MMA Fighting - UFC Vegas 39 Post-Fight Show | Marina Rodriguez Enters Title Picture at 115

Episode Date: October 10, 2021

Marina Rodriguez is officially in the championship conversation at 115 pounds after a decisive unanimous decision win over Mackenzie Dern in the main event of UFC Vegas 39. Where Rodriguez goes from the biggest win of her career, and other top storylines are discussed with MMA Fighting’s Mike Heck, Jose Youngs and Alexander K. Lee.  Follow Mike Heck: @MikeHeck_JR Follow José Youngs: @JoseYoungs Follow Alexander K. Lee: @AlexanderKLee 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

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Barry live. So live. We are super live right now as UFC Vegas 39 has come to an end. Huge win for Marina Rodriguez, who got it done. And I know what a lot of people are thinking, ah, these three dweaves sat there and they didn't give Marina Rodriguez a chance. They hyped that hype train, McKenzie Dern, over the hills. Unbelievable.

Don't feed the trolls. I'm pretty sure I picked Marina to win. did. I think we all said that Marina was the better fighter, but McKenzie got it to the ground. It was going to be over shortly after. And McKenzie does get it to the ground in the second round. And Marino is in all sorts of trouble. And somehow she survives. She gets out of the round. Things were looking pretty bad. And then she bounced back, bounces back and wins the next three rather convincingly. So great

performance for Marina Rodriguez. I am Mike Keck. Jose Young's is here. A.K. is here. UFC Vegas 39 post-fight show here on MMAFighting.com. AK, let us begin with you. Your thoughts, just, I don't know, 10, 15 minutes or so after Marina Rodriguez's biggest winner per career. She looked great. She's a contender.

She's a legitimate contender. I mean, I think after that performance, you can tell, like, I don't know if I want to say there's a big four at Strawway right now, but you could not tell me that she wouldn't have a competitive fight against Rosenomazunis, Zhang Wei, or Yuan. She has shown nothing but how poised she is, how talented she is. Again, facing more hyped fighters than herself. She's come out on top.

This is probably the biggest case of that. Obviously, this was very much the McKenzie Dern show, as evidenced by our man, John Anick, possibly getting a little mixed up in his mind there. And at the end of the first round, going like a great first round for the challenger. And he seemed to be referring to Marina Rodriguez. He then, he immediately clarified out to the commercial break, you meant, you know, underdog. But that's how much McKenzie Dern was the A side of this fight, you know, is that this, that switching his head went off to immediately say Challenger, like as if she was already a champion.

But it is, it is Marina Haredegas who looks like she could be a future champion, at least more so than McKenzie Dern tonight, not that McKenzie Dern can't, but clearly, Haudriguez is a step above. Yeah, look, we, Mike, you and I picked the wrong winner, but I think Altebris agreed how it would play out for the most part. At least I know I did my predictions. I said I if Dern wins she gets it down first two rounds and submits her she got her down didn't get the finish and then I said the last three rounds are going to be a real um she's not able to uh just has to fight away to get in there and get takedowns. She's got to cert be fine that's the next level of her game. Yes she has to improve the striking a lot but even before that she's got to get some some really strengthening

that wrestling because if she can still take people down then that's you know that that closes the striking gap a lot, then the striking will come last. Right now, she doesn't even have the wrestling yet to get the fight to her strongest area. So a lot of areas I need to field, but it's not about McKenzie Duren tonight. It is about Marina Rodriguez. Great performance. And she, she looks like a real contender. Yep. Big second round for McKenzie. It was a very close, I think it was the fourth round. If there was probably another 10 or 15 seconds, don't know if Marina would have survived that. I mean, it was very close. McKenzie was about to rip off that arm, but doesn't matter.

That was then. There is no 10 or 15 extra seconds. There's only 5 minutes per round. Marino Rodriguez won 4 minutes and 50 seconds of that round. So clear 10-9, clear victory. She's the better fighter. She moves on to bigger and better, Jose. Do you feel, I don't know, vindicated?

You picked Marina, but did anything really surprise you in this fight at all? Not really in terms of, like, nothing surprised me what they brought to the table. It was the surprising lack of, the lack of, the lack of, the lack of, McKenzie's ability to get the the fight to the canvas. I remember when Crone Gracie fought Cub Swanson, everyone was like, oh, Chrome Gracie, if this fight gets the canvas, that's a rat.

But it's a matter of can he get it to the canvas? Because Cub Swanson is such an elite all-around fighter. And Cubs Swanson is a much more well-rounded fighter than Marina Rodriguez. And obviously, we saw Crone Gracie. That was like the big thing. He couldn't get the fight to the canvas. Mackenzie Dern, at times, got the fight

to the canvas, but it felt like it was always Marina made a mistake. And he capitalized on it rather than implementing any sort of wrestling game to get the fight down and then implement her jiu-jitsu. And I remember that was a big knock on Damian Maya for a while. He was such a good jujitsu practitioner, such a good jujitsu player. But he couldn't get there. He couldn't get to the ground.

Like we saw it against Anderson. He just tried and tried and tried and he couldn't. And then even he said in a few interviews, like he actually took time to basically learn amateur wrestling, like not full-on. wrestling but like setups and takedowns and how to just shoot for these double legs to get it to the canvas like we saw it against like carl's condo where he just got to the canvas that was a rap and i think mackenzie durr and her striking is obviously with jason perillo is always it's not going to be on point but it's always going to be there she can live in the fundamentals she can learn how to block she

can learn how to throw jabs and overhands and all this stuff her jihitsu is always going to be there she needs to learn she needs to learn offensive wrestling how to get the fight to the canvas in order to implement her jujitsu or at least how to use her striking to set up any sort of judo type hip hip tosses or throws uh rose number units does a very good job with that michel watson has a very good hit toss too so uh you just it was the lack of offensive wrestling for mackenzie that surprised me especially because we all know we all said the fight gets the canvas that's a rap but she couldn't even get there and then when she did marina did a decent enough job at defending uh i feel like the clock saved her a few times, which is why, like, if McKenzie can get the fight down to the

canvas earlier in the round, she's going to have a much more, she's going to have a more, she's going to get path to the victory easier, is what I'm trying to say, if she can get it earlier on the round. That was almost one of the greatest submissions of all time, too, because McKenzie Dernal was locked in an arm bar with her legs, which was just so sick. It was so sick, but Marina did a great job. She did just enough. to not get finished.

