too tough for his own good, but actually had zero tools to realistically mount the fight back that he needed to. And now Tony Ferguson's out here tied with BJ Penn, the longest consecutive losing streak in UFC history. I dreaded this day. It was at a certain point, it was inevitable that it was going to come. Now it's here.

It doesn't feel particularly good. And I think there's a very, very, very good chance that because of the way tonight played out, we're probably going to have a night at some point in the next six months where Tony Ferguson's the sole record holder for the worst record for like the most unfortunate record I should say in UFC history in terms of the losing streak and I just I don't know what to say at this point

we've been here a bunch of times already over the last couple years like I've written too many words I've spoken too many diatribes about this and I just I can't muster more at this point like this is just sad this sucks it sucks more every time we see it it sucks more every time we get random anecdotes like the one Chal Sahnem was pulling out on the broadcast Saturday where like Tony Ferguson's father supposedly like pulled him aside and was expressing

concern over this whole thing and talking about how this 39 year old guy doesn't have a real head coach like everything about this sucks and this won't be the last time we have to have this discussion and the legacy of who this guy was and how what he meant to this division deserve better than for a whole entire generation of new fans to just know him as the the generation before new BJ Penn. He's just this eras BJ Penn now, and that is really big bummer, without the championships.

Jed, what would you say? And I guess on the flip side, the whole talk about this fight, the big narrative was, Patty can't gain anything from this. This is a quote-unquote lose fight. Even Patty himself had been saying that. Did Patty gain anything here?

Do you feel like this win is meaningful and pushes him to a new level in any way or like what does pat what did patty actually gain here with this win he got to look good instead of well good Stephen relative he didn't look great frankly

he got to put some distance between him and the Jared Gord performance that's it everything she said she nailed it he's much more attached to Tony than I am I was never a big Tony guy so I do not have the same way but told everyone coming into this

friends and then on several programs this week they're what you guys need to not get your hopes up please don't I know y'all are picking them I know you want it to happen and you're talking yourself into this I did it I did it for BJ I did it for the entire end run of BJ and I kept saying Clay Queda Dennis Siever's not very good he's not very good fighter probably nope can't he's just done can't do it anymore father Tom's undefeated came real hard for Tony. I, you know, Dana, what she said is right, Dana's not going to force him to retire, and I don't

think he should. I don't like a lot of what Patty said with regard to this, but Patty is right in that we cannot make him retire. He is a grown man. He gets to make his own choices and live with those consequences as such. The UFC needs to stop offering him fights. If he would like to continue fighting, they should offer him as release. and say that he can go

ply his wares elsewhere. Karate combat or bare knuckle or whatever it is. No, don't even put that in the world. Don't even put that in the world. It's just what's going to happen. It's just what's going to happen.

But the UFC should no longer be involved in the Tony Ferguson business. He's a great fighter for them. You know, one of the best lightweights of all time. It's it. Some, the life moves real fast.

And I always thought Tony would kind of fall off pretty hard. I didn't even think it'd be this hard though. This has been an astonishing drop off from him. And yeah, it's tough. And then having like David Goggins there, it's just like real weird and just didn't. The vibes are bad. We should we should stop doing this. The one thing I wanted was for Patty to beat the hell out of him so we could be done. And it started that way. And then Patty's just not very good. So he couldn't quite finish the job. He's not, Pat, he's not bad. Like, he's not a bad fighter.

He's a top 25-ish dude. But he's an atrocious striker. And his cardio, maybe he did just, you know, blow his wad, like he said. Like, he just gassed himself out in that first round. But he won one round very, very dominantly and then held on for two against the guy who pretty much couldn't fight back. I just, at this point, there's only, like, one positive outcome. I mean, there's two. Him retiring.

We bring back BJ? Well, I'm okay with this. I would take that as the Tony version. I would take that. Because somebody has to win. Someone has to win and someone has to take the record for most losses. Frankly, that's the only fight I would like to see for either. I'm actually okay with this idea.

