MORNING KOMBAT WITH LUKE THOMAS AND BRIAN CAMPBELL - Coronavirus Crisis Implications on MMA & Sports, UFC Brasilia Recap | MORNING KOMBAT | Ep. 34

Episode Date: March 17, 2020

Luke and Brian are back with a special edition of Morning Kombat where they look at the impact the Coronavirus is having on the MMA and Sports world. They also recap this past weekends UFC Brasilia event and answer some questions from the fans. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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. . . . .. himself. Moe is back, baby. Welcome, Donks. It is Monday, March 16th, 2020. And yeah, I guess it's time for morning combat. Hi, my name is Luke Thomas. I am one of the hosts of this program. I'm not sure where he's going to be on your screen, but the other half of this duo is Brian Campbell from CBS Sports,

and we both join you now for what can only be described as a very unusual edition of Morning Combat, Brian. I think that's a fair way to put it. That is a fair way to put it. And full disclosure up front, Luke, this is my first global pandemic. So I'm really sort of touch and go, just trying to make it all work. And I think for this week's episode only, it's going to be a little bit of an ish show, if you will. We're just going to try to keep that train moving. In the future, we'll make some adjustments in terms

of how to do this better from home. But for right right now we just want to bring the combat to you inform you entertain you maybe give you a little break from the uh from the norm and by norm luke i mean buying up as many toothpaste containers and toilet paper packages as possible yeah i'm good on toilet paper. I have some hand sanitizer, not a bunch. I have enough toothpaste probably for a couple of weeks. But I was thinking about this. I haven't really noodled this through. I'm supposed to get a haircut on Tuesday. Do I go?

Do I go? Look, you act like do I go when the people already have seen behind the wall. They know that that $80 plus tip haircut happens in your house. In fact, if I'm paying that much- No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, that lady moved. So now I have to go not far from the house. It's just a mile down the street, but can you say that a haircut is essential in a global pandemic? I don't think you can. No, no, certainly not. But I think really what the people want to know is what's the cost of the new haircut? You know what? They better be doing a pandemic sale.

It's actually a great question. I don't know. I guess we're going to have to find out. Before we get into anything that's happened, I guess we'll figure out this. Let's just start it here, right, where we'll talk about the general social change that's really happening and forcing it, which we normally would not do on this show. But because it's so enormous, there's just no way to talk any other way about it. And then we'll talk about the sports and MMA and then everything over the weekend and the look

ahead. First though, why don't we just answer the question? How are you doing? Why don't you go first, Brian? Why don't you tell the listeners basically how you've been holding up and essentially what you think about this whole thing? It's touch and go, Luke. I'm going to be honest with you. I mean, look, I'm in the suburbs of Connecticut. I'm in my basement right now. You know, things are not necessarily pressing at the moment, but it sometimes can be a daily battle with things like anxiety and depression. And walking through this or really walking in the pre-area has been a little bit rough. It's been a little bit touch and go, to be fully honest with you. I find, Luke, that if I've got a problem

personally or with my family, I can hunker down. I can fight it. I can fall back on my faith. I can do some things. But whenever it's like, oh, there's a category whatever hurricane coming or there's this crazy virus outbreak, I feel like I have no control. And then I'm sort of like, how many beers can I fit in my fridge sort of mode. Right. Yeah, sort of same with me i mean

you know thinking about this at first i'll be honest i had a i had a doctor write me i don't know maybe three three-ish weeks ago because i was mocking not yeah no i was outright mocking this thing on one of my radio or episodes of my radio show and because you know i had lived through swine flu and bird flu and sars and all of those were just kind of punchlines that never turned into things. And that it turned out there was an epidemiological reason for that. But, you know, your daily life, we lived through all that 2003 and SARS. SARS was a joke. You know, it was it was nothing. And so here comes another one. You just think to yourself, OK, you know, bird flu was a lie. lie swine flu is a lie and this one's not right and and then when it sort of dawns on you when you begin i don't know so you like i i drink too

when i get nervous but the other thing i do is i just can't stop reading i just read and read and read and read and read like uh probably to the point of inadvisability but uh so i just dug into the details and then as i began to connect the dots from what i was reading from again um epidemiological uh institutions from public health officials from reports on essentially the front lines of this disease a creeping amount of dread began to dawn on me and then not just about the sport but i was like i don't want to here's the thing brian and i'm being dead serious for a moment i'm not comparing the two like apples to apples it's not what i'm about to say but you know this man you're how old are you like a little older than me like 41 42 like i'm 41 i

got all the balls let's be up bro bro like doug stanhope says when you pull the slice of pie away from the uh pull the slice of pizza away from the pie and that cheese hangs on that's how much my balls are sagging now man it's unbelievable but but the point is this uh there's a couple maybe a few moments in your life that just they change things yeah and 9-11 was one of those i'm not here to say this had the exact same feel as 9-11 because definitely it didn't i'm not saying it's going to affect people in the same way it's not I'm saying, but rather one of those moments where after it happens, you're like, things are not going to be what they were before this. Would you agree or no? Oh, I would agree. And by the way, in hindsight, in 2001, if you could have been a mini flag dealer, the kind that fit on the window of your car, you'd be raking in the dough. I don't

know what the equivalent is in 2020. Maybe a hand sanitizer salesman, that might be the only way to rake in the dough. But yeah, this is starting to feel like it's a put a pin in it moment in my adult life, Luke, from that regard, in terms of things may never be the same from this. And by the way, both in good and bad ways, potentially, Luke. That's right, actually. Yeah, it's not not necessarily all bad although there will be probably its fair share of it but change i think change is the thing i'm expecting here and you raised it earlier by the way i don't know like how long we're going to be doing this now this version of what we're doing today we think it's going to be like a one-time version we think we think knock on wood that in subsequent episodes we're going to have an even better

setup to get a real it'll be an at-home vibe but for the people listening right now and watching not every episode of morning combat is going to look this way uh they're going to be a little bit we'll have more structure we'll have connection with the uh i want to say the studio but when i'm air quoting the studio that could just mean producer jay's basement we're not really sure what that will look like but you'll'll see the type of bells and whistles on the screen that you normally do. We're not going to see this shit this week, so to speak, Luke, but we may be able to see

that ish in the future. I'll tell you this, for the sports side of things, when it really began to dawn on me, like, oh, we're headed for something different here, was when I began to see Serie A, which is the Italian soccer league, and they, you and they started closing down games or having it behind closed doors where the fans couldn't attend.

And by the way, you don't know what to make of that if you're a soccer fan, because this sounds terrible, but it's really true. Serie A has an ongoing problem with racism more than any other professional soccer league, probably in the world. I mean, they're still chucking banana peels at black players. It's terrible. It's a really bad thing. So what ends up happening is the league will then find the team and then suspend them or do something where they can't play in front of fans. You see this kind of thing on a fairly, I won't say regular basis, but it's not altogether uncommon.

So you see him playing behind closed doors. You're like, well, you know, I kind of see that thing all the time. And then when you hear the stories coming out of China and then coming out of Iran and then Italy canceled all of Syria. And that's when I was like, Whoa. And then all of sports. And then it begins to spread. My buddy lives in Switzerland tonight. They had got all completely closed down. Only essential stores are open. Um, and so for me, when it really began to dawn on me was when they canceled fans in attendance for March Madness. And I talked to my buddy overseas and he's like, bro, they're going to cancel the whole thing. Watch. And then within a day or two, whatever it was, they canceled the whole thing.

That's when I was like, dude, this is not what I thought it was going to be three weeks ago. The NBA was like that for me. And it's like, you know, I sort of thought with the money involved, we could go on an empty arena tour. The NBA could still, you know, at that point, I was thinking, could still travel and give us the entertainment that we've come to know. But when they pulled that game with crowd in attendance in Utah, before the players even came out into the floor, it was like, yeah, this is a different animal right here. Are you mad at Rudy Gobert? He's gone on an apology tour uh and even today he put out another video being like i'm sorry for what i did i'm feeling better please i don't mean to laugh luke but he's become like the mascot of

blame for this it feels like every every bad situation a war or whatever you always have that one evil villain that you can throw all the shade at we don't even know if you know i mean suddenly a fan that got an autograph from him has now suddenly contact contracted the virus which is horrible news but it's like all the blame is pointing back at this guy because he put his hands all over the microphones uh touching the tips so to speak just for a second just to see how they felt and we're not even sure if he's really the villain i feel like this will be his first line of his obituary one day. It's like, you know, former NBA veteran who once contracted the virus and gave it to the rest of the league.

I hope not. Yeah. And then as I began to sort of, again, as everything escalated, I'm thinking to myself, oh, this is this is a wrap, man. They're going to cancel everything. And then I saw it was like Premier League games to go forward as normal. And then I don't know if you saw this in the news cycle. Premier League comes out and announces everything is just locked on. Dana White confident, right? And it must have been an hour or two later that I don't know if you paid attention to this,

but Mikel Arteta, the manager for Arsenal, tested positive. And then a player for Chelsea tested positive. And then immediately after that, so like four hours after that, they're like, there's been a major meeting of owners and blah, blah, blah, and managers among Premier League, I guess, stakeholders.

And at that point, they just suspended all operations. But they were all like, yeah, we're going to do this, yeah, until it really just literally invaded the various clubhouses of some of their premier teams certainly by celebrity anyway um that was another moment when i was like whoa this is there's no going back i mentioned rudy gobert as a potential key villain it's like you think of world war ii you're like hitler and mussolini those are the key players i wonder if dana white will end up escalating rudy gobert i'm sure much more on that to come in terms of the key villain in the moment. Hopefully it doesn't

play out like that. But Luke, just to close on sort of the personal touch of what we're all going through right now and we can't avoid it. I'm in the Connecticut suburb. We really haven't had much of a reach of the outbreak even to this point. We've been very lucky. But you're in a damn city, Luke. All right. I mean, do you have to put up a sign on your front lawn that says uh ex-marine even though there's no such thing just to try to scare free people up because to be i'm going to be fully honest with you right my neighbor we had a great talk at the fence today you know i was we were raking up leaves i was cleaning out the gutters took a 15 foot fall off a ladder by the way it's a separate side story um and you know i was I was like, look, neighbor man, Anthony.

