MMA Fighting - UFC Mexico Post-Fight Show | Reaction To Brandon Moreno Breaking Hometown Curse In Main Event

Episode Date: March 30, 2025

Brandon Moreno got the job done on Saturday night, and left his hometown crowd smiling and cheering after UFC Mexico. After breaking his UFC curse in Mexico City, will his victory over Steve Erceg get him a championship opportunity in his next fight? Following Saturday’s UFC Fight Night event, MMA Fighting’s Mike Heck and Jed Meshew react to Moreno’s victory, discuss what it gains him in the short term, along with Erceg’s performance in his third straight defeat. Additionally, they discuss Manuel Torres’ devastating stoppage win over Drew Dober in the co-main event, referee Mike Beltran allowing the fight to go on much longer than most wanted it to, Raul Rosas Jr. getting a win over Vince Morales, other standout performances from the main card and prelims, and much more. Follow Mike Heck: @m_heckjr 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

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 will 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. You're listening to the Vox Media Podcast Network. There they are, everybody, the victory horns. And for the first time, as a UFC fighter in Mexico, they sound for the assassin baby, Brandon Moreno, the curse is broken.

Brandon Moreno wins the main event in a technical, high-level flyweight main event at UFC. Mexico. and we are here to talk all about it here on the UFC Mexico post-fight show. Hi, everybody. Hope you guys enjoyed the Fista Cup and fights that transpired tonight. I am Mike. And joining me to recap UFC Mexico is the hot take-it, Mr. No Gray area himself. The climber.

What a climber he is as that climb continues to go up the mountaintop after UFC Mexico, the one and only Jed Michoud from MMAfighting.com. How are we feeling, Jed? Lots of climb action today. It was stressful, buddy. It was a, and I knew it would be, like, I knew that I didn't need to do this, but we were 13 steps down, got, wanted to get to the halfway point. I almost did two, like the two that I thought about do.

I thought about doing four steps. The two I didn't do were just the, the most stressless things that ever existed. And the two I did, I, I at various points, like, at this. it. I'm cooked. It's over. Sadness and terrible things you can see down behind me. I haven't ever shown this and maybe I'll do it a little later in the show because it's kind of a big thing. I have a climb board. We are officially halfway up the mountain though and as stressful as it was. We got that done. And then frankly, Mike, it was just a pretty damn good night of fights,

right? Like not everything was a winner. There were some ups and down. Some of the prelims, There was like a stretch of multiple decisions that were, you know, at least fun anyway, even if they didn't get the finish. And then things just really sort of started popping off in the main card. I know there were a bunch of booze and whistles in the main event. I'm sure we'll talk about the whole thing of that. But I just had a really good time tonight watching some fist fights. All I could think about watching this card was Mark Shapiro saying,

look, our fans, they don't care whether it's in a 20,000 seat arena for a pay-per-view, or if it's fight night on the road, or if they're, They're watching fights from the mighty apex in Las Vegas. It's all looks and sounds the same. Not the case because Mexico crowd, whether you liked the cheers or you didn't like the booze, they were boisterous, they were into it, and they hated Henry Sohudo,

but they loved Alex Pereira. It was just an emotional ride all around UFC Mexico with the crowd. And all in all, like, I agree with you. This was a good fight night card. wasn't the best fight night card but it was a very good fight night card and i think if you stayed home and didn't go apple picking or go to the oyster festival in your local town you had a pretty damn good time today jemishu did we not like this is fun this is this is what it should be definitely and this is like i i said coming out i thought i really liked this card i thought this car was going to be

fun the mexico crowd makes things better not having any heavy weights or light heavy weights makes things better. The top end, I mean, also just like the matchmaking was really well designed for this card. We talked about a lot in the preview show. The co-main event, I'm sure there would be many words spared on that, but on paper that fight is going to deliver something saucy. The main event's obviously very good. A couple of big, like, really high-end prospects getting set up fights, let's call them that,

you know, like, and they get to perform. Like, this was just a well-made card to suit the event. And that's why we knew it would probably be pretty fun. You know, if we're doing the AK gymnastics, I don't know if we got to as high as what this card could have been, but it was still like a damn good time. And like this was not an apple picking card. If you had other things to do,

it's not the end of the world to miss it. But again, man, like we do. I do these post shows every week at this point. I think I've done one every week this year that there has been an event. Sometimes I'm not all that stoked to be there. I had a great time tonight. I just, you know, I really enjoy. the fights and this is not an event i'll talk about for years on end but this is what you hope to get

when you are an mama fan and and you're spending so many saturday nights in front of the tv we have bonuses and very quickly too jett in the shoe wow that is quickly did you see them i did not you want to take a gander the bonus sure what i want to tell i love the guessing game yeah let's do the guessing game is interesting so i'm gonna guess I don't know if they can give Manuel Torres one because Mike Beltran let a guy die

I'm gonna say Edgar Chira's got one for the face crank maybe I'm just caught up because is very emotional in fact I'm gonna say no fight of the night though I think you could have awarded it and I'm gonna go with four performances I will give one to Manwell Torres I will give one

to Edgar Chirres I will give one to Atiba Gauthier and I will give one to let's go Jamal Lemmers Jamal Amish did not get a bonus. So were there four bonus, no fight of the night four performances though? Okay. There were.

So if Jamal didn't, then David Martinez. Yes. There you go. That's also fine. I think Jamal Emers is better than David Martinez, but I don't know. It's six, one, a half dozen of the other. Yeah. But yeah.

I mean, that's just how it played out. And unfortunately, for my fantasy team, not only did Rodriguez lose, I couldn't even have gotten a fight of the night now that I think about it because they fucking missed weight. So I still couldn't have got it anyway. That's tough. Oh, God.

I was like, all right, dude. That's good production, Casey. Great job. I'm just getting trounced in this fantasy game that we're playing. June 30th cannot come soon enough so we can redraft it. We could try this again. But let's talk about Brandon Moreno.

He was not on the losing fantasy team. He, in fact, wins, gets a dead. done, good technical scrap with Steve Urseg. What do you grade Brandon Moreno's performance? All three judges scored the fight exactly the same, 49, 46, all gave Brandon Moreno rounds one, two, four, and five. All three judges gave Vinnie Sig's round three. It was unanimous across the board.

How do we grade Brandon Moreno's performance in the main event? Somewhere between an A minus and a B plus, somewhere in that sort of range, because I really enjoyed the fight. I don't know that everyone enjoyed it. I don't think this is not a fight of the year contender realistically. It's not something we'll go back and revisit, but it was just a high level mixed martial arts. I thought that the tactics at play, sort of the adjustments that both dudes were making over the course of 25 minutes was fun. Brandon Moreno's strategy was appealing. I thought that he would mix in the wrestling much more than he did. Early on, he was targeting the body, which I thought he would do, and he kind of got away from that as he just kept having success

targeting the head, so he sort of focused less on the body. Did a lot of stuff I wasn't expecting, looked good. The only reason I'm knocking him points, so he's an A minus or B plus here is just the circumstances he is in right now, because though some people thought he beat Pantosia in that third fight of theirs, he did not officially, very competitive fight. He didn't do anything to make me said, man, he's got to fight for the belt again. Like he's got to do this sooner rather than later. get there just by being the second best dude in this weight class and you give him enough time

we'll get another like crack at it but i think like this was an opportunity because every fight is an opportunity for him to make a real statement of hey i demand it like it's i i got short shrift the last time out i am the guy who gets it and he didn't do that so kai kare france despite him having a win over kai kare france probably in front of him in the pecking order menel cop certainly in front of both of them at this point. And so, you know, he didn't make the statement that you may be like in an A plus perfect world he would have made. But still, he did not look diminished.

He didn't look like, oh, Brandon Moreno is on the back nine. Now it's like, yeah, that's still in my estimation, the second best flyweight on earth. So terrific. That's good. Yeah, I think B plus is a pretty fair score. Here's one thing I will say, though, because there was a big announcement today. UFC, which one was it? 320 is going to be in Guadalajara,

Nocha UFC Part 3. And I'm here to tell you, September, yeah, it's like 13th or something like that. It's one of those, yeah. Yeah, whatever that Saturday is. I can, I will say, and I obviously have no insight to this, the fight just ended. I feel quite confident that Brandon Marino will be fighting for the flyway title

on that card. in some way. May not be the main event. He is fighting whoever wins the next time. Well, I mean, or they just bench pants until that card. You know what I mean? Just to get Moreno in there. Because even if he gets it, first of all, that fight is going to be awesome,

just like their last fight was. And I know Pantosia has the multiple wins over Moreno, including the ultimate fighter one, and I get that. But that second fight or that third fight, the one we saw UFC 290 was a friggin' banger. One of the best fights, one of the 10, 12 best fights we've seen in the last like five years. It was outstanding. And I don't think anyone would have a problem with that outside of Minal Cop or Kai Kar-Franz.

