MMA Fighting - UFC Nashville Post-Fight Show | Reaction To Derrick Lewis' 35-Second Knockout Win In Main Event

Episode Date: July 13, 2025

Derrick Lewis improved on his UFC knockout record with a 35-second finish of Tallison Teixeira in the main event of UFC Nashville. With the heavyweight division in a weird place following Jon Jones' retirement, and Tom Aspinall getting promoted to undisputed UFC heavyweight champion, is it possible that "The Black Beast" may have punched his ticket to a title fight? Following a very fun UFC Fight Night event on Saturday night, MMA Fighting's Mike Heck and Jed Meshew react to Lewis' victory, the stoppage and if it was the right call, and if Lewis could find himself in a fight with Aspinall next. Additionally, they discuss the scorecards in the co-main event between Gabriel Bonfim and Stephen Thompson, Calvin Kattar suffering his fifth consecutive loss, Valter Walker's impressive streak of heel hook submissions, 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

You're listening to the Vox Media Podcast Network. All right, everybody. Those are the victory drums, and they sound for the Black Beast. Derek Lewis only needs 35 seconds, plays a little awesome, and stops Talison Tashara to add to his all-time record knockout number. Derek Lewis does it again. The celebration was classic Derek Lewis, the post-fight interviews. classic Derek Lewis and the Black Beast gets it done as we welcome you to the UFC Nashville

post fight show. I am Mike Heck and joining me to react to a pretty fun night in Music City USA, the one, the only. Jed Bishu, there he is. Hello, Jed. Hey, that was really fun, Mike. Like, I know that we are not always like the most animated or excited, or maybe some of this is had a little bit of distance. you know, what with the July 4th weekend off, that always helps, right? Some of it is, and maybe we'll even get some questions about this at the end of the show, uh, that the boxing event last night.

Well, not bad. Uh, it was a bit of a slog for parts of it and certainly at the end of the night. And this was just all killer, right? Like, there's nothing super wonky on this. Like just looking up and down the car and I know you haven't done the rundown of it. Like a couple of things that you could just not have cared about. Like if we just chucked them off. you know the the smoke break fights of the card but this was just nothing meaningful we sort of

talked about this and btl this week i know you guys talked about a little on preview show like not a huge amount of stakes here like this is not a card that if if we had an open weekend we would be pouring over for weeks and weeks here but it's a damn fun time some good storyline some some interesting outcomes here and i just had a pretty rocking saturday night man so i'm pumped to be here Let's have some fun. Yeah. It was a very fun card. It got started off with Fatima Klein doing the Leon Edwards head kick knockout, pretty nasty stuff, which your fantasy team.

Hell yeah. Reap the benefits of that. You also reap the benefits of Morgan Cherier. Who gets bonus money as well? Though Morgan Sherrye hurt, hurt my feelings. That was tough. But he got bonus money? fight of the night and fatima klein got one of the performance bonuses.

Let's go, Michael, let's go. I thought Derek, like, we were talking about it in Slack. I felt really good. Like, during the Fatima Klein fight, I was like, cool. I'm going to get the dub. No extra points. All of a sudden, I was like, that's a 200 ball right there for fantasy. Easy dub.

And then when Sharié did it, I was like, sick. I'm going to leave tonight with 400 points. And then suddenly Derek Lewis killed a man. I know that that's sort of a wonky stop. already people in the chat about will talk about it. But, you know, 30, it's his fastest knockout in his career or second fastest. It's Derek Lewis. He's very popular.

He was certainly going to get a bonus. And so I was like, ah, Derek Lewis may have cost me there. But we'll take that fight of the night bump. Let's go, boys. Yes, Derek Lewis did not get a bonus, actually. Mr. Heelhoek himself, Walter Walker, gets the other performance bonus. I actually think that's probably right. But we can get into that in the weeds.

Like if you're at like the most, you know, merit based, that feels the most correct to me. We'll get into the meaning and some stakes, which perhaps there might have been more than maybe some anticipated heading in. But you mentioned the stoppage and all that. So I might as well just ask you, were you okay with the stoppage in the main event? It's bad stoppage. I'm okay with it, though. I there are and people in the chat because I popped in the chat here before we went live sort of lurked around a little bit wanted to see seeing a lot of the chatter the chit chat

happening on the Twitter machine Mike and I think people are just like really confused about the rules and like what is and isn't allowed because a lot of people are out here propagating look he he grabbed the fence so the fights over and that's not remotely that the rules. Like he cheated, yes. And so like theoretically of Jason Herzog wanted to stop the fight and say you cheated, you're disqualified. He could have done that. But there's no like, you know, claws in the rules. It's like if a fighter is getting not like is is about to get knocked out and then they cheat, then that's the catalyst to say TKO fights over. It's not how it works. Thousands of share absolutely cheated like 100% use that fence to climb back to his feet. But that's, is kind of meaningless in the circumstances of whether the fight should be stopped. You are determining whether that fight should be stopped on his ability to defend himself. And pretty clearly he had turned to face Derek Lewis and was on his own two feet. I don't think that that makes a huge difference.

I think Derek Lewis probably just gets a more brutal finish in the coming moments. But also like, especially because Talasin then like kind of pushes Jason Herzog, doesn't seem to have it all together. I think we got the right winner. I'm not saying that Talcun's share was robbed, you know, in some massive way. But there's a non-zero chance that Talasin survives that. And then Derek Lewis is stone cold gas and Talasin wins that fight. And I don't think that that was a good stoppage. But it's not a stoppage.

Anyone's going to really care that much about it if you catch my drift. Yeah, it was one of those things where, I mean, I was confused too at when it first happened because Derek looked like he was about to. sort of body talism with just whipping him up against the fence or whatever and then herzog just stopped it i don't know if like he was going to call a foul on derrick which would have been really weird so i was a little confused that it was stopped at that time i don't have a huge issue with it we've seen way worse stoppages and again herzog's sort of in a position do i stop the fight and take a point which you can't do in that situation he just made a split second call may not It's not.

You don't stop the fight to take a point. He can just sort of like let the fight continue and take the point after the fact. We can just take it while it's happening and not stop the connection. Yeah. You just be like, I'm going to take the point or whatever. And then he like, you can go through the pro forma of it afterwards. But like, again, it's, it's silly to be like that's it. Like somebody in the chat is like, yeah, he cheated.

So that's the end of the fight. Like that's just not the rules that you can want that to be the rules. I want many things to be the rules. but that's that's not how this works. And so it's a bad, like it, I don't think that it's really defensible to call it a good stoppage. But no one cares and it's not bad

because the overwhelming likelihood is just like, that's, yeah, we were just going to get a Derek Lewis win and this, you know, moved it along a little bit. But like, if you're being a reasonable person looking at this, like, yeah, Talasin de Cher was still doing the act of defending himself as is traditionally defined in the sport. and sure he cheated, but those are not linked ideas.

So it's a bad stoppage that no one cares about. And no one needs, I'm also not saying we should care about this. So we're very clear. I'm not having the drum that Jason Herzog is a bad ref. I don't think he's a bad ref. Though he's getting worse. He's making more questionable mistakes than he used to do.