Was it like you? And then who was the guy who did it? The comedian in the tool man? Tim Allen. Tim Allen. He did it with the neighbor whose face you never saw. Was that like- Was it Wilson? I believe it was Wilson. Yeah. Something like that. I'm like, I'm going to be really honest with you. I'm not that fearful of the virus. Now, you know, if someone in my family catches it and passes or if some, God forbid, somebody in my house should catch it, I would be much more fearful. I'm a little bit more nervous, Luke, of the chaos, right?

Because I remember, it's a very regional story, but 2011, I think it was, in Connecticut in the Northeast region, we had this wild snow and ice storm before the leaves fell off the trees. So what that meant was trees, power lines down everywhere. I didn't have power in my house for 12 days, which meant no hot water, no electricity, no nothing with a well and all that. And it was Armageddon. The stores were empty. You had to wait an hour and a half at Dunkin' Donuts for a coffee. You couldn't go to the ATM because there was no power. It was just straight on Armageddon. I think in this scenario, that's what I fear the most, the potential for just mass chaos and craziness. Do you have the AK-47 aimed out the front window just in Washington, D.C., just to

turn people away? I don't have that kind of a fear. Those are not the sort of fear. I have different kinds of fears. So I live in an area of D.C. I don't know if I should say the neighborhood because I don't want the weirdos. Don't say it because they'll knock on your door, them donks. They'll put the tin right up to the glass, Luke. They probably will. I'll put it this way. I live technically in the city.

I live in city proper, but I live in a quadrant of the city that for years no one ever did. Now it's become gentrified, although I moved here in 2004. So I guess I'm part of the gentrification process too, but the tip of the spear, so to speak, to borrow the term. Anyway, the way it works is that my neighborhood is filled. If you've ever been to D.C. or watched House of Cards, you've seen in the intro, all the homes usually are all kind of connected. It's all row homes. They can be big. They can be small, but they're all row homes.

Mine is not that way. Mine is single family. I have a yard. It's not a very – it's actually a small yard, but it's a yard just the same in the front and the back. In fact, it connects all the way around. That is highly unusual. Why is that relevant? It's relevant because I have much less population density.

I've never once – there's actually been one day in my whole life that I've been here that I couldn't park directly in front of my house, which if you live in Georgetown or Adams Morgan or any other place, that's impossible. And it was when the Pope came and they literally made us get our cars off the road. You couldn't actually have it in the street. So all that is to say the neighborhood to me is calm. Everything is fine. I'm not worried about that. I'm a little bit worried about getting supplies if it happens. That sort of a thing.

But the thing I'm really worried about is what this disease is known for, which is, I'm like you. I'm not exactly all that worried about getting it. Although that dude who I told you about, my buddy in Europe, his wife got it. And it rocked her, bro. It rocked her bad. Uh, she was good for four days, you know, not good, but like whatever. And then got better and then took a turn for the worse and they had to take her to the hospital and it was the whole nine yards and she doesn't smoke. She's healthy. She's 36, you know? And it's like, if she has to get hospitalized, she lived. So in the statistics, you know and it's like if she has to get hospitalized she lived so in the statistics you know nothing stands out really I suppose except for maybe hospitalization rate

but here's my thing even if I don't get that sick Brian what happens if I get into a car accident and the hospitals are full what happens if my daughter gets sick uh is she going to get the care that she needs because there's not enough doctors to go around? Again, the stats say she'll probably be fine, but those are the, you know, that's no comfort when your child is sick, you know? And I think the last thing I'd say is, even if it's not me, my dad's 79, you know, my mother-in-law is 67. I obviously worry straight up for them. Just, just, you know, what will the virus do to them if they catch it? And I think more than that, like, dude, can you imagine if your wife was pregnant right now and was set to give birth in a month or two you know you'd be thinking to yourself shit the hospitals

are full yeah right are we gonna and even if you get there and even if you get a bed is she going to catch it when she delivers you know when her when her body is totally compromised and it's like fuck that's the part I worry about. I'm not worried about the walking dead. I'm worried about what's going to happen if an emergency happens during an emergency, you know? And look, there's two extreme ends, you know, sort of close on this topic.

There's two extreme ends to be on. And I try to always stay in the middle on everything. And I too have had to really just, you know, you asked me on a personal level, like, you haven't been active on your Twitter account in either direction. I've just sort of stepped away from it all, Luke, because you can get too close to it. You know, as much as you want to be safe, you can get too close to the digital pandemic that can break out, and Luke, you're a very educated man who had very smart things to say on Twitter,

but sometimes they're a little too smart for me, Luke. I felt like the world was going to end and crash through my window. It's not about that. Have you seen this guy, Dr. Tony Fauci? He's been making the rounds. Let me give you his exact title. He is the head of the part of the National Institutes for Health that is in charge of infectious diseases. And here he goes. He is the head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases within the National Institutes for Health. He's 79 himself. And basically the point he has tried to make is that you actually, people are like, here's the funny part about the argument. People are like, oh my God, you're a panic monger and blah, blah, blah.

But evidently I'm not, right? Because I don't know how it was in Connecticut, but you mentioned I live in a city. Dude, everybody I know who lives in more centrally located parts of the city, like the main artery that cuts right through all the museums is 14th Street. And if you just keep following that up to the north, it's

just bar, restaurant, bar, restaurant, bar, restaurant. It's crazy, bar, restaurant. It's crazy, right? It's this massive corridor of bars and restaurants. I have friends who live on 14th Street who are like, it is packed to the rafters out there. Like if I was and if I and people like me were fear mongering any kind of successful way, it's slowly dawning on them that as this virus spreads and the hazard that that could cause to health care resources and institutions, they're taking increasing measures. Even today in Washington, D.C., Mayor Bowser didn't call off, you know, all bars and restaurants are closed, although that's coming. I mean, it's just coming. Within days, Luke. Within days, yeah. And restaurants are closed, although that's coming. I mean, it's just coming. Days.

Within days, Luke. Within days, yeah. And New York City, too. The point being is, Tony Fauci's point is, you actually don't want to fearmonger. No, but if people say you're going overboard, you have to remember, once a virus spreads and you're dealing with each day's results of how many are sick, how many injured, how many are sick and then dead, you're behind. You're already behind. So you want to get out in front of it by saying, take it seriously, take it seriously, take

it seriously, so that, I tweeted a video earlier about this Italian doctor. They were asking him, hey, how helpful is it for you that there's this quarantine going on? And he's like, well, for the next 10 days, it's not. Because all the damage that was baked in before the quarantine went into place i have to now absorb that we're talking about the last he said the second half of the second part of march like the last week so what his point was is like yes once that effect takes in i'll be in a much better spot but for the next 10 days it

doesn't make any difference whatsoever and the the earlier you can act, the better. I think that's the point I was simply trying to make. Well, your tweets have been in good faith, Luke. But at the same time, I can't even begin to imagine what your mentions look like. Yeah, they're a graveyard. They're a complete graveyard. I mean, look, I'm not going to sit here and... There's been people who have been accusing me of not backing up my

claims with evidence and I put up a thread to support all of them and you can draw whatever conclusion you want I'm not mad at fans, I'm really not, I'm not mad at fans for being disappointed, it's what fans are going to do, man, fans are going to be disappointed, whether it's seniors

who didn't get to play in March Madness, can you imagine you know, I saw one guy for his school, I think it was University of Pittsburgh, was seven points shy of setting the all-time record, and he was a senior. Gone. It's just gone, dude. You don't get that back. Does he have a right to be disappointed? Of course. And even if you're just an average MMA fan, especially if you bought tickets to 249 or to UFC London, yeah, of course, you have every right to be disappointed.

And no one could say otherwise. All I'm pleading, this is what I'm pleading at this point is I think when this is all over and I hope I'm wrong but I think when this is all over and and by the way CDC is saying at a bare minimum sports organization should not plan for anything for eight weeks minimum eight weeks yeah I think two months by the way quickly, I think two months is the right window as the maximum, maximum might be a bad word, but as the healthy medium for everything, I think you have to prepare that two months of your life is going to be sidetracked and put on pause. That's right. And all I want people to do is just put that in their mind. So like they're mad, like, Oh, UFC London, are you happy? It's not taking place. Well, I'm not happy that we don't get to enjoy sports, if that's what you mean. But the thing I'm trying to point out is I think when this is all over, and I'm being dead serious, dude, how many times you can go through my track record, how many times have I said I wanted to see Khabib Tony?

I think it's honestly the most important fight in the history of the lightweight division, arguably. I really believe that. But I think when this is all over, that's going to be the least of our concerns. I really fundamentally believe that. But I think when this is all over, that's going to be the least of our concerns. I really fundamentally believe that. And so we don't need to witch hunt a web scream or web scream your choice who put that a DM question into Chuck and I saying, will the Corona end up being the fifth times the charm to end that fight? Yeah.

Something like that. I was, it was what I wrote to DC. DC was like, you know, the fighters want it, and the UFC's trying to give the fans what they want, and it's like, well, all those seniors who wanted to play in March Madness, they wanted it too. And you can go to any sport. They all want to play. Some of these teams are in the playoff hunt, and they were

hot, and they wanted to go. It's irrelevant. The question is not. It's never. It's never. This is the thing I've been trying to hammer home. It is not what I want. And it's not what you want, Brian. It's not what anybody wants to do. I mean, I'm not, you know, on a, on a very micro level. I'm not, I'm not excited about the next one to two months, potentially on a sports digital front, CBS sports, my day job to sort of fill content when there's nothing to fill Luke. It's going to be, how am I, How am I going to do 15 hours of radio a week, not only when there's

no MMA, there's no boxing. Dude, there's no sports. How am I going to do that? I haven't even wrapped my head around that problem. But again, that's my problem. And the point I'm trying to make is, and I'll wrap up on this and we'll talk about UFC Brasilia, which is, I'm just trying to get folks

to understand, if you want to tell me who you are as a person, show me what kind of belief you have in terms of what you think you owe to society and what kind of moral commitments you have to make to live around other people. And if you don't really feel like you have to do that and you don't feel like any of that matters, you know, that's psycho shit, to be quite honest with you. So that's what I'm trying to drive home. Let's worry about what we need to do by listening to public health officials, by honoring the requests, by taking care of each other. And then when this is over, let's regroup and let's fire up the fucking chainsaw, man. And let's have some goddamn fights. That's my view.