Tony will win, I think. I feel like Tony should win. I think Tony would definitely win because BJ has been out of it for a bit, if anything else. But BJ just needs two takedowns, my man. Well, so that's the thing, right? To me, there's only one realistic outcome that could maybe be a positive outcome from this because I just don't think Tony's going to retire

after this. Because if the UFC cuts him, he will go to bare knuckle or he will go to PFL or something and he will just lose to more people that he shouldn't lose to. And it's just going to be gross. I don't want to see that. And he kind of, he is, to me at least, he is someone who is an important enough figure within this division and within a certain era of

this sport that he deserves to go out with the package, the video package and the week of everyone's celebrating him and that sort of thing, the same way Robbie Wald did. The only positive way that this can work out to me is if the UFC, I don't know who's the worst lightweight on the roster with the least amount of wrestling. Because if you put Tonya Ferguson up against anybody with even a handful of wrestling, they're going to take him down and they're going to smother him. And he's just, he was never a good guy with the get-ups. And it's just only declassing. significantly over the course of this run. I don't know who this person would be.

Maybe you signed someone from the regional circuit strictly for the point of like, hey, you're kind of coming in to lose to Tony Ferguson. And then you give him the week that Robbie Lawler had essentially of like, hey, this is your retirement week. We have packages prepared. We're talking about your career this whole time. The whole spectacle. And maybe you can come out on some sort of magical moment with this guy getting like

one on the on the back end. That is the only possible positive way that this works out. maybe it's a UFC 300 setting or something like that. Again, just a big stage. Otherwise, I just, this is painful, man. I don't know. This hurts to watch. Shaheen, if he goes to bare knuckle,

will you talk yourself into it? Or is this the fight that is finally told you on that? I haven't talked myself. Are you sure? Because I saw your Slack messages today. Yeah, that's just being, like, that's just joking around and trying to will something into existence that you know it's not going to happen.

I hated this. with the moment it was booked. This was so obvious what was about to happen. And it happened exactly how I thought it was going to happen. And it's just not, it's not going to get better. I am legitimately trying to find a name here for him. And I have maybe one that probably isn't,

but like, there is. I mean, I am deep down technology. Casey has interesting suggestion building into this one. Let Shehee know what you're thinking. I'm trying to look for another one. Tony Ferguson versus Chase Hooper.

Yeah. You said that earlier, and I think that that might be the closest thing. Chase Hoover can grab up. I think Chase Hooper would. Yeah, but Chase Hooper won't concuss. Seriously concuss. Yeah, but he's very young.

And it works for everybody. It works for the promotion. It works for Hooper. And I think it's a safe way for Ferguson to kind of, you know, pass the torch. You know what? You know, in a sense. You know what?

And it's in the UFC. It's not in some random promotion. No, no, no. Oh, go on. I volunteer his tribute. I will do it. I will lose the weight. I will be.

Are you sure you lose? I'm about 200 pounds right now. I will cut down to as low as I need to. Like within reason, I can't get to like 155. But I can get low. Yeah, 170, easy. Easy. I haven't been 170 since I was like 13.

No, but you're cutting away. You drop 15 pounds of water weight pretty simply. You know what? Whatever it makes. I volunteer his tribute. I will do this because this man deserves to go out on a win. What a guy. I'm sure you lose, Jed says.

Oh, my gosh. I was just joking around. I think he'd lose. I'm not 100% positive, but I'm like 99%. dude there's nobody there's I'm digging through the depths of tapology I'm like nope I mean what about Joe honestly

Jordan Levin I was thinking Jordan Levin would just be Jordan Nevin I don't even think maybe Jordan Levitt's going to be then man I honestly think the best chance he has is Connor I don't know man Connor won't take him down and maybe he can just

take Connor down that's it I got that's actually out of a bad one. No, because if he won tonight, if he won tonight, he probably would have gotten Connor and Nate next. Yeah, but if, but if he,

but if Connor punches him hard, but can't finish him because Tony is still real tough, we do know that Connor cannot fight after seven minutes. Like, that's just not a thing he does very well. It's the only fight I can put together a real winning scenario for him in. I guess,

I think there's some slack of it, but the question is, Dana did a whole, Oh, he should retire. But Dana, you're the boss. You can basically retire him from the UFC. No, they can't. They can't.