But like, we could just call balls and strikes here. Like we don't have to pretend that that was great because I don't know. whatever reason. Like, it was a bad stoppage. Bad stop just happened all the time and the rightful man still won the fight. So it's all,

it all comes out in the wash. Yeah. When I, right before we jumped on, I was like, how much of a big deal to want to make out of the stoppage? And my thought was, I'm going to ask one question about it.

We're going to move on because it's not that big of a deal. It really isn't. I don't think the stoppage like changes anything. You know what I mean? It just would have happened probably 10 seconds later is the way I would have looked at it. And that's fine. So, yeah, good win for Derek Lewis. And let's talk about the meaning and the stakes behind it.

There is a very real world where Derek Lewis is getting a title fight after this win. Is he not? Funny as hell. I mean, especially with this whole. You have been, I want to shout you out here, Mike, because you've been beating this drum. Like, nobody's on this corner. This is not some shit where like some Johnny come lately's could be here. Like you have been standing alone.

for a year the lone man atop this hill with a megaphone and a dream and a lot of people being like what the hell are you talking about

and you're like Derek you are the meme of the man standing up in the room boldly saying the insane thing and that insane thing is Derek Lewis is one fight away from fighting

that's wrong and we talked about it on BTL and you asked and I was like I mean maybe like maybe you know if so somebody falls out and they need to drop somebody in. Derek Lewis is popular.

Maybe. And I'm, I got to tell you, I am thinking it's way more likely than I was giving it credit for like five days ago. I'm still not willing to say he's getting it. But I will not be, I would have been surprised like last week. If,

and now I'm like, yep, if that happens, man, it happens. I got, dude, there one,

one, the whole post fight is just the most ludicrous and charming insane thing that's made it was the most Derek Lewis thing he went full Derek Lewis which was unbelievable just thin of frankly to watch does his traditional black beast celebration

takes the pants off which is now his other traditional celebration he's just adding new wrinkles to the every time suddenly every Derek Lewis is going to have like 15 actions afterwards. He does a new thing. This time he went over to Cheshire's corner, lifted his leg up like a dog on a friggin fire hydrant, stamped his feet around, threw his shorts and his cup into the crowd, just full-blown psycho Derek Lewis. And the

crowd ate it up. Nashville couldn't get enough of this man. Talk to the president, apparently. Like, I, who who's going to be shocked if suddenly they're like, hey, Derek, we want to have some, you know what we want to make the heavyweight division fun again john sucked all the fun out of heavyweight for a year tom versus derrick lewis let's get tom over let's have ourselves a good time whenever that fight comes up oh man that seems very very possible right now i love it i i think it you should love it somebody this should be this is your greatest accomplishment in this industry. You got you were the only man and god damn it if you might not be just dead on. I might win on to the next one forever. Yes. 30 30 out no points. The, the riches you will have of

no points from this. No man could ever. Jeff Bezos wishes he could buy that many oughtno points. Yes. I'm looking at notes from Dana White at the press conference because he was at the press conference. White said that after the fight, Derek Lewis asked where President Trump was. White said that he wasn't in attendance, but was watching and then got him on the phone to speak to Derek. So that did happen. White says he felt the stoppage in the main event was a little fast, but it is what

it is. And apparently no one asked about that's the exact right take. Yeah. So we're clear. That's the exact right take. Stoppage a little bad. Who cares? That's the only right take.

If you're a day to white right now, especially as a man who feels Cyril gone, did not even beat Alexander Volokov in his last fight. It was very vocal about it. Made it a point to get out of his seat after that fight, go up to Volkov and tell him, you won. You got to be feeling like, oh, if we're doing Cyril gone, like, let's just do Derek Lewis right now. He's 40.

So if you're going to do it, like just do it now. Who at this point, give Derek the shot. He'll be fun. He'll say funny things. And he'll lose to Tom Asmanall. But what if he doesn't? What if he somehow nukes Tom Hasmel? Who is so chaotic.

Unbelievable. Incredibly chaotic if he does that. One, John's coming back immediately. If Derek killed Tom, John is, if Derek kills Tom, I mean, no, he won't because then John will fight Derek Lewis to UFC White House like that. They would just slow burn that. I learned the thing that today about Derek Lewis. I didn't really know.

And it's how over he is. And I knew he's popular, right? Like, I knew he was popular. But talking to this girl who knows what I do, right? But like, you know, doesn't, doesn't know to like knows about fighting is, knows some stuff and certainly knows what I do is asking me like, oh, what are you doing? I work and covering the fights.

Oh, who's who's fighting? I was like, Derek Lewis and Talas and Desherra. No, no belief that you'll know. It's like, oh, I love Derek Lewis. He's the balls is hot guy. right he's hilarious and like if you're that over with generic like Georgia white girl like you are over you're over over with people you know and so like there's nobody else right now you can't do they don't want to do serial gone like sure maybe you're supposed to but no one will be upset if you

don't do gone i mean pavlovich just lost to aspirin like if waldo cortezza costa does a like what's the street fighter move where they do the backflip and it kicks to like bolt of lightning out of them at people if he literally does that to kill sergey pavovic or like pulls out a stone like a super saan goku kameyamae to launch sergey pavich out of the cage okay well the quixecosta gets it but anything other than that like no one cares and so you're going down the line it's like it's jailton am i don't it's derrick lewis people are going to be more pumped about Derek Lewis, even though he'll almost certainly get obliterated within two and a half minutes. But like, you're right. He's going to do it. I can't believe how right you were. The shit just did it right away.

Like, just get Tom out there. Just give him bodies to fight. And Derek Lewis is a terrific choice with the options you have in front of you right now. So I'm just going to give it away. That will absolutely be my Otno pick. There is no other pick. I might just end the show right after that. So yes, Derek Lewis might just have found himself an undisputed title fight after beating 8-0 Talison Tashara in the main event of UFC Nashville, which is crazy to say out loud, but not surprised MFers.

I'm sorry, that's ranked Talasin Tashara, who beat a Tafa brother to get the number of 13. I also want to, and I want to pull this up because I, there, so I want to make sure. one, Derek Lewis was a freaking quote machine in his post fight speech, which rocked. Like everything he said was just a banger. I was doing our live blogs and I tried to get as many of them down as I possibly could because they were all, they were all just frankly delightful. But he, two of them, the one that people I think are mostly going to remember is when Daniel Cormey was like, what, what's next to you?

He's like, my wife, I've been gone for two weeks. Gonna, gonna give her some good old fashioned grounded pal. ever just like but that's like a classic derrick lewis being a bit bawdy and and funny the one that got me uh as he's out there he's talking like uh it's like why derrick why did you go to the corner and pretend like you were a dog you know marking your territory it's like i can't speak portuguese i know for sure they were talking shit about me he's his whole corner is talking shit about me i mean i can't speak portuguese so i don't know but i know so fuck them just like and then then Corman was like, hey man, like, you said all week that it thought it was too soon.

