MORNING KOMBAT WITH LUKE THOMAS AND BRIAN CAMPBELL - Derrick Lewis vs. Ciryl Gane | Khabib Predicts Conor-Dustin 3 | Nate Diaz | Ep 174

Episode Date: June 30, 2021

On Episode 174 of Morning Kombat Luke Thomas and Brian Campbell react to the news that Ciryl Gane will be facing Derrick Lewis for the interim heavyweight title. WHY (10:00)? The guys break down Khabib Nurmagomedov's prediction for Conor McGregor vs. Dustin Poirier and his comments about retirement (35:05). Firas Zahabi said Nate Diaz would beat 99% of fighters if there was no time limit. Is he right? What fighters also fall into same category (46:20)? Nonito Donaire vs. John Riel Casimero is not off according to Donaire (57:30). The guys close out the show with the Wheel of death (72:00) and Fan Submissions. '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

well well well june has or as i say, coming to a close here in 2021, but MK rolls on. Hello, everyone. My name is Luke Thomas. I am just one half of your hosting duo. I am from CBS Sports. I come to you live from the capital of Los Estados Nunez here in Washington, D.C., but I am joined by royalty. He is the king of Connecticut. It is Brian Campbell, my CBS Sports brethren.

Good, sir. how are you today? Look, I am fired up. It's Wednesday. It's hump day. No J today. Every day fired up as always. Look, you know, we shout out regularly a strong part of our fan base and thank them. We shout out our sponsors.

We never shout out our potentially single or recently divorced female listeners,ke even the the cougars need love once in a while so if that's your situation mk cares if don't nobody else care all right well there you have it uh if you're recently divorced sorry um there you go hey we got a lot to get to today bc i think we're doing wheel of death today uh i could be wrong about that i do i know we're doing fan subs and we've got a a lot to get to today, BC. I think we're doing Wheel of Death today. I could be wrong about that. I know we're doing fan subs, and we've got a few topics to get to here today. I want to remind everyone, thumbs up, hit subscribe.

Let's drive those numbers. Let's push it forward. Keep swinging the axe. Get us to where we need to go. And if you want to follow us on social, there it is, Morning Combat. Same name everywhere, but BC and I have slightly different names

between Twitter and Instagram. The place where you send fan submissions as well as dead wrongs for friday morning combat at gmail.com uh hit us up there with whatever you might need to do if you want to try showtime by the way because the fights continue this saturday you can go to showtime.com and get a 30-day free trial if you like it you can keep it if not you may cancel it at that point bc you had something you wanted to say? Yeah, Luke, I told myself I wasn't going to interrupt you today because the fans get really upset when I do that about 43

times a show, but they don't understand the passion and energy inside of me. But I wanted to say we are on the march to 100K on YouTube, 100,000 subscribers. We're getting there and people always say, well, that's great, BC, but what do I get? You know, what do I get for helping you guys out uh luke we can't give all the details but some shit's gonna go down the week of july 10th connor poirier way three where uh you and i

are gonna take this this shit to the next level so if you're gonna be in vegas that weekend for the big fight international fight week you know you may you may get a chance to to to rub bare chest with us. I mean, there's going to be some fun stuff coming your way. So keep telling your friends. Keep banging the drum for all things MK because we coming, bro. We coming in a big way. He's not lying.

He's not lying. There is going to be a clear demonstration of what CB, I think, knock on wood, of what CBS Sports thinks so far of what we're doing. They're very happy, and obviously it's a big fight with Conor and Dustin, but they want to capitalize on that. Plus, they want to capitalize on all the enthusiasm you guys have shown for MK. I think you're going to see some of that play out

during the week. He's absolutely right about that. BC, oh, yes, I got to remind, one more time, we have to scam the interwebs. We are going to do a... We did not do a Room Service Diaries in Jersey City. We are doing one for UFC 264, at least the week that we are there. So to scam the internet, we need you to leave questions as you give a five-star review for us on Apple Podcasts.

Spotify Podcasts, too, I guess. But that's the place you want to do it. So help us scam the system and we'll get your questions answered for Room Service Diaries. Please don't ask any fight questions. Make them fun. Make them different. Make them irreverent. Don't ask, who's your favorite lightweight

from Sengoku? I don't give a fuck for that, okay? Luke, what do you think of that Canadian guy's five jobs? You know, this is not the forum for this bullshit all right save that for the thursday live chat like you normally do that's right that's right do all that kind of shit okay bc you ready to get this started yeah uh real quick uh we're gonna have a homework assignment for friday's show luke you tweeted it out please give the details for anyone that missed that all right so if you have netflix i tried to pick something that i thought a bc

hadn't seen one i wanted to see again and see something that most people might have access to if you have netflix we have a homework assignment on friday's show i tweeted this out but you can it's my pin tweet go watch the movie the night comes for us it's on's on Netflix and we're gonna discuss it. We're going to react to it. If you have a comment or a question about that movie, you don't have to worry about Apple Podcasts, but you can email us morningcombat at gmail.com. The Night Comes For Us.

You might recognize many of the characters from other movies you've seen, like The Raid and some other stuff out there. But to me the night comes for us is special all its own bc i am super excited to hear what you have to say about it when the time comes my friend when the night comes for us luke i'm fired up and ready to see this i know nothing about it so uh it was there gonna be three three girls in a cup this time whatever it is i'm gonna be ready for it all right you're gonna like it i promise with that out of the way let's get to the story it broke yesterday espn's brett okamoto was the one

who shared the news so let's just set it up this way the ufc has i don't think announced but obviously uh okamoto reported from dana white so i'm assuming that this is uh more or less official august 7th in houston texas a interim title will be up for grabs in the heavyweight division. Cyril Ghosn, who just came off that win over Alexander Volkov, is going to take on Derek Lewis, who of course is coming off his big win against Curtis Blades. So Lewis versus Ghosn, August 7th, Houston, Texas, interim title. And you might be asking like me and BC did, which is, wait, didn't Francis just get it three months ago? Why the fuck is there an interim title in August?