Let's have loaded fights every weekend and hopefully we'll no fucking doubt each other out i'm sure that you know this social distancing thing will extend for a while luke you and i no future for tip the tip and at any point under any circumstance all right but hey by the way you know you say i don't give you enough compliments in life uh you look very nicely do you come from a job interview you look like you just uh fresh out of college at an insurance company or no fresh out of college at an insurance company. No, fresh out of the shower, really, is the way you're looking at it. All right, man.

Well, let's get into this. UFC Brasilia took place over the weekend. I thought it was morally reprehensible that it did. We should also note Showtime aired on Friday a Salida promotions card from somewhere in Minnesota. Hinkley, Minnesota on a name of a Native American reservation that I can't pronounce or remember at the moment. It was a little surprising. Yeah, here's what I'll say. I've been killing UFC for trying to and eventually airing a contest without doing any kind of COVID-19 testing. Salida

promotions and that commission, that show should not have happened. It shouldn't have happened, and it's irresponsible. Fair enough in defense for a tiny bit of that show box card. The fighters were already in Minnesota. It was sort of is what it was. I'm not saying it should have gone on, but that's a little bit different than some of the things we're seeing with the UFC,

not just the Brazilian card, of course. But now with the fact that really, I mean, before we even talk about the fights and Brasilia, how they went down, what that means for the future, Luke, I really think the starting point has to be the fact that every single sporting event and organization is pretty much calling it quits. We did see that showbox card in a tiny little conference room in that casino in front of a handful of people, but anywhere else in boxing, they're taking a time out for a while. Everywhere else in MMA, even Bellator 241 on Friday night, Scott Coker and

company decided not only to end that card hours before, but pay the fighters, the cutmen, the trainers, all of that, and just say, look, we were already going on a two-month break anyway, but we're certainly going to step aside. Right now, I think the biggest story is the decision-making process that's going on in the back rooms of the UFC, Dana White, the parent company Endeavor. Luke, to not just, in a way, act like all this scare doesn't matter, but act like nothing is going to get in the way of this business train that's going to keep moving down the tracks, even if we have to send out emails and draft any available fighter who's willing to pick up his gun and join this army

and this war. What are we fighting for here, Luke? There are times, man, when I work in this business, and I know there's some folks being like, oh my God, you're exaggerating. Fine, I'm exaggerating. Fine. Then I'm wrong, and you don't have to listen to anything I'm saying. There are times in this business where I feel morally compromised and co-opted and just gross, and I don't know if I want to do this for a living. And on the UFC side, if it had just been this one, I still would have found it ridiculous and bad faith and terrible, but I'd be like, all right, well, am I really thinking that this one event is going to be that bad? No, it sets a bad precedent. But if they had just relented to what essentially public health officials and best practices were telling them, you could sort of just, you know, grin and bear it, I think.

But what really has stood out is not merely the defiance, but what is backing that defiance. And what is backing the defiance from what I can tell, and I do not know this, I can only read into it just like you, is you have these two SportsCenter interviews with Michael Eves, who, shout out to Michael Eves, I hope you're watching this, this boy you have fallen down on the job in a dramatic way you should be ashamed of yourself um not falling down like Michael Douglas in that classic 80s movie not not like you off the ladder today I did take his 15 foot fall off a ladder today yeah no but here's here's why it's not that the interviews are, but you have a guy who is coming on SportsCenter and Daniel White, who is making a series of claims,

and there is no pushback on him of any kind of meaningful variety whatsoever. And actually, Michael and I went back and forth on Twitter. He was like, what else could I have said? Here, Michael, here's what you could have said. You could have said to him, are you doing any COVID-19 testing? Because before the interviews, uh, cab MMA, which is the, uh, organization in Brazil that

does the essentially the sanctioning they had said, we're not going to do any COVID-19 testing. That's not just the fighters. That's ESPN staff. That's UFC staff. That's facility staff. That's anybody in attendance anywhere. god only knows what they have uh forget about just the close contact of it that's not officiating crew nothing and if you're not going to say why you're doing it you should say why you're not doing it by the way then he goes on to say we're working on a plan with nevada turns out nevada doesn't want any part of that and then we'll see what happens in the uk at the time for the first of those two interviews it was full steam ahead it's like like, dude, how can you say this?

How can you say, how can you say you're going to, and let's see, you're going to fly people internationally all over the earth. You're going to have them go through customs where they're going to be around other people who've been flying all over the earth. There's no way to really quarantine them. So now they're going to go through major metropolitan cities. They're going to deplete themselves to make weight by also being around a bunch of other people

who, even during the course of fight week, have not been tested for any of this. Then you're going to put them into a fist fight where they're sharing bodily fluid, and there's going to be no attempt past the Brazil show. Let's put that behind us. Past the Brazil show, there's going to be no

attempt, or no real good faith attempt to do that, and then Dana White the Brazil show, there's going to be no attempt to, or no real good faith attempt to do that. And then Dana White says, well, we're going to put the gun on them to test them for fevers. Right. Well, here's what I learned about what they did in China. China did the same thing. Number one, the fever guns are unreliable by themselves. Number two, even if you actually have the fever gun on someone, what China did was they would test people if they went to the bank. They would test people. They left the building. They would test people.

They come in their building in all different kinds of spots. And if you tested positive with a high fever, they separated you. And what they figured out was they would do a test right there with a four hour turnover to see if you had COVID-19. And if you didn't, and if you did, they didn't send you back home to be quarantined at home because then you

just give it to your family. They actually separated you and put you with other people who then have COVID-19 so that there could be this healing process together. In other words, there's a bunch of steps that have to happen. Meanwhile, you can only do that if you already have a quarantine happening. There's no quarantine in the UK as of now. There's no quarantine in the U.S. as of now. You have all these steps that have to be in place to guarantee safety and then you're saying we're gonna have two healthy athletes dude daniel

white you literally don't know that that is true you literally don't know that you're not taking any steps meaningfully to get there there's so many layers to this it's like look if fans were still allowed to be in buildings in l next week, which they're not, which is why that card has to move, again, you can still make an argument, why are they going there? Why take that chance? If fights were allowed to be moved from the fight night card in Portland, the fight night card in Columbus, to the UFC Apex Center, which was the original plan, you could say, okay, again, it's dangerous, but fighters want to do this. And by the way, that has been Dana White's biggest defense is look, the fighters want to do this.

And all of us who have sense can see through that. The fighters want to get paid. That's what they want to do. But Luke, we have a scenario in which UFC London next week can't be in London. Leon Edwards has refused to travel. And when I say refuse to travel, I don't mean to put any shade on him. I mean, they told him you're going to have to get up early this morning, get on a flight to the U S you don't know what city or venue your fight may be in against Tyra Woodley. And you don't know if you're going to be allowed to fly back home yet. You have a family back there and a life. And he said,

no. And still Dana white and company are like, this ain't going to stop us. We're going to invite. Yeah. I'm doing a sort of country redneck, uh, accent, not,

not a little foghorn leghorn there. Yeah. A little bit of this ain't going to stop us, but really you say, look, we're going to find a way. Um, it's not heroic,

obviously. I mean, I don't, I don't feel that, I don't really understand how you could be on the other side and say what Dana is doing is right. So with that established, Luke, rather than just be like going in circles for five minutes, talking about how just absurd this is, why, Luke, why is Dana White really doing this? Because he has the sort of one dimensional intentionality of almost like a drug addict. I'm being honest. Of almost somebody who's like, no matter what, I'm going to get to that drug.

We're going to put on these shows no matter what. It's not heroic. It's not patriotic. It's crazy. Is it the debt that Endeavor and UFC has taken on to make this deal happen? What is really going on here? They just paid out a $300 million dividend to some of their celebrity investors, also to themselves. Dana White got a portion of that, as did Ari Emanuel and some others, which is their right to do.

But it's like if you're going to do that and then you have to keep up these shows because, again, we're theorizing here. We have no idea if this is true, but is the UFC broke? Or the UFC is not broke because we know they make money, but is Endeavor broke? Remember they had that failed IPA. Excuse me, IPA. That's actually a good name for IPA. I've got a few failed IPAs in my body right now, yeah. They had a failed IPO along with WeWork and others, and they've been trying to recoup some of the losses there.

That's part of what that $300 million dividend is supposed to help do. And you think, well, maybe that's part of it. The other part is, you know, look, I don't want to get political other than cases where we have to, but we might have to in this one case, because he goes on SportsCenter and says, well, I talked to Trump and Vice President Mike Pence, and they said, you know, be cautious, but live your life. Well, I got news for you. These are two people who are being pilloried by every public health official and epidemiologist and every, frankly, informed and concerned party about what best practices are. Nobody is recommending you fly across the country. Nobody's recommending that you fly internationally, which by the way, people were doing when he was

making that claim. Ashley Evans Smith was in the airport. She flew to London apparently for nothing. So you're making demonstrably false claims about what public health best practices are. You're leaning on this title of president and vice president, but the two men in charge have not shown a great capacity to handle the particulars of this challenge with a very, very strong hand. I realize that it's an act of God moment. I don't blame Trump for a situation that is really very difficult for any president to get right. Lord knows, maybe his predecessor would have fucked it up too. Hard to say. And I also don't blame Trump for the failed affliction promotion either, Luke, while we're on the record here. I'm just pointing out the argument that he's

done a bang-up job about it is just not true. Even today, or yesterday rather, giving bad advice about we have the virus under control. No, you don't. 80% of intensive care beds are already used up in New York City. If they have and the surge continues, it's going to be really bad in New York City and other places as well. Seattle is just like that too. So, you know, Google has this, Google is going to have a website that's going to help us identify and track, you know, those who are affected. Meanwhile, it's not even ready for rolling out.