And Derek Lewis just with maybe one of the best quotes of all time that people won't think about. But it's just like perfectly sums up the UFC in 2025. Man, I knew he'd been fighting tomato cans his entire career. So I appreciate the UFC helping me out. I need some more taxi cab drivers like they got back there for my next fight. Like just saying the quiet part out loud. This motherfucker came off freaking contend.

series beat a taffa brother and they're like he's the truth put him in there let's run him up for a title fight i've been doing this a long time and i just beat his ass but let me keep fighting these contender series heavyweights that you all think are the next big thing i could make a good living doing that shout it to derrick lewis forever man what an unbelievable effort what dark lewis might have done tonight was made swing rounds the most superstitious thing of all time because if Derek Lewis gets a 35 second knock a win and then a title shot after playing nine holes of golf with your boy here. Just line him on. Justin Gage,

you should just play golf with me immediately. All this guy wants is a title fight. That's all he wants to this whole world is a frigging title fight. So Justin, hit me up. This would be a really, really good gimmick. Honestly,

like if you could make that happen and then you could get people who haven't like, who don't play golf, right? Like think about like a few years ago, you could have been like, Leon Edwards, I know you don't play golf. You should come play golf with me. Like that's how we'll, B'allel.

Let's swing the sticks for a while. You need to get there. Benny Daryush, I know you don't even want a title fight. You want to fight 30 more times, but come on, like this would be an incredible gimmick. I'm doing it. That will be the gimmick moving forward. So congratulations to Derek Lewis, who gets it done and is getting a damn title shot. I feel it.

I'm willing to get into existence. Definitely. It's been a year. And I'm going to keep doing it. it i'm going to keep building it into existence so it was the night before the gathering and all through the house the host rapid cozy cashmere throw from home sense for their spouse kids toys for 699 under the tree and crystal glasses for just 1499 for their brother lee a baking dish made in portugal for tom and sue and a nice 599 candle perfectly priced just for you happy holidays to all

and to all a good price homesense Endless presence perfectly priced. Let's go to the co-main event, Jedmush. Gabriel Bonfim versus Stephen Thompson. And Wonderboy was a pretty sizable underdog in this fight. I just pull back the curtain. I bet a lot of underdogs tonight. I bet Derek Lewis.

That paid off well. I bet Wonderboy. I'm a little salty about that one. The other bet that I hit, which was the biggest bet I placed tonight, was Calvin Cater, Steve Garcia, going the distance at plus 195. Oh, that's right. Wow.

Well, I straight up dropped the ball and I placed one bed tonight. Cash to talk about it in a minute. But I like I didn't do any like that is that was a gift. Yeah. You're not going to die. Yeah. Even like even on the broadcast they had the draft Kings won at plus 180. I'm like, oh, I got a better number than that.

It's just it was just a beautiful thing because it got a little hairy, but it all worked out great. but Gabriel Bonfim wins a split decision against Stephen Wonderboy Thompson. It seems like the MMA community, I scored it for Wonderboy, and it's not even because I had a bet on him. 29, 28, I thought he clearly won the second round because he kicked Gabriel Bonfim in the face with a split open shin, which was gnarly as hell. And then I thought he did enough to win the third round because, yes, Gabriel Bonfim had some takedowns and had some control time, but he didn't do anything.

and Wonderboy at least hit him a couple of times in that round. So I thought he won. Again, not the worst decision I've ever seen. But it was one of those ones where I was like, ooh, I don't necessarily agree. So your thoughts, how did you score that fight? So I scored it for Stephen Thompson as well. I gave Bonfee in the first round and I gave Thompson the back two. I, it's pretty close to a robbery.

I don't think it's particularly the way it went, but it's not quite a robbery. It's just a competitive fight. I will say I The only bet I had on this card Was a bet on Bomb Feme I did not climb this week But like I was just kind of Just today I was looking at

Because I just didn't do enough research And so I passed on this whole week Functionally I was looking I was like I don't know I probably would feel pretty decent About climbing with Bonfeme Just in the dark without really digging in So I'll just throw 100 bucks on Bomb Fem

Just to like sim it It won't actually be a real thing And I just thought that that money was gone. I was like, cool, I lost 100 bucks. I would have wanted to throw myself into traffic if, if I had been climbing there. But apparently I got super lucky anyway, did not see. I actually want to pull up and make decisions because I haven't done this yet. I did not see almost any bomb feme cards on Twitter. Not saying there weren't any. There were two. Danny Seguera scored it for bond fume. That was the only one I saw. Yeah, me and Danny don't often agree on things. everybody else. One person scored at 3027. I'm not going to say who because it's not a person. That's bad. What?

Correct. You can go look it up. It's a media outlet that we may share an overlord with. Oh, God. Not their best work. Not their best work right there. But I will also say that looking at, because I, people online I saw were saying like you can't score the third round for Bonfim. I should disagree.

I think you can. I didn't. I scored it for Thompson. Again, I scored it for Thompson with money on Bonfeme. But I don't think you can score the second round for Bonfeme. No. The biggest thing that happened in the second realm in favor of Bonfeme is Thompson cut open his shin on a checked kick.

And sure, like that happened. But how damaging what like it's damaging. there's a cut there. He bled, but he kept kicking with it. And moments later, like nearly got him out of the gauge with that. So like not at all.

I will say I did, and this is certainly not definitive. We say this all the time. I just pulled up UFC stats as well. So because I do, I don't think Bonfim got enough credit that he actually had some success striking early in the round before he went full blown.

I'm just going to hold him around the waist. And so statistically, he did have 10 significant strikes landed versus just seven from Stephen Thompson. He had two takedowns, which I know that technically those counted his takedowns. There's no, like he didn't establish a position. They were Matt returns functionally.

That third round, I favored Thompson because whether I mean to or not, and you're not supposed to, I like to give credit to people who don't get taken down when the opponent is selling out to do that. I think that that is fair and just, and I think that that probably seeps in, even if it's not what you're supposed to do. But neither man really, like, that's around

where I would be a lot more comfortable just giving it a 10-10. Because neither man did any, like, real offense. You know, they clinch fought for a long time. Yeah, it's like I said, I've seen way worse. But yeah, I guess the good news is and Dana White apparently said the same at the press conference is that Stephen Thompson

is not cooked at all. He's just fine, even being the oldest fighter on the roster right now. I can't say the same for probably the next gentleman we're going to talk about. But yeah, man, I thought he was beating Joachim Buckley until he didn't. And I thought he won this fight. And now he's got one fight left on his deal. So we'll see what comes of it. Dana said, yeah, he comes back and keeps fighting.

So you don't hear Dana say that a lot about guys who are in their 40s and have lost back-to-back fights, or not three straight for Thompson, I believe. He's like, yeah. Stephen Thompson's not cooked at all. I didn't think he was cooked coming into this because like you, I thought he was beaten Buckley until he wasn't. Sometimes walking Buckley hits you and you die. That's just a thing.