And now I'm not sure where they're going to go with this Jed because we thought Kai Kar-France was going to get this title shot as soon as, as early as UFC 314. That was like one of the rumored title fights on that card. we don't know what Pantos is doing Manel Cop's teasing that he's fighting for the belt but when is that going to happen there's all these reports we've had 17 freaking title fights reported for the June pay-per-view card

which is still yet to have been announced by the UFC if you had to take a guess right now based on what happened tonight and I know meritocracy be damned in a lot of respects now that we know that the UFC is going back to Mexico in September who is Kai Kar-Franz gonna defend his title

against next Kai Kar-France is not going to defend his title at all because Kai-Car-France doesn't have a time He doesn't have a time. Who is Alexander Pantosia going to defend his title? So what you're telling me is you think Kai-Car-France gets the next title fight and wins and that happens in the next two months.

Yeah, Pantosia is going to walk down the street, drop his belt out of his bag, Kai-Car-France is going to pick it up and he's going to bring it to the next time he fights. But will he be fighting for the belt that he currently holds, I guess. I think that there is now a slightly more realistic possibility that Moreno fights for the belt just because doing it for Noce UFC 2025 in Guadalajara.

Like, yeah, I think that makes a lot of sense to have Brandon Moreno in a big time position for a belt there. If they're going to do that, I think that means that Pants has to defend his belt against cop in June. because you can pass over Kikar friends. That's fine because Marino had like finished him. So you can be like, well, you were kind of going to get one because nobody else was going to get one. But you're also behind Moreno pretty clearly, I think. So like cop feels like he's got too much momentum. So if you do that in June, that gives you an immediate turnaround.

But Pantosha is a team player. I think they'd be comfortable doing that. And so there is a real world, I guess, where Moreno does get to get a title fight because of how the how the board is opening up for him. If I had to guess, I will still err on the side of, they're just going to put Moreno on that card. Frankly, maybe they do the Roy Valle three match. You know, I know Roy Valle was supposed to be fighting earlier this year,

pulled out with like concussion symptoms. So I don't know sort of what his timeline is to return. I suspect that by September that that should clear up and they can do that. And then the winner of that just gets a title fight. And I think that that's viable as like a five round co-main event, not necessarily for a belt with, you know, you attack somebody else on as your main event. Sean Amalley is, he rematches with Marab and you do that.

I don't know. So interesting to see how that plays out. Because you are right. The Noche thing makes it much more likely that Marino gets to fight for a belt in September. We shall see how it plays out. it's Brandon Moreno, what a year he's had. It was a tough 24, tough run, had the two-fight losing streak,

really needed to win against Amir al-Bazi, put on a masterclass bad night. Vinnie Siggs, say what you will about him. Awkward, maybe not the guy you build a promotion around aesthetically. However, pretty damn good fistfighter. I'd like to see him get a little more aggressive, land some big shots, actually try to hurt somebody. I mean, you can obviously hurt Matt Schnell in fights

because most people who have fought Matt Schnell over the last four or five years has been able to do that. But it just seemed like Steve was landing a lot, but just wasn't putting a whole bunch behind it. If he could just take a little bit of what Brandon Moreno was throwing tonight, take some of that energy into what he was trying to do tonight, might have had a little bit more success.

But this 4946 for Stevie Vinnie Siggs, Jed, this is not one of those like, oh, this is a clear 4946. there are people who scored the fight 4847 for Steve Ursaig and if that was one of the judges scorecards I don't think either one of us would have come on this program and blasted that judge, would we? It would have been fine. I think it would have been like on the tighter end of fine, right?

Like everything's a spectrum. I think that that still falls on the side of that's acceptable. Some of those rounds are very competitive. I'm going to go rewatch this fight at some point to... I scored 946. I felt like that was right. But again, a lot of those rounds were close. And certainly if you're Caged side, you're getting a different angle.

Maybe you're seeing something different. I think it's within the margin of error to give it to Steve Bersig. But I don't think it necessarily happened and like should have happened. And so even if it would have been okay, it's better where we got to it. It would have been really tough for Moreno to lose like that splity today, right? That would have been really, really hard. But for me, like, this was the Erseg, the Erseg fight was very interesting. Because he looked really good in stretches.

And I was live blogging it. And I stumbled upon this as it was live blogging it. But honestly, watching it, it really jumped out to me. I thought Steve Erseg was having a good fight and a bad contest, if that makes sense. It was like, if this was a street fight, he's having a really good fight. Like, he was like, okay, I'm working through some things. I'm trying to figure out how to adjust. I'm protecting myself more than anything.

Like his defense was very good. He was eating some shots, but he kept making adjustments. But those adjustments were never like, oh, my adjustment is going to be to score more effectively to win in the eyes of the judges. It was, I'm going to keep landing because he did land shots. And like if that fight goes on for six hours, maybe Steve Erick just sort of wins a war of attrition with slightly better defense and consistent offensive output in like a very limited section. But instead this was a 25 minute conduct. And Brandon Moreno sort of had, as the commentary team kept saying, had the easier to identify moments when he landed big shots, Ersegg's head moved back. He, the optics were bad.

And so I thought this was an encouraging fight for him because, again, he is still very young in his career, right? This is like 60 UFC fight because he got shot up so fast, maybe too many expectations on him. But he just fought again, I think Brandon Murdo is the second best flyweight on Earth. and he just had a very spirited effort with him, particularly coming off a knockout loss, ate a bunch of clean shots from a guy who, you know, not a, doesn't hit like a with a purse or whatever. Like he's strong enough.

So encouraging, not the outcome he wanted, but I don't think he should hang his head too low from this one. Yeah, I would agree. It was just, it was just an interesting fight to watch. And I felt heading into the championship rounds. There was a part of me because of, you know, I don't bet a lot, but there's a part of me that's like, I might just take a little sprinkle on on Vinnie Sigs right now because the momentum is clearly in his favor after that third round.

And you could have made a case after the third that it was 29, 28 Erseg because I thought he was pretty competitive in round two. Round three, I thought he clearly won, which is how the other three judges saw it. Round four is clearly Moreno. And then round five was really close until the end. but I thought Moreno was kind of like just squeaking out some of those moments that mattered on the judge of scorecards but the take down at the end solidified it and just everything around it.

Big win for Brandon Moreno. We'll see where he goes. That's what capped off UFC Mexico. Manuel Torres just kind of beats the soul out of Drew Dober, kept landing right hands over and over again, hurts Drew badly. Certainly beat the brains out of him. God damn. Yeah.

Drew Dober out of desperation, grabs a single leg. and Manuel Torres just drops bomb after bomb after bomb all over this man and we're all sitting there watching on our television screens watching Drew Dober do nothing in defense of this.

Mike Beltran we're all yelling, stop this. What are we doing here? This fight is over. Mike Beltran is sitting there rubbing his hands together. It's like he's looking at a bowl of spaghetti

that he just desperately wants to eat and he's like, ooh, in about like 30 seconds, I'm going to eat this spaghetti. And just watched it happen. And then finally he steps in to the point where Drew Dober actually stood up on his feet, was veering off to the side, it was standing up like thinking the fight was still happening. That's how effed up that dude was because of all these unnecessary, unanswered punches that Manuel Tauras hit him with.

They sit him on the stool. He has no idea what has happened. He looks angry at the stoppage, but I truly don't even think he knew. that he was in a fight at that moment because he got banged up so badly in that moment because Mike Beltran allowed this fight to go on about 15 seconds longer than it needed to. So your reaction to obviously a huge win for Manuel Torres, biggest of his career, he's coming off of a stoppage loss to Ignacio Baja Mondays. And the story is more about Mike Beltran in a lot of people's eyes than it is about

Manuel Torres getting the biggest win of his UFC career. This is really bad stoppage. and I think of our website I believe I am the most generous in allowing fights to go long because I am pretty okay with an extra shot or two getting landed you don't like want it

but I would rather you err on the side of one shot too many than one shot too few because every fighter I've ever spoken to or heard speak is like yeah let me go out on my shield and I ultimately think the difference between this isn't boxing where the difference of all right you stood up go back out there and take 27 more shots i think the difference between like two extra shots and not is is just not that much to really

concern me this was the difference in 15 consecutive unanswered head strikes to a man who was not conscious he may not have been flatlined but like he was clearly doing that like hey, you know when an animal dies and its muscles all just seize up and lock, that's what happened. Drew Dover's body just seized up and held the foot as he just kept getting his head bashed in. This is a really, really, really bad stoppage from Mike Beltran. Mike Beltran has been working for a very long time. He has roughed a lot of fights. I do not know what is going on in his head that he thought that needed to continue.