BC, we know that Dana White said that the management of Francis Ngannou was full of shit, that they should not act surprised because they said that they were. They couldn't believe it. His manager fires back in this long comment on Instagram, basically saying, you're lying, Dana White. I have the receipts more or less to prove it. Why don't we put it all out there?

Now, BC, with all that information out there, what is your reaction to what the UFC is doing and then the subsequent dust-up between Francis' management and Dana White? Well, we can get to the management dust-up in a few seconds when we throw to that stuff so we can get a deeper look. But just on the surface of this decision, Luke, it's troubling. I don't understand it. So here's how I understand it, right?

I just said I didn't understand it. But you get my point here. To me, this feels like another, another short-term decision with no lack of care for the long-term consequences. Now, what are the long-term consequences? It's something, obviously, that Dana White doesn't care about, but as traditionalists and fans, we should care about. And that's the idea that an interim title has any level of credibility. When they act like this, Luke, it has zero level. So here's the deal. Francis Ngannou had wanted, and you could

argue had deserved to have already fought for an interim title when he was forced to basically just sit around and wait for Stipe and DC to complete their trilogy. It would have been perfect for him to have that fight against Jair Rosenstruik for the interim title. He pushed for it. UFC was like, you're shit out of luck. But now three months after winning it because he can't go on the date they want, we're just going to take an interim title and throw it out there? So the short-term element of this, Luke, is ridiculous. To me, this feels like UFC is looking at that date in Houston. They want to do a big pay-per-view.

It's one of their big markets. They don't believe the Amanda Nunes title bout against Juliana Pena would carry the card as a main event. And, Luke, I think history shows us it wouldn't. You know what's one of the worst-selling pay-per-views in UFC history? That time Amanda defended against Rocky Pennington. I mean, it was like something, Luke, like 75,000 buys. I mean, just ridiculously bad.

I'm not against them getting creative and saying, look, we got to get something in this main event that would sell, which I don't even care if that's grabbing a Diaz brother, just doing something. But when you put a fake title on the line in a fight with two guys who don't deserve to fight for this fake title because the champion just won the belt and he's telling you straight up, I can come back in September and you know that I can come back in September, and you got his management team saying, we already agreed and signed the deal

to come back in September, and now you're just going to throw this out there? Luke, I get that there's going to be fans that are going to use the stance you used to have on interim titles, which is like, I don't really care about them as long as the fighters get paid. And I know that Dana is going to laugh all the way to the the bank because this'll make this pay-per-view sell more. And in his short history of doing this, when he floats an interim title out there, because of the opportunity at stake

for somebody to go from average UFC pay to championship level, almost 1% pay, should they win that title and then get in a title fight and win it, people fight their ass off in interim title bouts. They tend to be exciting theater. So why am I hung up on the traditionalist side of this? Because UFC is the last bastion of hope where the titles really matter. They don't tend to do this boxing bullshit type of decision making where it's like, we'll just float out in interim or

vacant title or we'll create a franchise champion or we'll do all this bullshit. No, one name, one face, one division, one champion, unless there is circumstances like a Frank Mir motorcycle accident where the guy can't defend and you want to set the division forward and keep it moving. The fact that there's no consistency in the way these decisions are made makes UFC look like a laughingstock. It's obviously they don't care about it, and to be fair, they're making so many great decisions as a whole, Luke, that it's a bit nitpicky to pick out one like I'm doing right now. But I don't, as I always say, I am the boxing guy on this show. I know the sins of boxing. Don't do that just to save one pay-per-view card. It makes everything look bad. The winner is not a champion. They are not a fucking champion, Luke, okay? I'm not here for

this shit. Yeah, I mean, you're right. If there is any silver lining, such as there can be in a situation like this, it's that the winner of Lewis versus gone, whoever that may be, when they face Francis, they're going to get pay-per-view points by virtue of having the interim title. So they'll get a bigger paycheck than they would where there are no interim title there okay I can at least I can at least be happy about that for whoever that fighter may be I tend to think it'll be gone but we'll have to see now that out of the way this is just like this is not a very difficult argument to make for example I mean you could point to any amount of history in other situations

like this but we don't have to look at history how about just looking at the present moment at bantamweight you had aljamain sterling winning a title through let's just put it very controversial means so then he gets the title and he can't turn around and defend it while there's a bottleneck in that division because he has to get long-awaited neck surgery which i totally understand if you're going to defend that title against a guy like Peter Jan, you want to be in your best health. And if you've had a lingering issue, there's no time like the present. Fine. No issue with that.

But by the time that fight happens, according to the timeline that Aljamain Sterling has given, it will be around October or November. Well, the fight took place in March. So you're talking about a seven or eight months that will have passed, probably bare minimum, before they make that contest. Meaning Francis saying he wanted to fight in September would have only been six months and they're already turning around and making a title for it. It's obviously arbitrary. It is obviously just something that they want to do

because they feel like they want to do it for whatever reason it may be, whether or not to your point, buoy that pay-per-view to give it a little bit more oomph you know put Derek Lewis in Houston whatever whatever their reasoning might be um it's obviously just something that they just decided and made up there's no formal process and we can sit here and bitch about it all day and I've been bitching about it since the UFC's been doing stuff like this but I'm going to point out one more time fighters if you don't like this kind of thing, me and Brian can say whatever we want. We are not the cavalry. We are not going to be in a position to change this.