Like, Kamar Usman almost got hit and died by walking Buckley, you know, like he hits real hard. That is the way that Stephen Thompson will look bad in two ways. Either a really good grappler is just going to run his ass out of the cage. Bola Muhammad Chavkat Rakmanov. Quick work.

He was never the best defensive wrestler anyway. And if you have like a really good offensive grappler who can establish position and threaten quickly, that was all way. That has been effective against him for his entire career functionally. The other way that's going to get him is he is 42. He's old. You know, his reactions still good. It's timing good. He's slowed down.

And if you could just land one big punch, ship Bomb Fem cracked him a couple of times in there. You know, he's not like the world's greatest striker, though he's, you know, pretty solid in that regard. If you get a big hitter who just lands one, they can buckley him. But we, I think we should just sort of reevaluate where he is because his, like, look at his run right now. It's bomb fiend who's going to be ranked. It's Joachim Buckley, Shafcott Rachmanov, Kevin Holland, which he won, Balaamah, Gilbert Burns. Like that is, that's the most recent. That's since 2021, right?

That's just all hitters. He's a 42-year-old man. I know he's got a number next to his name. They should just remove him from the rankings just to do it. So we don't have to do the, hey, let's have him fight the next young guy thing. Have him just have some fun out there because he can still compete at a very high level. As AK says, I think maybe we should look a little closer towards age appropriate matchmaking. You don't have to.

You don't have to exclusively do that for him. But like you just don't need to run him in against the murderer's row of people because his title aspirations are over. but he can still be really competitive, really good against good, fun, interesting dudes and like, you know, Daniel Rodriguez versus Stephen Thompson. I think I'm favoring Stephen Thompson over that.

Because I'm still like, to this day, going to favor him in a striking matchup over most people because he's historically proven to be extremely difficult for people to figure out how to fight him. You know, so like, just have some fun with him.

He doesn't need to retire. I asked him when I spoke with him a few days ago, I said, if you have made the decision, you're like, hey, I'm going to go fight these two, and then I'm going to go to the broadcast booth, and that will be my role at the UFC moving forward, which he seems okay with. If you could choose your last opponent realistically, who would it be? And of course, he's going to say, well, of course, I would want to fight the champion, but being realistic, Carlos Pratchez, that's who he wants.

If it's his last fight, he wants to fight Carlos Pratchez. Like, I'm just going to go in there. I'm going to go out on my shield. He's going to go out on his shield. We're going to just kick each other and punch each other a bunch. And whoever wins wins. And he would be happy with that. If he wants to do it, that's fine.

That is at least like a little more. I think protest will kill him, which makes me a little more concerned. I think, you know, protests will, you know, Thompson will have some moments, but eventually his chin will get tagged. And when protest hits you, you're going to die. So that's like concerning. But if he wants, he's a grown ass manning, do what he wants. And that's okay.

my concern is like if Dana's out here saying like I hope he comes back and keeps fighting I don't know if we'll be saying that if you feed him to protest so like maybe let's get him a win like he's won one fight in his last seven before we do the protest thing re-sign him and let's get him a win something he can do like I don't know you're a matchmaker Mike but like just a really just give him a layup let's have him get a W again and then we can do practice. I just don't know. The thing with Wonderboy is like one RDA.

Well, RDA could be bad. RDA was watching RDA fight Jeff Neal in October was sad. It was very, very sad. Does RDA still fight anymore? It's a good question. Well, he fought Jeff Neal on that at UFC 308,

and he got dusted and got like badly injured in that fight. So he hasn't fought since then. Let me take a look at the welterweight situation right now and figure out where we need to go. Just scroll right on down to the middle section. Oh, like, I mean,

a little worse because he just lost Chitty and Jokwani, lost tonight. Like, he could win that fight. Has Stephen Thompson, has this ever happened? Oh, my God.

Oh, my God, I found it. Let me, let me make sure I'm not missing it. I know it. Jim Nico Price. No.

Oh, I mean, well, that's, that's really, if we're really doing it. No, man.

You got to, to do this. God damn it. He's booked. Why is Neil Magni fighting somebody not named Stephen Thompson? How have these two not fought before, by the way? Why are we doing this? He's fighting per topology

Elezu Zaleski. Oh, that's right. That's right. Easy DSS. Because he was supposed to fight Gunner Nelson and then yeah, that's right. All right. But like, honestly, no. We, well, Gunner probably just tackles him and actually

I wouldn't do Gunner. I do. Oh, Ponzi's team. Ponzi scheme. Let's go. Ponzi scheme's great. I'm okay with that. Yeah.

Yeah. Like any of those, we just have a little bit of fun with him, you know? Yeah. I'm okay with that. Wonderboy's just such an interesting case. One, because he is, he's not washed.

We're not concerned watching him fight. And two, he doesn't need to fight at all. He just does it because it's fun. Like, he doesn't make a living off of fighting. It helps that he fights and he's been around and has fought for belts and probably makes some decent checks fighting. But that's like not his full time job.

He runs the karate school and does all that. He's got a whole bunch of sponsorship deals and all that and all that jazz. So yeah, man. And then he'll be on the desk most of the time when he does call it a career. So. Yeah. It's a great point. It's the thing I really like because I think about it all the time for other sports, particularly like non-contact sports.

right? Like, I just think like if I was Roger Federer, I would have never retired. Um, because it's like, yeah, sure, I'm no longer going to win majors or whatever, but I still just like to play tennis. And I don't know, like if I go play tennis at my local club, is that going to be as fun as like playing competitive tennis? It's the same as like, sure, I'm not a competitive athlete anymore, but like I play in rec leagues or intramurals around the city or whatever, but you're just doing it on a bigger stage with like better opposition. You do like, why would why should LeBron ever retire? He can play until he's 55.

He wants to just like Vince Carter, come off the bin, like the bench for 12 minutes a game. And just be like, all right, cool. Like, why wouldn't you do that? And if you're a fighter, the time is, well, my physical well-being is just going to deteriorate to a point. But like you said, like, I don't think that's the case for Wonderboy. At least not now.

Eventually it will be. But like, just go and have some fun. You know, just enjoy this thing that you spent your life doing. Because eventually you won't be able to do it anymore. And I, I hope he gets like, like Dana, I hope he resigns and we get to keep doing this for a little while longer. Yeah, you got to do a time out here. Spamming. I was about to grab him to do good work.

I got him. So Stephen Thompson, not cooked. Is Calvin Cater officially cooked? Are we, are we there now? That was tough. That was tough to watch. He's lost five in a row. Again, a lot of really good opponents in there.

And by a lot, I mean exclusively really good opponents in there. Yeah, he's cooked, though. And this is the one like, I actually want Calvin Cater to retire. I don't think that's what's going to happen. In fact, I think there's like a really solid chance. Calvin Cater is fighting Jeremy Stevens and BKFC in the not too distant future or whatever. But the problem with Cater is Catered seams washed. and Cater's too tough for his own good.