And it's just for the Bay area. It's like, it's like, what, what is happening anyway? So here's my point. And I'll throw it to you. I know I'm rambling here. My only point is as a friend of Trump, and I'm just trying to ask this, not as a partisan, even though that there's no way to really separate the two, but I'm trying to ask you, Brian, because we don't always agree politically. Is there a chance that he really admires the president, believes what he wants to say, and is trying to force that worldview on all of us? Is that a thing? At first, I thought it was almost a crusader thing it was dana's way of saying look like everyone else is is folding up shop you know nba march madness we will be the ones who is who are

there for you it's by the way very similar to what vince mcmahon wwe is doing right now at the same time they're doing empty arena shows they just had a friday night smackdown episode in their orlando training facility they're going to do it again Monday night on Raw. And look, the message that they really hammered home in the beginning of that show was like, no matter what, rain or shine, WWE is here for you. You know, we're here to entertain you. And by the way, that Friday SmackDown show was just weird and awkward. It's in an empty warehouse, right?

It just doesn't make any sense. I thought that was Dana's stance to begin with, mixed with the sort of guile of a smart businessman who says this, Luke, if everybody's stuck at home and none of the traditional powers are playing, NBA, all that, we could be the only game in town. We could do record freaking numbers. This will be the best thing that happens to us financially. This will be the best thing that happens to our ESPN deal and all that. Now, look, a slight argument against that is it's not 1988 anymore. It's not even 1998, right? Like, if anyone's thriving during this period where we're all stuck at home sort of doing our own self-quarantine,

I think it's more of like a Disney Plus, a Netflix. We are overloaded with options from the idea of content and streaming right now. I don't think people are going out of their way to be like, hey, ain't UFC Fight Night Brasilia the only live sporting event? Let's tune in. Now, so because I don't believe that, I'm wondering if it's something deeper. And I think people on Twitter that have responded to that cry and been like, look, Endeavor's the parent company. They also own the PBR, the Professional Bull Riders Association. And that's the only other sport behind UFC who is seemingly not adhering to the fear or the guidelines or the reality of what's going on. So if this is just a whole debt thing, Luke, this is a sad reality. And I think a lot of people

on Twitter have sort of said like, look, if we go through two months and this all clears and yes, maybe there's realities of this scare, people we love die, like things, bad things happen. But on the other end, there's potential for some good things will change how we live our life. There's some people questioning, will sports ever be the same? Luke, is there any fear that MMA will never be the same because white is so forcefully pushing this on us? It's not that I don't want live sports during this dead time. Me, the journalist, would love more than anything if Tyron Woodley and Colby Covington fill the hole of UFC London and they do it, I don't know, wherever, in a warehouse somewhere. I don't care. On a barge?

If they did that, of course, as a viewer and fan i'd be into it but the irresponsibility right now mixed with the reality of where we're at with ufc no union bad situations for fighter pay now we've seen an email that ariel hawani shared of espn that have been sent out to managers just basically like hopelessly looking for any available fighter between Bantamweight and Welterweight in the company or not who can fill out an undercard. Luke, this is like a mouth dripping with saliva, sort of like I mentioned, sort of like a drug addict going after it. This is beyond dangerous. This is almost like sick at this level. It's exploitative.

I don't care where you stand politically. I don't care about any of politically. I don't care about any of that. How these fighters are being treated, you're preying on the fact that, look, let's be honest. Fighters in 2020, professional fighters, are already not adhering to any level of personal safety comparative to regular life, right? For a living, they're going in there and letting their brains getting rattled. We already deal with that morality as journalists, but they're dealing with that physical reality. It's not surprising that under this guise of what's happening socially right now, that they would be the first ones to be like, I don't care,

I'll fight, let's do this. Even separate from that financial thing, the exploitive nature of that, Luke, you were the one who tweeted it multiple times. This was the NBA or the MLB or the NFL. They have unions. So Luke, is the time now for all fighters to join arms and be like, look, this shit's crazy. We're the only ones still flying. We're the only ones still putting our lives and our sweat and our blood on the line during coronavirus pandemic season. Maybe it's time we join arms for the first time. We don't need B-1 Revenue, by the way, or GSP, but maybe it's time we join arms and be like, enough of this BS. We take a stand right now, and we actually join forces as fighters and stand up

for our future. Could you ever think of a better time, Luke? Yeah, this is not a great time for it, actually. It's quite the opposite. So, first of all, let me say a few things. One, I'll give any promoter through the weekend, excuse me, any television entity through the weekend a bit of a mulligan, right, about being a part of this, but any television entity in any place that's either been affected negatively or, you know, it's growing or the government is beginning to really hammer down and control the population for public health reasons. If, if, if all ESPN ever does through these Michael Eves interviews on SportsCenter

and no one in the company saying anything about it. And this march of insanity continues. It'll be a lasting moral stain on that company, right on ESPN. And they should know that and have a look at themselves in the mirror about it, number one. Number two, no, I don't actually think that this is a good time for it. I mean, in your mind, it might tell you that. But I saw when that news went out that managers were being asked to have anything. First of all, it's kind of hilarious that the UFC, who has been criticized for sort of like anonymizing their content, right?

Where let's just put as many shows out as possible with names you don't recognize unless you're a hardcore. And we'll do it as often as we can. And, you know, now they're willing to just have any kind of a show, it appears, with anyone they can book in any place that's open. This anonymized buffet food version of content is truly reaching the endgame. I think on top of that, I would say relative to the concern you had raised, the fighters I saw on social media, there was a lot of them speaking up like, I'll go do it.

And you want to get mad at the fighter and say to yourself, what the fuck are you talking about? Like we all have a responsibility to be, you know, we are in this together. We have a shared fate together, but the reality is they're grossly underpaid. They're used to being treated like commodities and this is utterly commodification of who they are and you win bonus points with the company by stepping up on short notice they're just praying on that right and they're praying on the idea that all company men bear arms and come join us but the point being is that's effective to them and that's effective to fighters because they need that. And so they can't even think past two months because they may not have the financial resources to think past two months. So as gross as it is to watch, you just kind of say to yourself, well, you know, it's also true, Brian, we should admit this.

We are extremely, extremely fortunate that Showtime is as committed to the show as they are, that we have the resources to do the show like we do. I have a nice camera. This is a nice microphone. You got a whole nice setup there. Dude, we're lucky. Not everybody has this, and that should factor into our analysis as well. Just the same. Daniel Cormier gets out there and tweets, isn't it great that the company is going out there and giving the fighters what they want because the fighters want to do it and the fans want to see it. And it's like, Daniel, and I wrote this to him. Part of the reason why the fighters want to do this is because financial destitution is a real problem for them. Number one. Number two,

you have noted previously when you had told the story that they had sent you an anonymous or, you know, unsolicited check during a hard time in your life, which I take seriously. That's a real thing. I'm sure it made a big difference for him and his family. But you had noted their generosity. Well, if they're generous, this is a much better time to show us that, rather than putting the public at risk by having them go around and do these shows, by putting these fighters at risk, UFC staff at risk, officiating people at risk, ESPN staff at risk, all of it, and then spreading the

disease to say we have no role, right? As if we are apart from the world, we have no role in maintaining public health. It is egregious. It is outrageous. And I would like to tell you, I can't believe we're doing it. But here's what I'll say, Brian. This is a time when people are telling you who they are. Do you believe as a society we are in this together, that we have a shared outcome, a shared fate, or do you not believe that? Do you believe that you have a responsibility to people, or do you just fundamentally not believe that? Again, we can quibble with the lines of what that might be, but to just blatantly, I mean, dude, they're on the run from the government. Everywhere they try to go, it's shutting them down to the point where they're like, you know this, Brian, it feels like we're

back in 1994, where they're just trying to find a place to park the boat because the waters have been choppy everywhere else. How did we get here get here i got a couple key questions or points to make on this um there's no better time to really talk about the fact of why we don't have a union why this has actually happened but look it's been brilliant it's really been brilliant not just from the beginning when they resuscitated this company to always make the brand of the company more important than the fighter but i feel like in ufc there's the have and the have nots, right? There's the underpaid fighters who will give everything it takes to climb that ladder and have a chance to win a championship. And then there's the elite haves, the champions, the guys

who sell, the guys who were former champions who are finally in that upper tax bracket, they have made it where the upper tax bracket guys finally, after years of blood and sweat, are getting real money to make up for all those years when they're taking life in the middle of the cage, those guys, of course, aren't going to fight for equal pay and for equal rights because they finally made it. Unfortunately, those guys are the ones who have the power to make a change. So as things are structured now, Luke, if you can't make a change during something like this, if you can't as fighters band together and be like, if you can't, as fighters, band together and be like, no, this moment is too far, you never will. Dude, it's not that I disagree.

It's not that I disagree. I'm just saying. You talk about how some of the other ones, there's have and there's have-nots. Sort of. Dude, you can't tell me that Conor McGregor has been fairly compensated. You can tell me he's been, you can tell me he's made a lot of money.

Can you tell me he's gotten everything he's earned? I don't believe that. I don't believe that even a little bit. Can you tell me John Jones got what they got? I mean, dude, look at the numbers. And people are like, how do you know these numbers? They've got them from court documents that the UFC was required by law to release. And by the way,

the more the UFC releases the numbers, the more it makes them look good. Pay is actually not going up. It's actually relatively declined year over year, in the last two years anyway, for which they have the numbers. And then more to the point, you're talking about $150 million in payouts, if you count USADA, which they do, is around 19-20%. Dude, yes, of course the Angela Hills are not making enough. The James Vicks are not making enough. The Tom Lawlers, of course, doesn't work for UFC. But those types of fighters who are very, very good, but are all kind of on the come-up

as celebrities, no, they don't make enough money. But at the same time, it's the top earners who also don't make nearly what um they're supposed to be making so i hear what you're saying they don't want to risk at all luke they don't want to risk what they finally have achieved by rocking the boat right they don't want to become like randy couture level where the company's just like get the hell out of here so let's do let's do this a little bit do you think think the UFC London zombie card ever happens wherever the hell it's going to happen? I don't know what Dana White, and I'm saying this from the standpoint of he does have presidential connections. I don't know what he's going to be able to pull off.

