MORNING KOMBAT WITH LUKE THOMAS AND BRIAN CAMPBELL - Derek Brunson-Darren Till Recap | Paddy Pimblett | Katie Taylor | Triller | EP 199
Episode Date: September 7, 2021On episode 199 of Morning Kombat Luke Thomas and Brian Campbell recap Derek Brunson's win over Darren Till this past weekend. How has Derek evolved into a better fighter (13:00)? Should Darren Till co...nsider a run at welterweight (26:40)? Paddy Pimblett made his UFC Debut on Saturday. What are the guys thoughts on his debut (40:00)? The boys close out the main topics by talking about Triller booking Evander Holyfield vs. Vitor Belfort. Should people be more upset about this matchup (67:00)? Finally the guys close out the show with DM's from donks. HYSTS and odds & ends Morning Kombat’ is available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, Castbox, Google Podcasts, Bullhorn and wherever else you listen to podcasts.  For more Combat Sports coverage subscribe here: youtube.com/MorningKombat  Follow our hosts on Twitter: @BCampbellCBS, @lthomasnews, @MorningKombat   For Morning Kombat gear visit: store.sho.com  Follow our hosts on Instagram: @BrianCampbell, @lukethomasnews, @MorningKombat To hear more from the CBS Sports Podcast Network, visit https://www.cbssports.com/podcasts/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
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Reveille, reveille, dogs.
Look at us now, tip to tip.
This is our life.
This is our passion.
That's the spirit we bring to this show.
I'm Luke Thomas.
I'm Brian Campbell.
This is Morning Combat.
Back like a bad habit, but hopefully we are one of your good habits.
That's a terrible intro, but we're going to do it just the same.
Hello everyone, my name is Luke Thomas. It is Tuesday, the 7th of September 2021, and it is time for Morning Combat.
My name is, as I mentioned, I'm Luke thomas i'm from cbs sports and showtime the gentleman on this side of the screen is your resident resident king of connecticut my friend and yours it's brian campbell bc nice to see you good friend how are you yeah
thank you so much luke i'm doing great um don't you know when you go it's the perfect ending
to the bad day like cheryl crowe said luke i hope that mk is everyone's favorite mistake because this show uh you know is accidentally awesome only it
ain't no accident okay there's art behind this there's passion there's fuel so as i always say
if this ain't your favorite combat sports show up to this point it will be wasn't it amy grant who
also said you know you don't know what you got until it's gone. Pink furry dice, pull up a parking lot, that kind of thing.
How about a genius named Joni Mitchell who actually wrote that?
That's right.
She covered Joni Mitchell, yes.
That's right.
No, not today.
I got it from Amy Grant.
But, hey, shout out to our friends in the music business.
Oteel Burbridge, friend of the show.
Dead & Company back on tour.
Luke, I didn't get to catch them in Hartford this weekend
because I had other plans.
But great to see. And just like Dead & Company, Luke. I didn't get to catch them in Hartford this weekend because I had other plans, but great to see
and just like Dead & Company, Luke,
chords, strings,
we brings, right? Melody,
MK, rhythm is life, right?
Well, it's a shame that you
miss them in Hartford, but the good news is we won't
miss Dying Fetus when they play the 18th at
Webster Hall. I'm looking forward to that experience,
formative experience with you. You know what I'm saying?
It's going to be awesome.
Yeah, meet me at the waterbury open yeah indeed all right great uh all right well we got a lot to get to today we have tons of stuff of course over the weekend
there was a big ufc show we got some triller headlines we have your questions from dms from
donks we have have you seen this shit we have a lot of stuff to get to luke we have a loaded have you
seen this shit okay like i mean it is i mean it's like a loaded diaper full of shit because that's
what happens when we take a week off of this segment okay so get so i'm trying to think
there's going to be a lot of uh elder abuse i'm guessing and then a lot of uh drunk women falling
is that maybe some milk crates involved there may be some rate my tats going on so this should get
fun okay all right i'm look i'm genuinely and i mean this looking forward to that
should be a lot of fun all right first things first if you're new here or not either way please
give the video a thumbs up and if you are new here to the mk experience you're looking you're
kicking the tires seeing what's up hit that subscribe button we have tons of content for you
we have a show obviously today we have a show tomorrow as well bc and we have a of content for you. We have a show, obviously, today. We have a show tomorrow as well, BC.
And we have a show on Friday.
Plus, my live chat will be on Thursday.
So, basically, the entire rest of the week, we have live programming for you.
Plus, a lot of stuff in between.
Of course, you can see us there on social media, on our lower thirds.
Note that Brian and I have different names, between ourselves anyway, for Twitter and Instagram.
If you want to try Showtime to get some of that Showtime Championship boxing,
some of that Bellator, something else that they offer on the app,
whatever you want, you can do that.
You can go to Showtime.com, get a 30-day free trial.
If you like it, you can keep it.
If not, you can go pound sand.
That's up there for you to do.
You want to check out MerchBC.
I know you know about this.
They can go to MorningCombat.store,
and it turns out, depending on when you check it,
there's all kinds of new stuff we didn't even know was on there.
Yeah, we're trying to iron things out.
People have had questions.
Why is it like this?
Why is it like that?
We're going to get to the bottom of it,
but if you check right now, morningcombat.store,
there is some new merch that even Luke and I didn't know about.
You want to have BC on a Hawaiian shirt?
You can buy that right now.
Luke, you want to outfit your beautiful wife
in a fake donk louis vuitton morning combat duffel bag or backpack or purse um you can do that as
well luke so uh you know maybe you should do a solid for the family and uh maybe get one for a
boiler too okay uh i will i will consider doing that which means i probably won't but i wanted
to put that out there um just the same so what have done? BC, we've done all of the major stuff we have. Um, am I forgetting anything?
Well, we're still, you know, we'll update a PSA on healthy living. It is, it is healthy liver
season. So guys remember gas station, uh, food is the silent killer. So be careful of that. I've
got a big doctor's appointment that I just had to reschedule for, for another week, but, uh,
I'll get the results back. Have I changed my life for the better?
We're going to find out.
I will let you know, Luke, that I've been eating more Latin salads
than Uncle Pepe on the weekends lately,
so let's hope that the numbers are good, okay?
Good. Well, you know what?
I can say this, and I mean this definitively.
We definitely had one or two nights where, or two meals anyway,
where we definitely indulged,
but I can say with the greatest amount of sincerity, I saw what Brian was eating for the most part when we were there in Cleveland.
Me too.
And it's a lot cleaner.
A lot cleaner.
A lot more smoothies.
A lot more green juices.
A lot more fruits, veggies.
You know, that kind of a thing.
It still puts me in the bathroom in the end, Luke.
I end up in the same place in the end,
but it's about the purpose and getting there.
And Luke, don't mistake our kindness of late
toward our friends and or enemies in the business
to something soft.
We are still hard men on this show
and we're coming for the competition, okay?
So, you know, as many a famous Canadian fighter would say,
you're going to come?
Come on. And MK's coming, brother. So, you know, hey, happy famous Canadian fighter would say, you're going to come? Come on.
And MK's coming, brother.
So, you know, hey, happy-go-lucky.
Everybody's a friend.
There's space for us all.
We're still the best in show, and we're bringing it every time.
I think today is the last day to vote for the World MMA Awards.
Yes.
I'm pretty sure that's true.
So if you would like to vote, I don't know if we have a lower third, fourth.
Yeah, we do.
Best MMA Programming Nominee. Listen, we do. Best MMA programming nominee.
Listen, we're up against juggernauts, okay?
There's Amazon, there's Google, there's Apple, and then there's us.
Like fucking Fubo or something.
But Fubo is good.
I like Fubo.
So you've got to give the Fubo the vote here, all right?
More of a Fubu fan, Luke, right?
Fubu?
Fubu, that's right.
For us, by us, okay?
Okay, let me finish.
So before we go any further,
we do have a bit of an announcement we have to make here
before we start the programming,
which is Morning Combat is now presented by DraftKings.
Yes, ladies and gentlemen,
DraftKings has gotten into the MK business.
So here's what's happening, folks.
As we all know, the NFL is back,
and you can get in on the action with the draft Kings sports
book.
There are two apps.
There's the daily fantasy app and there's a sports book app.
What we need you to do.
And by the way,
of course the draft Kings sports books and official betting partner with the
NFL and if I was returning draft Kings is giving new customers $200 in free
bets instantly.
When you bet $ dollar or more on
any football game that's a hell of a deal luke that's a freaking hell of a deal right there all
right here's what you're gonna do you got to go to the draft king sportsbook app i downloaded it
myself it's very good easy to bet and by the way of course we understand some of you might watch
nfl some of you might not some of you might be gambling djens some of you might not but understand something of course we want. Some of you might be gambling DGNs. Some of you might not.
But understand something.
Of course, we want everyone to gamble responsibly.
But if you want to get on that boxing action, BC, or that UFC action,
they've even got a separate section on the app today for just Dana White's Tuesday Night Contenders series.
Wow.
Plenty of ways to bet.
I mean, some of y'all might get with this, and some of y'all won't.
But listen, let me clear my throat to tell you that for week one, Luke, DraftKings is giving
all new customers a free shot at the $1 million top prize. So if there was ever a time to get
into NFL, put a little cheddar on your watching experience. There's a lot to earn as well as learn
from tuning in. And you can do that with MK and DraftKings, brother.
All right, so understand something.
Here's what you got to do.
Of course, as he said this, and I did too, one more time,
$200 for free if you bet instantly one or more dollars
on any of the games.
Sportsbook, if it's not available in your state,
DraftKings still has huge cash prizes up for grabs
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So here's the call to action that we need you folks to recognize.
Download the DraftKings Sportsbook app right now and use the promo code COMBAT.
Now look at how it's spelled right below my face.
And of course, if you're listening to this on the podcast, I will spell it for you.
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Use the promo code COMBAT to receive $200 in free bets
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BC, I'm a big Washington football team guy.
I know they're going to have the Chargers coming up to begin the season.
I'm not sure how that's going to go,
but I know, I know that they play the giants in week two i'm willing to
bet that my terrible washington football team beats i don't know if the giants are your team
but i know a lot of folks from your area that kind of root for the giants this is i live i live these
days more in new england patriots country luke or should i say tampa bay bucks country because of
all these uh sidewinding baggin winders who have have jumped all over wherever TB12 is going these days.
But either way, Luke, more or less you should just understand
that my favorite NFL team is whoever is playing the Washington football team each week.
So I'm ready to come after you this year,
and I'm ready to do some damage on DraftKings.
Better believe that.
You'll probably have more good days than bad days.
I'll put it that way.
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That promo code is COMBAT
with a K. K-O-M-B-A-T
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and $1 wager required. One per customer.
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Got a gambling problem?
Call 1-800-GAMBLER or in Indiana, 1-800-9-WITH-IT.
I mean, look, you do have to know when to hold them.
Very excited.
Very excited about DraftKings.
You do have to know when to fold them.
But here's the deal.
How cool is DraftKings, by the way?
How cool is DK getting in with MK?
Okay?
That's okay with me.
All right?
Let's do this thing.
Let's do this thing. Synergy. Synergy. So, yeah? That's okay with me, all right? Let's do this thing. Let's do this thing.
Synergy, synergy.
So, yeah, let's do it.
For folks at home who might be like,
I don't want to get involved.
Folks, this is big for the show.
This is big for the show.
If you care about the show
and you want to be involved with the show's success
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all things DraftKings are happy,
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know that you will is a big deal so yeah so get on it use the promo code combat with a k and by
the way they're giving you 200 bucks to just go play with have fun on the sportsbook app you can
use it on dan and wise contender series you can use it for the next ufc pay-per-view you can use
it for the next big boxing event whatever you want but of course you're going to start with the nfl
the nfl kicks off i mean look can we let people in on a little secret watching fights when you have a betting
interest it's almost 10 times as fun as watching fights right I mean it's pretty damn good okay
I'm just saying just saying Luke all right I've done it I've been there I won't I won't disagree
all right but with that in mind BC it is time to get back to action. We start with topic number one here on today's show,
which is, of course, the main event from UFC Vegas, whatever it was, 30, 36, I can't even
keep them straight anymore. But of course, it was the middleweight contest between Derek Brunson
and Darren, Derek Brunson and Darren Till. And of course, Darren Till losing via third round
submission. BC, this was a bad loss for him.
My question, though, of course, starts with Derek Brunson.
Five fights in a row.
This was, at least on paper, his toughest test to date.
And he not only wins, he won that one walking away.
It was not especially difficult for him.
He took some big punches.
So the question is, BC, given what he's accomplished,
is Derek Brunson owed a title shot?
I don't think so.
And that's nothing against what he has accomplished.
I just look at the bottleneck of this division
and some of the other sexy names looking to knock on that door and get in.
And I feel like with timing,
I feel like Derek Brunson's going to have to win one more.
I may end up being wrong.
We're going to see what happens.
But you'd mentioned something,
and we're certainly going to get into Darren Till in a second.