And so it's just like, this is a really macab way to put up, like end of career Muhammad Ali when he clearly wasn't, you know, wasn't Ali anymore, but he still has like an all time legendary chin. And you're just seeing him get,

like literally get the life beaten out of him. Like that's, we're verging on that because cater is so goddamn tough and durable. And that just means instead of getting one shot and falling over and being done, he's taking how many, how many strikes? Over a hundred. UFC stats here and see 85 significant strikes per UFC stats. Total strikes, I don't know something, but like a billion. So 85 significant strikes, he probably didn't need to take those, but he's too damn tough.

So I would really like to see Calvin Cater hanging up after that five in a row. at any point in time, if you lose five fights in a row, I think you should retire. That's my new official policy. Four fights, you might come back because we've seen Andrei Alavsky do it. It's one of the many reasons he's the goat. But five, five is a bridge too far.

Hang it up. And he may, but he's almost certainly going to end up in BKFC. They're, you know, $25 million tournament or whatever. Yeah, again, he's not a guy who needs to fight. he's got a lot of irons in the fire he just likes to compete if he's going to fight again do the ets and barboza fight and let's just call it a day like two dudes who are up there who are on the as you like to say the well done side of cooked let's just throw him in there double retirement fight and let's call it a let's call it a day you know what i mean um i understand steve garcy is

is a fine fighter but cal just looked real slow up out there. He had, I mean, he did land some shots. He just, he fought like a guy who just didn't want to get knocked out tonight. And that's, and that's, that's just not for your bet. That's great. Yeah, it was great for my bet. But I was waiting for him to go full knucklehead and just go out in a shield and just never came. So yeah, man, I, um, we'll see what happens. It doesn't seem like he's going to retire doesn't strike me in in that way i wonder if the ufc just says future endeavors him but yeah i honestly wouldn't like on the one hand he's still ranked right he's 14 though this will be the end of it i would guess unless they're 15 dude he's lost five in a row and i know

it's all to ranked people but five you got to win a fight at some point in time you know um they should frankly they should i'm sure he costs them money. There's about to be a contender series. Let him go to BKFC. I don't want him to go to BKFCC, but he'll land on his feet in that regard. I mean, you're absolutely right, because they're going to put him in front of Giga Chkaze, who's currently the number 15 dude. So, dope. He's still going to be ranked, which is wild. Yeah, because he beat the, he beat the hell out of Gigi Chicago. He changed Gagiccatsi's. Yeah, after them all up. Yeah. So, but go in for Steve Garcia, man. Steve Garcia is a large fucking featherweight. I guess theoretically they could put Morgan Sharie. a, you know, they could.

They could bump them both. I don't know. Yeah. You know, somebody know that in our slack. Steve Garcia, big fella, big fella in there. And on a hell of a run, man. Yeah, six at a row, knockout street at street ends at five. He almost got Cal out of there.

That was a great performance from Steve Garcia. I mean, that, that he was, it was not a competitive fight. So he's very good. He's going to be ranked. He called for an apex main event, just thinking realistically. I thought it was perfect, man. Me too. He caught a little bit of flack from some people online.

I thought it was perfect. I don't know what you guys are thinking. Do you think Steve Garcia is in a position to be like, I want to main event UFC, Kentucky or whatever? Yeah, you're Rodriguez. No. He's not going to get that. But like what he can say is like, hey, McMain or Sean Shelby,

I'll carry that water, man. I want to main event, which is still a step up for him. It's a big move. is the apex. I want a main event and I'll fight you. I'll give me any of these tough dudes, right? Yusuf Zalal. Who's trying to fight Yusuf Zulaw?

A boring ass dude that he is. Like I'll fight Yuzuzuzza-L. Yeah, David O'Nama. Like, I'll fight these dudes in an apex main event. Like, that's incredibly realistic. Honestly, I'll be surprised if he doesn't get it, given the runnies on. And like, that's, you know, it's always a tough game to curry favor with the

O.C. They can be so capricious with when they return them. but like I think it was perfect man I thought it was really well done from him great fight between Morgan charier and Nate Landware Morgan got out of there goes full I took that fight took two days off my life when I'm on my deathbed I will look at my grandchildren surrounding me and say I should have lasted two days longer but Morgan Shahee he is why I'm dying on Wednesday instead of Friday that stupid bastard

Vitor Petrino looking pretty svelts at heavyweight put out a whole bunch of weight. Heavy weight. Heavy weight is just so ass. I don't think we're going to see Austin Lane around much longer after this fight. But Victor Petrino did what you were supposed to do. Gets the first round submission. Even Tucco is out here getting finishes, finishes Jr. Austin Lane's one UFC win is rebellious to Spain.

And I cash that bet. And God damn it, I love it. I should get a piece of that because I told you who's training an extreme couture for that fight. God damn right. Well, they're going to shoot doubles on that big boy. And they sure did. They sure did. Remember when you played in the NFL, do that three times.

It's all you need. Chris Curtis was a splitting against Max Griffin and his return to Welterweight, his first UFC welterweight fight. How did you feel about that one? I thought Chris won. I was okay with those. Yeah, fine. Jake Matthews just runs over. cheating and Chiquani. Do you want to wax poetic about

Jake Matthews is back. I've been catching shit from all of you and me and Gene Alshaddy. We weren't wrong. We were early. This man still 30 years old. On a three-fight winning streak, as he pointed out in his post-fight, he gave Michael Morales a pretty good little scrap. Sure, the Matthew Simmel's burger loss. That one stinks. That one stings, right?

But like, losing to Sean Brady is losing is Sean Brady might be the best well-to-e in the world right now. You know, that's whatever. He gave Michael Morales a good accounting of himself and he's on three-fight Winstreet. 2026 is the year me and Gene Shottie will be all the way vindicated.

Take Matthews is going to be ranked in the top ten, not just in my top ten, but like everybody's top ten. And McKenzie Dern is going to fight for a world title and all you people who have been like you got to give these dreams up, screw you. I dream my dream.

and they're coming true. Way to go, Jake Matthews, Celtic kid. Let's do it. I'll never forget June 12th, 2022. UFC 275 came to an end. We just watched the greatest, maybe the greatest fight in UFC history, but the greatest title fight, the most insane title fight in UFC history.

And we spent 20 minutes, you and Shaheen talking about Jake Matthews no longer boy, Jake Matthews man, about to beat top 10. We were so convinced. Andre de Sahlio. He's 27 and he just, he looked like prime max, just boxing that dude's ears off. And then he, then Matthew Simulzberger like just was big. Like I don't, I still don't even know what happened.

Like, Symbolsberger was just a big dude and Jake Matthews imploded. It was like, well, shit. I don't know what the hell to do now. And then like we do a fight later, how you beat Matthew Sebelzberger. You just tackle him. Yeah. So dumb. But he's back.

We're back. Uh, me and jean, not wrong just early. Yes. Uh, Edward, Mora gets the unanimous decision win over Lauren Murphy, who announced her retirement. Lauren Murphy almost pulls out the, the shocking gilly finish in round three had more and some trouble. Shout out to dingo, channel member dingo.