Like five of them? Okay, yeah, he's holding the leg. Six of them, he's holding that leg, but I'm not really sure that it's seven, hmm, eight, is he still nine? No, surely he's like, how many of them does it take? The answer to get to the center of that particular Tutsi Pop was 15. Unanswered strikes to the head. It was incredibly bad.

It was made weirder by the fact that Dober was clearly so rattled. He had no idea what was going on and then was livid about it. it and I suspect that tomorrow morning he will rewatch this fight and be mad for a whole different reason justifiably at Mike Beltran for hurting his long-term mental health. So really, really tough scenes, but great performance from Manuel Torres. I mean, this dude, he got a bonus, you said Mike, right? Yep. In five UFC fights, he has four bonuses and one loss and the loss, Ignacio Bahamondez,

got a bonus for putting it on his ass. This dude is certified gold when he comes tune in because somebody's getting 50K. So congrats to him. Looked really, really good, man. Yeah, just terrific matchmaking there. Let's give this guy a test against a veteran who hits really hard. And you know, you can get a knockout win against him that obviously ages pretty well in the long run.

People love Drew Dover. Edgar Shira is what a perform. Casual's comment. Casey, throw actual casual. It's great because his name is actual casual. and this is either an elite joke. It's either an elite joke because his name is actual casual

and it works or you are an actual casual and so it also works on that because I thought it was a fine stoppage. Yeah, Dober had the leg at any point. No, he couldn't. At any point he couldn't have because he was not conscious.

His face was in the mat in the same way that when I am asleep at five in the morning, I can't do jumping jacks. He couldn't have done shit. So this is either. a really good joke or you are very, very casual. And I don't know which one, but either way, God bless you.

Yes. Yeah. I mean, look, there's always one person in the space who will defend that type of thing. When 99% of the MA community is on one side, there's always that one that says, not me, not me, sirs, not me. Shout out to Edgar Chiraz. What a moment for him. Gets a quick submission of C.G.

Vergara, emotional moment, gets his 50K. what a performance from him. That dude is a problem. He is a gigantic flyweight. And it seems like he's figured out the weight cut. And he's a problem. Man is an absolute problem. How about Raul Roses Jr., Jed Bishu,

the entire Mexican crowd. What's that? That man took years off my life tonight. Raul Rosa Jr.? Yeah. Oh, was that climb. He was leg two of the climb. He was the second.

There were two legs of the climb. this week. He was one of them. Who? Vince Morales, Wiley veteran, not an easy man to defeat. Not an easy man to submit. Crafty,

tricky little grappler on that mat as you probably sweat it out for a moment. It looks like Rall Rost Jr. was big trouble. You've exercised some patience. Had that dog in M. Jedd Michoud that we're

looking for. You know, Leon Edwards has the Chihuahua, as you said, heading into UFC London and heading out of UFC London. Raroos Jr. A little bit more.

A little bit of a bigger pup out of that 20 year old. He battles through and gets a unanimous decision win over Vince Morales. And heading into that fight, I was like, man, I hope he has a new catchphrase. I hope Chihuahuis goes away and he says something else crafty that can get us through the next six or seven months

because I couldn't be more over Chihuahueees. I could not be more over it. Just shoved down our throats. The Mexico crowd was just cheered it on. and I understand it, but Marl Ross Jr. gets the win. Forget the Chihuihuahuis gets it done. The kid is 20, and people are kind of shitting on him on Twitter. I do you, is there justification for this 20-year-old kid in a big spot on a big card,

just getting dumped on after beating a wily veteran like Vince Morales? So there's a lot of play here. I want to address Chihuahuis first because I'm fine with it. I don't understand it at all. And I've accepted that I'm getting older. this is me being an old man. And I just don't, I don't get it. But if people like it, I'm cool with it.

What I had an issue with, I don't have an issue with Raul Roses Jr. doing it because it's his thing. I had the issue with them doing a promo package that was entirely about it. And within a two-minute span, it was basically just saying Chihuis over and over again. If you did that with literally any word in the English language, even a good word, like, I don't know, pick your favorite word. Putting. Putting is a wonderful word. If you just said it 17 times in span of 10 seconds, it would get old.

So that's my issue with it. But him doing it being the gimmick, I don't get it. I don't have to get it. It's not for me. It's for other people. And that's okay. As far as the shooting on Roller Roses Jr. thing, I think that's obviously a little bit silly because he's 20 years old. And I don't know, he's pretty damn good for being 20.

I have been very skeptical about his, like, sealing for his entire career. Just because, like, he's 18, he's 17. I mean, he has some talent, but I don't know that he has sort of the raw athleticism that I want to see from like a really top-end prospect. He's not a bad athlete. And I don't know. I have concerns about his growth. I do think he is growing. I don't think he is growing at a rate commensurate with like, ah, this dude is going to be a champion by like the youngest champion or whatever that he wants to.

But also growth isn't linear. He could take a big leap. I thought this fight was mostly positive. positive, though I do think the major concern that I have for him is still there, in that his game is still pretty limited, right? Like he showed a couple of things with his hands, but he got him down. And when Vince Morales, Vince Morales didn't do anything different.

Vince Marales did the same thing over and over again because it was clearly what they drilled and prepped, and it kept working. And so Rao Roos Jr. just held him. I saw some people online score that fight for Vince Morales. I don't think that's indefensible. I did not do it that way,

but I think that there is an argument that you could certainly score that fight at draw and could give Morales the second round because Roses did nothing but hold position because he just ran out of ideas. He had the, like he would get him down and he could get to the back and he can get the one hook,

the downside hook in, but he could never get it over. Morales kept clearing it, and he was so concerned about not losing the position, he wouldn't give up his grips to do something else. else. So I have concerns long term, but ultimately he's 20 years old. He's still going to get, like he's going to get better. He's very accomplished for his age and showing what he can.

And like showed some real toughness, some real grit. Like he's, he got that sandpaper in him to avoid that. Because that third round, people could be in a lot worse trouble than he ended up. And he stayed, stayed tough throughout. So I think you should mostly take away positives, but we can be measured and be like, okay, we can, you know, let's just keep seeing him develop and not be like, straight to the top, get this man into the top 15. I don't think he's ready for that whatsoever. Yeah, I know he heading in, he wanted a ranked dude next. No.

Don't do that. No, no. So far away from this. I would say, and I'm just going to, the Otno long time every week, Otno listeners, know where I'm going to this. He fights to Ma'am Blackshare next. That's like the next logical step up. Top 38 to 40-ish guy who's got some decent wins under his belt.

I don't mind that matchup. I think that's fine. Anywhere close to that, like from anywhere like five spots higher or into the near the top 15 is just absolutely assidine matchmaking for him right now. So little baby steps. Demand Blackshare is a tough fight for him. And DeMond's nowhere near the top 15 right now. So I think that's that's good. matchmaking. I would also keep him far away from David Martinez, who was one of the heroes of the

card. Again, terrific matchmaking. They put him in this spot, put him up against Simon Olivera, knowing exactly what was the probability here. He was going to go out there and get a quick finish. And boy, did he. What a performance. Looks like a superstar tonight. I'm very excited to see how he develops because I've been high on him for a long-ass time. He obviously had a great run in Kambate. His look. own loss is to Gianni Vasquez, who is one of the best fly weights and bantam weights outside of the UFC right now, in my opinion, a guy who could absolutely be on contender series this year, a guy who could get a straight up signing from the UFC.

That's the guy he lost to. It was a close split decision, kind of controversial. But other than that, he's just dussing up everybody and none of these fights are even all that competitive. this guy out of just sort of the low-key heroes of the night, this David Martinez probably tops the list for me. Oh, that's a good question about that. I mean, I was pumped because I really like David Martinez.

I think he was one of those dudes who even going into Contender Series. I knew him from Good Combata Run. Like most people who are super hardcore or like watching the other stuff knew that David Martinez is a guy who could have just been signed out right. He didn't need to do the Contender Series thing. I'm sorry, Dr. David Martinez, my apologies. I love that so much. Give him his appropriate honorific.