But even more than how bad of a loss that this is for Darren
Till's career arc, I think the bigger story is how huge of a win this is for 37-year-old Derek
Brunson. Because Luke, there are levels to when you are, you know, resuscitating your career,
which is what he's done in recent years, moving down to Sanford MMA
and really kind of going all in, becoming a more patient and game-planning fighter,
leaning on some of his strengths, being less reckless. When you do that against a certain
level, okay, an Elias Teodoro, an Edmund Shabazzian even, you know, you can sort of look at that and
go, okay, Derek Brunson's a wily veteran. Maybe these guys aren't
who they
thought they were going to be, and he got the
win. When you step up to the level of a Darren
Till who always
comes in with a big name factor and a high
buzz factor in terms of his future
in this storyline here was about how
Darren Till's going to turn it around after all these elite losses,
and you have as dominant
a performance as Derek Brunson had.
Luke, I thought this was when the story was going to end.
How many times, Luke, whether it's even Andrei Arlovsky about five years ago,
how many times have we seen a fighter who once had a name,
who hit a wall, took on some big losses,
and in Derek Brunson's case, yeah, he always lost to the elite,
but he always got knocked out by the elite.
You feel like you know when that ceiling's coming
where you say it's a good story we'll talk about it heading into this fight but i know who this
man is and he's gonna hit the wall and that's why i told you put your money on darren till last week
and i was wrong i'll take the l right here friday's dead wrong how about right now bc dead wrong but i
was happy to be dead wrong here because darren brunson in terms of the natural career arc and
flow in my opinion wasn't supposed to win this. That's why he was the betting underdog.
But Luke, he dominated it. And what was great in the fact that not only did he win for himself,
but Luke, when this third round opened and Darren Till started to finally put together big punches
and Derek Brunson was getting wobbled, am I wrong, Luke? You were like, oh, I've seen this before, right? So great turnaround, Derek Brunson, but I've seen this movie before and
you're going to get stopped and we're going to say, wow, he, you know, he dominated the fight
until he got stopped. But for him, Luke, to transition into a level change shot, full mount,
forced Till to give up the back and then dominantly forced the tap. Luke, he's better than I thought he was at this point.
And while I think the bottleneck atop the division
and the fact that Costa and Vittoria are coming back,
you know, like maniacs looking to get big wins
and get back in this picture, and Jared Kananier's there as well,
I don't think it would be next for Derek Brunson.
But if it was, I wouldn't hate it.
These are five dominant wins
in a row, and he had to walk through fire in this one in round three. Hey, Derek Brunson,
with the Cisco hair, much respect, all right? I was wrong, and you were right, brother,
and that's the story here, Luke. Yeah, we'll get into Darren Till. Yeah, there's a lot of,
you know, was he ever as good as we thought he was, all that shit, but this is Derek Brunson's
time right now on Tuesday morning right here on Morning Combat.
So, Derek Brunson, welcome to the super elite.
You've teased it in the past.
Now you're in it, bro, at 37.
And I was wrong, and I got to readjust your ceiling.
I'll tell you what.
I agree with basically all of that.
And I, too, I think I was wrong on Friday as well.
I mean, I'm never super confident, as you know, in some of these picks.
But I kind of thought Till, you know, he might get taken down a couple times,
but would more or less find a way to get it done.
I just was totally wrong.
He had no answer for it.
And as you indicated, we'll talk about that in a second,
but let's focus on Derek Brunson.
I echo everything you said, and I would add one more thing to it, BC.
I've now seen it enough in the modern era where I think we need to accept
there are some guys, and it's hard to know.
In fact, it's very hard to know which ones are going to pan out in this direction, but there's a kind of guy who kind of hovers in that
top seven to top 15 space for a long time. They get some good wins. They beat the ones they're
supposed to beat, but they don't really ever quite get ahead because they keep making mistakes,
or there's other guys in the division just better than them, but somewhere around their mid, in this case, late 30s, they begin to figure it out.
Now, this is a little bit different in the case with someone like Benil Darius,
but I would put him somewhere in that camp.
Carlos Diego Fajera, I would put him in that camp as well.
And now you've got Derek Brunson in that camp, where they kind of just took a long time to get to it.
But MMA is so difficult.
Some of these guys obviously start a little bit later in the MMA journey athletically,
in terms of the number of their age than some other sports, so it kind of explains it.
But we need to reserve space, yes, for two different kinds of guys, or ladies, obviously.
One, the ones who get to the UFC when they're 23, and then by the time they're 28,
they're very different in many cases.
Or the opposite, someone who wasn't necessarily that great.
I mean, they're good, obviously very respectable.
Someone in their late 20s, maybe kind of beginning of early 30s.
But around 33, 34, 35, a light switch goes off.
And maybe it was the move to Sanford MMA,
maybe it was some awareness competitively about some of the fights.
He was just kind of giving away, chasing down opponents and running into punches.
But that seems to be in the past.
Not only, BC, did he take his time in the stand-up,
and as you indicated, took some big punches.
You asked me, did I feel like, uh-oh, here's the beginning of the end.
No, because he took big punches against Shabazian and stayed cool.
He took some big punches.
Dude, Kevin Holland dropped him in the first round.
Everybody forgets that because he got dominated.
What did Derek Brunson do?
Stayed calm, stayed composed, and then took his game to the next level.
On the ground, BC, he also took his time.
He didn't rush positions.
He didn't rush bad punches.
He didn't gas himself out.
Man, this guy, you know, I don't know if he took the things he was already good at
and made them a lot better.
Ground and pound, you can make an argument about that a little bit.
But what I would say is what he did was just look at what are all the things
that I can clean up and what would that do for my game. It turns out it does a lot for your game if you just take your time you're already
good at this stuff don't lose bearing don't lose focus stick to the game plan use your very very
formidable skills and look at what happened Darren Tillett turned out BC never had a chance he was
never going to win that fight what a performance from Derek Brunson.
And look, Brunson's ground pound, as you mentioned, was better than it had been in the past.
You know, I'm really impressed, obviously, in this five fight win streak with the poise that
Derek Brunson of old relied on his athleticism too much, relied on the gamble of, you know,
I'm going to go in there and try to land the big one. This guy's so poised now and so calculated.
And, you know, with at 37 37 his athleticism hasn't waned
his wrestling's better his you know his transition to everything about it luke i mean he got that tap
quick so uh it's interesting luke i uh you asked me will he get the next title shot does he deserve
the next title shot i want to spin it back and ask you that same thing. If we expect Adesanya and Robert Whitaker part two to take place at some point in early 2022,
barring, you know, COVID going in the right direction.
And Brunson said himself, Luke, and we haven't mentioned it until now,
he had legitimate issues in training camp three weeks out, was unable to spar,
didn't mention it at all in the interviews, which you love.
And, you know, Ali Abdelaziz, his manager of the Stars, told Brett Okamoto afterwards specifically the details.
I don't have that info in front of me, which it was.
But these are significant injuries, Luke.
He said, I don't mind waiting because I got to heal.
Do you think, regardless of who wins that rematch,
he could be next?
I mean, how do you see 2, 3, 4, 5 in the rankings,
guys like Kanani or Costa, Vittori playing out against each other?
Could the C's part that Brunson slides in there next?
I don't think so.
You do have the rematch angle with Adesanya,
but that might work against them in this case
because it wasn't a title shot the first time they fought,
but it also wasn't very competitive.
Granted, we're both saying that this is a new Brunson,
and I do believe that it is,
or certainly is significantly, you know, corner-turning Brunson. But, you know, it's like,
you want to run that one back already? I don't think so, especially when Jared Cannoneer is
sitting there. Paulo Costa, you know, if he can find a way back, I think he's still scheduled to
fight Marvin Vittoria at some point. I haven't looked at the dates on that. You know, he's still
sitting at number two in the rankings. Again, you can argue whether or not that should put him right back in the top shot or not, but you indicated, BC,
at the beginning of your answer, there is a log jam. Paul Acosta is ahead of him. Jared
Kananier is ahead of him. Derek Brunson is sitting at four. Whitaker is sitting at one. Whitaker,
not a sign you have business. So the question is, does Derek Brunson get to leapfrog, basically,
Paul Acosta and Jared Kananier? Seems like you got to beat one of them. Seems like you got to beat at least one more. But if you do that, you beat number three or number two, at that point,
they cannot deny you. That would be to me the absolute no doubt about it. And by the way,
we should say this, dude, how many fighters make it to the UFC and do well and never put together
five fight win streaks and never put, never put together five fight win streaks where some of
those five fights include ranked contenders inside of top 10 or even top
five dude Derek Brunson has done something fairly rare actually and I he should be incredibly proud
of himself and I'm sure in fact that he is here's what's more likely to happen more likely is he's
going to fight Kanan here next Luke and I think that would be a deserving for both final stop
to secure the next title shot.
And I just want to plant something in your mind and the minds of everybody.
And maybe I just love the fact that Adesanya and Whitaker, in my opinion,
are all-time greats competing at their primes in the same division at the same time.
We all believe Robert Whitaker might actually be better right now than he was back then.
It's not out of the picture that A, Robert Whitaker beats Adesanya,
and B, Luke,
they go directly into a trilogy.
So I think that potential adds even more, you know, to the idea that Brunson's going to have to do a little bit more work.
But, you know, he's on such a run right now that, hey, Derek, get healthy.
Stay, you know, stay in the gym.
Stay focused.
Stay preparing.
And I'm not saying I would favor him over can near, but he's in this
elite circle and he belongs, you know, and that's great. That's so great to see.
That's why the Jared Kennedy fights kind of important because we saw what Kennedy did to
Hermanson. He was able to stuff the takedown. And I'm not saying Hermanson has the same style
or ability of takedowns or composure or fight style that, that, that Derek Brunson does.
There's meaningful differences.
But what was one thing that we saw from that Kananir and Hermansen fight?
It was that Kananir was able to stuff the takedowns, scramble to his feet,
and then put the kind of offensive heat on the feet against a guy like Hermansen
that he basically couldn't handle it anymore.
That would be something you would at least think would be possible,
if not probable,
against a guy like Brunson.
So the reason why you like the Cannoneer fight is not because, BC, just that he's one step
ahead of him in the rankings, because that can be obviously quite arbitrary, but that
he poses just enough of an interesting test to see exactly how good he is, how far you
can push this.
And if you can beat a guy like that, obviously, you deserve to be in a title shot position.
Conversely, BC, if a guy like Jared Kananier can beat Derek Brunson,
this one who's got great takedowns,
doesn't rush seemingly anything at this point,
can get hit, doesn't fold, doesn't panic.
This is the big deal.
He just makes good decisions.
He makes great decisions all the time.
And by the way, this guy's been fighting since the Strikeforce days.
That's a hell of a competitor for Jared Kananir to walk over as well.
Maybe everyone doesn't share this opinion,
but I think also what Kananir would offer Brunson is this.
A chance to beat a guy, I don't want to say straight up
because that implies the wrong intention,
but here's what I actually mean.
This five-fight win streak has seen him expose guys who weren't quite ready or maybe in the case of darren till who we're going to talk about in a
second who have legitimate flaws so it's one thing to expose a flaw in another man and and you know
will your way to a victory against somebody as strong as cannoneer who's coming off such a strong
win in which i thought he you know bounced back and learned from that Whitaker defeat and really looked strong in this last fight this would be
a win that you know you're not backdooring into a title shot you're not doing anything but earning
it right Luke is there anything to that not that you take anything away from his wins over an Edmund
Shabazzian or over a even uh the guy with the Jurassic back who was in jail you know I'm talking
about there.
But to a certain degree, you could almost be overly critical and say, well, those guys were flawed and Brunson just exposed it.
Jerk Kananir ain't really that flawed.
You beat him, you earn that title shot.
So I kind of want to see Brunson have to do that.
And if he does it, Luke, there will be no questions.
There will be no one left criticizing at that table. A six-fight win streak with wins over Darren Till and Jared Cannoneer
to get a title shot, given the lay of the land and where he's at,
is more than sufficient.
We all know some people get shortcuts.
Derek Brunson's not going to be a guy that gets shortcut
because we looked at his old resume and we kind of thought,
oh, we know who he is, and he is out there trying to get people to reimagine him.
He's trying to get people to understand this is not the same thing.
If you want to do that, boy, he is well on his way.
But there is one more step before you get to the final boss in that case.
Now, that being said, BC, it takes us to topic number two,
which is where we turn the tables here a little bit.
Let's talk about Darren Till. And my question to you is the basic one, and we don't ask it
pejoratively. We don't, we're not trying to be mean, but you go one in four in the UFC,
especially when you're hyped as the next big thing out of the UK. We just have to ask BC,
and you can answer this however you want. Is Darren Till overrated?
Yeah. And apparently I was right, Luke.
I was the old guy saying that for years
when everyone said you're crazy or you're a hater.
And then I come around on Till in this fight and say,
no, I heard what I needed to hear.
And to Darren Till's credit,
I mean, he's always been a great quote, right?
Whether it be talking trash or whatever,
but I just really liked the mental toughness
he has shown in his interviews leading up to this fight.
And when he says, you know, he's going to,
no matter what he's going to figure it out, I believe him.
And I still believe by the way,
given his age and all things considered that he's only lost to elites that
there's obviously still time. We're not panicking to the level of, you know,
is he going to lose his job? No, but he is in a, you know,
Kelvin Gastelum like situation where it gets to a point where it doesn't
matter the flashes that you've shown Bill Parcells ad nauseum. you know, Kelvin Gastelum-like situation where it gets to a point where it doesn't matter
the flashes that you've shown.
Bill Parcells, ad nauseum, you are what your record says you are.
Yes, Luke, Darren Till is overrated.
And what I saw in the beginning is true.
There's a lot to like.
And like, you know, maybe you weren't worried
in round three for Brunson.