Shout out to dingo. Uh, Lauren Murphy calls it a career. I talked about her in the people's free fight. Yeah. Uh, Fatima Klein, we mentioned the head kick. Mike Davis lightweight just continues to be fun. Also, flying me doesn't get a bonus. Tough scenes for Mike Davis.

That fight was quite enjoyable, too. It really was. And shout out to Walter Walker, who did a number of things tonight. He got the win. He got his third consecutive heel hook victory. And on top of that, Jed, he started a great trend. But you have to stop the drought to start a trend. And finally, for the first time since March, shout out to Waldo Cortez-Akosta.

We had a finish and a heavyweight fight, 54 seconds into round number one, another heel hook for Walter Walker. And he got an extra 50 Gs. And all the heavyweight fights got stopped tonight. What a time. We've turned the corner, Jed. We've turned the corner. Jake Matthews is on a three-fight win streak. And we're getting finishes in heavyweight fights.

It would have been a terrible week for heavyweight over. Volta, like, I love when the sport does this. This is my absolute favorite part of M-May. I've been following this sport for 25 years. I don't know, at least 20 years. I don't know. Probably closer to 25 than 20 years. And my favorite thing is when you do something like this for this long,

it's just like, oh, great fighters come and go. They're always fun. It's exciting. Favorite thing is when super weird shit happens. And like somebody does a thing that's odd. It's like, Alexiolanic is like the only dude to get a zoo. Ezekiel chokes and then he just rips off like four of them in the UFC which is the thing that doesn't happen in like non-gee grappling almost ever and he just made it his thing uh and then like

volta valker just being like i'm just gonna heel hook dudes i'm a heavyweight i'm simply going to drop and not even like the heel hook on Kenny nunchucks is genuinely like they would tell you not to do that in any gym worth its salt Because he just full on commits to like, ah, dive on this. Yeah. Like in a neutral position. Like I'm going to go back and I got this. And like it's almost like it is genuinely almost a white belt level of confidence to try like an insane maneuver like that.

Except for he pulls it off. So it's obviously not a white belt. Like it's it's his his trademark thing. And Lucas Breske is the only dude who is just like, I'm not going to let him attack my feet and I'll win. And everybody else is like, I guess my knee's going to be torn up for nine months now. And I lose to this, dude. It's charming and hilarious. And I love it.

I love super weird things like this. Welcome aboard Air Canada. Rocky's vacation here we come. Whoa. Is this economy? Free beer, wine and snacks. Sweet. Fast free Wi-Fi means I can make dinner reservations before we land.

And with live TV, I'm not missing the game. It's kind of like I'm already on vacation. Nice. Air Canada. Nice travels. Wi-Fi available to Aero plan members on equip flights sponsored by Bell. Conditions apply. See Air Canada.com.

Speaking of loving super weird things, let's talk to the people because we're all super weird people and we're all in this together. So let's go to the super chatters. They get to the front of the line. Nick, can we get a little shout out for Herzog for stepping between those two slangin? That would be terrifying. Genuinely thought it when they said Herzog was the ref. Because it happens from time to time, but usually, and I don't know if they're actually intentionally doing this, but like I just usually notice it.

I'm like, Jason Herzog is not the man that I would call in to referee a heavyweight contest. Like, God forbid a fighter decides to not stop because we see that from time to time. Almost every time the fighter, when a referee intervenes, stops punching or stops the joke or whatever. But like, God forbid Derek Lewis just decided to get a little bit crazy in his ass.

He would literally wear Jason Herzl like a backpack while he's beating the shit out of an unconscious big text, like if that was what was happening. And so it's like, well, it feels like maybe Herb Dean should be the guy in those. And frankly, to this comment,

like, I'm not trying to intercede between Derek Lewis and a man he's about to punch in the face. That's not a location I'd like to be in. So shout out to you, Jason Herzog, even if that stoppage was not very good. Yes. Jason Herzog was also the referee in the one. Was he the referee in the Wonderboy fight too?

I don't know. Hold on. I can tell you. That would be interesting because that is super not common. Back to backs? That can't be right. No, Blake Grice. Blake Grice was the referee.

All right. Which fight was he the ref in? I can keep looking through, but Oh, it was the Garcia. I think it was the Garcia. It was, yeah, Cater Garcia, he was the ref. So he got a little break,

but I was like, they never do back to backs. Because old days when John McCarthy was literally the only ref, but other than that, it was never back to back. My biggest takeaway and the thing I'll remember most about Steve Garcia versus Calvin Cater has nothing to do with Steve Garcia and Calvin Cater.

It was that Jason Herzog's shoe was untied the entire fight. And I couldn't, once I noticed it, That's all I could watch the rest of the fight was running around with his shoe untied. I'm just like, dude, you got to tie that shoe. If you got to dart in there and make a move, like, you got to be confident. You got to make a football move, son. Nick adds another couple bucks.

Lewis Chaos Tom, the Jones on the White House lawn. I mean, can't get more apple pie than that. It would be incredibly funny. It really would be. Also, it would be terrible because basically I live my life at this point, just hoping, John Jones will forget the internet exists and shut the fuck up. And God knows if that happens, he will not shut the fuck up, maybe ever again. Stephen, thank you.

Are we seeing the long-term effects from the Max fight for Cater to me, even with Giga win, he hasn't been the same since Max is to write him. I mean, yes, to some extent. But like, I don't think it's just the Max. I think he's been fighting for really, he's 37 years old, right? Like he has a lot of fight. He had over 20. And he had a lot of fights in his career.

Like he has been, he's close to 20 years in because he started his professional career and like, hold on. 2007 was first. 2007. So he is right on the cut. He is 18 years into a professional fist fighting career. No,

almost no human being that many years into a fist fighting career, especially at good weight classes. You can kind of. really milk that cow for a long time at heavyweight, light heavy weight. Like a good weight class, 18 years is you're, you're Methusla.

You're 1,000 years old in fight years. And he in particular always had because, like stylistically, he took damage because he knew he could. And so he would take one to give one for a lot of his career. The max fight didn't help him. God knows it didn't help him.

But, you know, like that's just, This is this is not one fight that changed his career in the same way that you Occasionally see happen in this sport. This is I think this is just an accumulation of 20 years worth of getting beat up in the gym and in fist fights. I think obviously that was a very key moment in this sort of downslide. But then again, he had the best performance of his career in the next fight. He took a year off and just beat the shit out of giga after that.

You, like, he, we, he told us every, he taught us everything about Gia Chacazza we need to know. Like, we knew from that point, okay, Giga's just going to be a top 15 guy at best. And that's okay. Uh, we're okay with that. I think the next two fights really started the downside. The mental toll, I think the Josh Emmett loss took on him. He took a lot. He took a lot of shots at that one.