He earned that degree, much like you should call me Dr. Jedmishu, but we'll come to that another time. David Martinez, I really loved him on Contender Series. He was so pro-ready. He's like one of those pro-ready dudes that came and there's like, yeah, you toss him in. He's immediately, like, he doesn't have to develop. He needs to continue to grow and get better, but he doesn't have to learn how to fight. Royal Rosas Jr. still needs to learn a lot about how to fight.

Like Gautier, Tiba Gautier, he still needs to learn some stuff about fighting. He got it. Dave Martinez already knows how to fight. He just needs to keep adding tools, honing his skills, improving and adding depth. So this was, I thought, a perfect matchup. Like Simon Oliver probably shouldn't really be in the promotion. But like, good enough to, hey, look, here's your entry point. go do something cool he damn sure did yep i'm very high on him the on to the next one pick for him

tomorrow might surprise a lot of people but i don't care i'm i'm going to throw that due to the wolves immediately give him something big and see how he can swim with it or sink with it let's just see Kevin Borhaus, good win, probably fighting for his job, beats Ronaldo Rodriguez. Ronald Rodriguez, what an awful week for that young man. Jesus Christ, Mrs. Wade shows up, has a, I mean, just a clear-cut game plan. This is how you beat him. Ressel him, tackle Kevin Borges. Do not get in a striking match with this man.

Like, this is the blueprint. This is the report on the outside looking in. If he just wrestles and grapples with him, he will win this fight easily. And Ronaldo Rodriguez is like, you know what? I'm going to prove the reports wrong. I'm going to do the exact opposite of that. I'm going to get in the standing match with this dude. And he got dropped twice in the first round.

He tried to make it look cool. He just got dinged up real bad. And then won very few exchanges on the feet and just got pieced up by a guy who was like a plus 340 underdog heading in. good for Kevin Borhouse man good win awful week for an Aldo Rodriguez jeez Louise Jedbushu really really bad stuff from lazy boy

just just the exact opposite of what you want to see he has never been like a fight IQ genius but like this was just especially bad was just like everyone knew that the whole the universe was aware of how he could win this fight but for him and then to also do that while blowing weight is just like all right man

I don't you're incredibly popular he's incredibly popular you know millions of Instagram followers and then like this is a dude who should be trying to do everything right to really maximize what he's got and I don't I don't know what happened because the truth is I don't he's not a bad fighter but I don't think he's going to be like I think if he found a way into the top 15 that would be a good outcome for his career like he never has struck me as like a really high end prospect in that way but this was just a tough setback week maybe you know maybe this will let him get back on and be like all right i got to drill down a little more i got to take this more serious i got to listen my corner corner was telling him to do things i got to make wait and he'll he'll lock in because

this is a week he would rather forget i think yep um markelle mouderas opened the card the splity win jamal emmer's great finish for him but no bonus the one man with the finish he didn't get a bonus was Jamal Emmer's, took all that time off well over a year and gets a good first round finish. And well, no bonus for you. Rafa Garcia beats Vince Fichel, Lupi Godinez, Julia Palastry,

fun fight, especially that third round. Ocasio Costa, three-fight win streak for him, beats Christian Rodriguez. And then the other low-key hero was Atiba Gautier, Jedmishu from Cameroon. A lot of people calling him middleweight in Ghanu. I mean, you want to talk about A plus matchmaking. Boy, do they do it here, throwing him in there with Jose Medina.

That fight, as Jose tweeted, lasted like three minutes longer than we thought it would because Medina ate a bunch of big shots early, but we knew eventually he was going to crumble. Boy, did he? They got something with Gautier, man. Just keep throwing him in there with strikers. Like, do not throw him in there against the middleweight version of Waldo Cortez-A Costa. Do not do what you did to root ballast to Spain. Treat this man accordingly and just chuck them in there with fun strikers.

Yeah, man. Atabra was another dude who's one of my top prospects from African dinner series. He's 22 years old. I compton to Melvin Manhoff. I think middle-way Francis Inganu is a little bit better. But it was mainly just like, hey, here's a dude who hits unbelievably hard and is carved like a god. Like he, that man, the physical disparity between Gautier and Medina was dark. Like, you know, nobody wins a fight just by getting off the bus and winning the bodybuilding competition.

But he won the fight by, like, anybody who knew nothing about fighting could just look at those two dudes at the face off and be like, yep, I'm going to pick that guy. He is going to win. And they would be right. Sometimes in this sport, maybe it's wrong, you know, but it's usually at heavyweights and Roy Nelson's involved. That time I was like, nope, that dude's going to win because that dude looks like he could eat six of me. Yeah, he's, if he just gets with like anybody who can keep him growing,

and I forget who he's working with, so he working with Fortis. He's working with somebody that's not bad right now. But like his story is interesting, like how he got. sort of found and brought into the promotion or into fighting he is clearly very athletic a lot a lot more um patience to his game than you normally see with somebody who clearly has so many physical gifts and has all the tools you could want he's just got to learn how to use them and so i i think they should bring him along incredibly slowly given he's 22 years old and there just aren't that many like super young middleweight prospects.

Just let him kill people for three years. Just the bottom of the barrel dudes. Let him learn how to fist fight. And his dude will fight if not win a belt. Like that his ceiling is holding the belt. No idea if he'll get there. But that is the ceiling he has. I don't know if he trains at Manchester top team, but he's,

I know him and Lorone Murphy are like really, really close. So I think he trains with those guys. But I mean, which is a pretty good team to train with. Lauren Murphy obviously is a very good fist fighter. So develop him in that same way. And if he wants to bounce around a little bit, go to extreme Couture, go to go to, go to Fortis. Go to shit, man. There's lots of places to go to.

But yeah, just keep on developing. Let's figure out how to chain wrestle defensively. Any team, any big team, go get with any big team and let him teach you how to be a fighter. Because you have the potential to win the belt. Not saying he's going to do it. it not saying bet the house this is guy but like he has he had the lowest floor like one of the lower floors because he is still so green frankly um but like obviously his ceiling is through the roof 100% all right well it's bringing e casey lyden and let's talk to you guys

gasey gets sleeves on so that goes to show you and he's eating food i just went to apple my mouth i wasn't ready oh crap we're going to question like that. Damn, I'm looking through Gautier's Tapology now and he fought a man

named Jan Lysak and Yon Lysak two and 27 and as soon as I click him Tapology says

this guy's been flagged as he may have purposely participated in ballots with no reasonable path to victory.

The two and 27 fighter may have been shucking him just great but Goteer beat him so good work. What was that

promotion we were talking about on the on the pre-fight show uh explode fight series oh explode classic oh my god well we look at everybody's brandon braino has two victories and explode so explode dude all the good fighters have victories and explode because that's how you just that's how you juice up the record baby yeah whoever that whoever that guy is that's who the ufc needs to bring in to fight goatee air just bring those guys in bring in j alice bring them all in. Just line them up. All right.

First, super chat. I didn't listen to her post fight, but I've seen some things online about this. Loopy lost the last round because she had to poo. Did she say that? I didn't hear that if she said that. I think she said it in her backstage interview. Oh, you're not. Yeah.

I mean, that would be, look, sometimes it happens. You could convince me that that would make me fight worse. That is weird because mainly in my head, just like you're in the middle of a fist fight, your adrenaline should take away the poo reaction or you just go. Because we've seen that happen and that's less than ideal. But if you have to go and you're trying to hold it in, that would be distracting. Very much so. But I put Google, I Google loopie and poo and no, no, it was like,

this is bad at him. I bet you landed. I said, I got that really turned up what you were looking for. I was like, oh, no, work laptop. I delete, delete. Lupi go to this poo, UFC, Mexico. And then Google asked me, did you mean loopie Godineas poop UFC Mexico? And, uh, yeah, we turned down. Oh, apparently, so apparently there's audio of her saying it in the corner. I just, I twittered it. And they, and I mean, this, that I can't hear the audio. We're doing this. But I can't. can read her face and it sure seems like she is saying, holy shit, I need to poop.

Okay. Yeah, okay. That's what. Yeah, I must have missed it when they're done the broadcast then. Man, you got to do it. Also, she really can't because if she ends up having that, the rest of her career, she's poopy Godinas. You can't like that, I mean, that won't go away.