Luke, I've seen many an egregious sin happen on a Native American ground, to be really honest with you. Dude, if they go back to Native American territory, I mean, time is a flat circle. Tommy Morrison, with the HIV virus, had a MMA fight that one time under like half rules. In West Virginia. In West Virginia. It was like a, no, it was like a New Mexico Native American ground. Oh, yeah, yeah. And at the last minute, he fought an ex-boxer, and they changed, or he he fought an MMA guy they changed the rules so the MMA guy couldn't take him down like it was just

absolute train wreck bs is that I mean look is there a is there a state equivalent to that is will the state of Wyoming or South Dakota who has no play in major American sports gonna go like you know what we got nothing to lose here you want to bring Habib Tony to Cheyenne, Washington? Let's do it. I don't discount that that's possible. Cheyenne, Wyoming. Did I say Washington? Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. All right. All right. Dude, but even Bare Knuckle FC called it a day. You know? It's like, it's unbelievable where we've ended up here on this one. It's crazy.

So I'll say no. I'll say, here's unbelievable where we've ended up here on this one. So I'll say no. I'll say, here's my formal bet. My formal bet is no, it doesn't happen. Because there's going to be travel restrictions. Even if there are a bunch of destitute fighters willing to just do the company a solid, which is essentially how the business runs at this point. Even with that, there will... And by the way,

it is alarming to me that the only changes the UFC are willing to make are the ones the government mandates. But my point ultimately is that there's going to be enough mandates, either federally or locally or state by state, that is going to limit their possibilities for the foreseeable future.

So no, I don't think it happens. I just feel like they're abusing this whole statement of don't panic, stay cautious. They're leaning on the don't panic side, but let's not forget what the cautious side. Don't panic means don't read Twitter 24 hours a day and put tinfoil over your windows and buy all the hand sanitizer in the next three counties. That's what don't panic means. There's a difference between that and just staying cautious and maybe not going out all day. Look, I took the family hiking yesterday. It was beautiful. It was wonderful. All right. We stopped at the grocery store. I washed my hands right afterwards. I stayed cautious. I didn't panic. That's what we're talking about. Not this. To close on this topic, though, before

we can get into maybe some actual fights and what happened, I do feel bad for my media brethren at ESPN. And I'm interested to see how it plays out in the next few days. So what do I mean by that? Do you think they've been muzzled? Yes. We haven't seen a word negative from the many personalities at ESPN, who many of them we know and love. And I mean, I've worked there for 12 years. I love me some Brett Okamoto, for example, to be honest with you. We haven't seen a negative word out of them, but I think the real test, Luke, will come from the first take style programming. Will we see a Stephen A. Smith straight up be like,

look, the only sport we got on the docket this week is UFC London. If they can find somewhere out west in an open area where they can put up a cage, maybe this isn't the right thing. If they're willing to go down that road and actually hit their partner hard, then they'll show you a backbone. They'll show you some credibility. They'll show you some integrity. It'll be very interesting to see if all parties, every journalist at ESPN, not just our MMA folks, if they end up being muzzled through this entire process, Luke, that'll smell awful. And if that's the case, look, if CBS wanted to go forward with the NCAA tournament

and everybody's telling them to stop and they're telling me, you can't talk about it, I'm in a rough spot, right? Right. As I mentioned, if they continue this, it'll be a moral stain on ESPN, and you'll have to really look at what they're doing. I'll give everyone a mulligan. I'll wipe the slate clean from the weekend and say it was totally inadvisable and should not have happened.

Okay. Let's not do it again. And if they continue to try and not do anything about it, other than just to massage the back of their broadcast partner, you have to really look at what they're doing and say to yourself, is this a news organization? Cause probably at that point it is not. And by the way,

no, there's no glass houses here. People have come at us for having that tip-to-tip poster over my shoulder, Luke. All right? All right? Fair enough. We're not talking about the Brasilia card at all? Yeah, we should probably, within the first three hours of this episode, we should probably talk about actual sports that went down, Luke.

So I'll say this. Let's talk about the main event. Kevin Lee versus Charles Oliveira. Kevin Lee ultimately losing by submission, I think, in the third round. Charles Oliveira literally had a shoulder injury the whole time. People are holding our feet to the fire about this, Brian, which is that both of us had said, Kevin Lee, we had a lot of belief that has championship material.

You didn't see a lot of it in this particular fight. Here's what stood out to me, Brian. I wonder about you when I was watching. One thing, as you know, I'm sort of obsessed with the details about fighting. That's why I do dissected and I pick up on certain things. I miss others, right? I do the best that I can. But one thing I've really noticed, and as a boxing fan, I'm wondering, and I suspect you've noticed this as well, a jab doesn't have exactly the same value in MMA as it does in boxing, which isn't to say it doesn't have less or more.

It just has a lot of different function. But one thing I've noticed is you just don't see a lot of the jab. You see a little bit of it. You see a lot of crosses, a lot of hooks, a lot of overhands, a lot of combinations with the kicking that doesn't. The jab does not prominently feature in a lot of fighters' repertoires. That's not the case with Volkanovsky. It's not the' repertoires. That's not the case with Volkanovski. It's not the case with Holloway.

It's not the case with a lot of good strikers we could point to. I'm not saying it's universal. Here's my point. I thought for sure Kevin Lee was going to work behind the jab to keep Oliveira off of him. And he just didn't have one. There was no real jab that he could drive in someone's face. Before I throw it to you here, think of somebody in boxing right now that's got a really great jab, a jab that blinds you, a jab that stings you, a jab that pops the head back, a jab

where you can put other punches behind it. Think about how central that is to defining the way they fight. To me, yes, Kevin Lee had a messed up weight cut, and he looked like he was gassing by the end of the second when he was going for the takedowns. I think that played a role in him ultimately losing but to me whatever the issue there was at this point in his career how does he not have a jab which is that he has one how does he not have that kind of a jab where he can really manage distance he had i think a three or four inch reach advantage brian campbell yeah this is a great point by you this has been sort of one skill that

we've seen certain guys master it and use it i mean look the the go-to is george saint pierre in the cost check rematch where he basically broke his eye socket and freddie roach helped him use that as just a crippling weapon the whole fight you don't see guys commit to it isn't a lack of proper boxing training coming in is it just something that is going to take more years before it becomes a foundational thing i'm not really sure, but you're right. I mean, look at Gennady Golovkin. Statistically, he has the best jab in boxing.

It's a weapon. It sets up his right hand. The fact that he, I mean, look, those two fights against Canelo in which I thought Gennady Golovkin won both of them, very highly controversial. He won both in my eyes because of the jab. It's a foundational thing to keep guys in the area of the ring that you want and you're right lee didn't go to that lee just didn't look on at all in this fight now look he had moments i thought he won the first round neither of the three judges agreed with me there i thought he was taking way too many clean shots the missed weight luke was

an obvious sort of red flag i'm fearful that it's a final red flag because as I sit here right now, I'm still willing to call him future UFC champion Kevin Lee at 27 years old. You're crazy, BC. Yeah, yeah, I'm crazy. There's some guys that just have nine lives. Zab Judah in boxing when he was 37. I thought he could still make a run. We all have our blind spots here.

Kevin Lee could still turn this around if he had won this fight, right? That weight loss, even Charles Oliveira said it afterwards, the bad weight cut, he's like, look, I'm not going to hold this against Kevin Lee. These are unprecedented circumstances we're going through. Kevin Lee traveled to Brazil. There's no crowd. Look, I thought the lack of the crowd would help him. He had moments where he was in that fight landing big shots. He took too many clean shots, in my opinion, in return,

looked a little bit flat, then got caught in the submission. Yeah, there's the hole. Did he tap afterwards? Look, he tapped. The fight's over. At that point, yeah. I mean, look, there's nothing worth talking about at that point. I mean, it happened. The fight's over. I got fears, Luke. I got fears for this guy. There's too much talent there not to put it together. And it's like, yes, he has a history of bad weight cuts, which has blown up his lightweight potential. I was shocked when he came back into the Gillespie fight. I was shocked when he sent him to hell the way he did to sort of reappear in our minds as a future lightweight contender.

Luke, can he reimagine himself, before we get into Oliveira, at welterweight in the same way maybe like a Michael Chiesa just did and shows you, oh, wow, wow, maybe he should have been here all along because right now I don't think of Kevin Lee as a potential elite welterweight, but maybe it could surprise us with the explosion, with the ability. Or do you think there's still just foundational holes in his defense, and his mindset that's preventing him from taking all that's inside of him and throwing it against the canvas there luke and just becoming who he's supposed to be world yeah i mean when he's on he's on and when he's not he's really not

he is just he shoots hot and cold and so for me the reasons behind that are one like on the striking department just not having a jab when you have such a long reach um obviously you're drained by the weight cut maybe that played a role in it but the other part to me it's like he wasn't moving his feet a whole lot maybe that's why he was getting hit by olivera because olivera was the guy i wasn't saying it wasn't standing in front of him but it wasn't like using evasive movement to really get out of the way you know the way that kind of anasanya does you you know, and not everyone could be stylebender, I understand, but just sort of borrowing some of the insights. There's just not that there. And it's like, I don't,

there's no athletic reason why that can't be the case. You're training with Barazza Hobby. There's no technical reason why it can't be the case. There has to be something else going on. I think those weight cuts are killing him. I think he's a tweener. I think, I think the lack of 165 is going to kill or badly affect Kevin Lee's career because he said it might be a couple of years where we'll see him again.