I thought he won. Yeah. Absolutely thought he won. But like that, honestly, I would be more inclined to, believe that fight than the max one because we haven't seen him be good since that fight Josh Emmett just hits the souls out of people asked Bryce Mitchell and he took a lot of cracks there so like I'd be more inclined to believe that I'm still don't think it's any I think it's all of them it's not one of them it's all of them and then I think the Arnold Allen one plays a heavy toll as

well because when you tear your knee and you rip your leg to shreds like that kind of changed you kind of changes the way you move and the way you fight it just makes you you change a lot of stuff you're focused on that stuff so yeah the sterling fight i actually felt pretty good with the calvin cater bad at ufc 300 uh boy i couldn't have been more wrong especially with calvin being such a great like take down defender throughout his career but aljo just kind of been more wrong the zalal like zalal didn't like blow the doors off of him he just kind of Yous was the law. He doesn't blow the doors off anyone.

But the previous fights, he, like, he's such a perfect. I used him as a perfect example on the people's free fight show of like the swings the sports takes because Yusuf was in the UFC and he's fighting guys of Giliettaporia, which like, you know, that decision lost actually ages kind of well. And then he's gone. He goes on the regional scene and he comes back and gets a short notice opportunity. And he's just dusting dudes. He's getting them out of there quick. He's getting bonuses. He's fun.

And we're loving that. And everyone's like, yeah, Yusuf Salah's the guy. I can't wait to see him fight again. He might be a guy that should get fighter of the year, not nominations in 2024 for the year he had. What a comeback. And then he has this wit over Calvin Cater, which put him in the rankings,

but I have not inspired joy. There has not been one use of Zalal onto the next one's suggestion from like anybody since that fight. Yeah, that's tough. Yeah. And he was like mentioned in every show multiple times. Anytime there's a featherway. He's still,

he's still better served than Laurel Murph. So because he did have though, who do, who do he choke out before he fought Calvin? Jack Shore. Yeah. Um, but like Laurel Murphy needs to start playing golf so we can get on swing rounds with you because he's cooked. That's a lot that that was not like the most inspiring. But to Calvin Cater, not tonight, Calvin Cater usually is hard to look good against.

That has not been the case for two of his last three fights. because he's washed. But yeah. Everyday best bump and crump for Don J. Trump. There you go. I don't know what bump and crump means because I'm old, I guess. But shout out everyday best. Yeah.

Let's go back up a lot of comments. A lot of people are pretty excited about what we saw. I'm not going to put back on. It's a really good fight car, man. Had a really fun time tonight. Yeah. Especially coming off the boxing one where it was a little frustrated. because the event is more fun if they understood pacing at all at remotely but it was uh it was tough

let's see uh left lane with ufc 318 of course watch party next week for dust and porias final fight uh any thoughts in the climb next week do you have any early entries any early favorites let me take an early look let's go to our friends at old fandul and take take take a look at what's some odds are for next week. At a. Action. Jump on my wild card. Not going to be doing that.

I mean, he's going to win, but I don't want step 21 tied to a dude who's fought once in the UFC before. They still don't think so. Oh, no. I'll be pretty surprised if

I'm not climbing with Daniel Zell Huber over Michael Johnson. All right. The only other one that, let me take a look here, what we got? The other thing that's just like would maybe jump out to me is a come on give me an over under on this goddamn fight the over under for holloway pourier is four and a half it's minus 120 maybe a alternate over

like a minus one and a half minus two and a half something like that but it's i'm going to just go ahead and say it's pretty likely it's going to be daniel huber against fellow right not fellow because that would imply cell huber's washed similarly washed man Michael Johnson. Michael Johnson would look pretty good lately though. Turn him back the old clockeroo. I'll go with this question for Joseph. Thoughts on Mara being the SB fighter of the year.

I think it's deserved but incredibly stupid. And like when they have to explain on the broadcast, hey, so these fighter of the years are July to July, which is deeply. intuitive and pretty dumb. That's why Ilya's not on the board because everybody thinks it should be Ilya. But that's why it's not. So it's Marab.

Like if you're having to explain the joke, the joke is bad. And so I, given the context, yes, Maraub, Marup got three wins, progressively impressive wins, right? Like, uh, just,

just shook Sean O'Malley. The Umar win got the belt. Like beat Sean O'Malley to get the belt clearly. beat Umar, massive underdog, incredible performance, choked out Sean O'Malley. All that fell in the time zone. He was our fighter of the half year, which I believe came out this week.

Pretty sure we did those awards this week. So like, I get it. But it's when you on the broadcast, we've been like, Ilya wasn't eligible. Here's what was don't come at us in the comments. It's like, oh, there's something fundamentally wrong if you're having to explain why people shouldn't be upset about this.

even if you're right. Was the UFC card better than Taylor Serrano? Yes. Definitely better. Taylor Serrano was a bit of a letdown because the main event was a bit of a letdown. The rest of the car was okay, right? Like there were other cars fun. There were some.

It's hard for me to be that pumped about two minute rounds. There were parts of it that were frankly interesting, right? Like where it's just like I don't, I don't even know how to rate half of these rounds because they're over so quick. And so that definitely put a bit of a tamper on it. There were some pretty good fights. The judging was really specious, which was tough. And then the main event, which had unrealistic expectations. It's hard to live up to what they have done twice before, right?

Like, possibly we have that in store for us this weekend, right? Max and Dustin, they create, it is such an expectation that it's hard to live up to that. this one super didn't almost entirely Amanda Serrano's fault. I don't have any idea what her decision to do was. Granted, she got a draw on one scorecard and the fight still was very close, but like, she pretty much single-handedly made it way less fun than the previous two. And I think also kneecapped her chances to win that fight. So weird.

And like not the most satisfied. conclusion to the biggest rivalry in the history of women's boxing. But where yesterday kicked the, and the worst part that mentioned it, pacing was just atrocious. There's no reason for that main event to have kicked off

at like midnight or close to midnight. Like you just get them through. Like right? Like there's ludicrous, but whatever, neither here nor there. But where it was incredible and full credit needs to be given to MVP and match room and people who made all

this together, whoever, all the consensual parts, it was a massive event. I know it didn't do like huge numbers of traffic for us. I have no idea. I haven't looked at any of the TV stuff that you can get out there for like views via Netflix. All the people in attendance, all of them that I have talked to said it felt enormous, that it felt like a party. The arena was clearly rocking.

Like you, that came through the TV. And it, the spectacle, the pageantry. they promoted their shit out of that event. And for whatever your issues with Jake Paul and God knows, I have plenty of them. The man has been very positive for boxing in this way and promotes a hell of an event. So even if the action was not remotely as fun as what tonight's was, the event was bigger and more meaningful. And, you know, something that I might, may talk about in the future. I'm never going to talk about UFC Nashville again.