I felt like Till was one or two punches away
from putting that away and figuring it out
and going, okay, it'll walk through a little bit of hell, but that same guy who gave Robert
Whitaker troubles and dropped him, that's the same guy here.
And Luke, he still is that same guy.
But you got to get over that hump and win, and that's what he's not doing.
So Luke, you tend to know or fancy yourself an expert in some of these areas more than
me, technical, camps, coaches,
and all that. I'm going to say yes to your question that Darren Till is showing us that
he is overrated right now, but what should be the call to action? What should be the break glass
panic in case of emergency? Because we are entering emergency times, again, not for his
employment level, but for the idea of how
seriously do we take him luke there are elements of his game or of his demeanor which you can't
argue are elite how does he get everything else up to it luke what the hell would you advise him
to do if he watched enough dissected episodes and realized that real recognizes real and he
was looking at old professor salt and pepper and
saying fix me bro okay take me as i am and fix me yeah so here's what i would say i mean one i don't
fancy myself an expert i would say i am literate about these matters but expert no you believe
that to the you know farazah hobbies and others of the world but from my from my vantage point
which is what you're asking here's what i would say. If you look at his game and we were able to rewind it four or five years,
I would really have almost nothing to say.
I would say he's right on par.
The basic problem is that his offense is simply not dynamic enough
and he's got major gaps in his deficiency.
What do I mean?
If you look at his striking, now by the time, you're right,
by the time the third round rolled around, I was like, okay, this is a lot better.
Where he was teeping to the midsection, he was throwing leg kicks and exiting,
and he was a little bit more pronounced about his jab.
That was, I thought, perfect.
He was looking good when he was doing that.
And he was framing on clinch breaks, and he was just doing a lot of the right things.
But here's one of the major problems offensively.
It's just a lot of one-twos.
Now, he's very, very good at it.
His timing is good.
He can cover distance very quickly.
His left hand is sharp.
It's powerful.
But that's just really one weapon.
You could set it up a lot of different ways, but I'm pointing out,
it's not like he's been using a lot of uppercuts with combinations.
It's not like he uses a lot of combinations really at all.
It's just sort of fake you out with the timing and then the feinting
and then throw the left. There's really not a whole lot behind. At least it wasn't until the third round.
And even then it was simply too little too late. That's sort of one problem. But the major problem,
and this was the one that I saw and I was like, oof, this just needs a lot of work.
Dude, his, I'm not saying he doesn't have ground skills. Like if you ask me, has he trained
sprawling before? He's been training sprawling for a long time. So why did he get taken down to third after he stuffed the previous attempts by Derek
Brunson? It is because instinctually, he just doesn't have that sprawl switch in his head when
he needs to. When he is consciously thinking about getting his hips back and dropping them and the
various things that go into stuffing a takedown, Brunson
couldn't take him down.
That was great.
But the minute he started getting a little bit loose and that muscle memory of just the
years that come with mat time, Derek Brunson was able to run over him in that way.
He was able to literally push through him and get behind his legs.
And he didn't have that sprawling instinct at a moment when he needed to have it.
Moreover, on the ground, BC, this was the worst part. He doesn't have two-way jujitsu, right? So he was underhooking
and framing with his arms underneath, and his legs were doing nothing. If you go back and you
watch, dude, Derek Brunson, I couldn't believe this, but it was true. Derek Brunson let Darren
Till have double underhooks underneath which if you do that
against someone who's got a deep half guard let me tell you something bad shit is about to happen
to you but he let him do that because a was easier to frame and then strike and Darren was doing
nothing with his legs he was just holding if someone has double underhooks and they're just
holding then what you're doing is you're just clinging like a koala bear.
You're not entrapping someone, lifting their weight over you so you can do whatever you want, sweep or sub or whatever, a leg entanglement, whatever you want.
Dude, he just was hanging on.
Man, you can't be in title fight eliminators or something like this.
You can't be in top five fights at middleweight when you have double underhooks and you're just hanging on underneath that is not enough of a sophisticated offense from your ground game to win at this
level it's just not dude and Derek Brunson was having his way with him as a consequence so to
round out the answer dude he needs work man like he needs lots and lots of work not so much with
the striking I think he's very adept bringing some of those things to bear easily I think you
could get that pretty quickly he is obviously very gifted in that way,
but the, but the wrestling defense and then underneath the game, look at Adesanya. What
happens when Marvin Vittori gets on there on top of him? He is immediately looking for sweeps. He's
immediately looking for opportunities to create scrambles with submissions to disrupt the base.
Dude, Derek Brunson was literally just
sitting on one knee with one foot up and going to work because no one was challenging his base
on top it was it was a bad showing if I can be honest with you and that was a bit of a wake-up
call for me he took many backward steps on the ground that you just you know illustrated I mean
it was almost you know I hate to say this because anytime a non-fighter talks bad about fighters, you know, blah, blah, blah, keyboard warriors, basement people,
that's what I am, all that.
But when Barber got exposed by Roxy, I was like,
look, she showed remedial ground skills.
Darren Till showed remedial ground skills.
You make Derek Brunser not a great wrestler but not a known –
he's not Fedor in the ground and pound game.
He made him look like a killer.
So, Luke Luke it's tough
I have a couple questions I have a couple you know let me just let me just add one let me see
one small note to one thing yeah I don't want to cut you off I just want to add no I'm not the guy
to fix Darren Till I don't know more than Darren Till I can't fix Darren Till I'm not that guy
but the problem is if a guy like me can see those things boy you better believe his opponents can see it
too yeah i mean i don't know his financial situation a lot of times guys fight because
they have to i think this is one of those pause moments where you take an extended period of time
you reevaluate your entire thing your coaching system your your people around you everything
because you say i still have a window i'm 28 years old i have a big name i'm a great talker
i've shown you footage and evidence of being a very elite fighter in spots, but I got to figure this thing out. Luke, I thought
it was most interesting at the start of this fight because when Darren Till's at his best,
I think it's when he is striking from the outside and sort of controlling the terms. I mean, again,
you know, maybe my eyes are too remedial to see, but I saw him against Robert Whitaker make
Whitaker fight his game. Whitaker just happened to be great enough that he was able to edge him. But what
I saw against Brunson was a different type of Till. Even though he had success in the opening
minute and a half of the first round against Brunson, Till was pushing the pace. Now the
announced team, you know, was speculating, hey, maybe he's looking to crowd him to take away the
threat of the takedown. But this was a more aggressive Darren Till that I wasn't sure if it was a smart game plan
to go after it and leave no doubt and say,
look, I'm turning my career around tonight
and I'm going to take this fight,
or it was a little bit desperate.
And either way, as soon as Brunson changed levels
and set him up for the takedown,
you know, he got it with ease.
So, Luke, the panic move in a lot of these cases,
let's use Kelvin Gastelum as an example,
as people say, okay, well, the thing that's really going to fix him
is to just go back down and wait.
In Darren Till's case, he was a huge welterweight.
Have you seen enough going one and two now as a middleweight
to question within yourself, is this the right weight class for I saw Michael
Bisping say that and obviously whenever Michael Bisping has you know an opinion about what a
competitor at this level could do to improve themselves it would behoove all of us to listen
and listen you could make an argument about Adesanya right he showed the grappling against
Jan Blachowicz at 205 it wasn't it, it was a little bit flat. And then he goes
down against Marvin Vittori and all of a sudden his game comes to life. Now, obviously part of
that is improvement and everything else. But the reality is because the guys are smaller or at
least more commensurate with his size, he's just much more of a dynamic force. Would Till get some
of that? If he could make it down safely, and that's really the only consideration here, BC,
because remember, I mean, to your point, dude, this thing about Till, he's 28.
He's 28.
I'm saying things about him today that are critical.
But I want everybody watching to know this is not me writing off Darren Till.
This is me saying Darren Till's got work to do, but the good story is he's got time to do it.
Could he, by going back down to
welterweight safely, and remember the last time he tried to make welterweight against
Wonderboy Thompson, he went blind in the weight cut. That's a true thing that happened. If
you can avoid that, do I think it would behoove him? Certainly. Certainly I do think that
it would, BC, but I got to be honest with you. Watching some of the stuff on the ground
the way that I did,
it's not sufficient for any weight class.
That's just not enough.
You got to have a much more dynamic force.
If an opponent is allowing himself to be outgripped by you, essentially, to give you inside positional control because he knows you won't do anything with it,
that's a problem, man.
They don't do that in any other scenario, and they did it here,
and that's a red flag.
I thought you were going to make a case that him, Kevin Lee,
and Gastelum should be the face of the 165 division, Luke.
I thought you were going to come out with that.
Well, here's the thing.
Till, this is what I mean.
I think Kevin Lee would be a fucking killer at 165.
What about Till at 175?
Right.
I mean, obviously I'm not saying Till is going to make 165, but you get the point of saying, you know, he's almost a tweener Luke. And we don't see that
with so many division these days where someone's a tweener outside of that gap between lightweight
and welterweight, but he does seem like a tweener. So it's, I don't know, man. Yeah. You're right.
Before we talk about other things, I do think he has some of those intangibles that I talked about
the mental toughness.
There's a lot, again, a lot.
You know, the size at either weight.
He's a big dude at either weight.
But you've got to dramatically change something, Luke.
So it's going to be interesting.
It's going to be good theater to see him try. Listen, the team he's with in the UK team, Kayobon, I don't have anything but good things to say about them.
I really don't.
Maybe he's just better than all the guys in the gym so that they can't push him in the way that they need to.
Again, I'm not the guy who knows how to fix Darren Till's problems.
I'm only the guy who looks at tape and says, what do I see?
And what I see is, at least in this fight, maybe he had an injury we didn't know about.
That can often be a thing that comes out later.
But what I saw in this fight was a guy who just did not have the requisite skills in the position he was in to get up on his feet, to defend himself, to create threats.
And, dude, this is not the last time someone's going to find you in this position.
It's not okay to be at that level.
If you want to win at the highest level, that's simply not satisfactory.
That's just the reality.
And sometimes it's not the team.
Like you just mentioned, you know, like you don't want to say anything bad about the team.
I don't either.
I'm just saying sometimes people need to change.
Sometimes it's... I mean, look,
why did Mike Perry succeed so much under
Coach Latorre, Luke? I say that as a joke, but you get my point
here. People switch trainers sometimes
because it's just a different voice that they
need or a different setup and system.
Look, we're all different, Luke, right?
We all find our spouse for that
one thing we're missing in ourselves that it
fills in the blanks.
I don't know if this is the right team.
I don't know if that's the problem.
But if he wanted to panic and switch, maybe it's something.
And the communication and the motivation, maybe there's, look, again, there's something missing there.
I hope he finds it.
I hope the man finds it, Luke,
because even though I have historically thought he's overrated,
I think he's great for the game.
I love his personality.
So let's see what happens.
And if Derek Brunson provides any lesson,
is that some guys take a little bit longer to get better.
Sometimes they have to switch camps to do it.
Again, I don't know if that's what Darren Till needs to do.
It's not my place to say.
I have no idea.
But he's 28, folks.
You can be as critical as you want today,
but you must reserve space for him to get better
because he's got plenty of time.
And obviously, I think athletic ability to do it.
All right.
Point number three, BC.
We go to the guy who made the most amount of noise, so to speak, heading into this card.
It was Paddy Pimblitt, a lightweight out of Liverpool as well.
Now, he got rocked a little bit against Vendramini, but then wins with an emphatic first round KO.
All right, BC.
Very simple.
Give me a grade for Paddy Pimblitt's UFC debut.
I'm going to push it up to a B+, because, I mean, look,
he won the night from the standpoint of the interview
and the look and the viral highlight.
And, I mean, when you can talk on that level, Luke,
and you back it up with a dramatic win like he did,
you're going to win the night.
I mean, look, this guy is the type of guy, whether you're a, you know,
he's certainly polarizing, but he's the type of guy that I'll always say,
and maybe it's my love of some of the pro wrestling juice
that gets sprinkled on the real fight game, but I mean, he's must-see.
Whether you want to see him succeed or see him fail, he's got that it factor.
There's no question.
Obviously, Luke, the bigger question is,
so I give him a b plus from
the performance angle of it all but is he of that ilk as a fighter luke his defensive holes were
gaping against a guy who up to this point is not a killer and it looked like the train's going to
fall off the tracks and obviously patty's ability to make the adjustments and figure it out and then
get a brutal finish.
I mean, look at like eight unanswered punches after he landed the initial two right hands in the flying knee. That seemed to rock Luigi. There's a lot to like in all of that.
But Luke, I certainly have way more questions than I even have excitement about his future,
because if he doesn't make some drastic changes defensively,
they're going to buy him some one-way tickets to the basement floor, Luke.
The sub-basement floor.
You know it.
You know it, bro.
And some guys thrive off that because people want to see it happen,
so they tune in aggressively to see it, and he may be one of those guys because he seems to have that it.
But, Luke, there's a lot more to be concerned about
than love from my critical position after one fight yes i'll give him a bb plus as well for
the debut and the reason why i won't give an a is because on the promotional side of things i think
about it went about as well as it could given the circumstances which is there's not really much of
a crowd it was in the apex you weren't't in the UK. You weren't at home.
Our home, I should say.
So there was going to be some limits to him.
I will say on the good side, I've been paying attention to this guy
as he's getting a little bit older.
His physique tells me he was in incredible shape for this one.
He really did a great job.
Obviously, he hit all the right notes with the interviews and everything else.