Now, how true that is, we'll see. A lot of fighters say a lot of negative things when they lose, and I'm sure this will be devastating for him. That's an alarm going off in my head when I hear a guy in his prime, yes, with alternating wins and losses, to be like, this one stung so bad that i may have to go away for a while that that's a yeah yeah but this is my point it's like if there was if it was 155 165 175 185 205 if we had that i honestly believe it i could be wrong

about this maybe we're just kevin lee homers and we just can't get out of our own way but to me the flashes of brilliance are not an accident, nor are the flashes of just abject failure. Neither are an accident. But to me, I attribute them to probably some technical growth he has to go through, no matter if it was the right weight class or not. But I just believe the lack of 165 is going to hurt his career very badly. He's a tweener. He's a tweener. He is the guy who is perfect for 165, terrible for 155, and 170, it's just not quite right either, given who else is up there. So those are the two issues for me. Now, you mentioned Oliveira.

I'll go right back to you. He's a finisher, bro. He's a born finisher. And you know what? Even with the injury, I thought he looked pretty good on the feet. He looked great on the feet. I mean, the technique was there. Luke, he always had the

flashy submissions got the most submissions in ufc history second and most finishes overall those are staggering statistics those aren't as staggering in the first five ten years of his career when he's alternating wins and losses so consistently the fact now that he uses his striking to set up the submissions outside of his shitty haircut is it too late in the night can i say it too late in the morning can i say that out loud look outside of that crappy haircut um he's evolving into an awesome fighter i do believe that there's a bit of fool's gold buried within the seven fight win streak there's a reason why he hadn't been in the top 10 until now that we aren't really raising the Charles Olivera flag high, right?

Like Nick Lentz is fine, but there's a lot of Nick Lentz is on that streak for him. This is a wake up call against the Kevin Lee, a Kevin Lee who yes, we're saying didn't look like the best version of him, but again, had moments in there in which he landed some big shots against Olivera. His transition from striking to ground game,

his confidence, even more Luke, Sometimes a man just has to grow up and sort of figure this business and this sport out. He's at a scary point where he's not afraid of anybody and he's unique enough with the flashy submission style, yet well-rounded enough, Luke, that I don't see major flaws there. I'm not saying in this historically deep, lightweight division that he deserves or that he will end up in the title picture in one to two more fights, but you're going to have a problem keeping him out of that title picture if he keeps getting wins like this. Yeah. And he, what he showed me is remember what the way we had framed

it going into the fight, which was, we're going to see which guy, not their ceiling, although you'll see some great things from them, we're going to see their floor. I think that Oliveira is the one of the two that showed us he's really working on the problems he's had in his career. I still think he kind of is who he is to the point you're raising, but I think this is going to be the interesting spot for him. Now he'll probably jump into the top ten rankings at lightweight, which is very hard to do, and that's impressive, adding more to that depth. I don't think he'll ever be the best lightweight, but I'll say this. If the best lightweight isn't on their P's and Q's on the right day, he will snatch that fucking

neck of yours fast. He will snatch a back take quick. He will make sure that if you're better than him and you can prove it, you probably will. If you're better than him and you're slipping, he will win. And that always is going to make him to me, if not the most dominant threat, it's going to make him an interesting threat every time you see him on the fight card. Luke, remember in college, in your extended friend circle, I mean, you're a frat guy, which is honestly disappointing for me. I'm a non-organizational fella, all right? I don't believe in these organized white gangs that you rolled in

playing quarters with your folks. It's not the KKK guy. By the way, they weren't all white. All right, well, yeah, whatever. There was always like a skinny guy in that group who just banged. He could get chicks, and you're like, not really that good looking. Doesn't really have a demonstrable game. But he's a finisher, bro.

I mean, he finishes. This guy finishes. I'd like to know more about his personal life to see if he can carry that spirit and flare outside of it to see if the chicks dig the platinum gray, Luke. I mean, you're kind of pulling that off not on purpose. It's working out for you. We'll see what happens for your future, Luke. That takes us to the co-main event very quickly. Gilbert Burns.

Big no-sell, Luke. Big no-sell on the gray hair. Becoming, I think, the second person to TKO Demian Maia inside the distance. Winning matter-of-factly, dropping him. Demian Maia said he thought he was fine, but the referee disagreed. Demian Maia didn't really protest too much. Gilbert Burns, we knew if it was jiu-jitsu for jiu-jitsu, maybe Demian Maia's a little bit better, but Gilbert Burns is a world champion black belt

several times over himself, hardly some slouch, and has good wrestling and dynamic athlete and has really worked on his hands. He, to me, is a pretty interesting threat at 170. A title pitcher threat? You know, I don't really know. I don't think that's quite right. But like, what about Jorge Masvidal versus Gilbert Burns? Maybe Jorge Masvidal is better. I'm not saying that he's not. But can I consider that a runaway fight for Jorge Masvidal? No, I don't actually think that I can. So, and then the jujitsu prowess against a guy like Tyron Woodley or Leon Edwards or Colby Covington or Kamar Usman. I mean, again, maybe you think those guys beat him, but he's competitive everywhere and has an ace in the hole better than all of those guys in terms of the jiu-jitsu mat. He is a maturing, interesting talent at 170 pounds.

Yeah, I mean, you see a guy that's, look, we frame this fight on our various own platforms when we previewed it as sort of a potential passing of the guard from one great jiu-jitsu master to a new one, or not a new one, but, you know, the guy of the moment in Brazil, and yet he comes out there and knocks him out with a perfect left hook, and by the way, celebrated it a bit too early. That was almost Leon Lett style there. Don Beebe not in the house to make him pay. Got on there quick with those hammer fists. He's an interesting out. I feel like, Luke, I need to see one more in this division, one more big step up before I'm a full-time Gilbert Burns believer, but this was certainly a wake-up call. That name, give me a

Stephen Thompson-like opponent for him. You can do it on that level. Now you're at a four-fight win streak. You're going to the next level. Now you're at a four fight win streak. You're going to the next level. Then you become a title contender in my mind. That's a great call. You're right. There's probably a little bit more proving ground about his ultimate versatility, right? Because on paper he's versatile, but when the rubber meets the road, what does that mean exactly? I like that. I think that's a fair point. Still, the way in which he has been performing since going to 170 pounds, because he was killing himself to get to 155 for a time as well. I remember going against Dan Hooker.

He's looked great and has looked ready to go, and I've been really impressed by what he has shown. And, by the way, really worked on his English, Brian. He's a good interview as well. Anyone else on that card you want to shout out? I mean, I could shout down Johnny Walker, right? Yeah, he has not looked great, huh? I mean, look, this was a big moment to sort of put the train back on the track,

show us a little less flash and a lot more substance. And, Luke, look, he had moments in this fight that he just couldn't capitalize on. I mean, you know, it's a nice little asterisk that this is the first time Nikita Krylov goes the distance in a fight and wins by decision. But I felt I was just waiting during moments of that fight for Johnny Walker, including when he had full mount, to sort of take over and make that fight happen for him. And we're not in panic mode yet. It's two losses in a row, and it surely ain't good, especially when two fights ago we're like, should we throw him to the lion? Should we put him in there with Jon Jones? I'm not going to panic yet. And you know that I like to clown on his clowning this overall. He's a more serious version of Michelle Padeta, if you ask me. But Luke, at what point is he just a attraction? Three losses in a

row? I mean, he's got a new camp new team hopefully getting a little bit more serious is there a way to shave down some of that excess yet still keep that explosive dynamic crazy man striker who's going to do weird things and come in there with weird hair without being exposed by solid hard-ass wrestlers every time he steps up yeah here's his problem not every fighter is exactly this way, but he appears to be one of these fighters who really lives and dies on his own level of confidence. And you lose to Corey Anderson,

okay, you know, didn't go great. He made some changes, went to TriStar as well. And then this time, you had a lengthier fight, because remember, the Corey Anderson fight was short. This fight went, let's see, what was the full length here? It was Johnny Walker. I mean, it went to a decision, right? And he won a round anyway. But to get through 15 minutes and ultimately against a guy who, Nikita Krylov, who used to be a bit of a punchline, but has certainly improved a lot since then, since his return to the UFC, but is not exactly like any elite, he's not even a big

version for that weight class, much less a super elite one. And then to look as deficient overall, you partly think, yes, he got by with those quick stoppages early by a little bit of athletic luck. But also you have to wonder while he's working on his game, even if they give him lesser competition, to what extent have these two losses impacted his ability to sort of be in the moment, feel, rhythm, the whole nine yards, because he really seems to thrive off of that. You take that away, he's got a bit of a problem.

Let me say one last thing, if I can, on this card. Demian Maia saying his next fight is probably his last. He either wants Diego Sanchez or Donald Cerrone. I'm going to vote in favor of Donald Cerrone, because Donald Cerrone has been very good on the ground. If he has enough time off from the Conor fight so like you know rehab we can we went over he fought five different elite lightweights in a single calendar less than a single calendar year Donald Cerrone did but if he wants to go back to 170 it's not hard on him and he can do it I actually think it's an interesting fight on the ground. I think Donald's got superb wrestling.

And, of course, in the feet, he's got the advantage. Against Diego Sanchez, I'm not saying that's necessarily the best or the worst fight. Diego's scrappy on the ground. If you saw what he did at ADCC against Marcelo Garcia, you'd be impressed. But that was that version of Diego Sanchez. The one we have now under his new tutelage, I just don't know what we're going to get the next time he comes out. So I'm going to vote Donald Cerrone. What do you say?

Yeah, that's fine. That's fine. I don't want Diego Sanchez anymore. I don't want anything to do with it. So yeah, let's go Donald Cerrone on that. I don't want you to end this card without me bringing up the women's strawweight fight of the moment on there. I know it's supposed to say Hib, but Amanda Rebus again, look fantastic Luke and taking that decision from random Marcos. Uh, I'm not going to say short-term, but medium-term

title contender. Yeah, dude. Three 30, 25. She's athletic. She speaks English. She can strike. She can wrestle. She's got good jujitsu. She. She's the real deal holy field. Now, how far will she go with it? Your guess is as good as mine in a division that stacked. But you're right, dude. Again, A, women's strong weight. Bring it in close here. Bring it in close. Sneaky hot, too.