That lasts forever. Yep. Yeah, not the comments. Unless she gives that, Nick. day to herself then it's okay yeah yeah i mean you can try and steer into the skid i don't think i think you're just stuck it's just one of those like yeah if she just gets on the mic it's just like hey that's poopy godini as to you daniel cornea like that then then you're okay moving up the rankings you gave yourself the nickname yeah you can't make fun of her she makes yeah she she she takes control of it

yeah owns it hey good for her man that third round is awesome oh great third round um yeah go having to poop because it made a great round, yeah. So good on her. I made it fun. Yeah. Julia Pallastry, shout out to her. When Julia Pallastry and Carly Judees actually fight each other at some point,

it's kind of fucking rock. Like, it's got a rule. Those two are just made to fight each other. Yep. Oh. LFC DJ. Do we get a night of fights with no cheating? You know what?

It's so funny. There were a couple. folks, but not. So there's definitely that one thumb in the eye and the Rafa Garcia's Vince Bichel won. Yeah, that was a bad one. Thumb went deep in the eye of Rafa Garcia. That won.

I mean, it wasn't intentional, obviously, but that happened. Might be the only one I can remember. And there was another possible eye poke in that fight, but the ref didn't catch it, so Rafa just kept fighting. I don't think of any others. Yeah.

This is one of the coming out. That's impressive. Yeah. It's one of the cleaner nights. Outside of the Beltran thing, I think everything else was kind of pretty solid from a regulatory standpoint. Yeah. It doesn't seem like there's any like, it wasn't like any horrific judging. Yeah, no horrific judging.

Yeah, if all the judging was fine. I want to chime in when you guys talking about the main event. event. It was really interesting. For the fans, 32% of the fans actually had Erseg winning that fight, which I thought was interesting. Wow. Okay. It's a very high number, but again, I think that's allowable. I think it's too. Okay, so I scored the actual fight. It's a weird thing. I scored at 5-0. I know I'm an outlier. I think that scores, I think that score is acceptable. Yeah. But I acknowledge that two and three, I felt kind of easily going to the ursag like if this was a basketball game and it went to the fourth quarter like

like ran out one each quarter by like two points or something like in a sense that ersig even though he was down four rounds like he was still the fight was incredibly competitive that's why i kind of hate the 10 point mess system because it sounds like it's a blowout but i know it's not but um yeah so um some fans did think erasag win er sag won and uh rounds two and three a majority of fans had Erseg winning those rounds. So just interesting. I think the right fire. I just don't know how you give.

I think there's almost no scorecard that I'm like, that's unacceptable. 5-0 or Seg, I'd be like, all right, that's probably not reasonable, but. 4-1-R-Sage. Probably pretty bad. I think I could still allow it. I think it still falls within the range of what I'd be like, okay.

How could you justify giving him four rounds? because like I'm again I'm when I'm saying this like you're baking in that the rounds are competitive if you're a ringside judge like you're not getting the whole picture you can kind open things up there I don't it wouldn't be good not saying it would be good I think I think I can live I don't think I'd like pitch a huge fit about it I think it'd be like that's probably a bad scorecard but okay yeah I can mean like I thought one and four were the clearest rounds of the fight for Brandon Moreno like those are clear rounds.

There was like no, well, that was close. Like those felt pretty, pretty clear cut. Two was close. I thought five is more clear than four. With the ending of side control.

Yeah. Yeah. I just. I thought that round was a total toss up. And then very clearly, Marino, I like, was like,

whoever wins the next 60 seconds wins it. And Moreno clearly won that. So it's like, I think he wins it. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I thought four was all Moreno.

three was ursag two i gave to moreno but like i wasn't in love with that score card uh so i mean if you told me it was two two heading in around five like i would have no problem with with that scorecard and but i just don't see how you could give five to ursag it's just i don't know like i the more i think about it the more i'm just like i don't really know how you score the fight for er seg i just don't know how you can find three rounds that he won in there I could see how you found two rounds. I just don't know how you can find three rounds. I think one was the only one where I was like,

if you scored it anything other than Moreno, I don't, we can't even have a conversation. Like one was very clear to me. Ersig did find very, very clear. I think the other four. Didn't he get dropped in one or did he get dropped or he just? No, he got stumbled back.

Yeah, he got, he ate the uppercut and the hook and just sort of fall and fell and ran away. The other rounds like, I scored it 4-1 Moreno. I think on a rewatcher. I'll still think it's 4-1 Marino, giving round 3 to Erseg. But like two and three, I think, are very up for debate.

And you could talk to me about four or five as well for Erseg. Like, I don't think I'd agree, but we could have a conversation. All right. There's just really small margins, right? Like just very small. Erseg was doing a lot of things that were landing. It just wasn't big stuff. It was a lot of the jab.

Yeah. I would be interested in asking Steve Erseg if what he thought, the score was going into the fifth. And if if he knew he was down 3-1, 4-1 or whatever, they did, did his corner tell his corner was like, you got to hurt him. Okay. His corner also did something I've never heard, which probably has happened before, but I just don't remember it ever happening.

In heading into the fifth round, they're like, all right, Steve, it is, we are certain at this point that Brandon Moreno is listening to the stuff we are calling to you because when we call it, we see him re-eastern. act. So when we tell you something, do the opposite. If we say one, two, five, whatever, like, jab, right-hand thing, go low. And I was like, I don't think I've ever heard a corner be like, hey, it's 20 minutes into a fist fight. I need you to put your thinking cap on. Because when we say stuff, don't do the stuff we say, do something different. I was like, I get where you're coming from. I'm not sure that that's going to work right now. That might have been a plan you wanted to drill beforehand.

Because I don't think his brain's going to be like, all right, immediately connect one, two, five into low kick body shot. Yeah, I get to tell you, I enjoyed when they go, when I hear John Anick or Brendan Fitzgerald or whoever's calling the action say, all right, no more commercial breaks. And we know we're going to get both sides. We're going to hear both corners. It's the best. Especially in this main events. It was fascinating. Always give me the corners of main events.

Because like listening to Erseg side, like, listening to Erseg side, like, like after round one was just, they're like, hey man, he's figured out your jab, right? Okay, why don't you just front kick him

to the face? Because that's like wide open. And then I'm watching him like, not throw it. And I'm just like seeing how low Moreno is in his stance and Moreno like reacting to Steve throwing punches. And like, holy shit.

Like if he does throw that front kick, like that's right there or a good like solid knee up the middle. And there are moments where he would throw it out. And he was like this close to landing it. Like right there. And then on the Moreno side, just hearing Safe Sayou would be like, all right, man, you're telegraphing stuff. Like you're going to have to do some bigger things. And Moreno would listen.

And then here in Safe just lay into him in round five being like, hey, man, it could be two, too right now. You might have lost that second round. We're not really sure. Like, you need to go after him. And then he went and like that just rampage at the very end to like getting Moreno's head to get him fired up. Like just I love that stuff. We need way more of it. Just good.

This is really fun, man. It was really, I enjoyed it. But then being, save somebody, you're being like, Brandon, and we know you're tired after round two. I was like, really? Okay. That's interesting. And he was like, oh, not that. Like a little bit.

Like a little bit tired. I was like, wow. That was his response. Like a little bit. And I was like, okay. That's interesting. Like, it's way better. We should hear the corners in big fights always.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But I'm glad you mentioned that, Mr. Heck, because, yeah, I thought the front kick, I was watching the pie, it's like, oh, those front kicks are just barely missing. And those lands, those. land those are those are those can cause a lot of damage especially about how low marina was so um thank you for mentioning that i forgot i forgot about that yeah i just wish ersec just how did it did

irsac get too predictable or did because he seems that he seems to i think his game is i think his game is broadly a little more predictable my my single if i like and i'm me i'm not a coach or whatever so have at it comment section wants to be mad i genuinely think as i was watching i was like the single biggest issue he has is he is not countering. Like when Moreno started to get offense going, Erseg played defense. And he did a really good job of defending himself, a blocking of getting out, resetting, centering, not allowing Brandon to hit like a bunch of combinations on him. It was like, okay, but now every time Brandon attacks, you're just not, you're not generating

offense and your only offense is not, like you're not throwing heat at him. You're working a jab. Yeah. You're occasionally throwing like a nice right hand behind the jab. Every once in a while you find like a really slick counter when Moreno gets caught into like empty space. But like at some point it should be like, hey, this round is going to be the counter round. When he comes forward, set an elbow in his fucking head. Like just hold your ground and pop in one because we got to, you are conceding this avenue of the game entirely.

And I think that that was a huge problem for him because it let Marino just have those bigger moments. Yeah, I mean, I thought there were certain, there are certain moments too, Casey, and I'm sure you saw this as well. When Ersig was starting to throw more than two punches at a time, he started going to the body. Some of those body shots at the tail end of those combinations were friggin nasty. And I was surprised he didn't go to those more in the last two rounds.