And then being able to, the way you described it it like someone's going to put together a tweet about
this they're going to share it what can you show them in that 30 seconds 49 seconds that you're
going to put together there you know the finishing off of Indramini is just it's about it's about
perfect in that sense the problem as you indicated was of course his defense folks if you go back and
look on the tape and this is a great thing about Paddy Pimblitt he's been fighting in cage warriors
for a long time.
All of those fights virtually are on Fight Pass.
You can go and see them for yourself.
Here's my one worry.
That's not a new problem.
That's an old problem that has just maintained.
He is known for his ground game, as I mentioned previously.
He's a ferocious back attacker.
He's a great finisher from the back.
That's really where he thrives.
And obviously, when he's got an opponent hurt,
he's got incredible finishing instincts.
There's mostly just really great things to say about him.
But it wasn't just one punch that landed.
He has gotten hit a lot in fights.
And that head movement, being tall in the air like that,
and not getting off the center line, not blocking,
all the various things he might need to do given the circumstances,
it's a big problem. And I'm at'm at the point now where like you can absolutely
give him a mulligan in this one could be nerves who knows things he's working on but that is this
is this is just the reality of that either that gets corrected quickly or he pays for it quickly
simple as that choice is up to him i don't get to make those calls. And I'm sure the UFC will find, you know,
the right kind of matchmaking to bring him along.
And as indicated, he's got great experience from Cage Warriors,
no doubt about it.
But the time is right now to clean that up.
Because if you don't, he's at 155.
The amount of power punches at 155,
they're going to knock your block off if you don't clean that up,
is endless.
So great start, a lot to work on. Power punches at 155, they're going to knock your block off. If you don't clean that up, it's endless.
So great start, a lot to work on.
Luke, even though he's a scouser and they don't get knocked out, as you said,
I don't have the vast experience watching his old fights.
Does he have a ground game?
Yeah.
I mean, he's very good on the ground. Okay, because there's going to be some of those obvious, you know, McGregor comparisons of a guy from that area of the world coming in,
and he's almost had McGregor-like quotes of, I'm going to take over.
And look, he's great for the sport.
Luke, when he says, put me in, you know, did he say Dublin,
or did he say whatever town he said in Ireland or the U.K.,
put me there and put me in, you know, co-main event or main event,
and I'll sell at that arena and I'll show you.
I mean, I'm sure, I'm sure it's going to be fantastic entertainment.
I want to see it.
He is great for the game.
But, you know, the good news, I guess, in this sport is losses can be non-disastrous
like they are in boxing to a guy on the rise.
But I'm going to be very interested to see, as you will,
how quickly he can adapt his defense to this level and how hard they're going to matchmake.
Are they going to give him a soft der run to milk the excitement
and the potential for ticket sales and all that,
or are they going to do the typical UFC thing
and find out what they have pretty early in this as well?
It's going to be fun to watch either way.
So that's why I ramped it up to a B+,
because there's something very, very special there.
And I can't tell, Luke, if the fan in me loves or hates him.
And that's what I kind of like about it.
He's given me a little of both.
You know, when somebody's that polarizing,
the fan in you can instantly say,
I'm either for that guy or I'm against that guy.
I can't really figure it out yet.
And it makes you want to see him again.
So that's great to see.
That's great for this division.
I thought Daniel Cormier nailed the comparison.
He looks a hell of a lot like the late great Owen Hart, the former WWF superstar.
This is going to be interesting, Luke.
You say he's got a good ground game that's going
to help him um he's ferocious from the back he's very very good at not only just like once he gets
there uh making an effective use of it but he relentlessly attacks it he's one of the few guys
who like um you know goes out of his way to search for the back and he's and that's been a real strong
suit of his and he's good with ground and pound there. And he's good with submissions there.
If you're a big shit talker and people want to see you pay for it,
Luke,
um,
sometimes the thing that allows you to survive losses and even big ones
is your ability to make fun fights.
He seems like a guy who's going to make a fun fight against anyone and
everyone.
And I think that's going to help him a lot.
My daughter's home.
Can you hear her?
Oh yeah.
It's oh yeah.
This is great.
This is great. Uh, well, I was going to say one last thing here before daughter's home. Can you hear her? Oh, yeah. This is great. This is great.
Well, I was going to say one last thing here
before we move on to some other topics
outside of this particular event.
I want to talk about anyone else on the card
that may have impressed you.
Now, he's not, I don't think he's from,
well, he's from the UK, obviously.
I don't know if he's from Liverpool.
But to me, man, all the attention was on Paddy Pimblitt,
and I get it.
The guy's got a certain appeal,
or as you pointed out,
polarizing appeal one way or the other. But me man if you're asking me like who was the biggest
standout from the UK on that card or even like when I think about top you know UK prospects
slash contenders the guys I've really got my eye on it'll be Arnold Allen who obviously did not
fight on this card and then it's going to be Tom Aspinall dude Tom Aspinall to me was by far the
best of all the Brits on this card and it's not especially close Tom Aspinall. Dude, Tom Aspinall, to me, was by far the best of all the Brits on this card,
and it's not especially close.
Tom Aspinall is the real deal.
For a couple of reasons.
One, he takes his time.
He sets things up.
He's very fundamental.
That finish on Spivak where he went low and then went high on the clinch break,
just good basics.
But when you deliver on the basics, they can just do so much for you.
And then, BC, the awareness, the honesty to recognize it is not weakness to say,
I am not ready for the top of the division. It is, in fact, a strength. It is a strength to know
where you're at, but where you want to go and what it takes to get there. Because that means this guy,
obviously, he's probably going to get fast-tracked because he's just going gonna beat the shit out of most of these guys so we'll see what happens but to
understand that you have work to do before you're really ready for your full potential to know by
the way that you know but 38 you can still he's obviously younger but he was saying he's gonna
be competing his mid to late 30s at heavyweight that is very reasonable dude tom aspinall to me
looks like the real deal holyfield that's the guy that I think the UK fight fans should be hanging their hat on.
Yeah, there's a lot to love here.
I did get a little nervous when you said real deal twice because that implies,
well, it can imply two things.
It implies that we've seen enough to know that he is legit,
or it just can imply, obviously, that he's showing qualities
that tell you he's on the road there.
Either way, 4-0 in the UFC, seven wins in a row.
That's saying a lot. The poise, the way he's setting up these there. Either way, 4-0 in the UFC, seven wins in a row. That's saying a lot.
The poise, the way he's setting up these finishes is saying a lot. But the reason why I question the
real deal is we got to see him against somebody with a pulse, Luke. And that's no disrespect to
the remaining husk of Andrei Arlovsky and everybody else on the Sergei Spivak level that he's defeated
up to this point. I mean, Luke, honestly, have you heard of some of the guys he defeated in the UFC
to start off? You know what I mean? That's
who you face when you start off. You face the
Jake Colliers and the Alan
Baudats, but Luke, we do
have to see him at that next
level, and obviously he wants to take it
a slow, responsible path
to get there, and there's a lot
to like, but I can't get too excited,
Luke, until we get to a next
level, because... That's fine. I mean, he's got some work to do. Luke, you should do we get to it to a next level because that's fine
I mean he's got some work to do you should do that against this level right yeah that's fine
he's got some work to do in terms of proving who he can beat but you know it wasn't like he and
Spivak went the distance he made short work of him and it was one-sided if you know somewhat slow
the entire time um Arnold Allen to me is more proven as a top contender or you know on his way kind of
contender than than uh aspinall aspinall's got in your in your obviously your estimation a little
bit of a more of a hill to climb fine but just on what he's showing this the poise the smoothness
the understanding of space and time and position it's it looks formidable we'll see anybody else
i gotta ask you something from this card people would kill us if we didn't bring this up
unfortunately my Lithuanian brethren
Modestus Bukowskis
dropped his third straight and who knows
what his future brings Luke, obviously now that he's got
this bum leg
Khalil Rountree Jr. needed a big win
he got a big win
he got it by vicious KO after he wrecked
Bukowskis' nose early
but Luke, the way in which he delivered that TKO
leg strike via sideways kick to the side
of the knee, you're going to get a lot of people questioning
where we're at Luke from a rules standpoint
from a morality standpoint, one of those people by the way is not
Bukowskis so you got to give him his respect, he did put out on Instagram
like, hey guys, no disrespect to my opponent, do not be sending him disrespect he won this fight fair
and square it's up to me defensively to see that coming and block it Luke where do you stand because
you can make a strong case that we're at a point in modern MMA where hey man are we really should
we be outlawing 12-6 elbows should we even be outlawing soccer kicks or strikes to a downed opponent?
I mean, there's a debate either way on all of these topics.
Where do you stand on the debate that kicks like that should be,
A, legal or not legal, and, B, a gentleman's agreement not to do them?
I know Jon Jones has a history of doing those,
but you could wreck a man's career for a couple years with kicks like that, Luke.
A lot of people talking about this.
You didn't put it on the rundown.
What are you hiding, Luke?
Not much.
I don't, I don't.
Listen, if there was a UFC Players Association, some kind of union,
and they work together with the UFC to say, listen,
the fighters are just not comfortable with this rule,
because I do see a lot of fighters speak out about
it, or at least, you know, they seem uncomfortable about it one way or the other, then I would be
like, fine, like, that's just something that they all got together, decide they weren't comfortable
with. And, you know, a little less violence in the octagon probably is not really going to hurt the
product and, you know, might save a knee here or a knee there. So it would be what it would be.
But I never seem to understand exactly what the argument is, right?
Because if they're trying to make a claim that this particular strike is so dangerous and in
such wide use that it's causing at scale enough problems with fighters' knees that we need to
address it, then where's the evidence? Because that's never been presented. There is none,
actually, that would tell you that. So then they might say, well, we want to get rid of it on principle,
but why would you want to get rid of something in principle, right?
Because the idea would be just to injure, not to do anything else.
But if you want to get rid of something in principle,
why would you do it if there is no evidence in the real world
to suggest that it's all that dangerous relative to some of the other dangers
you might face in the octagon?
Yes, it can be different in principle about what it is doing versus others but the material end ends up
being something rather insignificant in which case there would be no reason to have the principle
to begin with so i never really understand exactly what the case against it is supposed to be
okay um i just feel like and i get your point and you point, and it is consistent with you, Luke.
Show me the proof, conspiracy head.
Show me the receipts. It's a very easy rule.
We want to do things in this world.
Okay, Jose, but it's very easy.
For anything you want to do, hey, we want to do this.
Okay, do you have a good reason to do it?
What is the good reason to do it?
I'm perfectly willing to hear it.
I just don't know what it is.
Because there's certain injuries that can take away a man's career and livelihood and ability
to make money and i don't know that this is that one again to your point we do have to see a long
track record of it and you could just as easily argue that any knockout could take chunks off
your career any snapped and broken arm any anything in this absolutely brutal sport is not
good for your body or your mind or your brain or your soul, Luke.
OK, we established that up front.
This just looks like an absolutely devastating frickin strike, Luke, that can that can really set somebody back.
And I don't feel good about it, Luke.
Do I have an argument to support that that would win a debate?
No, but there's a feeling inside of me that and it does
nothing with lithuania i just don't feel good about that kind of finish luke yeah i understand
that i think a lot of people look at it and they're like is this are we okay with this and i
understand the questioning uh and again i'm not like i'm not so wedded to the idea that like wow
we this is we need to keep this strike.
Again, if a majority of fighters dislike it, who am I to say they should keep it?
Rather, all I want people to do is to say, okay, what is the actual impact of this thing at scale in the UFC?
What has the oblique kick done to fighters relative to other ways fighters receive injuries in fights?
And I think what you'll find is that it is barely noticeable on the list.
And so for that reason, I tend to think it's ugly to look at,
but overhyped as a threat.
Like hurricanes that exist that never touch landfall,
they're formidable.
But if they don't touch landfall,
I'm not exactly sure why I should worry about them too much. So should we legalize titty twisters, Luke?
I mean, you know, it's cosmetic, right?
People always ask about this.
What about pinching and then, like, you know, tickling?
Why don't folks use those?
Because they don't work.
I mean, what about a reach around, Luke?
They don't actually work against high-level fighters.
Where do you draw the line, Luke?
Can I cup the ball sack?
I mean, where's the line here, Luke?
I know you've been dying.
Listen, I know you've been dying to cup my ball sack, but you may not.
I mean, you can't play with somebody's digits and break a toe on purpose or a finger.
Yes, that's against the rules, yes.
But let me ask you this then.
Let's say fighters watch that and go, oh, crap, I never thought about doing that.
And if Rountree's okay with it, and if Bukowskis is okay with it,
and if Luke frickin' Thomas is okay with it,
then let's make it the new calf strike.
And then how many fighters do we have to see be out of action for a year
because of it that the conversation would go to the next level
that we would consider outlawing it?
Or a lot of fighters try it and realize that they're not all that good at it.