The last time I'll talk about is BTL this week. And then that's it. never speak of it again. The Taylor Serrano three, that's probably a thing that we'll get talked about at points in time because of how big it was. Yeah, I would say, like, my biggest takeaway of it all. I did enjoy a lot of the fights as they were happening. The main event was stinky. It just wasn't, it was fine boxing, but Amanda Serrano trying to be a boxer was not all that compelling. It was basically, we got Israel out of Sonia, Jared Canaaner for the third fight. That's what we got. Katie Taylor's like, oh, we're doing this. Okay. Thank you. Appreciate that. And I'll just take the victory. And I scored it

the same way the two judges are scored it for Taylor. But very few times when I'm working, like, I'll cover like any fight week that my wonderful bosses would want to send me to. But if we're up to me, I would just do all the fight weed stuff. And then I would come home and cover the actual fight night at my house. I am totally fine. that. I don't need to be in the arena. I've seen enough fights at this point. I like doing the fight we grind and then just being at home. Very few times I watch an event. I'm like, shit. I wish I was there. Last night I felt like I was like, damn, I wish I was in the garden last night. That would have been fun. A lot more fun than watching it on TV. 100% like I got a little bit of

FOMO with all the people there. And it just, it seemed mega. And that that's that matters. Like, even if an event doesn't deliver and like you know people will probably write and maybe not even incorrectly about it would have been better if they had made an event delivered as a another buoy to continue building the sort of movement they're doing with women's boxing it what matters more is that the event feels big that it doesn't feel small and it certainly did not feel small yeah it was loud as hell even on the broadcast uh we'll end here uh shout out to will i feel like this card shows what an actual venue can do to a card. Like Jed said, not a ton of stakes, but it made every fight feel like a big deal. Have a good night, gentlemen. Miss heck of a morning, Mike. Yes.

Thank you very much. Yeah. I mean, it was just fun, man. Like, I love coming on these shows and being like, hey, that was a fun night of fights and discussing how much fun we had. You think I like coming on here after a fucking Lorone Murphy headlined Apex card?

And I'm like, wow, Lauren Murphy versus Josh M. that was a fight that happened. There's nothing to talk about there. At least what this is just, we spoke 20 minutes just on Derek Lewis post fight stuff. That was amazing. It's fun.

Like, we say it all the time. It's like cliche now, but MMA is supposed to be fun and it's great when it's fun. When you have a great night in a great event and you talk about it. You're like, this was on a Saturday night where I could have done anything else. I worked and watched the fights and it was awesome.

It was terrific. Yeah. I mean, we don't have to bang the drum forever on this because we do all the time. I did, I, I, uh, I wrapped up Mark and Mandy's book, say hello to the bad guy, or bad guys, uh, this week, you know, recommend it. I learned a lot as I'm not the most versed in professional wrestling. So I got to learn a few things. It was informative and good. One of the things he talks about in there, um, that I did know at least to some extent, though, it maybe got

put a little more clearly to me is how much wrestling wrestlers do, how, how, how active they are, that they are on the road like 300 days a year, you know. And it's, I've learned that in recent years, but like originally I was just like, I don't know, they, they do a pay per view once a month and they wrestle every Monday on brawl.

So like they, they, they, they, they, they, they're, but they're doing house shows and they're going everywhere.

And they're doing those things. Like, as Mark puts it in the book, I'm paraphrasing because I'm certainly not quoting this. It's like, you know, like, yeah,

they go to do the television show. on Monday. But that has to happen in a bigger city. It has to happen in a city like Atlanta, because they can't really do a TV taping in some smaller show, like in some smaller area, like Sarasota or Savannah or whatever. And so they do the house shows there, and that way they can build the product. More people can attend. More people can get interested in what they're doing. crowds and traveling events. That's how you build a product. That's how you generate and keep interest

among a wide dispersion of people. Cirque de Soleil doesn't just set up shop and then do a broadcast every Thursday from a gym in southern France or whatever. The apex is not what a company does when they are trying to grow their brand. The apex is what happens when a company has re-exed, maximum or at least has reached a level of F you, we don't care.

This is us filling a contract. And so it will never, no event at the apex with 10 people doing anything. And frankly, this is going to be true of the White House. I mentioned this on BTL this week. And after I said that, Dana came out and said, yeah, we're not selling tickets. It's going to be a comp event. That event's going to have a couple hundred people at it. They're all going to be dignitaries and politicians and influencers.

And there's going to be no. energy on the White House lawn for whatever spectacle thing this is because these people aren't fans like one of the i would take this comment even a step further mike it's not just about having events for fans this is a thing that you're starting to hear in bigger sports than m a as well for big events for playoff nicks basketball games or whatever you're pricing the real fans out because tickets are like 800 for bleeders and so that's not even what you want you want to be creating an energy and that comes from the diehard hardcore fans and most of those people can't afford $500 tickets every week or whatever and so yeah yeah it's it's a much better thing when

they're on the road and it would even still be much better if the ticket prices i didn't look for this week so i don't know they're pretty they're pretty reasonable are were they great because the Atlanta tickets prices were still pretty up there yeah it's like a hundred hundred hundred I think I saw some people post it was like a hundred and awesome bucks that's great That's exactly. That's awesome. You can make that and then that maybe was why the arena was so lively. And yes, it makes a huge difference.

If the UFC was still trying to grow their brand, they would be on the road constantly. They are still on the road because they still generate money by going on the road, but they can also generate money in this other way. And so those will always just not feel the same. I promise y'all, New Orleans is going to be losing it shit for Dustin Porre's retirement fight. that place is going to be like a freaking atom bomb was dropped in it and it's going to be awesome as hell i can't wait i'm very excited i know it's not like the best card in the world i don't even like

that card but i'm excited for for that i'm excited for that means yeah dustin's got to get put over like rover it's got to be all about him this week um i mean if you watch any of the interviews i've done over the last couple months i've literally the only fighter did not get a chance to ask about dustin porre was kai kare or france but literally everybody that i've interviewed over the last two months ever since this fight was announced, I asked every single fighter about Dustin Porre, favorite moments, et cetera. So we'll have like a little video of like all the fighters reacting to Dustin's retirement, what he meant to them as fans of the sport, not just competitors and just really good stuff. So looking forward to that. Looking forward to being back

tomorrow morning for a special edition of On to the next one where I will be riding solo. No AK. He has the day off. He's going to take the actual day off. So I'll roll solo. So if you got matchmaking suggestions, send him my way. We're going to barrel through him in the morning. So shout out to all the future matchmakers out there. And you know what that music means? We are done. Wrapped a very busy weekend in the combat sports world. Not only do we have the UFC next week. We got Alexander Usik fighting next week. We got PFL next week. PFL next week. PFL Africa.

We get Dakota Dichiba. So much happening next week. Dakota Dichita. Dichita fighting. We got Johnny Eblen fighting, Corey Anderson's fighting, Agent Keys fighting. 2 p.m. Eastern, main card for that. So if you are like a hardcore MMA fan,

you got to watch it all. Saturday is going to be a very busy day for you. So get multiple TVs, multiple computer screens, lots of combat sports action. We will have, of course, boots on the ground in New Orleans with our own Jose Youngs. our road warrior, he'll be hitting the road,

and we'll have all sorts of coverage and all the fun stuff we typically do for fight weeks, including the watch party right here, uh, at the castle here. Also, I don't know if they've broken. I don't know if they've said or not. Uh, I'm all morning combat Wednesday for their pregame preview. So, uh, the, the boys have graciously invited me back. Gonna go have some fun with those D Jens. So full week as we all get ready to celebrate the end of Dustin.

for you. Good night, everybody. Thank you so much. Love y'all.