The only people who can change this are your management, maybe, or collectively, y'all deciding to do something about it. It is up to you to fix it. I will also add, BC, though, that I did speak to some people in Francis's camp. And again, what is the truth? I've not seen the receipts between, um, what UFC had to say and what Francis's management had to say, but some folks that are close to him told me that like UFC was very much informed about what was happening. They knew that he was going to be on vacation until the end of June and that he would come back from vacation

and then be able to articulate a timeline. But just do the math on that. He's not going to be ready to fight four fucking weeks later. At the earliest, at the earliest, it would have been late August, maybe early September. They depict, just to be on the safe side, the end of September. Hello, six months past your first title defense. That's not a super quick turnaround, but that's literally not even the latest turnaround

by other existing champions at the moment. The whole thing is insane. The whole thing is capricious. But it is what it is, BC, because this is how the UFC is able to exercise control. Last thing I'll say on this. Which is where, Luke? UFC. Hold on, hold on.

I'll pitch it right back. I'll pitch it right back. Last thing I'll say on this. Which is where, Luke? UFC. Hold on, hold on. I'll pitch it right back. I'll pitch it right back. Last thing, last thing. I did see a series of really interesting tweets from Ariel Helwani who was pointing out that Hunter Campbell, who's sort of this lawyer slash top executive there at the company,

he's liked by a lot of people. A lot of fighters like to do business with him. But according to Helwani, and this is what I hear as well, that they'll threaten to strip people. I did not. I did not hear from anyone in Francis' camp that the UFC threatened to strip them. But the idea that they did not know what they were working with

or they didn't have a timeline to understand what they'd be up against, they thought he'd be ready by August 7th, that's patently, they deny that there is any situation that they didn't know that that was coming. It's like, look, UFC is so successful right now. Last two, three, four, five years. I mean, they're just unbelievable. As a fan, as a journalist, it's just been a pleasure to watch this journey. But separate from the fight pay issue, which is an issue,

it's like the only nitpicky thing I have is just this blasé decision-making, usually as it pertains to championships, meaning like who gets stripped when they're a champ champ, right? Manda Nunes can hold on to both belts forever, but DC gets stripped instantly. Conor can hold on to two belts and kind of do what he wants for a certain amount of time, but other people get stripped instantly. That sort of haphazard decision-making, Luke, it's not fair to the fighters. I mean, it is 100% not fair to Francis Ngannou to have any sort of potential

threat of being stripped if you're not perfectly on their timeline. I mean, I hate interim titles to begin with, and I think Colby and Tony Ferguson got raw deals in how their titles were taken away. Even full titles in the past, whether we're talking about Nico Montano or Jermaine Durand, I know other people don't agree with me on the GDR side of it, but still, just the way half-passionately, like, nope, we're taking that away from you, we're doing this. Like, the fighters are already dealing, Luke, with the unforgiving nature of this sport to begin with, the fighter pay and the whole idea of, like, just trying to become that 1% and be taken care of and set yourself up, but now we just, on top of that, we have this built-in threat that if you can't stay on some

company man's schedule that is very quick on turnarounds that we have the ability to just bully and threaten that we take it away it's like that looks really bad but on a whole it's like we you play to win the game you know that's that famous coach that the coach her medwards has that famous quote right you play to win the game luke i, that's that famous coach, the coach Herm Edwards has that famous quote, right? You play to win the game. Luke, I know this is a business. I know this is entertainment. But these people live their,

commit their lives to this craft to win a championship. Yes, there's because of the money backing with it. But to be considered the best in the world at what they do, when you make those titles mean less, what do you have left at the end of the day? OK, you still have like fun fights and grudge matches and that. But man, when you have this level of control, which UFC has, which other promotions and other combat sports don't, man, you have to protect the integrity of that at all costs.

Because at the end of the day, that's why people tune into fights into fights where let's say both guys aren't great trash talkers let's say there's no great you know theme to build to this and storyline at the end of the day you're like well they are competing for the UFC's championship and that freaking means something right that's you know that's going to change their lives like don't don't bastardize that I'm still Luke not fully over that the fact that Dustin Poirier, to me, is the best lightweight in the world, and he's not fighting for the lightweight title. I know, again, that's his decision. He's choosing the money of Conor over the opportunity to face Charles Arlovere or Michael Chandler or whatever, how that would have played out.

But even that, to me, is a little bit of a stain on the idea that you want the best in show to fight the other guy who's the best in show to figure out who's the real best in show. This goes against that grain, and I hate it. But but luke we should get into the francis side of this and we should get into those tweets and ig messages because it looks like team and god who is almost declaring war here luke yeah well there's one last thing on this which is you know for all the belly aching that we're doing here why doesn't it matter because ultimately i'm going to argue that it probably won't matter i think it's worth it if you're in media to try and call reality as best you can make sense of it so that's what we're doing here that's our job but on the other hand you know the ufc knew they were probably going to get pushback in the media on some level when

they did this but they went ahead and did it anyway why well because they know it probably going to get pushback in the media on some level when they did this, but they went ahead and did it anyway. Why? Well, because they know it's going to work. They know that if they put a belt around that, by the way, you know, Derek Lewis in Houston on the cusp of having a belt around his waist, interim or otherwise, just the picture of the story, because if Derek Lewis, he may not, but if he goes and says, wow, this is the most important fight of my career, winning a belt would mean everything to me, all of a sudden takes on a brand new character that I think the fans would probably get behind because he's a very sympathetic character.