She took a beating. I actually, I scored it a 10-8 round. I understand if he didn't score it a 10-8 round. I know there's a lot of, like, judging snobs out there who were like, read the rules, bro, read the rules. But I thought it was just a dominant, decisive round. And it wasn't just the grappling in jujitsu.

I thought McKenzie put it on Marina, too, with the strikes. Especially when she was a mountain land of those right hands. She busted her up. I had no problem scoring it a 10-8. If he didn't score it a 10-8, that's fine. No problem. It was still a clear win. I scored at 48, 46 for Marina Rodriguez.

She moves on. And it seems like I don't feel like Carla Sparza. Like I don't think it's fair to Carla to give her Marina. But I think we have to, I think the fan in all of us of high level martial arts competition, Jose, we got to do Marina Rodriguez versus Juani and J. Yeah. Right. Like this is the fight.

Like she should go to the press conference right now and call it Yuana right now. I tweeted out some matches that we need to make. I'm going to pull them up. These are the fights that I would make. If I was Sean Shelby or McNeum, I'm not quite sure which one is the matchmaker for the Strawaway Division. But I have Rose, the winner of Rose Wayley versus Carlos Barza, Yawanna versus Marina, McKenzie Dern versus Cloudy Godelia, and Jan Janon versus Michelle Waterson. Those are the fights that I would make. At least those are some fresh matchups and stuff like that.

But obviously the Strawweight Division is very stacked. It's one of the more deeper divisions in all of MMA, not just women's MMA. But those are the ones off the top of my head that I would like, see, I don't think Carl is already beaten Marina. But it's in a, she's in the same situation as Alexander Ratchik is, where he already beat Anthony Smith, and he's already could have a title shot,

but then like Yuri's right there. And I feel like that Izzy Yon fight that happened, basically the Rose Whaley thing. It just kind of put a pause on the division. And now that it's catching up, Ratchik is kind of like, what do I do? Do I wait? Or do I fight the guy that I just beat?

and a lot of people weren't like as daniel cormier said that was like the worst fight in the history of m m m a or something like that was it that fight or was it the tiggo santos fight i can't quite remember but i remember daniel cormia was very critical on it as under ratchick fight as of recently so carla won fair and square i think she should fight she doesn't have to do she also has a win over rose so if rose wins that's just the fight to make and then if waley wins obviously you have the yawanna rematch or the rubber match with rose and that's a whole other conversation we can have after that fight happens, but no, Carla deserves a title shot, Marina versus Yawanna has to happen. Yeah, what kills me about like the idea that we have to do the Carla Asparza, Marina, Houdriguez rematch anytime soon as,

that's a rematch that, like, that exists, you can always do that one in the future. You know what I mean? Like, that's a one, if you're confident that Marina Rodriguez is a world title contender, okay, so you give her, you do the Yawana fight, that's fine. And then you, if Carla can wait, if she can afford to wait, please do Carla Spars. for your title fight. And then if she loses that, then you can do the, the Rodriguez rematch later. And then Rodriguez can, if she redeems, I guess that win back, that propels her into a title. Like, there's so many ways to do, like to lead to that rematch with her and Carla. It just doesn't

need to happen next. I don't know what the urge is to have it happen next other than if they, if Carla needs to fight, that's who she has to fight to keep her spot in the rankings, which sucks, but that is who she would have to fight. But again, if she can wait, which she should, then, then again, you can do it somewhere down the road. So that's the only thing. that I really, really don't like about them. I definitely want to see Carla Sparsa and Marina Rodriguez fight again. Just not anytime soon. I just don't think it's fair to Carla.

Agreed. So there you go. And McKenzie Dern, she'll be back. She'll pay somebody else in the top 10 and we'll see what happens. Hopefully she can improve a little bit on some of the things that she just didn't have tonight, like getting inside, being able to work those clinches to her advantage, land some strikes that aren't like just completely charging and sloppy. I thought Jason Pearl did a tremendous job in the corner, just saying the right things.

But I just think I think that second row was a little demotivating. Like very rarely does McKenzie Dern take somebody down, mount their opponent and just have that kind of position for all that time and not come away with the finish. Like that must have been a little bit demoralizing. So kudos to Marina Rodriguez, we got bonuses. We got bonuses. Should we guess? I haven't seen them. We should guess.

Don't look. Don't be cheating. Jose. Okay. Mm-hmm. There is a fight of the night. Okay, I would go. People couldn't even hear me.

My microphone got unplugged again, so I'm going to say it again. That's so weird. How can we can hear you? And they, oh, it's different, like, it's a plug-in- Yeah, it's just my microphone got unplugged. Sorry, go ahead. I'm going to say Marina, the main event, Marina McKenzie would be my pick for fight of the night.

Uh-huh. And then just process of elimination, I would say Maria Agapova over Sabita Mazur, because that finish was just all kinds of bananas, like knock-up. her out and submitted her. The Romanov finish was violent, but I don't think it was like an epic finish. So probably Lapida and Steve Garcia just by process of elimination. This is not what I think will happen. This is what I would do if I had like complete control of the situation. I am one of those people who thinks like you should give. I wish they gave more performance bonuses for like, like I hate how if you win a decision, you're automatically like you can't win a

performance bonus. Like that's so silly to me. Like I think sometimes some some performances are like five performances are so strong. It's like, why is that not like the best performance the night? So I would actually go and I actually really like the main event, but I would give just the performance bonus to Marina and then I would go definitely another, the other performance bonus to Agapova. And I thought I'd really like to Damon Jackson, Charles Rosa. So I'd throw them a little, maybe a little fight of the night for their, that looks at gruesomely bloody a bear. Yeah. So there you go. So I know that's not what they're going to do, but that's how I would go with it. Yeah, main event gets fight of the night.