Okay, that's all you being super unprofessional. All right, let's do this. We have got questions. Oh, I've got two quick questions for you before we get the questions from the DMs from Donks. All right? They'll be quick, 10 seconds. You versus Josh Fabia in an MMA fight, if I gave you six months to get back into powerlifting,

can you beat him in a three-round fight? No, I'm not doing these dumb games. What's your other one? All right, would you rather get a hand-o from Rudy Gobert right now or have to pull out mike beltran's braids out from his shirt after the night and soak out the sweat i'll take them i'll take i'll take that beard believe it or not all right hey i'm not a homosexual and b rudy gobert has coronavirus yeah there you go all right yeah uh all right let's get

to dms from donks if jay who wants to put up the graphics he certainly may at this point uh let's see by the way i love this one can you just do your job he's talking to me and cover the fights and stop virtue signaling over the boomer plague hashtag just believe these people don't know what virtue signaling actually means by the way but no i cannot say the guy's name you got to give the guy oh rip brian callan he's just just is this a troll he has no pictures it's a troll um all right is there a way brian campbell to infect jay with coronavirus without infecting luke and brian the fans want to know we will one day unleash the j on the people luke i

was actually i pitched it no one got back to me luke a lot of times when we have these corporate emails or text chains i feel i put out either a fairly strong joke or a fairly strong idea sometimes it's an idea wrapped in a joke and i get full no-sell from you i thought we would put jay in that hazmat suit that marty mcfly wore in back to the future when he pretended to be darth vader you know i'm talking about and have him show up on our show to speak so that people wouldn't see his face but you know we'd play up the whole corona season, maybe next time. All right. Just a thought. This is from Jack Thompson, but with a bunch of numbers in between. Just a thought. Would you say Kevin Lee and Anthony Pettis have similarities in their careers by jumping

around weight classes and beating good guys, but then fall when they can get to the next level? I'd say a little bit of that is true. There's some similarity there, Brian. The difference is that Kevin Lee is still sort of kind of junior in his career to a degree. And part of what's happening with Anthony Pettis is he's just gotten and absorbed a ton of damage. And so he built up a name and you can take a fight here against Wonderboy. That's great. And then Diaz and then lose. And you sort of keep jumping where the, where this reinvention and use of your name is valuable, do that.

But that's not exactly the same as the woes that Kevin Lee is having. Although I suppose you could say that they are if you want to count what the weight cuts might be doing to him when he goes to 155. Yeah, Kevin Lee never certainly had the high period that Pettis had. But I think Kevin Lee doesn't rely so strictly on athleticism and theatrics inside the cage, right? Like the big moment, the big strike that Pettis does. And as Pettis started to age, deal with injury, deal with loss, he's become what he is now, which is a celebrity action fighter. Whereas Kevin Lee, I feel has a much more well-rounded game. I think we saw some of those holes full blatantly, not just missed the

cut, not moving his head enough. But, Luke, when you combine the athleticism, toughness, mindset with the wrestling and the power of that overhand right, he's a complete fighter. You know? I mean, look, the only thing he's lacking are the intangibles that you need to get to that top level. I hope there's still time. Why do we feel like Kevin Lee has nudes on us and there's a gun holding against our head for us to keep mentioning that he's going to win a world title? Luke, you and I don't typically

fall for the same thing. I'm a T guy, you're an A guy, right? We don't typically get caught on the same thing, Luke. Unless it's just the right woman. Alright, from Be Back Later, what are your top three essential items to have during a self-quarantine?

What do you say, Brian? Very expensive IPAs. Right? That's one. That's one. Okay. So here's the deal luke i wasn't a movie guy until like you know i used to be a movie guy but i wasn't a movie guy until i hit that streak in vegas as we've talked up you know the uncut gems into 1917 it's a parasite i started to be like oh my god like it's real again um i have

all these streaming apps like you do on your tv that i typically don't watch for the movie side good god i filled many a night lately luke you know on hulu that I typically don't watch for the movie side. Good God, I've filled many a night lately, Luke, you know, on Hulu, Prime. It's so great. Dude, if you have a quiet evening, you got $5 to $15. You've got a nice TV. Nice TVs are as inexpensive as they've ever been. I realize it's still a first world luxury, but still. You can watch so many great movies in high def.

If you got it, ultra high def. You don't need the box, Luke. Just my Prime membership alone, an app I never use, has a hell of a lot of great movies on there. I got Netflix. I got the Showtime app. I got a lot of crap. Then you mix that with WWE Network, DAZN, UFC Fight Pass. Look, I'm married, but I don't need to be.

I can go a long way with just me and my stream, Luke. You know, I saw this. Someone said this. Look, if the UFC really wants to get right with fans during this period, they should offer a reduced subscription price, like as a sale right now during this quarantine times, right, where people are at home, social distancing, make Fight Pass a little bit cheaper to get signups.

I just thought it was kind of a brilliant idea. I don't know why they wouldn't do it. Oh, I know why. This comes to us from Open Road, Open Mike. Luke, thanks for being one of the few that's taking this as seriously as it should be. What will it take, Brian Campbell, for the UFC to cancel cards like every other sports league? This is extraordinarily stupid to keep trying to keep it together. It would take government complete shutdown which

again i feel like we're a couple days away from people not being able to travel state to state and being forced to stay inside not at gunpoint but just forced to like hey every business is shutting down that would stop it so would an elite fighter company man coming down with it and then passing it on to a pr person a a handler, a social media person. If it breaks out backstage at UFC, that's going to shut it down, right, Luke? Or do they just replace those folks? They might replace them. The other part is, dude, if past is prologue, they will only do what the government makes them. And again, the government might make them do absolutely everything in terms of stopping, but they don't appear to be proactive in any capacity.

Brian Campbell, no handshakes during the coronavirus crisis, but what about tip-to-tip? Any thoughts? This is from Eric Reinberg. First of all, that's filthy and inappropriate. Second of all, no, I'm not going to exchange that type of stuff with you, fluids and stuff. No, look, the tip-to-tip season is – look, in some ways, Luke, it is effectively over.

We've mentioned it multiple times. I've been very deep in the dick trade, like elbow deep, sort of accidentally. I'm pulling out, right? I mean, look, it's a good term to use in this situation. I'm pulling out. I'm getting away from that. I can't be known. Luke, I don't know when I'm going to die, right?

I hope it's at the end of the line when they're like long time boxing analyst and this guy who achieved all this stuff he once climbed everest with that sherpa you know he cured corona he you know he's whatever one time you'll be the dosekis guy yeah like i still think there's a lot i want to do but if i died tomorrow right if i drank a corona filled with corona and that was the end of me, I wouldn't want my subhead in the obit. Like, somebody would have to write the obit. Showtime would come to you, Luke. They'd be like, look, to be honest with you,

the past few months, you've been the closest to him. You want to write this obit for our website from your time with BC? You'd be like, alright. Knew a good amount about boxing, knew a good amount about MMA, loves dongs. Cannot live with that, Luke. Cannot be like all right knew it knew a good amount about boxing knew a good about about mma loves loves dongs cannot live with that luke cannot be like that so in a lot of ways we said look we're only talking about the bad that's going to come out of this corona scare there's a lot of

good luke i've had a lot of time with my family the kids i've introduced my 12 year old sons to the simpsons on disney plus we have 30 seasons of content to go through. That's bonding. I want someday, Luke, that third line to say, great father, right? If I wrote your obituary, I would put all of those things, great father, hell of a friend, brilliant analyst, hard worker. I would say you lived life from tip to tip, really is what I would say. This comes to us from November 311. Is the UFC liable if one of their fighters on the Brazil card tests positive for coronavirus,

even if they passed a pre-fight screening? Well, look, I saw a lot of the night that the Rudy Gobert thing happened, the NBA shut down. Then suddenly the Rudy Gobert memes are coming out with him touching the microphones, which he apologized for. I saw a lot of people on Twitter that I respect truthfully writing, hey, you know, don't be surprised if he starts getting sued by other players. Look, I don't know what's possible in the sewage game. I mean, you could sue anybody. So yeah. But look, that would mean a fighter standing out, stepping out, saying, like, I've got an issue here. Let's start a union.

They don't do that in that organization, Luke. Yeah, well, what if one of them got sick and then got one of their parents sick and, God forbid, their parent died? Well, now you might be dealing with a different situation. I guess we'll have to see. I hope it never comes to that. Is Scott Coker a hero for paying people? I'll say this. He's a responsible public steward.

And that's not nothing in these days. You see so many people glibly assess what the responsibility is of each of us in our individual roles to do. By the way, I talked to Joe Rogan today. I don't think I'm going to go to my scheduled sit-down with him. Well, here's the thing. I was talking to him, and I'm what do i do here man because i don't know that hey i don't even know if we're going to be allowed to fly in a week's time number one and even if we are is that a good idea and you know we sort of talked about the different possibilities um but i'm probably gonna have to reschedule just because

i don't think it's the right thing to do yeah the only person he's had on skype right has been snowden and i don't mean jonathan right right at the edward snowden variety because there's hello no way to get him out of russia without putting him in jail so the point being is um you know whatever your life is and whatever it calls for some people have to expose themselves to the public more than others and there might be very good reasons for that but if it's not necessary and you're in a, I would argue, because Coker's in a very privileged position, you have to do the ethical thing, and he did.

And in a world where you could say, well, doing the ethical thing, that's what you're supposed to do. Well, maybe, but in a world where most or many, even the most successful MMA promoters won't, it sort of stands out, doesn't it? From Don Salda, Brian Campbell, do either of you play Mortal Kombat 11? If not, what was the last actual Mortal Kombat you played?

Who is your favorite Mortal Kombat character, Brian Campbell? I've always been a bigger Street Fighter guy than more Mortal Kombat. But the last time I played Mortal Kombat consistently, I mean, I certainly played it in a bit. I played it in the arcade at the movie theaters before movies. In 93, when it came out on Sega, it was a giant rush. I played the crap out of it.