And hey, by the way, beating Cyril Ghosn would be a big fucking deal. I get why he would be incredibly proud of that achievement. All I'm pointing out is, if the UFC can do things that they know might cause very, very short-term isolated blowback and then will result in, let's say relative to what it would have been if that fight was not on the card, an improved economic result and there's no real cost to the business, why wouldn't they do it? Why would they not just go forward with things

like this? I know what your argument is, that there should be some kind of safeguarding of the things that are important to the business if you have this much control of it. Fair enough. And whether it's a monopoly or monopsony, the courts can decide. But I can just tell you that you can just look around and see that they have so much control over the fighters, over the the industry over the amount of fighters that matter that they can do stuff like this and the consequences are pretty minimal until that dynamic changes for whatever reason this will not be the last time you get an interim title that's a bit of a head scratcher now why don't you lead us into the other part of the discussion i want to introduce a quick

fix i've said it before i think you and i had this debate on the mma beat back in the day but luke here's the deal because interim titles to me are, especially when UFC is bastardizing what it actually means, right? If a champion, a longstanding champion is hurt and can't fight for a year, but you're not going to strip them because they're your longstanding champion. You put an interim title at stake. You build toward the storyline of unifying the belt. We've seen it before. Unfortunately, the last four or five times this has happened, Luke, it just hasn't made a whole ton of sense, right? The champion has not been inactive. But the problem for me is seeing a guy to be able to go down in the history books,

like Carlos Condon at welterweight, Shane Carwin at heavyweight as interim champions. Like if that's like, I don't want to take away that accomplishment for them and what it means for them. But Luke, you and I are in some ways, UFC historians based on our job title to a certain degree. I just don't consider them champions. So since UFC has bastardized the idea of interim champion to essentially make it mean this number one contender, we already know we get excited when there's a good fight on a UFC card. We go, Hey, by the way, that could be a quasi number one contender fight. That means it means more. If UFC wants to officially make number one contender fights, number one contender fights, then take off the interim champion label. Get rid of the title belt, which looks exactly like the

actual title belt, by the way, because it's not the real title. If you want to introduce a green jacket like the Masters or a ring or a large sombrero. I don't even care what it is, Luke. A gold-plated athletic cup for your cock cover, Luke? I don't even care what it is. But something that specifies that this fight is more important than others, although it's not a title fight, because it's going to produce the next championship contender. And if that means giving them the right money

that an interim title fight would normally give, then everyone wins in this case. You don't go down in history as a fake champion. You go down in history as I fought in a number one contenders match, and I won it, and I got to put on this comfy jacket and show it off. Maybe that means nothing to you, Luke, but the belt looks exactly like the real belt, only it ain't real, Luke. All right, so you're big into this battle between Francis and his management.

I got to fix the computer i gotta fix i want you to respond to what i said motherfucker hold i'd love to but my i got a computer glitch i need to fix before the whole shit comes down introduce that part of the topic and why does it matter to you we've seen managers beef with dana isn't this let me play devil's advocate bc isn't this just another run-of-the-mill dana versus some famous fighters manager i mean it might be but it feels like francis's manager is coming guns blazing at a time luke where you just gave that speech about you know the only change that's going to happen is if it comes from them the time is right i mean it's ripe right now with fighter pace still a big

topic for now fighter treatment as champion, right? I mean, look, the only reason why Francis Ngannou is not fighting Jon Jones next, Luke, which is the fight to make as you fix your computer, and I respect that. It's the fight to freaking make. The only reason it's not happening is because UFC is fighting with Jon over how much someone in his spot should be making. They don't want to pay him that until he comes out and wins the championship. So for someone who actually is the champion and is potentially getting treated this way, it's very important to come out guns blazing and stand up. Let's throw Manic if we can to that little IG conversation. It feels pretty important

here. There's Francis's take, which makes sense. Can we zoom in here? Yeah, it's a little hard for me to read. Here we go. This comes as a complete shock to make an interim title so soon if you look at the history of this division it comes as a surprise francis is just now returning to the states to begin training and he won the title three months ago we're unsure of what the reasoning is behind this but we hope to get clarity soon and figure out something with the ufc soon at the end of the day they're in control of these decisions that is the manager of francis by the way francis repped by caa a big agency well francis's manager i don't know if we have that that actual ig convo

but he went at dana to the point of almost sort of oh here it is so dana responds under brett's ig post of of the account from francis's team and says francis's manager is full of shit he knows exactly what's going on and he isn't shocked at all because we told him several times this was coming. His management is incompetent, and hopefully Francis starts taking a look at new people to help his career. That's a pretty firm public statement to be made from the UFC president there. Manish, do we then have that long response? Here it is, actually, Luke.

Okay, so let's see this. So, very quickly, Dana White, LOL, complete shock with your decision after we said September was good for us. Complete shock that you guys made threats after less than three months after you were all aware. Complete shock after you knew why Francis needed more time. That is correct. I know you're passionate, but you're trying to discredit my integrity when I've been nothing but respectful to you, Hunter, and your entire staff. Speaks more about you than it does me.

I'm not even mad. I'm actually impressed that I've gotten your attention in competent management. I think we've done a damn good job. I think you really don't like the fact that Francis is being represented by not only me, but an entire agency, one of which you cannot control, hence why you have people trying to rep him all the time

to your benefit. I tell you what, let's disclose everything for people to see. Emails, calls, texts, everything. Deal? Because I'm ready to get blackballed by UFC. I'm not defined by it. You or anyone else for that matter. How's that sound? Sincerely, Markel.

Wow. Sincerely, your old employee. So, Luke, I mean, that's pretty. I mean, would you argue, Luke, that no one's come at Dana that hard except for Conor McGregor a year and a half ago exposing the DMs of their actual discussions to try to show that his word was true in terms of who he wanted to fight and all that.