I mean, he timed it well off the
jab right that's how he got it he got bukowskis committing to it and then timed the in between
and that's how he got it that was really nicely done i mean i see people try it all the time
they're just not all that great at it again dude i'm not immune to the evidence if the evidence
become if it gets popular and we start seeing these get shredded in a way where it becomes
alarming yeah and then fucking we can have this conversation again it's not that i love this strike and i'm married to it i'm just saying
if we're going to outlaw something we should probably have a good reason and procedure to do
that and something that looks bad but may not be ultimately that harmful i tend to think that's not
where we should be focusing our energies personally luke can you punch can you punch to the adam's
apple without like how come
that's not a thing no i don't think you can do throat attacks like that nor can you attack the
clavicle and some other things as well so some things are like for example like why don't we
allow eye gouging well fuck man if your eyes are coming out or being permanently damaged in fights
you can't do this for very long it becomes a really you know insanely dangerous thing
um if can you literally kick goes that direction we can get rid of it can you literally kick a guy's ass or is
there rules against getting too close to the anus or uh grundle track is there like i mean it's
luke where are we where's the show gone i think we should move to the next topic
that's what i think that's what i think okay uh speaking of which
let's do that next so bc's all over the story i'm of mild interest in it but he likes it it is it is
fairly interesting which is that with that stop with that precursor hold on i didn't want this
wrestling champion slash brand new olympic gold medalist plus I mean, what do you want to say? The best Gable Steveson, the American.
We've been seeing him at Bellator shows.
We've been seeing him at UFC shows.
We've been seeing him tweet Dana White and everybody else.
But in the end, it's not what he went to.
What he went to was WWE.
Dave Meltzer reported it along with many other folks as well.
BC, you believe this to be a big story for a lot of different reasons.
Tell me why.
Yeah, obviously it's a big story because, look, someone being a dominant amateur wrestler
and winning a gold medal and then deciding which way they're going to go is big
when you've got this level of size and personality. But let's not forget that he just won the gold medal with one second
left in a fight that he was losing in patient fashion to dominantly do it i mean like it's just
there's so many next level parts of who this guy is his ability to trash talk his confidence and
luke how i mean you we got it why do i want this on the rundown? For a few reasons, but one to just stand and applaud.
Have you ever seen somebody dominate a negotiation period like Gable Steveson just did?
Knew that he would have two different sports competing against one another to bring him in, not to mention the different entities and promotions within each sport,
and then do what you just said.
Show up at everybody's show, take pictures in the back with everybody, and then do what you just said show up at everybody's show take pictures in the back
with everybody and then tweet at everybody tweeting at vince mcmahon a month ago and waving
tweeting him the other day just tweeting out like sign the deal put the put the pen to paper
sign the deal i mean this guy from the beginning was calling the shots luke and i think what was
interesting was the debate that started to be had in the midst of this season when people were
wondering where's he gonna go the whole idea was this you can do pro wrestling for longer and forever
right because it's fake it's demanding on your body but obviously it's fake but do you want to
put off mixed martial arts meaning if you have a window and a lot of people think physically he has
the tools to one day be a dominant heavyweight mixed martial artist on the super elite level, you could argue, Luke, it might be better to do that now,
to get into the sport now while you're young and put in those years now,
knowing whether you were great or not, you could wrestle forever.
What I thought was interesting, Luke, was that this man looked at the landscape
and I think he came to the terms of realizing,
I can get a lot more money now in pro wrestling.
And that doesn't eliminate the ability to one day slide over into MMA.
But I think what he has set himself up by making this decision is that when he does slide over,
he'll already be an even bigger star at that point.
It turns out, Luke, he's not going to be one of the guys who's just going to go sign with PFL or Bellator or even UFC and, you know, go dark for two years and learn
every aspect about the game. When he does eventually cross over to MMA, it's going to be on a major
platform and it's going to be for big time money. But the decision he made, and without knowing
details on it, and I don't, I think it's fair to look at the pro wrestling landscape right now.
And Luke, I think it was unfair for both you as a pro wrestling hater and the whole pro wrestling
hater fans of this show to be like,
oh, remember that time BC held the show
on top of the shoulders, but then he completely hijacked
it and did a half hour on pro wrestling?
I didn't just do it to just, you know,
art and, you know,
haul off into the screen because I
had the moment. Because this is a
pivotal time in pro wrestling's
history. Really cemented by what
happened over this weekend with AEW all out and Luke no don't worry listeners don't worry I'm not
going to come at you with 25 minutes about how huge it was that Punk debuted and Adam Cole and
Daniel Bryan made surprise crossovers and now the business is on fire and we could be headed through
the third boom period I'm not going to talk about that. But what is happening in this period is Vince McMahon is
doubling down now more than ever on the idea of all you little indie guys that I can't understand,
go to AEW and do your thing. I don't care about you. I'm Vince McMahon. I like big boys who can
move and sell like Brock Lesnar. So I think Gable realized that the most amount of money he could
have was showing Vince McMahon how many options he does have in the other areas
and potentially driving up that price.
Because whether you're a close follower of pro wrestling or not,
Brock Lesnar has raked Vince over the coals for ridiculous money in recent years,
constantly using the UFC as leverage and working his schedule down
to the smallest amount of part-time dates
for stupid monstrous money Gable has the potential to be Vince's next Brock Lesnar and that's why I
think Vince was probably willing to break the bank WWE has more money now than ever due to
how successful their network and licensing deals have been so this was a major decision in the end
Luke because if he came in if he chose MMA it's going to be must-see TV for this guy I think he'll eventually get to MMA but right now as
pro wrestling is as red-hot as it has been in 30 years 25 years this was a big
move and he and he's going to a place WWE where they love the big boys
especially the cocky ones that can sell and they're crazy athletes so Luke this
is huge do you have a care level whether this man because you you respect
amateur wrestling you certainly respect the dominance he has shown whether he does end up
getting into an mma cage before it's quote unquote too late heavyweights age later than others but if
you looked at him are you lamenting at all him going this direction into an area that you think
i think he made the right call to be honest with you again i'm not going to watch a thing he does over there but I'll say this dude I mean just think about what Jake
Paul is doing right so let's say things work out really well for Gable Steveson over in WWE in
whatever way he goes and let's say he eventually tries to make the move to W excuse me to UFC or
you know whatever the situation is at that time whatever a good place that wants to pay him a lot
of money he's going to do the Jake Paul thing where even in his early fights, I don't know if
he'll be selling a million pay-per-views or not, we'll have to see how things go, but
like, you can fight someone commensurate with your experience level in that endeavor, MMA,
and get paid a shit ton of money for it, or certainly at a bare minimum, much more than
you would ever get paid right now.
Like, why not?
And even if you don't go far like
look at all of Brock's purses from MMA maybe not the K-1 one but probably that one too but
certainly from UFC probably none of them are small even by today's effing standards he probably got
huge amounts of money all the way through and he obviously accomplished a lot by winning the title
but I just mean dude Gable Steveson can go to WWE make a ton of money up front build his name to the point that when he
wants to go to UFC people don't remember this because obviously fans are from a newer generation
but like it used to be pretty clear that if you were signed through the UFC like a grassroots way
you might make money but it was harder but if you got acquired from one of the other orgs out there
where the fans were hot on you, you got a lot more money.
Here is a case where he can build his name where the fans might be hot on you in a much more pronounced way.
Then come over here.
Yeah, dude, he absolutely made the right call.
It sucks for us at MMA, but this is what happens when an industry doesn't have a whole lot of protections.
The job is hard.
And, yeah, you can just do a lot right by yourself by going the direction that he did.
Yeah.
And he earned it.
And I'm not going to bore you by talking pro wrestling,
but I did.
Look, I'm not exaggerating.
I've gotten like 75 different DMs of,
man, BC, if you could only get Luke into wrestling right now
and see, taste, and feel what AEW's doing,
maybe you could win him over.
But look, I tell them the same thing every time.
It's not going to work. So give up the fight. Look, maybe you could win them over. But Luke, I tell them the same thing every time. It's not gonna work.
So give up the fight. Luke, I don't I'm not in this fight. You didn't
grow up with this, right, Luke? You didn't grow up
getting injected with this sickness
where you're not
a grown man who could cry
after a pro wrestling storyline made good
in full circle. So if you've never been
injected with it, it ain't gonna happen now
in your state
luke okay every every kid in the 80s was a hulk hogan fan i mean he was everywhere so did i watch
in the era of uh hulk hogan and ultimate warrior when they're airing on tv after sunday or saturday
morning cartoons absolutely i did but then you know i hit puberty and i was like wow this is
this is for is for numbers and
i'm not one of them so there you go well to to be honest with you i also hit that point in 1996
grade i was just sort of like you know what pro wrestling's lame wwf is all commercial comical
cartoon bullshit but luke the fact that you never came back in in the late 90s with the nwo and wcw
and all that it's mind-boggling toling in georgia it's mind-boggling
to me that you didn't to be honest and because you didn't you'll never come back in this era
either and by the way i respect that i'm not putting it on you i'm not forcing it i'm not
trying to inject unnecessarily pro wrestling into the show unless i create some kind of spin-off
thing but um respect to gable he's gonna he's gonna make that money player and uh i think it was a smart move all things considered all right and then last but certainly bc not least we have
got to get to this which just pains me to even talk about but here we are uh okay so this saturday
was supposed to be trillers return to boxing with os De La Hoya coming back long out of retirement after
Manny Pacquiao walloped him to take on Vitor Belfort, who has, of course, you know, been sort
of outside looking in in terms of the world of combat sports. Except Oscar De La Hoya got COVID,
and so they had to find a substitute, which was Evander Holyfield. Now here's the story for
folks who may not know. Evander Holyfield was promised to fight previously on Triller,
didn't get it, and was basically threatening or even put in the papers to sue them.
I don't know, we're going to ask BC here in just a second, if that's why they gave him this contest,
but here was the problem. De La Hoya versus versus belfort was supposed to be at the staples center in la obviously a guy like de la joya can draw there now you could say that they
moved this fight to florida which they did because obviously without de la joya they're never going
to fill out the staples center you could also make the argument and probably this one's correct
there is no fucking way that the california commission is going to sanction a pro contest with a 58 year old Evander
Holyfield, who, by the way, even on training footage has looked bad against Belfort, who,
you know, obviously that doesn't have a ton of boxing ability and as long in the tooth,
but has, I think it's fair to bring up a long history with PED use and everything else in
between BC. What the fuck is this? Yeah is gross this is what it is it's gross and
i get a lot of people saying bc isn't this like isn't this your shit right i'm the guy luke for
10 years as a national what am i a pundit an idiot have been saying hashtag old guy fights right
because that's my shit i love it i love the slop well first of all again let me reiterate that
gas stations are the silent killer so keep your livers in check but also luke there has to be a line there has to be a limit and for me this was the limit not just
because holyfield is 58 in some ways luke that's that's almost like the third or fourth worst part
of this you asked me does this have anything to do with the lawsuit well i don't have proof of that
i wasn't on the phone with trill's Ryan Kavanaugh getting a confirmation.
How could it not, Luke?
Right?
Holyfield signed with Triller with the language saying he's essentially signing with them to have a third fight with Mike Tyson.
And the problem with Mike Tyson's comeback against Roy Jones going so well, meaning nobody got hurt, Mike looked great, and a lot of people were into it and a lot of
people actually exited that fight happy because it was a special situation with Mike Tyson kind of
going through another season of turning his life around and redeeming the past and all that
unfortunately when that stuff happens you'll get the copycats and unfortunately Mike
inspired a lot of old guys to come back there There's a difference in my mind when 47-year-old Oscar De La Hoya
wants to come back for one more,
and when 58-year-old Evander Holyfield does.
So, Luke, the combination of this looks like a make good
to make a lawsuit go away,
even though the Oscar COVID stuff is real
and they did need an opponent to sort of save this card,
although you could argue, were they co-main strong enough
of Anderson Silva versus
Tito Ortiz and all the music acts. Did it really need to be saved? I don't know. But you add that
and you add the obvious commission shopping that was done here. In fact, I don't even think
the trailer people hid that in the quotes because Ryan Kavanaugh was quoted by every outlet of
saying, if California won't approve it, we will most likely move it to Florida, which they did.
So, Luke, it's gross as shit.
So you're going to ask yourself, well, BC, would you have been okay
if Holyfield, who was scheduled to fight Kevin McBride, right,
when the Tyson thing fell through because Tyson has his own issues
with Triller that led to Triller suing Tyson, saying that he has one fight left.
So, you know, Holyfield was going to box McBride, who's old and slow and all that.
Well, the difference is that's a fight Holyfield was going to win, but nobody cared.
I didn't want to see that fight.
It was gross to begin with anyway.
Now we're going to put him in there against a guy in Vitor Belfort, who's a lot closer
to being active and dangerous.
He's only 44.
And Luke, you know, I'm not saying things out loud so i can get sued
but this guy looks like he's freaking what word do you want to say that won't get you sued luke
about what vitor belfort looks like in the pictures right now it looks like 2013 vitor
belfort okay rejuvenated i don't care that you could say, well, hey, Holyfield was still an active boxer into his late 40s.
He's going to have all this boxing advantage over Vitor.
No, he won't, bro.
Because once it gets really gross, it gets really gross.
And Belfort's in that category of the really gross category.
I'm sorry.
Holyfield is in that category of the same really gross category that Chuck Liddell was when he came back for that third Tito fight.
Where I just don't want to see it.
There's nothing good that can become of it.
In fact, there's a chance that something bad can become of it.
We do not need 58-year-old The Holy Field having a chance of getting hurt
or knocked out or whatever.
And when you add in Vitor's history and you add in all the other gross elements there,
this is a gross fight that I'm not looking forward to,
that I'm almost hoping falls apart, Luke.
There's nothing good I can say about this.
There's not even a good, like, hey, man, maybe it could be cool and competitive.
Get that shit away from me, seriously.