I believe when PlayStation 1 came out, I got like an old bootleg copy of it in around 98, 99 and sort of resurrected it. Under the MK branding, I'm a Johnny Cage guy. How could you not be, Luke? I think it was the most relatable to an average white-skinned guy. A cool guy who can fight, that's relatable to you? Yeah, that's pretty relatable to me, Luke.

I mean, I'm not some of these superhero kind. I'm not shooting fireballs at people, Luke. You know what I'm saying? I'm shooting old balls at people. That's right. I've played every Mortal Kombat up to Mortal Kombat 10. I've not played 11. Who's your guy?

I've got many of them, but my number one all time, you want to guess? I actually don't think you'll get this i i say sub-zero because as as a person you're ice cold luke i knew how did i know you were going to go with the easy sub-zero zing you fucking doofus no it's not it's baraka the guy who had the long knives out of his forearms who would slice you up baraka yes yes no baraka was initially my favorite since then um like a repurposed jacks i like luke hang as a classic you know um but mk was a better game in the long run than street

fighter mostly because it had blood i mean look on sega 93 it was brutal but i did love the street fighter guys more you're telling me guile wasn't like who you wanted to be in life, Luke? No. Here's the thing. Do you remember the precursor to – so you and I grew up in an era when arcades were a thing, right? Yes. And do you remember the first time you played the original Mortal Kombat and you were like – with Kano and Liu Kang, you were like it's an amazing game. But do you remember –

The only time I was more high was the first time I played NBA Jam in the movie theater arcade. And you're like, oh, my God, this is next level. NBA Jam was great, too. But do you remember the original sort of like out there, the kind of game that made your parents nervous that was bloody and gory and violent? And it was in the arcade. Do you remember? It was not a fighting game. It was not a fighting game. It was not a fighting game.

Well, in the early 90s on my dad's PC, I had like Duke Nukem and those type of ones. No. Did you ever play NARC? No, no. They must have had that in D.C. where you were or Cutter or Old Marietta down in the... No, this was D.C. when I was a kid with my dad.

And NARC was like, you know, it was a shoot-em-up kind of game. It was brutal and ugly and violent. And I remember how fun it was. It was kind of a shitty game, but it was fun because it was violent in a way that was novel at the time. I mean, since then, you know,

people are like murdering hookers on Grand Theft Auto. But at the time, it was novel for how violent it was. And then Mortal Kombat came around and it actually was a good game and then Mortal Kombat 2 came around and to me once Mortal Kombat 2 came out the rivalry between that and Street Fighter was never the same to me that was the turning point to be honest with you I thought Mortal Kombat 2 how quickly you brushed off Guile Guile was basically if you took Prime Zack Morris and if you're asking me what's the mountaintop point of prime Zach Morris, it was that episode where they had that band, the Zach Attack, and then he broke free from that band because he was banging that real hot manager, Mindy, and he kind of had that Vanilla Ice look with the big hair. That's mountaintop prime Zach Morris.

And then imagine injecting him with steroids, giving him sort of a machine gun like Rambo look. That's guile, bro. Everyone should want to be that. All right, last but not least, we've got to get out of here. This comes to us from Nick underscore Ybrow. How badly, Brian Campbell, do you think this global pandemic will hit the finances of lower tier fighters if multiple events need to be canceled? Let me actually add a little detail

to that. What happens if there's an outbreak at a gym? What happens if a lower tier organization can't ever get itself back going again, right? I mean, the damage that this is going to cause from, by the way, you know how my family was closing their restaurant anyway this past weekend? Like their mood has, I'm not going to say completely changed, but pretty significantly changed because they were closing this weekend no matter what. They just didn't want to be in the restaurant business anymore. Well, now there's going to be a global pandemic. And so they're thinking to themselves, we could have gone out of business with that, or we can just close it on our own terms. So why not just close it when you're on your own terms?

In any event, I worry about outbreaks at gyms and what that might do to the gym, to the ability for the – forget about the organizations to be able to book the fights, to the gym, to the individual fighter who's now on the shelf. What do you think? Yeah, it's going to be crippling. I mean that's sort of why as long as Dana and company are going to be able to play this charade, which is don't worry, we'll resurrect a card, you're going to find people willing to sign up to do it. It's almost like there's soldiers sitting at home waiting for the battle and they're gonna like i keep using this alliteration they're gonna pick up their guns and go in there because they need the damn money

uh it's scary they're gonna be working at fast food joints if those fast food joints can even stay open luke this is the kind of chaos on life chaos i'm talking about and it's not just on the lower level it's us luke you know thank you showtime and morning combat the label that does pay me to keep this going in cbs sports but uh i'm hopefully that this going means you know two months of our life on hold and then we move on but even in those two months luke that's a long time bro a real cripple to two fighters who fight three to four times a year and 100 depend on that um it's rough man it's it's rough by the way you're forcing me out of here like you got to get to one of your next jobs bro you work from home now yeah i know but i've got one of us has to get this video

to jay and one of us doesn't so i have an extra bit of work here there's potential good i mentioned that could come from this whole scenario. You have much more of a darker heart, naturally, than I have, maybe through your life experiences, the Marines. We didn't even get to talk to a movie. Luke, we probably got two months to talk movies, so maybe I should-

Yeah, we don't need to overload this episode. We're going to have plenty of time to get to it. But it was Dave Grohl who said, it's times like these we learn to love again. Luke, are you ready during this process maybe to just put down your arms for good and repair all the broken relationships in your life Luke first and foremost you'll want a young jay check I can facilitate this Luke follow her on IG pants optional bro I have zero interest in any of these things all I need is for people to

do their job to the rest of us in terms of doing the best we can to keep everybody safe. That is all that I ask of anyone, and it is all that I will do. I will do my part. Everyone should do their part. Remember, we're all in this together. Now, if Jay is watching this, which he should be, this is the time when you put up the stuff on the screen about how you can follow Brian on social media. There should be a Twitter follow how you can follow Brian on social media. There should be a Twitter follow, an Instagram follow. Same for me.

For Morning Combat, we didn't do this at the beginning, Brian, but let's do it now. Like the video. Subscribe to the channel. I know this is unusual. This is the first time you've seen this. This is not normally what this looks like. This is very unusual. So, Brian, I'll throw it to you for last parting words here.

Anything you want to say to the audience about where we're headed with all this? I mean, in a global pandemic, he's begging for subscriptions and likes.

Crazy. Look, no, all seriousness. We love you guys. And a lot of you have reached out to us since all this went down.

So man, I hope MK does not take time off. If you guys could just show up and give us something, we'd be grateful. And I certainly appreciate that. Please, everybody, stay safe, make the right choices, and get closer with the family, right?

Get back and spend some quality time. Not everybody's in the same life situation. Some people are alone, but be safe during all this. We want to, as long as this chapter goes on where there aren't fights, and I think we can all assume there probably won't be, we're certainly going to be here finding ways to entertain and be here with you anyway. And Luke, Dana's convinced Tony Habib is going to happen. I'm just going to close on this and say we've waited so long.

Whether you believe it's cursed, whether you believe this is the fifth time, the charm or not, I need to see this in a major arena with a packed audience on pay-per-view preferably with me in the front row yes first world issue here hashtag blessed for that i cannot see this luke in an empty you know garage somewhere and just just to get it on the air can we be smart enough as as the ufc brass to just be like tony habib now means so much more can we not just force it out there yeah so we'll end on this. I'll say this. I am. I don't know why, Brian, I don't have a good reason for you. I really don't.

I am very confident that fight is going to happen. I just don't think that there's any way it happens on April 18th. I don't think that there's any way. I don't think that's where this country is going to be. I could be totally wrong. I would love to be wrong. Shit, we get Tony Khabib in a month? That would be amazing. I just don't think it's realistic, man. I don't think it's even remotely realistic. It's obvious. There's something about a full arena and fans there and something

mattering. I cannot have Brasilia. I almost want that to be the light at the end of the tunnel. I don't think April 18th is going to be that time horizon. Let's wait a second. I know it must feel like, you know, you just can't believe we're going to book it. It's technically a sixth time. Okay. Well, maybe we do like this. You know, this is why you have a rainy day fund. This is why you have insurance. This is why you just, you have to live in a world where bad things or accidents or just unusual events happen.

You got to roll with it and this has been the most unusual of unusual fight bookings uh even if the other four hadn't even happened this is unusual so i don't know i am i am i am very optimistic we're gonna watch these two fight i just don't think it'll be till may or maybe june that's sort of where my head is at and and it might be june because it'll be after uh ramadan so that's sort of where my head's at on all this little rumors out there luke by the way that jorge camaro will be pushed off a bit we may we may get connor at ifw that could be interesting oh that'd be nice it'd be a nice july return yeah that's got to be just engaging right it doesn't got to be anything with him but i would hope i would hope

to be nate diaz part three you never know you never know luke uh yeah that's that's the damn show next week we're gonna have much more bells and whistles but you're gonna get the at home version for a while it's up to you to believe what i'm wearing from the waist down i'm not gonna i won't reveal that though uh i am assuming you're wearing flippers and Speedo. I don't know why. You just remind me of a weirdo who would do that. All right, Brian, I love you. I will say, Luke, really to close on this,

I have been on a war movie breakdown ever since I told the world, rightfully so, that 1917 is the best movie ever made. People are like, how can you say that if you haven't seen Insert Vietnam and whatever movie here? Well, I am personally now one-on-one in a challenge going down the line and watching all those movies to prove to myself first before I prove to you that 1917 is a cinematic classic. Luke, I hope by next week you have watched that and you'll be ready to come to the right side of history. I will be ready because I've seen Uncut Gems.

So I'm halfway home. I will watch 1917 and we will have it out, my good man. All right, my friend, stay safe. My best to your family. My best to everyone's family who is watching here today. For Brian, I'm Luke. Until next time, may all of your gains be loyal. Mo Monroe is wanted for the financial terrorist attack Black Monday

Black Monday was my idea It's me, the Wizard of Wall Street himself Moe is back, baby We'll be right back. you