And Brendan Schaub, Luke, when they had that back and forth, Schaub came guns blazing with the Eskimo bro line and Dana took the knee and backed off and put the arms down in that fight. So shout out to Brendan on that one, Luke. But again, change is not going to happen unless these guys make these threats. Am I wrong, Luke? Make these threats to make certain things public

so that UFC cannot do bullying tactics. Again, we don't know. We're not inside, right? We're hearing both sides of the story. But you're hearing this enough times from fighters that it's not hard to believe them. I'd almost be like, hey, why don't you make this shit public if fighters feel like they're getting bullied

and that things are getting announced without their knowledge, right? Like they agree to a fight against somebody and then that fighter gets announced to be fighting somebody else. They're like, am I just being used as a negotiation ploy here? Like what happened to Habib ahead of 205? If this shit starts going public and we see the receipts, Luke, I know that's juicy. I know that's a that's juicy i know that's very you know social media voyeuristic but won't that create change

i'm skeptical i mean here's the thing whenever you see dana getting mad at a manager almost invariably not not totally true but usually it's because the manager is doing a pretty good job like for example you never hear dana say nice things about Holly Holmes' manager. But BC, you know who Holly Holmes' manager is. This is a dude that's an old-school boxing manager. He doesn't give a fuck what you think about anything. He's just going to do what he's going to do. He's going to promote Holly's interests the best that they can be promoted.

And that's what it's going to be. So because he doesn't play ball with UFC in that way, and I don't think he reps a ton of MMA clients anyway, maybe just her, he gets sideways with them. But that's the job. The job of a manager is to not intentionally get sideways with them, but when shit hits the fan, you're not supposed to be on the promoter's side. You're supposed to have divergent interests.

I still got to say, though that like, I've seen people beef with UFC over this stuff. I remember when Couture tried to say he was going to retire from his contract and there were press conferences about what was in those contracts and they released it publicly. And it, you know, it kind of got to a somewhat better place for Randy individually. And maybe you can get to a somewhat better place for Francis individually, but like you want to create change in this industry. I'm going to keep saying it until I'm blue in the face. Either get a union, or pass the Ali Act, or

win this lawsuit. Because all this other shit everyone's doing looks nice for Instagram, good fodder for us here on Morning Combat. I'm not a believer that it actually results in substantive industry-wide change, BC. I'm skeptical. Well, if you don't try, Luke, nothing's going to change, okay?

That's true. That's true. Listen, laying down is not the answer. But the question is, what is the path to meaningful, lasting change? Unless you really want to... You've got to hammer UFC, honestly. I mean, I'm not... I don't know which path is the correct one. There's a lot of debate about what would be best for the industry and best for the fighters and really keep you know ufc in a healthy

position too but like i think people think that getting mean on social media is like an actionable form of change and i'm i don't believe that i don't believe that it is well it's what what is what i don't believe is a possible as a healthy form of change is when was when the ufc makes these public declarations and goes against what a fighter potentially said i mean that that seems like a dirty tactic luke so sometimes the only way to counter a dirty tactic is by trying to come clean correct yeah i mean listen if they've got emails and texts and they feel like it's important to get that story out there, then put them out there. But like all these vague threats about what they're going to do and blah, blah, blah. Like, I just I don't want to see UFC continue to go down these roads and fight the fighters these ways,

because it only it only ends in the guys who should be champions or should be fighting for championships not doing so. And Luke, that hurts the sport. And it creates sort of an us and them where if you don't play ball with us, you know what I mean, we'll penalize you. But we also have you under contract, so you ain't going nowhere. I mean, that's not a healthy reality, Luke. No, it's not. But if you've got – it's not.

Like, you think like, oh, they can't keep doing this. And I'm like, dude, if the market is structured in such a way where you've got the kind of power that they've got, you absolutely can do it. Now, whether or not it's a good long-term thing because you sow so much negative energy with your talent that they end up wanting to sue you or get legislation passed or whatever. Yeah, that can be the argument. But I got to tell you, I've been around long enough. I have seen many, many, many, many iterations of this kind of a battle. And each one's

a little bit unique in their own way. And every time the UFC might do a little bit, a little bit to give it back to the fighter. I remember there was an inexplicable pay bump for Cowboy Cerrone and TJ Dillashaw after that MMA thing. Right. okay, we'll make it a little bit easier on you, but like real change, real change? I got to tell you, folks, real change comes from real work, and this, that ain't real work. Yeah, I didn't see Bjorn Rebny get any bonuses after that press conference.

And Luke, to close on this, you know the way to fix this probably? A giant bag full of cash that won't be tracked by either the federal or John Nash. That would be probably the way to get around this. Yeah, probably so. All right. Topic number two is Khabib Nurmagomedov has spoken. He spoke to UFC Russia. Had a few things to say, BC.

We'll talk about Conor Dustin in a bit, but he had some thoughts on retirement. Quote, I am living the life of an ordinary person, not the one of a professional athlete. I think living the life of an athlete is somewhat close to being held in a prison because every day he has to do the exact same thing. Train, rest, then train again, then rest. It's like living in the same mode at the same pace, not slowing down. Once you slow down, you are no longer a champion. So I have just released myself from this prison in a way. However, he also says, there are so many moments when I feel a lack of competition or its spirit. There are many things that I miss simply because I spent my entire life doing them. No, there was not a single moment when I had regrets or doubts about my decision.

However, I miss this competition environment itself, training camps, losing weight, blah, blah, blah, because it's some sort of an addiction and you can't get rid of it. It simply exists. Sometimes you just want to enter the octagon and kick ass, fight for five rounds straight, and make it really tough. But life is life. Even if not now, then at some point in life, I'd have to quit and say no to the sport anyway. BC doesn't sound like he necessarily enjoys every aspect of retirement

but i don't get the feeling that he's really itching to come back all that much no i like this this was a really honest take from him i mean you could use it to kind of fuel either side of the argument i think but i think he's showing us a couple things one that to be great and i mean great luke it's stressful as all hell i mean you be, you know, there's no days off as people like, you know, in boxing, Bernard Hopkins and Floyd Mayweather has shown that there's another level, if you can get to it, where you don't get fat between training camps, where you are full, you know, 24 hours a day, 365, a champion.