From the UFC? From the UFC? Sure, but I think Dana, I think also understands what we've said of like if you cut him loose, it's just going to get worse. Like, and you're not in control of how bad it gets at that point. Yeah, but that's fine. You just don't need to be involved in the business. You know what I did realize for Tony, though?

seven is the exact number that Tapology keeps on their pages for their most recent fights so it says the TKO decision win loses so seven is exactly the number so Tony just is all reds on his Tapology quick hit on the most recent fights that's a shame

that is a bunch of humor still number 67 in Tapology's lightweight ranking honestly what's BJ ranked. Is he ranked? That's the fight. Frankly, that's the fight. Like I said, I'm actually down

for it. It's awful and would make me feel real gross as a person. Yeah, but eligible for ranking for the inactivity. Are better than the old man versus the young lion fights. I guess that's true, but I watched Chuck Tito 3 and that was

pretty grimy. Oh, I was in the arena for that. That was wonderful. and grind me. I don't think Tony's at the Chuck level yet. That's a little too far. Give me,

give me, give me, give me Tony Ferguson versus Joe Lozahn. That's, I like that fight. Give me that. I don't hate that. I'm gonna send,

gonna send Joe out on a win. I like it. I don't hate that. Someone's got, I mean, someone's got to go out on a win, right? What's Joe at this point? He's got to be like almost 40.

Yeah, and he has a fought. He has a fought since 2019. He wanted to fight chase, Super in Boston. And the UFC is like, nah, we don't want to really want to,

we don't want to be in the who really is on this for this card. I'm like, what? In Boston? Like, geez Louise, but we'll see what happens to Tony.

I do want to shout out, uh, do we want to shout out Ariani Lipski, who I think is the low key MVP of this entire card. I thought she looked incredible. She, she just beat the hell out of Casey O'Neill. Best performance to date.

She is putting it all together. Uh, and shout out to Carol Hosa and Arrini Aldanan. She, she, Geez. Like, who would have got, it would have been plus $475 trillion, the odds on that being not only a fight of the night contender,

but being a fight of the year contender, that is going to be on everybody's top. That's going to make some balance for sure. Yeah. That's going to make some balance for sure. What a fun. Fun fact. Mike, I did kind of sell that, sell that fight in our pre-show.

I was like, more on the Adana part, but I was like, I've always been a big fan about Donnas. So I was hoping this will be the make women's bantam weight great again type fight. And it got close. That's the best women's bantam weight fight since what? Holly Misha. Holly Misha. It has to be Holly Misha.

Right? Like that was great. Especially in terms of it was just a fight, not like, you know, a title fight or anything, just a fight. It was just like, holy moly. So just the hospital phone, man. Anytime we get a hospital phone that's like a really like a 2000 retweet, hospital photo.

That was a John Jones, Gususent type photo, you know, that photo of them. And I just, yeah, great, great freaking fight.

Dude, Diego Lopez, man, another, another notch on that man's belt for this year. Dude, just crushing it.

Great. Fun fact, those two women in 15 minutes, landed 350% of the strikes that Colby and Leon managed in the main event. 350 strikes between them. This episode is brought to you by Peloton. A new era of fitness is here.

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Stop wondering. Start gifting. Winners. for less. All right. We'll take a couple questions. We're going to go crazy here. We'll have plenty of time this week to rehash and recap.

Also, Cody Garbrandt is on his first win streak since 2016. Yes, Cody. This is good performance from Cody. But now we're going to get it, Jed. It is deeply smoking mirrors. It is deeply

smoking mirror. But this is what they should have done with him a long time ago. It's like Matt I mean, they tried. And then he blamed up against They tried They were throwing up against like High Carre France and like Pedro Munoz

And like real dudes Because he was like I'm gonna I'm gonna solve it by going to 125 Pedro Munoz he was like a fight that made sense Because like oh Pedro's gonna strike with me And Cody's really good at this So actually Pedro's tough his nails And can throw hooks so Cody's cooked Yeah but then we all just missed that

Like he has been mostly fighting killers Like this is the first time has gotten a little bit of reprieve from that. I mean, besides Trevor, and he did not make that little good. This year, these two back-to-back fights are like the first time he's gotten a chance to like

get his bearings. Well, this is great. This is a setup fight and now he's going to die. Now he's going to fight James of Figurato. And that's how it works. You set you up and now. It's so.