loopie and agapa good performance which is hilarious because loopie's the big and listen loopie great performance hats off to her biggest favorite on the card and very rarely

just the biggest favorite on the card get a bonus like poor Alex Hernandez just highlight reels Mike Breed in last week as the biggest favorite on the card and doesn't get a bonus and loopie gets a bonus I'm happy for her she deserves to get a bonus

but sure it's just funny how they look at it from a week to week basis. It's hilarious. She's, uh, she's, she's representing BC as well as Mexico. So I have a lot of, a lot of, a lot of love for, uh, loopie. Yeah, loopie's, loopie's a tough out. She's going to be a tough out with full training camps. That's for sure. And I think that this fight, at least for her, like, I know the opponent was different, but I think in terms of, like, actual fight camps, this was the longest fight camp of her career by far, like, not even close. Most of her fights are on, like, less than a month's notice. This one, she had some time to get ready for it and she's a problem man he's a problem so good good for her agapova you knew

she was getting a bonus and then she's cutting skit promos you got to make the marina morose fight at this point that that that is the fight to make yeah i mean i i i had that i knew i i didn't because i think we all said i'm making sure my my microphone's in i'm i think we all said sabina had the the the brighter future between these two and I thought I think I can't remember what you guys picked I thought Sabino this is her fight to lose like I even know I said Agapha has the better future but I thought she would lose

okay I thought Sabina had the brighter future and was going to win this fight and I tweeted like man did Maria Agapovna proved me wrong I just think the Shana Dobson fight was just fresh in my mind and all the stuff that happened between then and now stuff so I think a lot of people were tweeting about that but man that fight was bananas and I had I remember saying saying all this. I'm like, well, if Maria wins, I'll just make the Marina Moro's fight,

but that does, that's irrelevant because she's not going to win. So she proved me wrong completely like good on you. Maria Aga. Great performance. Very violent performance. That knock out into the submission was insane. It was knocked her out and submitted her all in like one fell swoop. That's crazy. Great, great performance. What a bounce back. I think her stock probably rose more than anybody's. And I think what I said was I think like skill for skill wise. I think Mazzo had the bitter upside, but I thought, like, from a star power perspective, Agapova had the higher ceiling, and now looks like Agapva's got all those boxes checked off right now. So good win for her. By the way, as our pal, Sean Alshaddy just tweeted, Marina Rodriguez, I guess, is that post-fight or doing

an interview or may on ESPN, said, I really think that Carla was the one who should have been getting the telefight now and not Wei Lee. I would much prefer to let her go fight for a title, maybe get that belt and then we can do the rematch for the belt. So Marina Rodriguez is just hitting on all cylinders here. She's hitting on all cylinders. She's all. I hope there's a, I hope there's a but I want to fight Yawani and Jacek and punch her in the face coming. Well, here's the next comment. She said, let's be honest. Yowana shouldn't even be ranked anymore because she's been out of action for so long. So I don't know if that's some slander. Well, hold on. That's like some slander. I don't know if she's, or she's so slanders that she's saying like she needs to fight someone else before fighting me. I don't

know, but I like that kind of talk either way. I like that kind of talk. Someone has been reading the MMA fighting global rankings and has the same criteria. Obviously, everyone does. As we do. We're the only rankings that matter. So she gets us. She shouldn't even be in the rankings.

But what a way to try to welcome her back into the rankings. I like it. So good win for her. Goodwin for Randy Brown, especially with the toe. And that was just a pretty crazy fight. Nicola Elliott was a lot of fun. Talk to Ligoppova. Chris Gutierrez.

Split-Sition win, by the way, that judge was horrendous. How could you score that fight? Coleris, that's atrocious. Romanov is just so fun. Damon Jackson bled everywhere. Lupi Godinez, unbelievable performance. And then Charlie Otero's bled everywhere. But unlike Damon Jackson, he was finished by Steve Garcia,

a very gritty performance from the Jackson wink standout. Sorry. Sorry for the guy in the pre-fight Q&A, who I think the first part of his parlay was on Tavares' first round finished, so sorry, sorry, guys. He was probably feeling pretty good. Yeah, like two knockdowns, right, in the first round?

Yeah, it was almost three. It was almost three. And I think what was, yeah, like, for those who bet Anteveras for a first-run, K.O., you probably were like a Yankees fan. Giancaro Stanton hit a ball off the green monster and Fendmer for a long single. You know, we call those, Mike, those hits?

A Stantonian. Stantonian home run. Oh, wow. I'm into that. I'm into that. The Yankee Radio voice call on that play a thousand times, and it's tremendous. With Instacard, you get groceries that over-deliver, so you can over-share your preferences. Want russet potatoes with no brown spots?

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Choose from 14 flights per week between Canada and Dubai. Book on emirates.ca today. What are the peep saying? By the way, while we're pulling up, peep questions, this nine-fight card, amazing. Amazing. I feel so good. Take notes. I feel so good.

I might meet my family out every while to, like, have some fun a little bit before the wild or It started at 2 p.m. Eastern, 11 a.m. Pacific, and it was only nine fights. I tweeted this. I tweeted normalized fights that are 10 cards or less. What is the, actually now if it's on, like, this is all on ESPN Plus, right? Yes. This is all, it's not on TV. So the length that doesn't matter. It's not like, like, I understand when they used to, you know, they used to have like, oh, this is fight.

It's all on ESPN. It's like, oh, how great it is for ESPN to get like seven hours of programming, like a seven-hour block of USC programming, like a guaranteed audience. Like that makes sense. I understand that. If it's a streaming only card, why do you care?