I think it's some of that stress, Luke, that led GSP to get out of the business and take that long break because it has to be stressful to always be on with that fear in the back of your mind that if I'm not at my absolute very best, it could fall apart. And it could, Luke. I mean, MMA is as unforgiving as any other sport from the standpoint of there just being so many ways to lose and so many ways to lose freakishly especially you could dominate a fight for a long time and lose just like that so again i always want to tip the cap to anyone gsp john jones amanda nunes um anderson silva habib guys who have been able to sustain oh extreme elite level championship excellence and i know in hindsight habib's reign wasn't actually that long because it took him longer than maybe it should have to finally get the title shot.

But to do that, Luke, I mean, so few have done that for a reason. So I like hearing him express what that actually means and feels like. He does feel a sense of relief from not having that anymore, but it also seems like he's come to terms that that itch to compete is always going to be there. It doesn't go away.

That's why guys make ill-advised decisions and keep coming back in various forms, whether it's a real fight or an exhibition or what have you. Luke, I still stand by the belief giving his almost supernatural level of conviction. I mean, again, who walks away when they're pound for pound number one

and at the peak of their earning potential, meaning anyone they fight, it's a pay-per-view main event and you're unbeaten. Who just walks away like that, right? And then you add in the level of the promise made to the family. I feel like if anyone can stick by it, it's still Habib, but I did like to see this sort of honest take about the machine right inside of him that it needs to be fed in some form luke maybe he can get that that that feeding through coaching or promoting or whatever he's going to end up getting into but you better feed it luke or it'll come looking for you all right yeah i think that's pretty sober take bc i think you know he's grappling with the dual realities and they don't necessarily make sense that he would have these positions

independently but they that's just the reality he's in this transition from one life to the next if you had this life and it's all you know you're probably going to hate certain parts of it but if it's all you know leaving it is actually a little bit more of an adjustment than i think some folks realize right especially if you're still 32 and you got you know two-thirds of your life maybe left in front of you something like like that, at least half maybe. And yeah, he's having a hard time with it. But at the same time, I think he realizes like, to your point, okay, let's say I delayed it a year, two years, three years, four years, five years.

I'm still going to be in this exact same position that I feel the way that I do today. And I'll just be three or five years down the road road and God only knows what could happen in that time. So he has to kind of make peace with it. He, there was footage of him training at AKA recently, giving some kid the business. So, you know, he's still in the gym and I think having some good, good times, but for folks who were, you know, who built on that training is about getting ready for competition. When you do just the training, it's not as satisfying. It doesn't, you know, even you can go 10 rounds with 10 guys. It still doesn't get that competitive urge settled.

So he's having a hard time with it, BC. But the other thing that I thought was kind of interesting was the quote on Conor Dustin 3. We know they're going to be fighting July 10th. Here's what he said. Quote, he's asked for a prediction. It's the same thing as the previous fight, UFC 257. If it's a first round finish, I'd back Conor. From the second round and further, Poirier wins. BC, is he right? Yeah, I mean, look, let's be really honest. Whether

we're handicapping Conor versus Habib back at 229 or Conor versus Dustin 2 or Conor versus Habib back at 229, or Conor versus Dustin 2, or Conor versus anyone, Luke. It's sort of the same analysis. If Conor, with that rocket left hand and that ability to find your chin in the opening round, finds it with some level of power, the odds tell you more often than not he can have a great shot at getting a first-round finish. But if we go longer than that and stamina comes into play wrestling comes into play you know it could be another story i think that's again a very fair and sober look at this trilogy fight coming up and i think it is interesting

to get his thoughts on these fights and look by the way on habib and i don't mean to spider-man meme him because you can't really compare me to habib too often but i do understand habib every time i drive by cumberland farm i can't even get gas there anymore. My liver is pulsating and calling for the sweet grease and juice and all that stuff that has blackened my organs, but I got to stay away. And I think he feels the same about MMA, but Luke, one day it's going to be somebody else. Habib is going to be about 37, 38, and there's going to be somebody else who's on a run and Habib's going to get that itch. I don't think he's going to scratch it, Luke, but he's going to get that itch and there's going to be somebody else who's on a run, and Habib's going to get that itch. I don't think he's going to scratch it, Luke, but he's going to get that itch, and he's going to get back in the gym, like you said,

and he's going to go through the rounds, and he's going to quietly think, man, should I come back and do this? Should I snuff out someone who thinks they're a growing legend? Should I come back one more time to take a seat at the bar and take down some shots? He won't do it, though, Luke, okay? He won't do it. He won't do it.

By the way, I think he's probably right that I'm a little skeptical that Connor couldn't win in the second. Although I do think Connor early in the first is probably a smart bet or at least, you know, a decent one anyway, but there is something to be said. Like, remember dude, he was the one Habib who thought that after the Gaethje loss and not that this is the most controversial take, but I remember saying after that beating that Gaethje handed out to Ferguson Ferguson I was a little bit worried about Ferguson at that point because he was kind of old and that was a horrific beating he was the one who after that was like he'll never be the same and then sure enough you've had subsequent encounters where again I don't think Ferguson looked altogether terrible but he could not muster enough to beat

people who you thought maybe he could have beaten just a couple of years ago and so habib's usually got a decent eye for this kind of a thing i'll be curious to see what happens for a lot of reasons on july 10th not least of which is was habib's prediction true and my dog is going apeshit i love that hey look we we're you know we're not getting ahead of next week because i mean, next week's going to speak for itself. It's UFC 264. It's a monster fight. But that narrative is there, that whole, like, man, what if Conor loses this? Or what if he gets stopped again? I mean, it doesn't mean that he couldn't retool in camp and come back and get a gimme fight and then come back and beat somebody big.