Do we know for a fact that Florida has approved this?
I'm not exactly sure where we're at on this, Luke,
but as far as I know, this fight's happening, and it's going to happen in Florida.
Does Florida have a history of not approving things, Luke?
I mean, what are we doing here?
Yeah, I don't know.
I mean, this is, I mean, listen, the last time I think,
I could be wrong about this, but I think the last time
Holyfield was in the ring, he was boxing Mitt fucking Romney.
Well, that was a comical exhibition, but Luke, the last time,
hold on, let me just tell you quick, the last time he was actually in the ring was 16 years ago when the new york state
athletic commission after the fight said we will no longer give you we will no longer sanction you
for fights because you have you know you're whatever the term was you know you're no longer
a safety to yourself in the ring yeah and also i mean you can just hear him in a speech has slurred
i mean this is unethical. It's unethical.
Like, you cannot be doing something like this.
And I don't know what's going to happen.
And by the way, you know, listen, I lived through Tim Sylvia fighting Ray Mercer,
and then Ray Mercer knocked him the fuck out.
So, like, you know, certainly in combat sports,
we have to reserve space for anything being possible,
which is why fans tend to tune in on it.
But, dude, you got Holyfield who's had a long documented history of financial trouble, selling all of his memorabilia.
He's got documented issues with health.
He's 58.
The guy's nearly 60.
You couldn't probably, we'll see.
I don't know what the exact truth is,
but you moved it from a place
where there was going to be a strict commission
to a place where there's going to be, you know,
just guys fucking making airplanes out of paper
in their offices in terms of the commission.
It's not just that it's gross to make money off this or try to this is fucking
dangerous this is a potentially dangerous and uh if you know people can spend their money how they
want but i would strongly caution to think twice about what this might mean to purchase something
like this do you know what nobody was talking about? That Belfort De La Hoya was potentially dangerous. I know
Oscar's a lot closer to
being closer to his prime, but
Oscar was still 13 years removed
moving up considerably
in weight again against
the guy who's starting to look a lot like 2013
Mohawk Vitor in pictures.
That fight was getting sneaky,
dangerous, interesting.
Now that fight's off.
Nobody wants this.
We don't want that.
I mean, look, would you have been able to be talked into Holyfield Tyson 3 if it was an exhibition handled the same way that the Roy Jones fight was?
Maybe you would have, but you would have had misgivings.
Yes.
Maybe.
Again, as an exhibition where they can change rules and timing and stuff,
I'm more or less okay with it.
But when they wanted this on a pro contest,
like, what are we doing here?
Florida's gross.
It's a gross place.
Yeah.
Sorry, Florida.
I apologize.
Luke, what is your...
Hold on, since it's fight week,
what is your Anderson Silva, Tito Ortiz care level
from 1 to 10 right now?
Negative 5 billion.
All right, there you go.
There you go.
Have it.
Saturday night, be there.
Be nice if Anderson Silva won,
and that's the most I can say about it.
He seems to be having a great moment after his UFC run.
He deserved it.
Tito, by the way, had a great run after his UFC moments as well.
That win over Chael Sonnen was kind of big for him,
and good for him.
He made some money with it.
It's not even about that.
It's just like, what are we doing at this point?
They wouldn't have done this, but what if
they had paid Tito to step aside
and we saw Anderson versus Vitor
a boxing match? Would you have been into that?
Yeah, I'd be all into that
as a matter of fact. Yes, I'd be very much
into that. That to me is actually kind of
fun and silly, but
you know, I could get into and you silly but you know i i couldn't get into
and you know as a replacement when i get into tito versus or van evander tito's hands are so
bad that i could be like that's gross as shit but it's probably a lot better than if tito knocked
out chuck liddell the way he did and then afterwards you know viciously coyote vander
i would be really sad i think i think a lot of fans would be like,
gee, this guy's just, dude, we would put him,
we couldn't talk about him on the five-part rundown.
We have to put him on Have You Seen This Shit
because it'd be elder abuse.
I mean, what are we doing at that point?
Yeah, it's a fair point.
It's a fair point, yeah.
All right, with that in mind, we're one step closer.
But first, BC and I are not going to ask each other questions.
It's time for you to ask us questions. It's for dm's and dogs we've got mail as you know every uh well the day before
the show on the monday show in this case a tuesday show normally it's on monday so every sunday
typically we put up an instagram post you can find us at morning combat on instagram and we
ask you guys what you guys want to know, and then you ask us questions.
All right.
I don't even know if I have them or not.
I think I do.
Yes.
All right.
Here we go.
From atcase4days, who will eventually get cut first by UFC, Till or Gastelum?
Oh, that's a terrible question.
Wow.
Luke, you would agree that both have, quote, unquote,
money in the bank as company men.
Would you agree with that?
For sure.
Gastelum makes better fights.
True or false?
True.
Much better.
But Till's a better talker and more marketable.
True or false?
By the way, people are writing me saying Till apparently told Michael Bisping he tore his ACL 10 weeks before the fight.
And to what extent that might have affected his performance.
Yeah.
Keep that in mind.
Okay.
Okay.
Till's the bigger brand, right, Luke?
For sure.
At this point.
Well, yeah.
Yeah, he's the bigger brand.
And also, he is regionally important, right?
He's very, very important for a particularly important market important market yeah it's going to be gasolum he and i think gasolum has more
bad tape than till has up to this point oh you could argue ball you could argue it's even you
could argue it's even luke it's tough it's tough to say um all right gasolum would get cut first
we both know it okay i think so i think so from at at Tyson underscore calm. Did Patty the baddie deliver the most exciting UFC debut ever?
No.
Is it in the conversation?
That's not even a pimple on the ass of what Anderson Silva did.
Yeah.
Well, certainly Anderson's the go-to.
Who else are we missing in this conversation?
Ronda Rousey?
Yes.
Right.
Ronda Rousey had a good one.
Hers was fucking thrilling, and it was a main event.
Brock in defeat.
Brock Lesnar?
Brock in defeat.
McGregor was a big one.
St. Pierre's was not a big one.
Obviously, I think it was either against Caro or Jay Huron.
Either way, it wasn't that big.
Who else had a big one?
BC had a big one, but that's another conversation you can kind of you can
kind of argue vitor belfor it was a different era um but it was big um but no but no i mean
listen he had a he had a very strong ufc debut no doubt about it but the most exciting ever no
dude i was there i watched it when silva beat lieben and that was oh you were in the building
no no no no i was covering it live oh okay okay but uh i remember exactly where i was at the
moment i remember looking at my tv being like what the fuck did i just watch that was incredible
um so no it's not quite on that level yeah that's fair all right let's keep moving from at my uh
yeah from at michael curson what are your thoughts well kind of went over this
what are your thoughts on the sidekick khalil roundtree landed on buchauskas should that kick
be banned you want to go over one more time or you want to just no i i wish i would have known
i probably should it was am i allowed to see these in advance i'm not even sure what the morality
laws are in morning combat rundowns luke yeah you should be able to he normally they normally send
them just to me but for that purpose i think you should see him too i wouldn't have brought it up then but we have already
answered that maybe we can we call this guy on the phone see if he has another question luke
yes he's asking what are you going to wear to the dying fetus show in november luke people are
tweeting at me in the moment saying that you attending an aW card is the equivalent of me going to Dying Fetus.
Not exactly.
It depends.
Here's why.
We can go to Dying Fetus for a very small amount of money,
and they're in your hometown,
and it's easy to be right up front or pretty close to it,
wherever we want to go.
I'm not going to an AEW show where I'm in the fucking bleeders,
where people are sneaking in booze, and there's fistfights over chicken fingers. I'm not going to an aew show where i'm in the fucking bleeders where people are
sneaking in booze and there's fistfights over you know chicken fingers i'm not doing that
next wednesday right you and i might we might be in the same city together right next wednesday
we might it's possible that night i have third row aew tickets with two cbs sports employees
right here's the problem It's my wedding anniversary.
There's no chance I'm going with you to fucking AEW.
In Newark.
I mean, not that we have an extra ticket for you,
but that would be the ultimate.
Luke, get a taste of this.
Third row.
Who are you dealing with?
As my daughter cries insanely loudly.
Shout out to Robbie Snyder and Jamie Maz from CBS Sports.
But that would have been wild, Luke.
But it is your anniversary.
I can't do that to you, Luke.
I can't do that.
Dude, I tell them every day, if the baby's crying loudly,
take her outside.
And they just don't.
They just don't.
They just give her a megaphone.
Luke, at what point can we stop calling her the baby?
She's like three, right?
Nah, she's two.
Yeah, you're right.
She's two and a half.
I just do it for shorthand.
But yeah, the kid.
All right.
Or the child. Look, the kid is all., she's two. Yeah, you're right. She's two and a half. I just do it for shorthand. But yeah, the kid. All right. Or the child.
Look, the kid is asking for me.
The kid's a little disrespectful, Luke.
It's your own child, okay?
I know.
It's crazy.
All right.
From Pentameter9.
So sad to learn of Michael K. Williams' passing.
Favorite MKW role other than Omar.
That's a great question.
That is a great question.
So this is IMDb.
Luke, this was,
I tend to make fun of this culture that we have
where when a celebrity dies,
people are just like,
I mean, they are heartbroken
and they put out seven different Facebook posts.
And I'm like, man,
you didn't know David Bowie from Adam.
Stop being all that emotional.
You can still listen to his music.
But I will say this was one that got through. When I read that luke and i texted you i was like damn mother no right
it's like when when stevie ray vaughn died in 1989 i remember my dad walked out of the room
and he goes not stevie motherfucker and i was just like whoa dad whoa But now I get it, Luke. Not Omar, bro. No.
Dude, that one's a bad one.
Boardwalk Empire, he was kind of big in, obviously.
I haven't seen any other role.
So I'm very heavy on loving this man from Omar and nothing else, Luke.
So I should probably revisit his entire catalog now.
Yeah, he was in 12 years a slave as
well he did a bit on Christmas Addicts um Aqua Teen Hunger Force which by the way terrible show
overrated as a motherfucker that thing is um his IMDB is just too long to read it's everything
everything is in here it's amazing what he's done. When you look at the five seasons of The Wire,
is there a strong argument to make that he was the MVP of the show?
Because that's arguably no worse than the second or third best TV show of all time.
No worse than.
What is your favorite season of The Wire?
I'm going to say season two.
Okay.
Notice how, Lukeke you just completely ignored
my question i did i did but i flipped it back because wrong with you you know what i mean like
dude i did a whole bit on how patty pimbley was good on the ground and your first question was
is he good on the ground you don't listen either motherfucker i just don't call you on it all the
time so i mean what i what an absolute what just uh you don't listen either. I just let it go.
I don't hold grudges about it.
Favorite season of The Wire.
Well, okay.
That's a great debate, and I've got a lot of time if you're willing to go down there.
Everyone's got it wrong, okay?
And everyone says season four with the school kids and all that is the greatest season in TV history.
Jim Lampley used to go nuts on that.
It's a great season.
It's also just a little bit massively overrated, Luke. So season
three would not be an incorrect
answer as the greatest because the dynamic
between Avon and Stringer is
amazing. But the real
answer of this, Luke,
I'm sorry, folks. Rewatch
it for yourselves. You heard wrong.
Season two on the
docks is the greatest season of
the damn wire. is oh bc because
you're a white guy you said that no it's just really freaking good okay i love me some season
two what's the guy's name what's ziggy's uncle frank sabaka come on my man bogo you know about
frank sabaka luke that season two is the best season and i'll fight you over it all right
yeah also i agree with you first of all.
And also your part about like,
Oh,
everyone mourns celebrities.
They don't know.
It's,
it's true that there's a bit of like melodramatic nonsense to it all.
But you know,
when the guy was open about addiction issues and then he dies from an
overdose after doing such a great art,
it's just awful.
It's just awful.
So,
uh,
it's terrible.
And if you've not seen
the wire i don't know what you're waiting for so is he the mvp of the show luke because i think
stringer bell was idris elba i think he was the mvp of the show are you uh omar was the best
no i'm with you stringer bell idris elba is just a it's just an unbelievable actor
michael gilliams was too but but yeah. And that character, I don't
know if the character was as interesting, but he made
it as interesting as it could have been
relative to Omar.
I can't believe you agree with me on season two, Luke.
That's allowing me to forget
your
saying that I don't listen to you,
which could not be further from the truth. Patty
Pimblitt notwithstanding, Luke.
Wow, I didn't know we had that in common. We could have been hanging out it's also one of my favorite bars from
uh re-up gang which is half clips half these other guys and uh the the bar is where the wire season
two bitch is back to the docks it's just one of my favorites so yeah and hey how about okay do you
remember real quick you remember the crazy uh... What's the guy's name?
What's the crazy sabaca kid?
Not Lenny.
What the hell is his name?
Iggy.
Ziggy.
Ziggy.
How about Ziggy's cousin, Nick?
How about his girlfriend?
Do you remember?
I don't.
It's been a while since I've seen her.
Okay, she's the real MVP of that show, Luke.
Okay, that's all I got to say about that.
Duly noted.
All right, last but certainly not least,
from Danny underscore Bridgewater,
in light of ABBA dropping new tracks for the first time in 40 years,
if you could bring back a band slash solo artist
that has broken up or just stopped making music,
who would you choose?
This will be a little bit of a deep cut, Luke,
but back when I was single and had disposable income, we used to say
if this band came back, because back then, before David Lee Roth had reunited
with Van Halen, my friends and I would always be like, what's the distance you'd drive for that?