Why should we as fans care, whether it's 12 fights, 14 fights? Like, you should want a little bit more of a brisk viewing, which is what this card was. I don't think there was like a terrible fight on the card. No,

I think every fight was like compelling in some way. Brown couldn't was maybe a little disappointing, but I mean, given Brown's injury. I still thought it was a decent fight. It was. fight. And, you know, he had an injury. So if that's like the, if that's your worst fight of the night, that Brown couldn't fight, you had a pretty good card. It may, I still stand by

my gymnastics system, though. It's like a seven. But you know what? It was a seven point two at a seven point two. There you go. Nice. Way to go. Way to go. Way to hit your marks. There you go. 100%. Uh, Joseph Boza. True or false? Carla Sparza has to be the biggest winner today. I don't even have to read the rest of this to say true, but I will anyways. It was clear they needed McKenzie to win because they were going to give her the title shot. So yes, I mean, I don't know if that's necessarily true, but yeah, I don't know if it's, I don't agree with the word clear that she was going to get the title shot with a win. I would say it would have been unsurprising if they gave McKenzie during the title shot. But I just think that's because people are a little jaded on the word deserving or not.

but I still think I'm still in the boat that if McKenzie Dernard won, Carla still would have gotten the title shot. If anything, they would have made Carla versus McKenzie for a number one contender. I don't think McKinsey

would have skipped the queue, but it wouldn't have surprised me. If she had gotten the submission in the second round, there was a very good chance. She was going to jump the queue. But yeah, Carr Spires has got to feel pretty good right now. She's probably having a cocktail at this point

feeling pretty good. What else we got? Scott McCray. The UFC can't make Agapaba Morose quick enough. Looking forward to this one. Hopefully Agapova got 50K for her performance. She sure did. Well done.

That was, yeah, that was amazing. And then maybe the scariest promo ever with the smile and so nice. That's a scary woman. Really disappointed in Dern. She looks like she's regressed. She got the girl to the cage. Instead of grabbing her, Dern put her head down, closed her eyes,

and threw Loopie punches. I mean, there were points of some of that. And there were points where she landed hit throws and, you know, landed clean entries and got takedowns. Like, she had her moments when she, like, when she listened to Jason Pearl and did what he said. It worked out. Sometimes, I mean, this is her first five-round fights.

She's still learning. She's still kind of green compared to a lot of these girls. And I don't know if she's regress. I don't think her losing to Marina Rodriguez means she's regressed. She just lost to a very good fighter. And one of the more underrated fighters on the roster right now. Yeah. Yeah.

It's how she looked against someone who we now know is a top five fighter at 115 pounds. So she wasn't already. I'm sure there's already people who had her in their top five Marina Rodriguez. So, yes, again, it speaks more to, you know, Marina skills than it does. McKenzie definitely has a lot to learn. But I don't think she regress. I think this is, this could be, frankly, the best version of her we've seen just facing a superior fighter. And I know we all have those fighters where we were on the bandwagon very much earlier than the rest of the world.

I don't know who's yours are. But I, if you go back and look at all of our past posts or preview shows with Marina fighting, I've been waving the Marina Rodriguez Flav for a very long time. I always, the way Lemos is now, how we all kind of see her as a future contender, that's how it was after the Tisha Taurus fight solely because if you look at like those string of losses that she had it was like rose like yawanna way lee and then like marina was in there so she basically lost a three champions and then marina and i was like well if we keep up this pattern then marina's going to be a big deal and then she gave a cynthia calvilla who came in overweight all she

could handle and then i don't think i scored the fight for carla but the fact that it was such a close fight i still and then when she fought amanda he boss everyone was on the he boss train at the time because she was like saying she was going to be a champion. She had to just be in Paige and McKenzie back to back. Marina is a monster. I don't know if she'll ever become a champion, but she will be parenally in the top five, I think, until she decides she doesn't want to fight anymore.

Yeah, I'm with you. She's only going to get better too, so let's slow our roles a little bit. Ooh. A couple of questions on Tim Elliott. Do you guys think Tim Elliott won the fight? Clearly lost the third. I had Elliott on my bets. Just curious what you guys thought.

I thought Nicolao won the fight. I thought Elliot won the first and I thought Nicolaoan I saw a lot of tweets saying that that a lot of people seem to think Tim Elliott should have won because Nicolao got the takedown at the end but didn't do anything with it. So maybe Tim Elliott was trying to get up or showing some sort of offense off his back and Nicolao was trying to just ride it out. So I think people were maybe upset at that.

But I saw there was a few comments in our YouTube section about Tim Elliott. and like in that fight in general. I think I don't think Timelia was trying to do that much from his back in the third round. I think the fight was super duper close to that point before the takedown.

I thought the takedown was like the one that just kind of teetered it over. Like it was a super close fight. Super fun to watch. I would have loved to have seen two more rounds between those two guys. Like I wish there was like a button that like one of the judges could push

like it's American Idol or like America's got talent. And it's just like an automatic. two more rounds. Like we just want to see a three-round fight, get two more rounds. That would have been the one I would want to see. But they can only use it once. Once a-fons.

One card, yeah, once a card. That would be the one. That would have been the one to use it on. I think Tim, I think Tim L.E is so talented. And I think having James Krause in his ear is such a big thing. Sometimes, and I love Tim a lot, he's one of my favorite guys to interview in the sport right now. Tristan Gordat, yep. He plays around a little too much.

He feels himself a little too much. And I dig that about him at times, but I think that was a detriment tonight. I think that's what's awesome to fight. Tim Elliott, live your life. But man, yeah, he was, he was balancing on one leg, flicking out front kicks like he was like Jean-Claude Van Dam. It was wild. I mean, some of them were landing.

So if you're Tim Elliott, you're like, I'm scoring right now. Like we see it as goofing off. We see it as like, oh, well, he's playing around too much. But a lot of those kind of weird techniques were landing, or at least, we're clearly throwing Nicolao out of his rhythm. Nicolao is a very disciplined, patient fighter, a very smart fighter for a guy his age. And

I do think Tim Lay was throwing him off. And I think this is why people thought it was such a close fight. It might have gone the other way because there were times when it felt like he was playing to Elliot's game. However, it did seem like he was landing. He was more accurate. It seemed like he was timing his shots well. So I also saw it for Nicolao. But

thank you, Ben. Yeah. Ben in the comments saying that Tim wasn't doing much in that third round yeah i didn't think so either um i don't think unfortunately this is the that's going to we were saying claus a little kind of underrated slash overlooked uh one of those guys in the flywood division i don't know if this is the wind that's going to change people's minds this probably keeps him steady keeps him um his spot i don't know if in the official ufc rankings not that anyone cares about those that he was behind elliot i know in ours uh he was already he was already ranked ahead i don't know if this moves him i think we'll have to see what happens

with like Kai Kar, France and Cody Garbrandt, see where Nicola ends up moving in the ranking. So we got two questions on opposite ends of the spectrum. Ooh. What's so funny, Mike? Dueling King Kong questions. I love it. Wow.