And then you're like, oh, whoa, what about Conor again for a title? It's like, until he dies, so to speak, he's not going to be dead. But this would be a big blow, Luke. again for a title it's like until he dies so to speak he's he's not going to be dead but this would be a big blow luke this would be i mean there there is a double or nothing feel to connor taking this fight that we last felt yes at ufc 202 in the nate rematch right there is that feel here yeah there's i would say it's even worse at this point i mean again you can't just declare someone's career over off of one loss but to me if he loses to to Dustin and not let's say you know in a way relatively similar-ish to the first one or I should say the second one the last fight anyway

if he loses in a way similar to that then you really have to reconsider uh that Conor's peak has passed at that point but just the same Luke could you imagine the flip side you may and look let's not forget in that second fight earlier this year luke second round he was putting it on dustin right i mean there was you know he was kind of walking him down with some with some left crosses you're like oh oh okay i mean what if connor stopped the best lightweight in the world not named habib right now what i mean what that could do to the whole idea of the king is back and what that could do for commercialism of UFC and promoting Conor. I mean, that'd be wild. That's why your phrasing of it is so good.

It's double or nothing. Because if you win, dude, the rewards, I mean, he'll probably get a title shot. And then you beat Dustin Poirier, you could say, well, did you have enough wins to merit getting a title shot? Well, in that sense, no, but we know he's got enough popularity. And then on the meritocratic side, if you beat Dustin Poirier, you're pretty fucking good. So you would just get a title shot at that point. But if you don't, you lost twice to a rival. You had three chances to beat him. You'll only could beat him the first time. Six years the game at that point if he loses would have passed him by it's a huge hugely consequential bout for dustin

too but especially for a guy like connor still we have a whole week to get into that all right bc topic number three faraz a hobby which by the way shouts to faraz he sent me this years ago you ever seen one of these, BC? No. This is called a... Is that like a motorized anal plugger? I mean, what do you... Yes, it's a motorized anal plugger. Yes, that's what it is.

No, Faraz Ahabi. I think his company is called Tim Tam. I got a pinched nerve in my... Something's wrong with a nerve in my right trap. So my wife's been using these. Ready? On my back to loosen up the muscle. You it on your arm and uh she's been using that yeah wow i mean when you travel maybe when you're gone on those long nights luke that thing looks dangerous i got a pinched nerve in

my crotch you think that'll fix that luke i mean come on wow i mean i'm impressed 45 minutes before referring things back to your genitals. Impressive record. You're really trying to limit those. You know the first world of improv, right? It's like, don't shut your teammate down. Don't just drop a deuce right on the guy's face. Well, I have to.

These are terrible 13-year-old jokes. You could have spun that into something good there, Luke, I'm sure. Faraz, he sent me one of these years ago. It's been a lifesaver for my back recently. But Faraz has in the news for another reason. He said something about Nate Diaz, which I thought was very interesting. Quote, if you put him in a fight,

talking about Nate Diaz, where there is no time limit, I think he beats 99% of fighters. You can't sub him. You can't finish him. The guy doesn't stop walking forward. He puts volume on you. He's the scariest, in my opinion, street fighter in MMAma i think if you had to fight him in the street man you are in a fight

for your life ain't gonna be no judges standing you up between or i think he meant referees uh there's no judge to come in and give you the win no no this guy ain't going away i think if he had a no time limit fight with leon, he beats Leon Edwards. And I have tremendous admiration for Leon Edwards, BC true or false. He's the best fighter. If there's no time limit. Well, it's, it is interesting. It's not like the first time we haven't thought about this. Cause Nate has talked about this whole sort of street, you know, idea that he's never, he never lost, right? Luke Nate, he has never lost a fight, right? The fight only ended in defeat because they put rules around it and judges and rounds. I mean, you do need some of the very strong intangibles that he still has. Durability, intense stamina, just a predestined willingness to go

through hell like he does. And, you you know you're not really going to submit him which could be an out for somebody who's skilled in that area i don't want to say he can't be stopped i mean luke doesn't josh thompson of the weighing in podcast own a head kick knockout of nate yes he does i mean he was still conscious but he was you know you were in a really really bad situation at that point i mean you know, some would say I sparred better with Josh in a podcast sense, at least, than Nate did, right? Some would say that. Well, I'll say this, BC.

I mean, my guard was tight, Luke. It was. I mean, tight guards aren't necessarily what you want, to be clear. Open guard is where the offense is, but okay. BC, let me ask you this, though. What does it mean to be no time? I mean, I realize we're just playing with theories and ideas here, but what would it even mean to be no time limit? So, for example, we had a fight like this previously in Pride,

but there were some rules about it, and there was last-minute changes because the Gracie family wanted him changed but you go back to Hoist Gracie versus Kazushi Sakuraba what they ended up getting was unlimited rounds but each round was 15 minutes and so what I'm asking is what would it mean to say you finished him now if you sub him and you choke him unconscious okay that's out if you arm bar him and he taps okay that's out do you have to literally knock him unconscious. Okay, that's out. If you arm bar him and he taps, okay, that's out. Do you have to literally knock him unconscious for the fight to be won in a no-time-limit bout? How does that work?

The last time we saw this, although unsanctioned, was Kimbo Slice versus Sean Gannon in that Miami warehouse. Right, Luke? And didn't they have that rule, although there were modified rules within that as well, didn't they have the rule that there was a 20 count if somebody's down? Yes. I guess if you did something to that degree, I mean, it doesn't really work

because a fight with Nate would inevitably go to the ground. But, I mean, is there something to that idea that if somebody quits, they're out? If somebody dies, they're out? If somebody, I don't know't know i mean this is really stupid here's here's my view on this no i actually think it's worth thinking about just a little bit which is this says a lot about nate diaz in a good way and i think it says a lot about the cult of nate diaz not so much in a bad way but in a way where they got some blind spots about this here's what i mean let's talk about the good i think Faraz's analysis here is pretty good, actually.

Like, some people, I mean, look at Leon Edwards. Look at Leon Edwards. He is not a devastating finisher. By virtue of the way the rules are set up, you have five-minute rounds, you can do X amount of techniques, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. The issue is that he has built a game that's better at winning rounds than Nate Diaz.