It's how it works. You fat enough the hog before you take it to slaughter. And that's what they're done with Cody. It's going to be off. I don't like the figgy fight. And that's not a bad thing about the UFC. That's how the UFC should do things. That's not the fight.

Figgi Yon is still the fight. No, they already called on. He's fighting song it on. No, yeah, you're right. Okay. Is that official? Oh, yeah, it is official, yeah. Yeah, they announced it.

I was about to go outland on either Dominic. He's getting Figgy. I was about to say either Dominic Cruz two or Pedro Munoz two. Both of those would be really fun. I could live with I could live with Cruz too don't give him Pedro Munoz just do the exact same thing again

Yeah Munoz is still there Munoz is he's still in the game Yeah So Munoz is still very durable And can punch hard And those two combinations Are gonna beat him every time

No but you're right It is Figgie Can't wait for Figgie I wasn't I've been waiting for this for three years All right Mike our beautiful friendship started with me talking about Figgies Smalls fighting Cody Garbrand.

That won you like your first beat the L. Just throwing hooks. Just throwing hooks with each other. Throwing bolos, I believe, was the exact one. Throwing bolos until Garbrand falls down because he's the one who's falling down. It's going to be awesome. I'm so much fun of that fight.

Omar, if Colby retired by the end of 2024, will Colby be remembered in M.MA history or just a footnote in Usman's legacy? Sean, I want to go to you first. this question. Remembered in MMA history is a weird framing for this because will he be remembered? Sure, because I think he's a popular fighter who has a big fan base and who created big events. And so you're just inherently going to be remembered, right?

Like you created enough big moments where people will remember you. How he will be remembered, though, is a different question because I think how he will be remembered is frankly one of the most overrated fighters of his era whose resume did not age. well and does not particularly look good. And like I said, one of the biggest underperformers in a title fight, if you're counting this one, like this was a very, very, very bad showing in a title fight. So he will be remembered because there have been enough memories from him.

I don't know that he'll be remembered in the way that it felt like he probably would be a couple years ago when he was doing the Usman fights. And it felt like he was the obvious next in line, like in this division. Is he going to be remembered as one of the all-time greats that never had the UFC built? No. Okay. No. Okay.

That's what I want to think. Okay. So I think we more remember for going all in and politics into the sport and an exciting fighter too. If anything. Is there another fighter who really has brought in politics as much as he has ever? Not to that degree. Not to that degree. That's sort of my, I wouldn't say concerned.

I'm not because I'm not concerned about it. But I think that that would be the worry of like one of the things he could be remembered for is that he maybe showed a path that's a really gross kind of unsavory path to shortcut your way to making frontrunner money without sort of having the resume there. And I think it's a path that is easily replicably. because he's not particularly good at it, right? Like, his whole shick is that he's like a bad chel sonnin, but like he's really bad at it. And he stumbles over the lines and the lines aren't that particularly clever. And it's just very base level stuff.

And so I think if- There's no humor to it. Yeah. If I'm a fighter coming up who maybe doesn't have the most entertaining style, and I'm seeing the level of attention and money that Colby's able to make, that's certainly a choice now of like, he opens your eyes of like, okay, that's a path that clearly works and hits with the fan base and hits some sort of niche. And if you're even remotely good at speaking and you're able to do that in a better way,

you can probably monopolize on it a little better than he did. So that maybe is like a one way he could be remembered of like he certainly paved some sort of path that I don't know that we would want more of, but I guess some people would want more of. He's not going to get remembered. That's it. I actually have a ton more respect for what he did because I think it was very smart. I think aligning himself with Donald Trump and the MAGRA movement. Totally.