This is great. One on team, Team Romanov, Joseph Boza asks if Mr. Romanoff is a dangerous threat. Four and a new in the UFC. More of that fresh blood and the heavyweight division is needed. Sam says Romanoff is a fraud. first fight against a legit opponent

and Aspino is beating him up. He takes a dive for the technical win. By the way, Al Jemate Sterling had a tremendous tweet about that about Romanov and his win and coming back and the performance. So listen, I'll go first on this one. I've been on the Romanoff train since his first fight. I don't care that he beat Rocky Martinez.

And I love Rocky Martinez as well, but it is who it is. He is a dangerous threat heavyweight. And you could say what you want about the Aspino fight and being in the trenches and whether you thought it was a dive or whatnot. This guy is, this guy's a problem. This guy is a problem. Jared Vandera is a super durable, really tough guy, really good on the ground too.

And Romanov just chucked him around like it was nothing. And we thought he was starting to fade. And I think, I think Van dera's game plan in this fight was like, I'm just to let this dude suplex me for the first five minutes. I'm just going to let him belly to back suplex me over and over again. let's get tired. And then Romanoff somehow just didn't really slow down all that much and just got better. Got him mounting and beat him up.

That's a, it's a dangerous man. I think, like, if you can't take this man to the third round, if you can't get to the third round, you're not, it's going to be a really hard night for you. So, yeah, I think he is a dangerous threat. He's, what, he's 15 and 0 now? Something like that. 15 to know. I do want to see the Espino fight again.

I'd like to see him run that one back. Yeah. I think because Romanov is on that is young enough that a loss wouldn't derail He's like well I guess it's the heavyweight division so string together a few wins in general You're going to be in the top 10 But I think Romanoff is young enough that a loss won't be a massive dump What's this face you got Mike? I mean he's going to be 31 December

Yeah, that's frightening He's young enough and Espino is closer to 40 So I would like to because he's not getting younger his his time to to surge for the title now so I would like to see him run that back because he looked pretty he was doing well against he's the only one that's given Romano of any sort of problem in the grappling department so I'd like to him run that back

interesting question that I want to touch on from our friend Ben oh can I say something about Romanov before we move on yeah I just want to say I the only thing this win doesn't do as impressive it was does not move him up that far in the rankings I think so the thing he doesn't have that Osmondal and Daukas has is

they both have again their last two wins were against so Aspinal beat a veteran in Arlofski and then a fellow kind of young heavyweight guy in Spivak. Docis beat a veteran in Olinic, and then a guy who before he was taken out of the rankings due to injury and inactivity, Shemiel Abduo Jemov, who was in the top 15 at heavyweight.

So they both have these nice two wins that clearly put them into the top 15. Bromanov does not have that yet. He needs to get like, again, Arlofsky, Olinic. I think a Ben Rothwell would be a good one. I have him right behind him in the rankings. Some people might put him above him already, but again, I need to see him beat a veteran

before I see him take one of these veteran spots. But yeah, but amazing, really fun, heavy way to watch. Ben, look at James Krause's Instagram post. He just posted it and I'm reading it as we speak. He says he made one of the biggest coaching errors in his career. That quote, I'm sure is going to haunt me for some time to come. Going into the third round, I thought for 100% sure we took rounds one and two. Regardless of what that, if that was true or not,

I should have pushed Tim to work up in the third, and I didn't. Win-lose-a-draught. I'm so proud of the improvements that Tim has made in the last year. His willingness to learn and be coached is what makes him so incredible. I effing hate losing, but it's part of the game. Regardless, this dude is my dog. We've been through worse losses than this one. I've said it before, and I'll say it again, there's only one Tim Elliott.

So James Krauss. I mean, what a guy. What a dude. One of the best coaches in the game. Take responsibility. Yep. He's very aware. He's very aware. He almost fought on this card. He almost fought himself.

That's hilarious. Glad to hear the coach say that, yeah. Yeah. What else we got? There's a lot of coaching, coaching stuff that happened today. Coaching storylines today, wasn't there? What was Chris Gutierre's thinking, Mark Montoya for like saving his life? Yeah. And then earlier on the card, who was it?

Who else was that, like, made sure, like, I've got to pull my coach in here. I'm going to thank my coach is. Lupi? Yeah. Yeah, it was going to use. This was the coach. A lot of coach, like we saw a lot of other relationships between fighters and coaches today. It was very intense.

Again, this was a really nice card just to be able to focus on these sort of things and not have our brains exhausted by 12, 13 fights just beating us into submission. So, again, I don't know if it's because the storyline was so prevalent or we're just less exhausted. But I really enjoyed what we saw today. Axel Adams, do you guys think commentators should keep people's personal and family life situation? out of the live broadcast, like mentioning Randy Brown's father's incarceration. So, I mean, there's some you just can't avoid, right? And then there's other ones.

I don't think, like, Anakin is well researched and as well prepared as Anick and Felder are. I don't think they're, like, digging into Wikipedia and, like, clicking on all the numbers to see all the different stories. I feel like they take a lot from these fighter conversations, these fighter interviews that they have leading into these cards. And I'm sure this is information that Randy offered up himself. And if they're using those interviews, chances are they're going to make the broadcast. And I think the fighters are well aware of that. So I think there's certain situations where, yes, you keep things, you know, on the vest. But I don't know if I have a problem with this one, because especially when you're dealing with guys like Anik and Felder,

Something tells me that this is something Randy talked about and he's very passionate about. And this must have meant something to him more so heading into this fight than maybe some of his other fights. Your thoughts on that, IK. Yeah, it's, you know, listen, they have, like I said, they do the interviews. They have a lot of notes prepared. It's live commentary. You've got to find ways to sort of fill the air sort of when things aren't happening. So, I mean, during the Brown couldn't fight, it wasn't a slow fight, but like we said before,

the injury made it kind of less action-pack than it might have been. And so if you're a John Anick, you're kind of like you're watching, you're listening to your partners. If they're not saying something, I'm like, okay, well, I got to interject here. I got to add something to this broadcast. So in his notes, clearly he has this story. But it's little awkward definitely to bring it up because they might start talking about it. And then suddenly there's a burst of action. And then there's a scramble of conversation.