But when he was landing in the third, those are frigging. He was thumping that rib cage, man. Marina is so tough. Yeah, that's a wild part about AirSag. Like, he's clearly not the best flyweight in the world. But man, he almost could be. Like, he's in him. He's 29 is the thing.

Yeah. He's 29 and he has been a professional for like eight years. Like, he's been in the UFC for two. Like, he's still got growing to do. Like, I leave this fight being like, this is what, this is almost, this is very, close to the fight I expected. Maybe not the texture, maybe slightly different, a little more grappling heavy. But that Brandon Moreno was just a little more offensively potent and would ultimately win as a result of it.

But I just left being like, man, Steve Urseg, this is, I know he's on a three-fought losing streak. I won't have any concerns about his next opponent if he's getting matched down, right? It's like he's fighting some random dude. Like, yeah, he's going to beat him. This is very, very good. Yeah. Steve Ersegg is the Craig Biggio of the flyweight division. Just. He's going to play every night.

You know, he might not go four for four. He might go 0 for five, but he makes a great play at second base, turns a game ending double play, gets hit by a pitch in the bottom of the ninth to be the lead guy on first. Like, it ain't always pretty, but he can be reliable at times. And maybe gets him into the Hall of Fame. It's the UFC. Who the hell knows?

Craig Bishio's in the friggin' hall of fame in Major League Baseball. Deservingly so, deservingly so. Play catcher, play center field, second base. All reliable. He's just going to show up. He's not going to blow the doors off for you statistically, but he's going there. He's going to compete.

He's a great computer. He is a great computer. The best computer. The best computers. Peter. Lots of super chats to go through here now. Let's go here. Here we go.

MMA is life. KKF is like fourth based on merit. Yes, I believe that this is true. Merit is not really a word that matters, though, is the problem. Yeah. But yes, I agree, based on merit 100%. He would be behind Royvalb Moreno cop. So, yeah, four.

I got to tell you, with each. There's the rumor that Horoguchi is coming, so that would actually put him at five. There is, yeah, I would say with each day that passes is worse for Kai Chara France. He had a very small window where he like just might sneak into one because everything broke right. That window is closed and he needs to find somebody and it needs to be somebody good. Yeah, I don't think he's getting entitled to. He should be trying to fight Brandon Roy Vall again. Yeah, if it was got to be in April, he probably would have got it because like you said,

availability is your best friend. But apparently they didn't need him for that card. And the longer Pantosia continues to say. like, yeah, man, they haven't offered me anything. The worst it is for Kaikara France. So not great. All right. Stephen.

Boys, I don't care what anyone says. Pants making flyweight great again. I love this division. Also pants is number three pound for pound lads. How could you disagree? I believe this is, didn't Stephen, was Stephen the one who said, Hey, Steve Ersig's about to upset?

Brandon Moreno because he's from Australia. Not sure. Oh, maybe. Very possible. I could be wrong. But at the same token. Number three pound for pound. I don't think that's like, if you rank pants.

I have them two. I haven't two. I think it's fine. We did a ranking show on this like four months ago where I was like, you guys are all insane for having pants as low as you do. Like, because that was where I had them as a website. else had him there or whatever like Casey bumped him up with the two

yeah man like if you want to rank him at three I think that's fine I haven't at four because I have Islam is undeniably one if you don't have Islam I think you are incorrect I have Taboria and then I bumped Drickus

I had pants at three I bumped Drickus over him after Drickus stopped Izzy and then I have the same I was like yeah our top five Lives are exactly the same. Islam, Taboria, DDP, Pants, Marab, top five. But we talked about this on a ranking show relatively recently.

I don't actually have that many issues with any, like, top eight ordering. Because, like, if you want to say that Balal is a top three dude, I know he doesn't have a lot of finishes, beat a lot of good dudes, hasn't lost in a very long time. Marab beat a lot of good dudes, hadn't lost in a very long time. Like, I'm kind of okay with anything, just so long as you have Islam number one, because I think that's incontestable. but anything else, I'm sort of okay with it.

I don't want to get too caught up in pound for pound, but is it, are we doing a disservice by not having Moreno in the top 20? Do I know? I might have him ranked. I don't remember. Well, he said,

no, because he lost two of his last three, which really hurts. Like he lost two in a row last year. So that just kind of bumped him. Okay. Top 20 is hard to crack into, man,

at any given point in time that are certainly there. And then that's 13 other spots amongst all the other male fighters in the sport. There's a lot of competition, especially when like you, Casey, I think a couple of other people have some Bellator fighters tucked in there as well, or I guess BFL fighters. Well, we haven't updated it, but I suspect Leon Edwards will be out of our top 20 because right now he's at 12. Leon Edwards is for certain dropping.

I think Sean Brady will probably end up bumping into mine. man but yeah i think i think i'm thinking if you want to put merino i don't think that's wrong yeah i don't know question is do you do you have roy vall in your top 20 i probably don't probably you don't i'm looking at it right now you do not yeah dude it's just hard 20 is not that many slots when seven when seven are basically guaranteed and 20 is just not that many spots cool uh thank you step All right

I'll tell you what I'm having a hard time Keeping Charles Oliver in the top 20 But like he so deserves to be in there Just because of his strength of schedule But like if he loses That's why he's in I have to pull him

Yeah I believe I bumped him this last round And I didn't feel good about it And I didn't feel good about it But it was just like That's really tough Because just a whole bunch of dudes Are making real claims at it

Yeah But yeah, you want to put pants at three? I don't hate it at all. It's very good of fist fighting. This is true. Forrest Daniels, John Jones isn't in the top three because John Jones is retired. Super chat from Terrence Librette. Will Alexa return a UFC no-J and it gets two?

Alexis booked. Wait, is she? She booked against. Natty Ice, baby. Oh, oh, that's, uh, I think that sounds like Canada, baby. I mean, what better place to have? She's still definitely, yeah.

Alia Silva than Montreal, Quebec, Canada. I mean, that's 100% she's coming to Nocea, though. Yeah, for sure. Canada's May. She's turning that around for sure. Yeah, she's going to lose to Nadi Ice in Montreal. Hey, hey. Sorry.

It's, you know where I'm going with that. It's going to happen. And then, you know, we do know. Alex is going to fight somebody ranked and watch Natty Ice fight for the flatweight title Oh no

Here's who she Alexa's going to fight the winner of Blanchefield versus Barber Which happens on the end of May With Alexa fighting in mid-May Or beginning of May She's going to fight the winner of Blanchfield Barber In the feature bout of Nocha UFC

320 Oh pretty cool All right All right uh Put my all no points down right now I'll take them I'll tell you what man, Macy Barber would fit right in as like the heel opponent for Alexa Grasso. She'd fit right in.

I think Aaron Blanchfield would probably do pretty well at being a heel in Mexico as well. She's not afraid of making people not like her. Yeah, but yeah, she just doesn't say anything. Macy Barber will say things. All right. Stupid chat from Achilles Jr. Oh, boy. I'm sure y'all talked about it,

but Lazy Boy is going to have some bad nights if he doesn't make defensive improvements. Or, you know, have fight IQ. Follow through the game plan that would, you know, win you a fight. It was just bad night. Bad night. That's all. I still.

A shorty Torres. Not a bad night. Bad week, Casey. Not a bad week. Too. Don't forget that. Bad week. You know, maybe maybe that bad weight cuts.

happened that led to the bad fight you know just just are we giving up on lazy boys are we giving up on him has a i was never in on him so i'm not giving up on him i was never in on him i thought that he maybe could be fun but i i never believed too much in him so i guess i'm giving up on him by if you thought i was on him but i don't think you if you were lazy boy like believer i don't think this give you know everybody gets a little bit of grace this was just a bad outing though Yeah, just bad out of me. Bad night, that's all. Thank you, Achilles.

But I do agree, Achilles. You should really learn how to defend himself and not just run his head into punches a lot. You mentioned Shorty Torres. I interrupted you. Yeah, Shorty Torres was in the corner. Yeah. A crazy boy.

I got your sticker. Shorty Torres sticker on my phone. I mean, like my phone. It's like my thermos. Also, just very quickly, because we talked about a lot of lazy bed. Shout out to Kevin Moross, who, you know, Josh Van and Alessandro Costa. Those are not, like, Josh Van's obviously very good. Costa is pretty decent.