It may not be to everyone's taste. And him doing bad chale, I have less patience because it's not hard to do good chale because chale had writers. You just get people that can make you do this better. But I think aligning politically was really smart. It tapped him into a fan base that, to some extent, cares. They're not loyal, as we all heard them boo him directly after this. They were very pro-Colby until he offered that to them, and then they booed lustily at the end of that fight.

When he is feeding them. Yeah, and they're booing him when he is feeding them the lines that they want, and they're still booing him because it's less about that, and he was very boring, and so they didn't like it. I think that was really smart. It was a very clever way for him to sort of find a way to make himself popular. And I got a lot of respect for that. But I was trying to figure out a comp.

This isn't exactly perfect. But he is Ricardo Arona. Does anyone talk about Ricardo Arona at all? I disagree with that. I disagree with that. When is the last time you had a conversation about Ricardo Arona? He had wins that at the time weren't bad. But what were the big memories that were?

Ricardo Arona created. He had big wins. He got bombed. That's my point. Carter Arona didn't create any big wins like Colby has memories. Like the Mazvedal thing was a giant event. The Usman secret series was giant events. Him chasing after Tyrant for his whole beginning of the title run and calling out

Tyrant in the middle of the media day. I remember I was dead. I don't even remember that. Those were giant things that happened. And those were memorable things that people who were there for that era will remember. Like, Ricardo Orona did not have those. I think we will remember that stuff less because that stuff falls away from like memorable in cage stuff a little more.

And as time removes us, he won't be entirely forgotten because he was an interim champion and there are parts. But he has nothing in cage that jumps out. Like there's, I, the Mosford. Two who's been fights. I just think that's going to age gold. Yeah. Yeah. Great fights.

Yeah, honestly, he's going to be remembered as being an overachiever with a pretty limited skill set. And honestly, pound for pound, he is going to go down as one of the best prize fighters in UFC history. That's how you do it. That is how you do it. You pick off the biggest names that are the least risk and you make as much money as you can.

And Colby did it. Like, he's going to go, is he going to go down as one of the all times? Is he going to be a UFC Hall of Famer? Is he going to have his own plaque? No, but his fight with Kamara Usman is going into the UFC Hall of Fame. The first one is going in. Dana White's favorite fight. So it's going in.

That fight's going in. So he will be remembered. He will be remembered. But he's also like a fighter, like when they showed the, you know, the Bobbo O'Reilly video montage, there's actually going to be no Colby highlights in it, even though. He doesn't have a single highlight. He doesn't have a single highlight. It was just, I think it's very interesting. I think his legacy.

He's not going to get a damn. Yeah. I'm telling you right now he's not getting a damn unless he gets really entertaining. He's the one that really brought in the whatever, whatever you want to call the politicized society we have now. He brought it right in front of us in MMA and just like and didn't and didn't half acid. He just went all in, which I've given credit on that, I guess. You just went all in.

I think like Michael Chandler kind of, he puts his toe in the, you know, the political spectrum publicly a little bit, even though him and Colby, pretty much the same person, like politically, but Kobe just goes all in on it. And I think that's what, that's his legacy.

And, yeah, and changing, I'm changing, really, I'm sure. I don't know. I think he will be remembered

as the dude Usman beat. Like, when he gets remembered, it will be, oh, yeah. I think in 15 years, he's just going to kind of be forgotten. Well,

he's Camaro's signature rival. Like, that's, I think you're right in that regard. Like, that will be, The in cage part of it, that will be his sort of MMA legacy as he is Camaro's signature rival for whatever that era of the Welterweight's vision was. He made Usman.

He put Usman over the top with that first fight. When Usman finishing him, he made Usman that night. A thousand percent. Usman was disliked. Usen was thoroughly disliked until that. He was the boring fighter until that fight. And then he was like, oh cool. Look at Usman doing the thing.

He did the thing. He did the thing. Wish we could say the same for Leon. Oh, wow. Full circle. Yeah. Leon did the thing with the head kick. That was enough.