And they might never come back to the story that they were like talking about. And so it comes off as very awkward. And then people will clip it on Twitter. And it's like, oh, what was John Anick talking about? Why did you bring this up? And I've been critical of it before. too. I remember, I think it was Chris Gutierrez. I think in his last fight. Him and his opponent both had an issue.

Andre Yule, thank you, an issue with the custody of their children. It was a very sad story. And John Anna kind of brought it up almost out of nowhere and then didn't really get to explain the story properly because some action happened and then just never came back to it. And again, a lot of us, including myself, were like, was that an okay thing to bring up? But there is, as Mike was saying, kind of understanding that these guys wanted to share parts of their stories. And again, it can be hit or miss. I think, I think sometimes, and it's up to the liberty of the commentators. I think sometimes these things should be brought up. I think sometimes they shouldn't. ESPN certainly in general, as people know, likes this kind of, uh, occasionally tragic

backstories. There's a lot of jokes about the NFL draft. When they do the NFL draft, it's almost like tragedy. That's the most agree. Right. Right. And I think there's, I think now the U.S. is on ESPN I think that these kind of stories and bring the stuff up during broadcast is encouraged if not like they're told to do it but it's definitely encouraged

it's definitely not something ESPN's going to say oh why'd you bring that out there like yeah yeah more of that stuff bring that stuff up during a fight so I don't know some people I think some people really like it and appreciate it but I understand others who are like I just want to watch the fight and I just want to know surface level things about the fighters and not kind of

these you know these parts of their background that seem like something like I wouldn't want brought up, but it's different for everyone. So, yeah, it's a good question. I've always been on the boat where it's, if the fighter doesn't care, then why do I care, if that makes sense? If the fighter doesn't have a problem with it, then so be it. Because specifically for that one you talked about, AK with Chris Scudierrez in his last

fight against Andre Ull. I was backstage for that. I was at that card. That was the, I believe it was the Usman Burns card. And shout out to our colleague, I believe, Gabe, what's Gabe last name, Gonzalez? Gabe Gonzalez, Miami, he straight up asked Chris Gutierrez,

like, do you have a problem with them talking about this? And he said, I don't have a problem with it. Because they brought up on it, because it was both of them. And he's like,

you know, as part of the story, if my story connects with someone else, then so be it. But I remember hearing about it and being backstage. I'm like, that was very bizarre.

I don't think we needed that. And then, but then no, everyone was like, oh, you know, let's just concentrate on the fights. And Gabe asked, then he didn't have a problem.

So if he doesn't have a problem, I don't think anyone should have a problem anyway. Yeah. I've done some pretty heavy interviews in the past with Chris Gutierrez. Yeah. Talking about that, they're very easy to find. And yeah, it was just, I think like the first one I did about the subject, I mean, it was, it was heavy. It was, what is heavy as it can get.

He opened up was like when the wound was very fresh and he just opened up. And I mean, this story about Chris and everything he's going through, it's been out there for a while, like three or four years. He's done constant interviews about it. So it's not news. So I feel like the commentators weren't like just digging deep for that one. The personal slash family life is cringe coming from the commentators. Let that be for the UFC slash ESPN promos, fighters could have a say in how it's presented. Well, that's what we're saying, though.

Yeah, exactly. We kind of do have a say. Because I think also the big knock on like the contender series, every time like the contendos series restarts, they show like all the promos of the upcoming fights and they're all the same guys. damn promo like I fight because I want to be the best or I fight to give my family a better life or like I fight because I had this I'm like dude you could just copy and paste this with any person and maybe it's because they're all up they're all newcomers so they're like they're afraid to say the wrong thing and they say what they're expected to say maybe that's the answer but I remember tweeting like I want to see I want to change it up like say something just absurd like I fight because I want to fund my brothers of opening up a barbershop, like something. I fight because my little kid wants to go to clown school,

and clown school is expensive or like something weird like that, man. You don't. It's not about being the best every single time. It just isn't. There's other, like Derek Lewis. I like Derek Lewis's in straight up. I'll punch anyone for money. Like, just say that.

Why do you want to be a UFC fighter? I don't know, because I dropped out of college and they pay me to punch people. Like, just say that. Anyway. And I would believe you. I believe you. Bufo on the beat. When was the last time we've seen as much blood as you did in the Jackson versus Rosa fight?

I thought it was going to get stopped. Props to the doc for letting it go. That doctor rules, by the way. Great doctor. Let him bleed. Our colleague, Damon Martin comes back. Our colleague Dame Martin comes back and gets in the wind call. I'm good on him.

That was a great fight, man. Great fight. And the Charles Rosa win loss, win loss, win loss track just continues on. It's unbelievable how he just, it's just one and a one. one every single time. Our first two fights were super bloody, right? Wasn't the Garcia on DeVarro's fight? Pretty bloody as well? That was bloody too. That's right? You know, hey look, the sponsor, that video game sponsor, back for blood, you better send some extra money these guys way because they... I thought it was backblood four. No, no, no, it is back for...

Backblood number four. There's not a franchise called Backblood. It's not the fourth game in that series. No, it's Back for Blood. And I thought it looked... It's so cool, like having that, like the ad, the ad itself was there, and we just covered, like, by actual human blood. So please, I know, well, none of these guys got a, we said none of these guys got a bonus, right? No. All right. So, let's send these guys some extra cash, please. Jackson, Rosa, Garcia, and Tavaros, please.