If they announced that tomorrow and the first concert was
16 hours away, would you get in the car and just drop everything? It's a bit of a deep cut
and by the way, they ended up reuniting and it was what you know? It's a bit of a deep cut. And by the way, they ended up reuniting, and it was what it was.
It's a bit of a deep cut, but I think Whiskey Town,
the former Ryan Adams-led alternative country groundbreaking late 90s band
who specialized in that just roots Americana rock,
bluegrass-y country rock folk combination,
if they ever got back together, your boy Beast,
even though Ryanyan adams
has made some horrific headlines in the me too era of late with the molly uh with the with the
mandy moore fall out of his marriage but um that would be some shit for me but look that's a deep
cut for me personally i'm sure you have some you know uh um death by abortion rock band to to bring
out in uh and really no no texas bands uh or you're like
if wolf dimebag daryl could come back from the dead that's my pick that's probably where you're
at right luke no but i'm glad that you've decided for me what my pick is and what it isn't my answer
is going to be clips which i just kind of mentioned it was the two brothers push a t and malice and
then malice kind of had this conversion to Christianity so he became
literally no Malice was is now his name he became literally awesome yes no he became terrible because
they don't make music anymore and the music they made before was fucking amazing obviously Pusha T
still out there doing his thing but I wish that clips were back together as good as Pusha T is so
sucks that Malice or no Malice did what he did,
but what are you going to do?
All right.
All right, Luke.
Dude, somebody sent, who's this guy?
Somebody sent me this band that I was supposed to check out
and they're interesting.
Luke, it's progressive metal.
I'm going to have to get back to you on this.
Okay, Luke.
Oh, have you ever heard of the band Between the Buried and Me?
It's progressive death metal. And some fella i i'm sorry i don't have your
name right in front of me he sent me he's like dude you got to listen to the the the parallax
2 future sequence album and luke the singing is atrocious because it's death metal but the music
is a a common wave between you know hardcore metal and progressive rock and almost jazz
influence. It's some great shit.
A lot of people are telling me, hey BC, the bridge
between you and Luke, the common ground,
it's not just Rage Against the Machine or 90s
alt-rock. It actually is that
bridge between Luke's
crazy death metal and my love
for very sophisticated jazz
fusion progressive rock. There is a
middle ground there there's a
genre luke that people said we could be hanging out and watching season two of the wire together
listen i got in your car the melissa etheridge mobile and in there you just had like ravi shankar
fucking no no i had just nine hours of ravi shankar on the fucking sitar just jamming no
nothing in particular.
I'm like, what in the fuck are we listening to?
I had the Maha Vishnu Orchestra with the great John McLaughlin,
and it was a weird track with a lot of bang, bang, bang.
And Luke, he has an Indian influence.
He's got a spinoff band called Shock T.
But I could have picked a lot.
Like, if Weather Report had been on,
you would have been getting down with me.
But unfortunately, yeah, it was like,
if you were like, hey, BC, uh dying fetuses hardest track i would let me ask
you are you into you're into that kind of music why aren't you are you into indian food i like it
i like it i like a good indian buffet i think indian food is just like it's just it's just
unbelievably good you got this weird thing where you're. You got experimental music tastes.
You got okay food tastes.
Well, yeah.
I grew up as basic in food-wise as you can,
but I'm trying to evolve over the years.
Luke, can I ask you quickly about death metal?
How could you tolerate the singing?
I mean, it's atrocious, Luke.
Well, here's the thing.
People think I like all kinds of death metal.
I don't.
I like a little bit of it. There's a couple of think i like all kinds of death metal i don't i like a little
bit of it um there's a couple of bands i like a lot obviously but most of the time people send
me recommendations to listen to like vomitorium and i'm like no this is terrible i don't want
anything to do with this i just make a couple of exceptions along the way all right well shout out
to cory marlin for hooking me up with that band. I'm getting him into Cream
just the same.
Luke, not my Cream.
Not Cream, Get On Top,
but one of the greatest bands
of all time.
All right, Luke.
With the anti-vaxxer Eric Clapton.
One day.
Luke, the thing is about you and me
and we had a little dust up today.
I'm not afraid to document
our divorce on a documentary.
I'm not afraid.
Luke, I go so close to the fire
and the edge on this show that if it leads to us never talking again i'll sacrifice that for the
art okay well before we do that we need to watch elder abuse and uh lions eating fucking hippos i
guess it's time for your stuff yeah we scour the globe luke the good and bad the ugly the highs
and lows and in between of combat sports and beyond and we are two weeks out so
this is going to be a loaded one. Shout out to Gaff
for compiling all this shit.
Have you seen it, in fact? Let's do this.
Alright, Gaff Pierre on the ones and two
setting me up, Luke. How about we go to PFL
from two weeks ago? I had to bring this back.
Brandon Jenkins with the flying
knee KO, Luke. This is going to be a nice little
appetizer to get us ready
for what's coming. Yeah, baby.
Jumping switch knee.
Bop. That's the one like
Paul Daly hit on Brennan Ward, I believe.
Pretty close. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah.
It was good stuff right there
from Brandon. Don't call me Bubba Jenkins.
All right. Let's go over to Nacionis MMA
1. This is Ivan Perez.
Not only does he knock out Emmanuel Rivero,
but how dirty is this?
Is this...
The old Hendo.
The old UFC 100 stamp that he put on there.
Wow.
You don't have enough brain damage.
Let me help you with that.
I think that's regional Mexican MMA.ican mma there's no rules luke
there's no rules okay let's keep it going now let's get to some women's boxing lols you see
this face off kiss luke okay okay yeah i know uh yeah why did i wear pants today well luke if that didn't get you off this will polish boxing
iwa bradnicka she brought a damn dildos she brought a damn dildo and put in the face of
anelia bogus anelia's not taking that shit luke at least not with cameras around you know these are your type of women right here this is this is the bc fucking center of the target right
here that is invented eastern it's like eastern pasty eastern european women in scantily clothed
scantily clad clothing throwing dildos at each other i mean remember sometimes like
modafari will bring gifts to the scales to for the face off you know and we're like what's going
on here this is an interesting gift right here luke so uh wow all right let's keep it going
let's go over to the women's kickboxing ring luke this is a vicious ko get ready for this shit luke
i was gonna say is the left hook gonna keep landing and yes the left hook is going to
keep landing god that's one of those where you just oh it's like wwe with the it's open the
coffin they fall right in the match is over luke i mean that is they fall face first you can just
go ahead and call the stretcher over immediately yeah all right all right hey luke you have a
problem with tough people wearing gloves when they work out? Well, say it to their face. Here's Teofimo Lopez Jr. getting ready for his Tuesday night trailer showdown, Luke.
Yeah, I don't know if he knows this, but this will do nothing for your bench.
He's working his abs at the same time, Luke, okay?
You could learn from him.
If he wants to work on his core, it's great for your core.
It ain't going to do shit for your bench.
Okay.
Those red gloves must anger you, Luke. That's just angering you i just you know i like teo a lot i think he's an incredible
boxer i gotta have a talk with him about these okay we'll have him on we'll have him on we'll
get down to the bottom of it let's go over to one championship luke what the hell is your boys
gordon ryan and gary tonin doing here uh uh yeah
yeah that's that's that's
that's funny I guess Luke
little
play a little how's your father yeah there you go
okay yeah
yeah bad to the
bone these guys Luke yeah that's
great okay let's keep it rolling uh
Luke you remember UFC newcomer Chris
Motinho check this out Yeah, that's great. Okay, let's keep it rolling. Luke, you remember UFC newcomer Chris Moutinho?
Check this out.
Okay, he's my new favorite fighter.
People don't know, this is where BC and I hang out
before Red Shoe Diaries.
Room Service Diaries. Room service diaries.
Only it's
Maniche and Gaff sitting topless
on top of the washroom. I mean, this man
is just living life in a way that I
could not possibly critique.
How much weed is in
that washroom? I'll say this.
He is wasting a lot of
perfectly good grass over there,
but
God bless him.
He is having some fun, and the ladies are too.
Who's having a bad time over there?
I don't see anybody having a bad time.
There's more weed in that dryer than what Nate Newton got caught with
when they pulled him over, Luke.
Remember that?
Wow.
Remember Nate Newton?
He had like 5,000 pounds of weed in his trunk when they pulled him over
that time, Luke.
It was incredible.
Let's keep it going here.
Major League Baseball shenanigans, Luke.
Francis Ngannou throws out the first pitch at the Angels game,
but he does it sidearm.
You know what?
It was a strike.
Okay.
Who cares?
He didn't bounce it in or do some 50-cent bullshit,
so that's good, right?
Dude, when you do it sidearm, though,
don't you have to kind of step over and lean as you throw?
Yeah.
I mean, it's like when Rick Berry and Wilt Chamberlain would shoot free throws
underhanded.
It looks lame as shit, Luke, but if it works, right?
That's right.
That's my attitude.
Does it work?
Does it not work?
All right, Luke, check out these fans at Nationals Ballpark.
Just living life, drinking out of a paralyzed guy's leg, Luke.
A prosthetic, you mean?
Prosthetic leg.
Sorry about that, Luke.
Sorry about that.
That's here in D.C.?
Yeah, dude, there was a guy in my gym.
What day is it today?
Tuesday?
Saturday.
There was a guy at my gym with a prosthetic leg like this,
and he was squatting 400 pounds with good form.
I was pretty impressed.
And then he celebrated by drinking out of his bum leg.
Look, that's fantastic.
Good for him, dude.
He fucking earned it.
All right, let's go to Chicago.
Luke, you get those White Sox and Cubs fans together.
It can get a little fiery.
Let's zoom in here if we can.
I never understand Chicago rivalries.
Obviously, I get this one, but in general, what it's all about. Oh, shit. This oh shit oh shit oh shit this guy wants this he
wants all the smoke this guy oh yeah there's a lot of shoving boy thank god bc thank god for
steady cam oh yeah that's a boss move to just push somebody over as they're coming at you
i'm into that dude tell me you have the one where the guy in the dodgers game gets slept uh maybe not on this one luke that'll have to be next how do you
miss that one it's so much better than this one uh luke let's go over to the bathroom are you down
with this sink would you use it luke willingly i definitely wouldn't drink out of the toilet i can
tell you that make sure you pull your fly up before washing your hands at this place, Luke, okay?
You know what I'm saying?
Unless that's your thing.
All right.
Hoagie farts, once again, to the rescue.
Always, always.
Luke, the dangers of drinking are upon us.
I don't know what they call this, a butt-cracking tonic?
That's, uh, that's some uh oh okay okay were they were they white bc i can't oh right right
all right luke you'll drink your eye out people get mad at me hold it go back for just a second
i'm not saying that people of all races don't do drunk shit they all everyone everyone drinks everyone bombs out but dude this shit about pouring booze down the ass crack of
your friend and then catching at the bottom like a fucking ball sack luge and then drinking it that
is the exclusive province of whitey 100 let's go over the, Luke. You'll drink your eye out. You got to be careful here.
Check out this guy in the center.
Oh!
Yikes.
Yikes.
Yikes.
All right.
Yeah.
My man, take it easy on the fish bowl drink.
That's what we called them at.
I used to go to this place in New York when I was broke as fuck called brother jimmy's oh i love that 20 yeah and for 20 bucks
they'd bring you that that like that fish bowl full of like purple liquid that would get you
fucked up new york city dive bars that maintain like competitive pricing luke are like the the
jewel of the mile when i first moved to new y, I was broke as shit. There was one place called Down the Hatch.
It's in the village.
It used to be, I'm sure it's changed now.
It used to be, so this was 2003.
It used to be you'd go there
20 bucks from
noon until the
big game started in the evening.
So like 6. All you can
drink, all you can eat.
I used to go there and get fucking housed dude oh yeah luke
i'm having some poster issues here luke okay we have a lot more than poster issues yeah all right
hey let's keep this this crap going luke what you mentioned earlier but white people are are
gonna white luke um check out this drive-thru in florida okay but this is genius. That's different. Let me get that
wave pool going, Luke.
Listen,
you're not...
Honestly, though, is this any worse than normal
above-ground pools?
No.
I feel like above-ground pools
are nubs as shit
all right all right it's good that you're hosting this bc i'm glad it's good that my
office is falling apart here uh let's keep on going luke check out these dickheads
this is when you mix gymnastics and drinking luke you could
you could you could catapult your spine out of that yeah wow um just got quiet in here okay i guess they're in a relationship now yeah yeah
all right check out this drunk guy getting shafted here luke both of these guys actually
you gotta you know you gotta be careful messing around when you're sloppy drunk
watch out watch out watch oh no oh no bye okay yeah Be careful messing around when you're sloppy drunk. Watch out.
Watch out.
Watch.
Oh, no.
Bye.
Yeah.
I'm watching this like Jabba the Hutt when he pulls the thing out and Luke goes into the dungeon.
Yeah.
Sent to hell.
To knock us solo.
Quite literally.
All right.
Hey, we got footage from the future here, Luke.
We went in the DeLorean.
Here's Luke 40 years from now.
Oh, we went to watch this old guy drown.
Oh, the kid had floaties.
I don't feel bad.
That's definitely Luke to his great grandkids.
Many, many a year from now.
Hey, Luke, Anthony Rumble Johnson posted pictures of his dog's toy.