Leon has a signature highlight. He already did his thing. This could have been another thing for Leon, but I think it's just going to be, you know, just. It's a notch. Leon has put me in. How many of GSP's title defenses do we not even begin to remember? Because they were very uninteresting. Oh, you're not invited to the GSP.

damn. That's fine. Don't bring me that. Anyway, because I didn't want to rewatch much most of those fights anyway, to be honest. How dare you? How dare you? Hey, he's the goat. Yeah.

All right. I'm really starting to think DJ's the goat, guys. I know that's a ridiculous thing. It's like DJ could still be running shop in this freaking weight class right now. Dude, DJ, I, DJ's my goat. He is. He's my goat. I don't hate it.

I think about it every time Joe Rogan, because Joe says a lot of stuff that I don't agree with, and I'm not even sure this is true, but every time Flywates are fighting, and he's just like, man, look at how technically freaking good these dudes are. And I'm like, yeah. And we all just are super pumped about John,

lording over a division full of people who suck ass because Light Heavyweight is trash, man. like flyweight rules and it doesn't have the legacy of the lineage totally get it and i understand that side of the argument but i don't know the more i watched was like man dj dj might just been the dude i'm big on that j j threw a man into the air and armbard him on the way down if that's not goat shit i'll know for a record for to like set the all-time record that was his yeah he was he was cruising to a 5045 victory he's like you know what let's have a little fun he rematched his biggest rival and sent him

to the shadow realm like DJ King. King shit. And I guess quick question last question. Yeah, last one. Biggest winner slash loser tonight. I mean, Biggests loser is Kobe for sure.

It feels like he at least just tangibly in the space, it feels like he took a major hit. Like you would see a lot of people turning against him right now on social media, whether it's fighters or fans or whatever. Like, it feels like this one was a very meaningful moment for him in a way, in like not a good way. So the fans aren't buying it. They're not buying that he, that it was a corrupt judges and a conspiracy.

And he really won the last three rounds. None of the fans are buying. He's not even buying it. I haven't looked any, I haven't really, I've looked at no social. So I don't really know how, how the, the fans just boot him thing. So it's just, the issue with a stick is it's. if you're it falls apart at some point particularly if your stick is being the exact opposite of who you actually are as a fighter and you're aligned with the person who by his own definition like is only

interested in winners and you are not one of those that's pretty tough to overcome is the biggest winner emitt because he like might have retired if he lost that fight and now he's like kind of biggest image Sean Strickland and Strickland just made a lot more money than they previously would have incorrect. Sean Strickland just made a lot more money than he would have. Fair, fair. Drick's, Triggis' pay did not change whatsoever because he will not get paper viewpoints for that fight. But when Drickis takes the belt, probably bought himself a brand new tractor or whatever he buys.

I don't know what Sean Strickland buys. Lots of guns. Lots of guns. That fight's going to be insane. That fight's going to be more insane than we think it's going to be. Dude. I remember when I was so excited about that fight and now everyone's there and I'm pumped about it. Sean Strickland has completely taken all of the Izzy DDP mojo and taking it for himself. Like all of the hype that we have for Strickland DDP is exactly what we would have been feeling for Izzy DDP.

And Sean Strickland has just taken it. But that's what I'm amazed at the sport. Like we know when we have like, what was it, Almeida had that horrible fight against, I can't remember who he fought. We're like, oh, I give up on him. How many times do we say that about Strickland in some of his main events? Oh, I don't care about him. I don't care about Strickland. And now we're so hyped to pay $80.

bucks to watch him fight. It's weird. I mean, he dummied up one of the 15 best fighters of all time. That gets you a lot. Yeah. Get you a lot. He was the moan and grown. Here's the moan and grown.

He might have, he was the moan and grown apex main event guy for two years. Yeah. It's like, oh, God, it's a Sean Strickland made of head. And now look at it. He's, he's fighting of the year, isn't he? He's dead. I was trying not to do it.

I think he has to be. When I look back on this year, I'm going to think about Francis. It was the year of Sean Strickland. In the UFC, it was the year of Sean Strickland. Like, fight of the year.