Let's help these guys out. They really helps advertise that game. All right. A lot of comments on Romanoff since we had that conversation. So I'm just, a lot of them have been about the Espino fight. So I'm just going to toss a few up there. I think we talked about this on. Because remember after it was before they booked the Espino fight,

AK, a lot of the listeners were like, we want to see Romanov versus Espino. Yeah, yeah. And I hated it. I hated it so much. It's true. Almost for the reason that we're talking about right now. It makes no sense.

There's so many heavyweights that need fights, and there's like such an opening for heavyweight stars that you could push both of these. guys and they can meet like two years from now when they're top 10 or top 15 or top seven why throw them in there now it made no sense and now we have a disaster on our hands unless you want to run this thing back right now like I would love to see them run this thing back asap because like Jose said you got nothing else for them just throw them in there and like let's see what really happened like just do it so yeah

uh what aspect of marina hodriguez's game would you like to see her work on before she challenges the top three. This is a pretty good question. Jose, you are the one that picked Marita to win this fight. Coming out of those 25 minutes, if there's something about Marita's game, you would like to see her improve. What would that be? Probably take down the fence or offense off her back, one of those two. Either she goes to the school of Donald Cerrone and Carlos Condit, where her best wrestling defense is her offense off her back, if that makes sense. Like, they were so good off their back with elbows and triangles and arm bar is that people were maybe hesitant to even take them down

because just because you got them on their back doesn't mean you were out of trouble a la like Donald Seroni versus like Mike Perry like one of those kind of situations or she just needs to learn how to keep the fight standing. She did a good job against McKenzie Dern in the later rounds but I think McKenzie may have just gotten tired and she also had been getting punched in the face a lot.

So I just think she needs some sort of defensive grappling, whether it be wrestling or offense off her back or something because she's obviously light years ahead of almost everyone at straw white striking her grappling her defensive grappling or offensive grappling i should say just needs to catch up but i think that's just the obvious answer okay yeah i agree with that i think i think uh off her back giving her like long limbs she could be really like a real pain in the ass to deal with on her back she gets an offense going but i also think uh that that would be number one i also think maybe even uh the ability to mix in her own takedowns just to change the change the tempo of the fight a little bit because again physically she's got some great physical tools and if she could have you know the other way to avoid having to fight from the bottom is be on top and so if she could mix in the occasional take down just dealing with these three specific names uh no damage unit is definitely the deadliest on the ground of the three but i think if um if she could again get on top of a jang or or joanna or even rose

even being in top position of rose uh would probably be helpful so her breton butter should be a striking don't go away with that but if you can add in a little bit of wrestling offense it really helps you to win a five-round fight. And again, she's got two of those in the bag now. So she doesn't need advice from us. But again, if we're talking about just one more level up, yeah, I'd like to see. We both said grappling offense, but I think also take downs. Get stronger is my advice. I thought she looked pretty strong in this fight. I mean, I did. I thought she looked pretty strong. There's not, I mean, obviously defensive grappling is something she would want to work on.

But she went, she was off of her back, mounted for four and a half minutes. against McKenzie Dern and did not get submitted. It reminded me of the Tim Kennedy-Hodger-Gracy fight. When you get Hodger-Gracy on your back, nine times out of ten, that's a wrap. And Tim Kennedy survived and ended up winning. Yeah, I mean, that's impressive. I think to me, like when you talk about those three names,

especially Rose, when she goes at, like, she went in for some of those exchanges and trying to charge Ford. She leaves her head up. She gives her chin up there a little bit from time to time. She gets a little lazy, a little sloppy. She's very effective because she lands stuff at such different angles. She makes people

guess, but sometimes when she darts in and tries to be the aggressor, she makes some mistakes. If you're up against a striker like Rose, who can throw that quick kick up top or Yowana who can counter really well or Zhang Wei, who just has like extreme power, only needs one or

two shots to really put the lights out. You got to probably shore that part of the game up, but overall, I mean, no issue really with the grappling. I mean, that was by one thing. I was like, McKenzie gets her to the ground. This fight's going to be over a minute later. And she survived over four minutes with her on the ground in some pretty heary situation.

Yeah. There were a few fights on this car that proved me wrong. Yeah. But she also blocked an attitude-adjusted attempts in the first round. McKenzie got in there deep, got in there deep. And I thought she was going to pick her up with the John Cid attitude adjustment. And great take, great, blocked it. She blocked it.

Hit it with the head over the elbows. And then should have hit her with Brocklessner German suplex. But again, we've talked about this. Next time. Next time. Next time. She'll throw that out there. All right.

All right. I only caught the main event in a random prelim fight. Any standouts? Maria Agapava is the biggest standout. If you're going to watch one, if you're going to watch one fight off the prelims, watch that one. Yeah. That fight was awesome. Well, Agapov was on the main card.

Yeah. That's right. Yeah. The undercard, you meant. Yes. Any undercard, anything besides. Okay. Yeah.

All right. Yeah. Take one more. How more? The best one of them is... Well, why do we're... I would if I was him. We're going to take two more because this individual has asked this question three times,

and it's specifically for Mike. Hold on. Our pal, I just want to say our pal, Jessica Crystal Crew, tweeted out earlier that Wilder's going to come out in the Jake Paul robot suit. That's going to be his... Wilder's wearing 60 pounds of all-farmors, no doubt about it. keep getting those things listed that that could be to your detriment

in this fight when you probably will lose shine of your head I don't know depends on the day today Danish head's way shine here I let my girl a little too much Dana's head gets very red too yeah Dan's got the shine we're gonna close on Tuesday

we're gonna close on this one Oh gosh this is a Jose question Is the three scariest Halloween movies and did any of them give you nightmares I love If you want to say Halloween Like are you talking like specifically Halloween Or just horror movies in general

Yeah I'm in a group chat with uh just Crystal Crew and our good friend New York Rick about And we just trade horror movies Give us a good three Just specifically Halloween or just Horror movies in general Horror

The scariest movie I've ever seen in my entire life is the dissent I've seen it once and I'll never see it again Cousin loves it one That was that that is absolutely petrifying movie I'm a big fan of footage film. Grave Encounters, I think, is the best found footage outside of the Blair Witch Project. And then, I don't know, Friday the 13th one is really good. I'm a big Exorcist fan too. Yeah, that was ahead of its time. The original Halloween was ahead of its time.