Like, those are some tough losses and comes in to win it. Look, looks really, like back against the wall and looked really, really good. Shout out to him. Yeah. Yeah, I think we're kind of crapping on a lazy boy, but yeah, I'm glad we're giving them some props to his opponent. Yeah. but R is 40 Manuel Torres is that dude

Who do you give him next also Who do you give to Pratchis now? Colby, okay So we'll talk about Manwell Torres in a moment We'll definitely talk him on onto the next one tomorrow But big news UFC 314

As loaded as it is We got a title fight And we got a co-main event That's stolen a lot of headlines Jed and I have been on the same page I'm sure Casey has been as well you could argue that the more like intriguing divisional matchup like outside of the title fight

was Carlos Pratchez versus Jeff Neal. We're going to figure out like if Carlos Prochus is that guy a little bit. Beating Neil Magni is great and a lot of great welterweights and a lot of even just good welterweights have beaten Neil Magna over the last few years. That doesn't mean they are on the trajectory to the top 10 or even the top five. You kind of go from Magne to Jeff Neal. And if you could beat a guy like Jeff Neal,

that opens some more. our doors for you. So that made that fight very, very interesting. And now Jeff Neal is out of the fight. Pratchez, not fighting UFC 314. But the way John Annick kind of said, stay tuned for some possible big news from Carlos Pratchez over the next couple of weeks, opened up some eyeballs and some ears. And that leads us to think, Jedmishu. Where does Carlos Prachis go? What are they teasing here if you had to guess. I'm guessing he goes to, let me make sure I'm doing this right

and I'm not a total bunsen. No, okay, I was right. I just make sure. I think he's going to go to Miami and be a potential backup fighter for the Bullaul-Mohamed Jack Della Madalena Welterweight fight because like, why not?

People really like him, you know. There was like even some talk of throwing him in against Shavcott at 310 or whatever that was. So, like, maybe the only other thing that I could see is, like, does Stephen Wonderboy Thompson say yes? Because, like, maybe Ian Machado Gary says yes. Like, those are bigish fights.

I don't know. I genuinely have no idea. Like, it sucks because I really like that fight. But it seems like they just believe in college protest. So they're just going to be like, all right, man, we're going to give you something. else that's really cool we're not going to make you fight random replacement level dude on a couple weeks notice that nobody cares about we we want to invest in you in a meaningful way so no real wrong way to

eat this reese is any dude you match him up with in the top 15 i'm kind of game for so but do you take him off the card and move him farther they are they they said they've they said that the fight is off entirely yeah but the project is off that car i know the fight's off yeah yeah no yeah they They said that their fight is off entirely. They are, neither fighter is competing. Okay, can't do that.

Cool, cool. I think he is going to fight MVP. Ooh. That's what I think it's going to be. Solid. Middleweight MVP? Sure,

like Wonder Boy's okay. Like, Wonderboy would take that fight. Like, you'd absolutely take it. Why? I'm a chat, Gary.

That might be sneaky that, like, tough fight for protest, honestly. Exactly. Which is why I want to see it. Yeah. Ian Gary, like, if he was offered that fight and he said yes to it,

like that's just ballsy, man. It's real ballsy. This guy, this guy, I mean, he was a ballsy fought shop card too. Yeah, I mean, that's just a ballsy, just choice to fight back like that again. Just pretty wild. So, I mean, we're not going to be Gilbert Burns. Colby would be interesting. That's just, um, someone likely.

That seems like the most unlikely to me of it all. It makes sense, but it's Colby. Because Colby just wouldn't, you don't think Colby would do it? I think that that is a loseable fight for process, and that would be really bad matchmaking for the UFC. But then maybe Colby takes it if he thinks it's a loseable fight for Procter. I think I'm not. I think Colby would take it.

I think the UFC should not book it because like, why are they trying to kill a fun new guy with a dude who is old and not ever fighting for a belt again, even though they kind of like him. I just think that would be, I think Projects could certainly win as well, but I don't think that's a no-lose outcome fight, and so I think that you should not make that. To me, that's the least likely of any other top 15 dude.

Beyond Edwards. Okay, correction. That's the least likely. Yeah, that's the least likely. I honestly think they may just be like, you're going to fight the loser of Bilal Jackdela. So just hang on. That'd be a long wait though.

He should fight somebody cool. Would Buckley go? Is Buckley going back? Oh, God, that'd be saying. I think Buckley wouldn't take it. That's the thing. I think Gary would be more likely taking than Buckley would. Yeah, it just wouldn't take it.

I mean, I want to see it, but I just, Buckley's career right now, I don't see him taking it. But fighters don't turn down fights, man. I mean, if you're walking Buckley, you turn down some fucking fights right now. Yeah. After the year, you should be choosy. You should be choosy as if. Be very choosy.

Fight Usman, fight Brady. Like, these are, these are fine. Other than that. Or fight Gary. I'm okay with that. All right. Manuel Torres, cool dude. Is he the dude?

Is he that dude? Who do you give Torres next? So three answers, one to Casey. I don't know if he's like what you mean by that dude. He is that dude and that like, yeah, what? Certified action, like certified banger coming down, coming your way. I think that there's no wrong way to match up any good lightweight, frankly, like pick a dude in the top 30 and that's going to be fire. I think that like in the grand scheme of matchmaking and Mike, this is.

is your purview not mine. This is probably not a good fight because like other dudes are probably more deserving of this opportunity the man Maturias is. I just really want to see that dude fight Ben Wausantani because that's just an anarchy. And I think the like other lightweights should probably get the ranked chance like Ludovit Klein or whatever. But I just want to see those two dudes chuck them because it would be freaking bananas. I that that was like off the top of my head just not even calculating this or even really looking at my rankings that's the first fight that came to my mind was him and BSD but I mean Jesus there's you could also convince me of Maricio ruffie Ruffy is a good one CDF's a good one there's no wrong way to eat the lightweight Reese's there's just no there's nothing bad but I really want to see him fight BSD like do Joel you could do Joel L Alvarez, you could do, I mean, there's just throw a name in there, man.

I refuse. Joel Alvarez deserves to fight into the rankings. Let my guy breathe. Come on. It has been putting in work for a decade. Let him get a chance. Nazarad Hackparas is on a nice round. Like these, all these fights are, are fine.

Oh, but BSD. That just scratches me where I itch. Again, they're like genuinely like six lightweights who deserve that more than he does. Yeah. But they wouldn't be more fun than he would be. For as I am. I mean, come on. Presley am, absolutely.

Nice fun. Absolutely. Joel Alvarez. Absolutely. Grant Dawson. Absolutely. Like all of those dudes deserve the ranked chance. None of them are as fun.

But if you could. Him and Rapids me. With Ruffie. He would be awesome. I'm down. Do him for Zeeve. Like, I mean, Jesus. So many.

Yeah. But I think he's, I think he's like one, that one, one fight away from maybe being that dude. That dude that we didn't expect to be that dude, but he became that dude. I think, I think he's, I think we're like one, one big fight away. Yeah. Yeah. Ahamandes could be that dude. He's the guy who.

That's the thing is, Bob Mondays, I think is, is that dude at this juncture. and killed him. And so, like, because he got killed by Baumondas so recently, he's probably pretty far off of getting, like, the BSD fight. But, like, I just want to, I just really want to see those two guys fight. All right. Thank you much, RS 40. Critical Cameron.

Steve is the most dumb, smart fighter I've ever seen. Definitely suffers from imposter syndrome. Wouldn't bet against him if he could work his way to either Brendan or Alex match, though. Oh. Oh, Perra. Are we talking? I am assuming that he means Brandon Royval and Alex Pantosia. Okay.

I think that this is Steve Fores. I guess it could be Alex Perez as well. I mean, I would bet against him against Brandon Royval, but I think he could win that fight. I just think Brandon Valle would probably win that fight. I don't think he's, I don't think he's dumb at all. I think he's a very smart fighter. I think that he is a very smart fighter who's limited. And so like he's trying to work around some deficiencies.

Like he doesn't have a dynamic game. He's got very crisp boxing. I think people wildly overestimate his power because he killed one dude. And like, yeah, that's pretty cool. I'm not here to tell you the match note. Knockout wasn't sick. was but like sometimes you just land the perfect shot in a dude implodes like he's got enough pop but it's not like murderous pop a lot of the top dudes in this way class have

incredibly good chins as well brandon merino pantosio very very durable young men um he doesn't like his his game is tight boxing and he has a couple of other tools but there's not there and so he's working around that but i didn't think anything he did was dumb night like he just didn't have the juice. If anything, it's almost like he needs to, it sounds weird to say, but he needs to get dumb.