Camp, I'm sure. He's freaking dropping the worst homophobic slurs and press conferences and getting in fights in the freaking audience. And we're still like, fire of the year. It's just, I don't know how we're here.

We're here. So, question for y'all. And let's end on this because it is incredibly late. Sorry. Is Sean Strickland the most, like, what's the last time we have a UFC champion that's this much of a loose cannon in every way? Where we don't know what he's going to say. You don't know what he's going to do.

You don't know what he's going to, what kind of performance is he's going to put on. Like, you put him in any situation whatsoever, and he is 10 out of 10 loose canton. There's never been anyone remotely close to this. Truth. There's a pretty decent argument that, like. Maybe John. to some degree, but not like this. Not like this.

It's a different way of being insane. Yeah. We would never have seen John. You could extend this to other sports. You could extend this to other sports. No. Alexander Gustafin in the crowd. You can extend this to other sports.

This is like, Sean Strickland is the, he is the Mike Tyson zone. Bill Simmons' famous Mike Tyson zone of, if a headline came out saying Sean Strickland did this, you would believe any headline. Sean Strickland is like in that and he is the U.S.

middleweight champion. What headline would you not believe? You couldn't give me one. Other than like Sean Strickland deeply respects all people and their value systems or whatever. Like this is just that's it. Like he, it is entirely up in the air, which is really fun. If you just kind of set particular parts of a moral compass aside. because like chaos is entertaining

it was legitimately funny because he's he's never been entertaining it was legitimately I think it was actually like a super shitty move from him but it was like it is partly entertaining to be like hey Gilbert's lovely family could you could you step over here briefly and like it in my read on is it looked like

Drick has just kind of thought they were going to face off with each other he's like yeah come here like he's trying to play this up and then He was like, yeah, move over, I'll step over, and then, wham! It's like, farted a lunatic, man. Just one foot on the chair. He does his box step-ups. There's no doubt about it.

One foot on the chair and just launched himself into the sky and started dropping hammer fists on DDP. All the angles of that skirmish, depending on which angle you look at, the fight looks 14 different ways, and it's hilarious. Every different angle looks like a completely different fight. It's fascinating. Cheeto looks Chito probably stoned out of his mind

just enjoying whatever the hell is happening. Just think of it in the last like in the last like four months Sean Strickland has had one of the greatest upsets of all time held a man at gunpoint outside of his house and like kicked him on camera in the street

started a melee with Driggis duplicacy for no real reason in the middle of a crowd and I'm sure there's like four other things that I can't think of it right now. After he won the belt, he spent the whole post-fight presser just being like, oh, this is great.

Like, I'm just a piece of shit. Look at me. I guess this is, I don't care. Like, just being like, like a deeply charming and like, approachable individual. And he comes on,

does this next week. The man contains multitudes. You something. What? It's, wow. Wow. And somehow,

Now, in an event where he wasn't even competing, he's easily the biggest story of this weekend. Yep. He sure is. The fighter of the year. That's the fighter of the year more than likely. If we're allowed to put Francis down, maybe I'd pick Francis. You can do whatever you want, my friend. It's your world.

I mean, you should not give me that part, Blanche. You know what I can do with. It's a public ballot. So people will see what you do. Boy, if he and Gary found on this card, you might have a different conversation. honestly he would have gone he goes out Dost Rukee 4-0

Yeah he might be the Colby's the biggest loser but like Ian Gary who right there this this week Also goes from fighting Lucke to Jeff Neal This is either going to be This is either going to remember it as like the worst week of Ian

Gary's professional career or the turning points into like greatness for him So we'll see how it all plays out Shut out Happy New Year. Happy holidays. Yeah. Shout out to them as well. Great performances. And that's it, everybody. And thank you to all of you. What a year it has been covering this crazy ass promotion. Thank you for watching. Good night, everybody. I love y'all so very much. Happy holidays. You're listening to the Vox Media Podcast Network. Boating for Flight 246 to Toronto is delayed 50 minutes. Ugh, what?

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