And I'm very excited for Halloween kills on Friday. Very excited. All right. I'm on that whole ariaster kick. I like those really slow new horror movies. I know some people hate, but I like I like Hereditary. I like Midsummer. Yeah, I'm a fan of those. Not traditional, like, spooky scare stuff, but I definitely enjoy those. I'm a scream guy, too. I love the Scream franchise, even though it's clearly like the first one's great,

and then everyone after is like not. Big fan of us and Get Out as well. Yeah, yeah. Oh, and I really like it follows. If anyone has not seen it follows. I love it follows. I've never seen any of the new movies. Very charming. Very charming.

Conjuring? I thought the conjuring was pretty well. I can't get into those. Conjuring takes place in Rhode Island. The house is the show. You know what? You know what movie I'm very excited for? Lamb.

Yeah, that looks cool. Oh, I read some of the reviews. It's like the new 824 movie coming out. I watched, I read some of the reviews. And like during whatever like film festival it premiered at, like people had to leave because they were like so scared or like grossed out. Oh boy. So I'm very hype for that. And it's also age 24.

So you know it's going to be bananas. Anyway, we'll have plenty of Halloween talk coming up. I mean, we're two weeks away. I want to end one more question. We're going to end on a fight question because this one is an interesting one. Who will win a UFC championship? Wow, this is a great question. That's so good.

That's so good. Who will win a UFC championship first? Carlos Sparza, Islam Makachev or Rob Font. Wow. That's a great question. Hmm. For our podcast listeners, we're just thinking, by the way. This is, we're having a moment of silent reflection.

I will say. You should be doing the same. I think it's Islam. I think it's Islam too. And it's the main reason why I think it's Islam is because I think he will fight for a title before and in the other two will. I think Carla will fight the winner of Waley Rose. And I think the winner of Waley Rose beats her.

So I think Carla gets the first shot. I think Rob Font, like we said, I think the problem with Rob Font is there's like a huge cue in front of him and there's so many injuries in front of them. Oh, yeah. I think just timing. Yeah, that's tough. going to be his biggest enemy.

Like, especially if TJ comes back and fights for the title and then, like, who knows if Al Jerman comes back. So I'm going to say Islam gets the belt. And I think in a world where all three get the title, Islam has the longest reign. Yeah, you're probably right. I'm just going to say who, who I'm going to hope, Carla. I'm going to say, Carla. She gets the rose, Rose beats, uh, Zhang Wili rematch.

Carla wins again. I love the fact that John Way Lee is at fight ready. Also, Cobra makes a good point. Carlos already been a UFC champion. Oh, thank you, Cobra. That's correct. She was the first. So who will be the next to win a UFC?

Yeah, that's all. That was a trick question. Thank you. Cobra, we got fooled. We got fooled. NFC is pushing for Islam. But again, like, I think Islam being Dan Hooker is going to be a nice win. No doubt about it.

That's a good win to have on the resume. I don't know if it like immediately put you into a title fight though He's gonna have to get one more win and who the hell Top five is gonna want to fight Islam is gonna Islam's gonna be Dan Hooker and then he's gonna fight Tony Ferguson and beat Tony Ferguson and then he'll probably fight B'Neil Daryush and then or get the towel shot because B'neal Daryush has done enough to get the title to get at least a number one contender fight He just added his first kid I don't know if it's a daughter or son so Apologies to the Darius family so he said he was

wanted to come back probably early 2021 anyway so but anyway lightweight rules i think is the man and he has the habib factor like if they go if they keep going back to the to abdhabi or if they hold another event in russia anytime soon because bellatory is going to russia why can't the u s you go to russia in the future that happens why would you not want islam at least fighting an normal contender fight i agree and who knows if dust and pori bach charles olivera who knows Don't even say it. Don't even say it.

Don't even say it. Don't listen. Doors are wide open. I thought you're about to say. He can fight anybody he wants. He can go fight Connor. He can go fight Nate. He can go fight anybody you want.

Nate's not. He can't have to fight a 55. Nate's not fighting for Dustin Poirate for the title. Anytime. No, I'm not saying that. I'm saying Dustin will just be like, screw it. I'm going to go up to 170 and fight Nate for two million bucks or more.

Way more. I don't think they do that. Why wouldn't that? Because Nate Diaz has one fight left on his contract and they wanted to be the Connor fight. they're going to wait that long though yeah Nate Diaz has been out longer that's true I'm also been on the train that Nate Diaz

wants to fight Vicente Lucay wrap it up and then go fight Connor outside the UFC and make a ton of money it's possible as well conversations that just kind of spur off of an event you never know and that's the beauty of a nine fight card we have all the time in the world it's only 808 Islam has to fight Dan Hooker

have fun with that That's a tough fight. Oh, that's true. That's a very tough fight. He's not a lot. What Fon has to fight freaking Jose Alzo. Have fun with that, man. Like all those fights, all like I favor Islam and Rob.

But those fights like you're going to get hurt. This is why pick Carla. She's getting a title fight soon. She's going to win. If John wins, though, then she ain't getting a title fight soon. All right. Anyway, we're going to, we'll close it out. Now people are just talking about who's going to get the shot.

That's a great question. Maybe we'll answer that on BTL. That'll be like the final question. We'll just throw out random names on who will get a title first. All right, we're out of here. We have more. See you guys. Ahead.

So keep it locked. M.AFighting.com. We have all your coverage, results, anything you can find in regards to Tyson Fury versus Deonté Wilder 3. That fight is going down in a few hours. But the card is going on now, at least the prelim. So you can follow along with results and all that good stuff over at M.A. fighting.com. But until then, Jose Young's for Alex K. Lee, aka my best friend. I'll see you tomorrow morning. We'll talk to matchmaking with on to the next one. I am Mike Eck. Enjoy the

rest of the night, everybody.