How badass is that? i wish i had that yeah
that's that's the amount of weed that that would do with smoking in the dryer oh yeah oh yeah uh
luke i wasn't going to put this on here but i got so many requests to get in on the milk crate fever
so uh here we go let's watch some people get sent to hell, Luke. Oh, Jesus. Wow.
Kiss that pavement.
This guy, as we mentioned on Room Service Diaries, this guy's young, so I don't care about him.
He sucks.
It's the old dudes I always feel so bad for.
Luke, what about if we combine a baby reveal with a milk crate challenge?
Will that get you fired up?
Oh, no.
Oh, no. Congratulations. You you're gonna be a dad here's your wheelchair you paralyzed bitch the good news is you're getting you're having a son
the bad news is you'll never walk again all right you know what actually this is my favorite form
of reveal if you're gonna do gender reveal parties which is the dumbest fucking thing on earth you should have to be maimed for it yeah so i'm okay all right uh let's keep this rolling here
luke this is uh similar to how sweaty you were just leaving your your hotel room in cleveland
only you didn't have a giant dick stain on the back i apologize bc i sat on this guy's back
right before someone shot this.
He gave you a piggyback ride, and that was the... Sorry about that, dude.
Hey, Luke, we're going to close with America's favorite game.
It's called Rate My Tat.
I want you to give me a score here on 1 to 10,
10 being a badass tat, 1 being it sucks.
Here's Brandon Moreno, the UFC flyweight champion's sword on his left arm.
I can't read it.
One more time.
Este.
Este lauder.
Can't reach it.
Este juego no es un.
Oh, this game is not a marathon uh yeah i don't know uh i don't know about the lettering
start start over from the beginning
don't know about the lettering what i would say though
the line works a little off but that could be intentional yeah um placement's decent goes with the body and the flow i'll give it a seven and a half
that's respect i respect that let's keep it rolling here lou check out this pink floyd
tat i might actually have to get this luke oh that is an excellent tattoo that is the
album cover of wish you were here of course uh that is
awesome that is i mean look at the work with the suit crinkles uh that's that's about a nine and a
half that is an excellent tattoo and that is you on the left me on the right it really sums up this
show luke in a lot of ways so maybe i will get that with an mk in the middle between their legs
there that that'd be great okay oh let's keep it rolling here, Luke. Here's soccer player Mateo Politano's back.
Give this one a score.
That's a nine and a half.
That is an absolutely incredible piece of work.
It's got depth.
It's got shading.
It's got line work.
It's got, I mean, sparing but incredible use of coloring.
That's extremely good.
All right. Let's go over to Detroit's finest Thomas Hitman Hearns inspired.
Oh, first we have Sugar Sean O'Malley getting Luke his own silhouette
of him doing the fadeaway jumper on his neck.
Let me see it again.
That's about a five.
That's not great.
It's not great. Pl That's not great. It's not great.
Placement is not great either.
Listen, and I say this as someone who's got some fives on his body, too.
I've made some tattoo mistakes.
He who is without sin cast the first stone, but that's a five.
You've had a lot of fives in the dorm rooms, too, Luke, back in the day.
Probably.
Probably.
That's not unfair.
After the William and Mary mathlete challenge.
Here's Thomas the Hitman Hearns on a white guy's
calf Luke you into it
well if it's brand new
one thing you always have to remember when it's brand new
like that it's always going to be darker and like
purpley and so you can kind of see that
it will lighten up it's hard to see from this distance
I'll say it looks okay
not great the posture's
not right
the hand placements a little bit off.
The chin's a little bit...
It's a bit busted, actually.
All right, we got two more.
This is inspired by the great boxing artist Richard T. Sloan.
Here's a Pacquiao margarito tat on some guy's chest, Luke.
That thing's a mess.
That's a mess.
I realize what you were trying to do with it in the fight poster,
but he made the fight poster work, I think, about okay,
but it's hard to read.
Imagine picking that fight to be on your chest for the rest of your life.
I mean, there's better fights you could have picked.
I know. It was fine. Pacquiao just tuned him up for the whole fight, really,
and, you know, Margarito just kind of stood there.
It wasn't that awesome.
I mean, I could get Gotti Ward on my chest.
I could understand that.
Corrales Castillo.
God, Triple G Canelo I'd have on my chest over this shit.
All right.
All right, let's close with this Star Wars tat on the arm, Luke.
You got to factor into your score how it looks with the sleeve.
Not great. Not a great tattoo that's a three if not a two yeah but when you put the sleeve on suddenly it looks like that dong on the chest of brock lesnar luke yeah it's like oh uh
you've got a dick and balls that's an x-wing and then you pull up the arm, and you've just got childlike black and gray work.
That is bad.
And also the farmer's tan is nice, where the head of the dick is all tan,
but the balls are all white and triple.
Way to go, guy.
That's it, Luke.
That's the shit for the week.
Hope you saw it.
Yeah, there you go.
BC, time for odds and ends.
What do you have for odds and ends?
DAZN over the weekend in boxing.
Unfortunately, that main event, the rematch with Mauricio Alada
and Josh Warrington was turned into a no contest due to a cut,
a bad cut across Lara's entire eye in the, I believe, the second round.
But, Luke, the co-main event was all about Katie Taylor,
and she handled Jennifer Hahn like we expected,
defending all four lightweight titles with a knockdown
and identical
scores of like 100 to 89 dominant performance but here's the good news for all you fans who realize
that Katie Taylor versus Amanda Serrano for the undisputed lightweight championship it really
could be in terms of their talent arguably the greatest women's boxing match of all time and it
really has that potential let's hear from promoter Eddie Hearn, Katie Taylor's promoter, after the fight.
I think she fights again in December, and then I think she has to fight Amanda Serrano.
I mean, it's not her fault that that fight hasn't been made.
It was a mixture of many things, but that's the past.
You think you can get that over the line?
I think we have to.
I think Amanda Serrano fancies that fight.
I believe she's done a fantastic job to raise her profile.
She brings tremendous value in that fight as well.
She can be rewarded for that value.
I think we can headline that fight at Madison Square Garden.
By far and away, the biggest fight in women's boxing.
We have to do that fight.
We have to make that fight because I feel that if we don't,
it will be a piece missing of a wonderful career.
Look, this was great to hear.
Obviously, this fight almost got made a couple times in the past few years.
COVID took away from it.
Serrano's team pulled out multiple times thinking they were getting shorted on money.
But to Eddie and Katie's credit,
they both said that what Serrano has done since
then in the past year plus right she had that close-up that big fight on NBC Sports on Ring
City USA which is a platform I've done some work on and then came back on the co-main of the Jake
Paul pay-per-view against Tyron Woodley they believe that Serrano has raised her profile to
a new level Luke when Eddie Hearn said words like Madison Square Garden,
I think that has the potential to give this fight the credence
and just royalty that it deserves.
I'm not kidding when I'm saying when you're matching up their talents
still in their prime, although both are in their mid-30s,
this could be, you know, maybe the best women's fight on paper in history.
Katie Taylor also said, look, from here on out, I'm 35.
I only want super fights, pay-per-view fights, big-time fights from here on out.
I respect that.
Luke, I'm just finding out now.
I didn't know this.
Katie Taylor lives and trains full-time in Vernon, Connecticut,
which is about a half hour from where I live right now.
We could have been hanging out.
But big win for Taylor.
Make this fight.
Thank you.
Please.
Let's pay Amanda Serrano what she deserves, and let's make this fight.
This is massive.
Yeah, and at Madison Square Garden, the Puerto Rican and Irish fans would be just an unbelievable combo. And real quick, Luke, we've done the argument in the last couple years, rightfully so.
Women's boxing at 10 rounds instead of 12 for title fights and two minutes instead of three per round.
Enough of this bullshit.
If there was ever a fight to change the rules across the board for all states and all sanctioning bodies and make it universal that it's time to treat women on the level of the men and realize that you're only robbing from the entertainment value by doing two minute rounds.
This would be the first fight to debut that across the board.
I'm just giving ideas to people, Luke.
I think you're right.
For my odds and ends, I'm going to go with Glory 78 results.
We talked about it on Friday a little bit.
At least we previewed the fights to a small degree.
So Alex Pereira lost to Vakitov,
which was not altogether unsurprising.
He's basically had one foot out the door to MMA the entire time.
Afterwards, he even said as much like, hey, this is maybe not my last fight, but my next fight is definitely going to be in an MMA cage.
It was a majority decision, I believe.
So, Bakhtov, you know, there was a spirit of contest.
It was back and forth, but in the end, he was the rightful winner.
The more interesting result, though, came in the main event.
I cannot pronounce the guy's first name, but I think his name verjo shick verjo shack something like that with batter harry batter harry goes in there looking
smooth beating this guy up drops him twice in the first round then drops him a third time these are
all from liver shots for the most part in the in the second round so he goes down three times
and then as batter harry walks forward with his jab, he eats a head kick, and the whole shit comes undone.
He loses.
So they probably will run that back.
Kickboxing is a bit of a rematch sport anyway, so I think it'll be okay.
But the crowd felt big.
The event felt big.
Glory did a great job with it.
But what a fucking result for Badr Hari, man.
That was in the bag and quite surprising in the NBC.
Let me say this. Our guy Todd Grisham,
who's known for being able to rise to the big
moments, like a Mauro Ranallo,
although Mauro Ranallo's on
historically his own levels, but
Todd nailed that call.
He rose to the occasion and buried it.
On top of that, his partner,
Joseph Valtellini, he saw
the head kick first, so you could hear
him react to it immediately. And then when Grisham sees what the fuck, because it takes a second he saw the head kick first so you can hear him react to it immediately and then
when grisham sees what the fuck because it takes a second because the head kick landed but it wasn't
like better harry went like this or something he just kind of fell over and then there was blood
on the ring but what a fucking win man god here's what's wild they're calling this you know maybe
one of you know among the most dramatic comeback wins in the history of
combat sports and look i'm not familiar with the rules enough people were saying that if there was
a fourth knockdown it would have ended the fight so harry looked about harry looked like he was on
the way to landing that final knockdown is that the rule what's the rule here i'm not i'm honestly
not sure that has been the rule previously i don't know if it's still the rule uh again i'm not we are very casual kickboxing fans so i apologize to the audience for
that but at a bare minimum bc you could see it he was getting eaten alive with liver shots and
collapsing in anguish and then just happened to pull off a really well-timed head kick counter
to a jab and that's all she wrote what's crazy is you is, you know, that wasn't, it was a lucky shot for sure.
It was a Hail Mary, but it wasn't the kind
that like turned somebody's chin and you're like, no doubt.
It was kind of like, it almost,
you had to rewatch it a couple of times.
You're like, did that hit the right spot?
But it hit him in the temple, it caught him
and it did enough to prevent him
from being able to stand up.
Luke, unfortunately for Badr Hari, who's, you know, 36,
this is, he hasn't won in five fights
and now four of those
won no contest and four knockout losses so this is the end it seems Luke of a great career and
a rematch would be interesting since he was dominant there I mean I'm saying the end meaning
I don't know how much longer you can linger when you're taking losses like that but um that was
pretty telling Luke that he doesn't seem to have the resistance anymore that he that he certainly once did in his prime still i think he's such a huge name in dutch
kickboxing he'll still be around but you're right like his best days appear to be behind him uh
that's it for today's show i want to remind folks draft kings as bc put it quite articulately it's
mk it's dk together okay great the DraftKings Sportsbook app now
and use the promo code COMBAT
COMBAT with a K. K-O-M-B-A-T
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$200 in free bets
when you place a $1 bet on any NFL
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That's promo code COMBAT
with a K this week at
DraftKings Sportsbook,
an official sports betting partner of the NFL.
And as we said, BC, tonight's Contender Series, there'll be a show tomorrow.
You can go and bet on the Contender Series on the DraftKings Sportsbook app right now.
Absolutely.
And you want to enter that chance to win a million dollars.
That's not bad, okay?
Not to mention the deal that Luke just stated, giving you $200.
So check that out. Support what we're doing here by getting on board with what's going on with DraftKings. There's no, no reason not to, uh, enhance your viewing experience by helping us
get to the next level. So shout out to our folks at DraftKings. Let's make this work. Also, Luke,
let's not forget our schedule. Today is Tuesday because of the Labor Day holiday yesterday.
Today's also Rosh Chana. So shoutana, so shout out to Pennington James
and our other brethren in the tribe.
And also we will be back tomorrow.
We'll have a Wednesday show this week.
We'll have a Friday show back on normal schedule.
But back at it tomorrow, looking at the latest headlines,
recapping what goes on tonight on the Dana White Contender Series.
And I don't know, Luke, should we bring back the wheel tomorrow?
Up to you.
Up to you.
Okay.
Okay.
Okay.
Well, that's it for us.
Remind everyone,
if you want to try Showtime, you can.
You can go to Showtime.com,
get a 30-day free trial.
If you like it, you can keep it.
If not, you can go somewhere else.
We do have merch,
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I don't quite know what's on there,
but you can go and see
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see if there's anything you like. And by the way, we do in fact have worldwide shipping. It is
available. You can get at us on social media. BC and I have slightly different names between
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Twitter, on Instagram, and of course, youtube.com slash morning combat. Um, all right, that's it for
Malka for CBS sports for the King of Connecticut and everyone else in between. I'm Luke Thomas.
We'll see you tomorrow, 11 AM in the East. And until then, may all of your gains be loyal.