He needs to actually fight dumb in the sense that he just needs to like stop, stop thinking, just, just, funny every fighter needs to fight dumb. You know me. Sometimes he's got to be dumb out there. Like all that.

The middleweight champion of the world in my number three pounds of a fighter. He is the smartest dumb guy you've ever seen. Yeah, exactly. Thank you, critical camera. Beal, do you guys think Joe Piper ate too many tacos after win? That's incredible. Is that Marker Mundy?

Is that Marker Mundy? That's a good one. Comment of the day right there. Dude, that sucked too. I really wanted to see that fight. Me too. That was like the one fight. I kind of was very curious.

It was very curious. But, yeah. I was picking Calvin Gasolm to win, by the way. I believe I did pick Kevin. I certainly bet him because I got him at plus 400 earlier the week. The line was wild. The straight-up pick. It was insane.

I absolutely agree the line was wild. I was still picking Piper as a straight-pick-em. But, yeah, the betting-wise, it was, oh, geez. I just wanted to see it. Like, I thought that was really good matchmaking. And, you know, you shouldn't really knock fighters for this. But, like, this is a continuation of Joe Piper not Dassey. me.

The fight day pullout is not, it's not a good look for anybody and hope he's doing fine and food poisoning or whatever it is that ended up taking him out. But not great, not been a great, whatever, 18 months or whatever it's been for him. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. The clip that kept a win, but he is, but it's Mark Andreau. UFC veteran.

Yeah. Yeah. especially like his reaction in the news immediately like if you followed on Twitter was was a clip of Joe Piper talking to the UFC saying like I'm 100% that that was very good that's just somebody retweeted I was like this age like milk was like yeah well done uh thank you bea yeah great super throw that and throw that one at UFC 315 man like I know that goes against Joe Piper's never again fighting outside of the United States type thing. But, you know, maybe by UFC 315 Canada will be the first state. Who the hell knows?

Yeah, just short no drive. Oh, God. Yeah, UFC 15 could use a little bump. I mean, it's a good card, but it's a card. No, no, it can use a bump. That would be good, yeah. What we got? Stephen.

Casey Royval, Raw Dog is top 20. Okay. You could be. Top toady. I don't think, I don't believe how pound for bound, yeah. I don't have him ranked, but I think it's fine. If you want to put him in there, I don't have any issues. I probably should because I lean so heavily toward this moderate fighter.

You almost certainly should. Yeah. Does that bump Ankelyif out of the pound for pound ring? I know. That would be incredible. That would be an incredible gimmick. I want to. Oh my.

Oh, Turpy buds. No way. We're not going to put your comment up. Turpee buds, we're not going to put your comment up because we just shouldn't do that. But I see you and that isn't incredibly good.

I think that's spot on, man. That feel, that is the energy I feel. I see it. Don't put it up, Casey. We don't need to put it up. That's the energy I feel. I'm not. I see it.

I see it turpee buds. Because I think you were also with me on feeling that energy because that's great comment. No, yeah. Yeah, we're, I know he's a very... We're there. Yeah, he's a very good fighter. He's a good fighter, good fighter.

He can bring some violence, but yeah. All right, uh, hold on. See you, you got a couple. See a couple more super chats before we get out of here. Uh, you guys for super chatting away after this card. You guys are killing it. Uh, if they say John versus Tom on 4-1, worse or best timing.

Oh, Jesus. What's on 4-1? April Fool's Day where we don't believe anything. Got it. I was looking for like UFC 401. It's like, what are you talking about? Got it.

I was thinking around. Sorry. I say 4-1. Okay. It would legitimately be the best timing. It would be such a good, like, if it's real, it's never going to be real. It's not happening.

But it would be one of the few moments. I'd be like, well done, UFC. like you guys smash this one. All right. And, yeah. I would, I'm not a big April Fool's guy, but yeah,

I would like this just, just to, yeah, just to see, just to see how Juanie gets so upset. He's like, you don't do this. Stop making,

I remember how Juani just always ranting against April Fool's stuff. And before we get out, a shout out to me. 8 and 0 my main event picks this year. Damn, still riding it. Still riding. Still riding. Still riding.

And one comment from Lazybed because you got, oh, what? Shout out to me for winning the pickum today by 10 points. Over you, by the way. Yeah. Well, then. We, we all said, it was a great competition. Who came in last place? I can't read, I couldn't read that part of the list.

Right here. I didn't have a great deal. Actually didn't do that bad, but everybody else did amazing. Yeah, everyone did really good. I think I actually owe this. I may actually owe this victory to, let me just check your picks real quick, Casey to make sure. Well, Casey El Costa, I think, is the man who officially put me over the top. It was Costa, yeah.

So shout out to him. And did Joe Piper want to put me over, though? Because he would have won. Maybe. How do you beat a guy? How do you knock a guy out who cannot be knocked out? Can't be killed. Can't be killed.

Joe Piper would have just dinged Kelvin Gassel him up for five minutes and been gas. Just dead. Because he would have been like, this is the shot. It would have been full culminate. Like this is the shot that's going to put him down. And Kelvin would be like, nope, still here. And then after five, it's like, I'm done. I hit that dude with everything and he didn't die.

Altitude. Actually. Actually, I have to cut my trophy in half and give it to Edgar Chiraz for a first round submission. First round, Naco wouldn't have done it for me. He would have given it to AK. AK would have got the win. Oh, wow. That is.

That is a mission in round one. That's, that's saucy. Shout out to Edgar Shirez. I'm going to 9 of 12 and I got last. Yeah. It was like a solid effort. It was a very good effort. That has to be our best card

Yeah As a group Almost certainly As a group Yeah That's our best That's our best card by a mile I would actually

I'm looking at the card I didn't realize Like 11 of the 13 fights Were lightweight and under And they were only two middleweight fights Yeah The middleweight fights was the only

Only thing we had going And it was only one Because one of them dropped off Yeah I'm really curious If I was this Jose Medina Jose Medina

Kind of got it to the second round how how did he say his name Gutier Atébert Gautier Gatier Gatier Gatier I was curious to see how he would

handle the second round but he finished it and I think it would have been fine He wasn't like He just he didn't try that hard to kill him You just let it happen And boy it happened It was so I wrote up the highlight of that

Which was sick because like rewatching the replay I didn't notice this in real time Rewatching the replay when he heard him Medina waves him on and then gets dropped like two seconds later. He's up against the fence. He's like, all right, come on. It's like, okay, whap, weep, knee.

Yeah, it was a bit of a mercy stoppage. Like, whatever, whatever Beltran. That's the walk off mercy. It didn't get the dober. It was like, yeah. I think I was like, no, you're done. I'm just, I'm going to let you, I'm let you visit your family tonight. And before we get out of here from lazy bed.

Jet is a mouthpiece for Big Pudding. Yeah, dude, pudding is a really good word, man. It's just like, I've always, I've always really liked the word pudding. I like putting as well, but. I like words that sound like what they are, like pudding. What is pudding? Oh, you know exactly what it is. Yeah.

Salsa. It's a little on a monomata. Piaatic. Yeah. But like, yeah. Usually it's a fun word. It's a great word. It's a great word.

Guys, we're back at the world's most famous. We have another super chat in there, Casey. Oh, let's go. It's a good one to leave one. It's a good one. Here we go. Oh, I got to get ready. Boys, thanks for a great day.

Packaporta. You're damn right. BKFC is coming back to Mohegan in June. And so the better contract. Gotta have a guy. Got to have PACA on there. UFC back of the apex next week. Damn good main event.

very much looking forward to Josh Emmett versus the Ron Murphy. How about the other 12 fights? Are you feeling good about the other 12 fights on that card? Boy, I thought this card was better. Gerald Mirashar versus Brad Tavares is definitely fun. So we got to talk about on the shows this week. I think that could be a middleweighty contender. Boy, Torres Finney's making his UFC debut.

I mean, come on. Torres Fini is a fun person to look at. So that's... Davey Grant, Daniel Sont, She know that's going to be fun. Deoni Barboza versus Deoni versus Deanna. Ooh, lots of the same. Reese McKeese is probably going to lose another fight.

Victor Henry competing. Hey, Victor Henry. And then we got a hair of women's strawweight fights. Loma's fighting against the Selle News. How did Estella Nunes get bummed from Molly McCann? Two weeks to Loma look booed me. What in the frigging world? That's tough scene for you, kid.

Yeah. Good night, everybody. I love y'all. I love y'all. It's true. You're listening to the Vox Media Podcast Network. Unwrap holiday magic at Holt Renfrew with gifts that say I know you.

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