That's just a reality. He's got better defense. He's got better techniques. But everything is geared towards if I have to go the full five minutes, and I usually do, I will have the 10-9 or get my hand raised or whatever. Maybe I will win that frame. By contrast, there might be other rule sets where Nate Diaz does a lot better and Leon Edwards can't hang.

Maybe an hour-long time limit or a no-time limit or whatever modifications you wanted to make, it might actually be the case that Nate Diaz does a lot better. I think Faraz is probably right, but here's my point about some of this. Diaz's fans and admirers love him so much. And we love Nate Diaz on this show. I mean, he is important to mixed martial arts. He's thrilling to watch. He's an interesting character. He's an anti-hero.

He's frankly a vanguard for fighter rights and representation. I mean, you can't say enough good things about Nate Diaz. But there's also this longingness from his fans to find just enough accommodations so you can look through the keyhole and you can see him on the other side. If you take out this, and if you remove this, and if you extend that, and if you tailor it in this way, Nate does really well. But we don't do business like that for a lot of reasons. Fighting till there's no time limit, yeah, Nate could do that, but he wouldn't be able to do that for very long because even if he beat X and Y and Z,

he'll have taken so much fucking damage, his career would be much shorter than it is right now. And honestly, to your point, Josh Thompson laid him out inside of 15 in a way where I don't think he was going to have a whole lot of ability to get up from that. So I like the idea that certain fighters, and you see this in jujitsu, by the way.

I talk about it all the time, BC. IBJJF and ADCC, for the the most part have a points-based system but there's a place called u.s grappling an organization called u.s grappling bc dude no time limits on any of their matches i've seen black belt matches go one two sometimes three hours it's true some people do better in different time frames but to make that accommodation in the way that they're always trying to make accommodations for Nate they want him to be something I think sometimes that he just can't be but he doesn't have to be because the things he is are already great I mean maybe he could have won you know maybe he would have been great in the early UFC days with no rules or time limits i don't know luke but yes yes no there's no doubt there's no doubt under a slightly different

rule set longer rounds maybe pride rounds i do think i do think you might see him have different kinds of success but it's but what does that matter we don't we don't do any of those this way so i don't know how relevant it is remember like in high school if someone thinks they're better than you at basketball they're like let's play one-on-one, bro. And then you play and you beat them. You're like, yeah, I showed you. Then they're like, who cares? I can kick your ass.

Let's fight. And it's like, oh, really? We're going to that? That's what this feels like every time. It's like, oh, yeah, so what? I lost. Let's fight to the death. Well, no, bro.

No, we're not going to do that. But I got dead wronged in the moment. The warehouse where Kimbo and Gannon fought at was apparently in Rhode Island, per our producer, Mikey Mormyle. So shout out to that forgotten state, fought at was apparently in Rhode Island per our producer Mikey Mormyle. Shout out to that forgotten state, Luke. My neighbor, Rhode Island, that nobody talks about or goes to unless they're going to the beach or they're going to visit those mansions

in Newport, Luke. By the way, I forget his last name. His first name is Evan. He's a tattoo artist out of Rhode Island. I'll find his name here in a minute. He does some of the best portrait work in America. Insanely good. When I ball up one day, Luke,

wait, will he tattoo me under any kind of influences to numb the pain, Luke? No, a good tattoo guy, unless you have a personal relationship with him, they're not going to let you go in there. By the way, if you're drunk, you might bleed more. No, no, they're not going to let you do that. I'll bring my own anesthesiologist luke and i'll just be out cold

for about six hours he can work on me all day all right luke uh but yeah i'd like to get some portrait work done with that guy evan from word island let's do it luke okay i mean this won't cost me like five grand you're not setting me up here luke right there's gonna be like five grand to get something on my arm right right? That wouldn't be crazy. It wouldn't be crazy. All right, topic number four. Not a whole lot to say about this one except I'm a little bit sad about it, which is Jan Blachowicz versus Glover Teixeira,

two of the nicest bad motherfuckers on earth. This was reported by AG Fight on Sunday. Jan Blachowicz's light heavyweight title bout against Glover is now being targeted for UFC 267 BC in Abu Dhabi. So it's still on the books, but it's not going to happen until October. By the time the bout occurs BC,

Teixeira is going to be your fucking age at 42 years old. Can you believe that Glover Teixeira is 42 and beating the fuck out of people, and you're 42 and the doctor's like, stop eating hot dogs. Sorry, Glover. The good news is you'll fight for a title later this year. The bad news is you'll have a black

liver, no libido, and three needles hanging out of your dick. Yeah, that's great. Alright. Yeah, that's good. Yeah, Luke, not much to say here. You'd like to see this get done somewhat quickly, but you'd like to see this get done somewhat quickly, but you'd like to see Yuri Prochazka get in the hot seat soon enough, Luke, right? But I guess we've got to delay that a little more.

I'll say this. Real quickly, before we just move on super fast, what is your early sense about who wins there? You reserve the right to change your mind because I'm asking you on the fly. You haven't really fully thought about it. Initial instinct is what the Jan Blachowicz has shown us in this career resurgence two major fights the Reyes win the title defense against Adesanya that he's smarter than we thought he was Luke he's a little bit more complete certainly has uh knockout power um

it's not like I didn't watch his rise Luke I just didn't see this until now it's all come together in the right time Glover Teixeira just getting to this point, a second title opportunity at this age is an impressive accomplishment. He's great on the ground, but it's not like Jan's going to get handled on the ground. And I think that's the difference, Luke. I think Blachowicz has too much for this version of Glover on the feet. And that will be your decider when he wins a somewhat unexciting decision. Jan Blachowicz, survive in advance, get Prochaska up in the bullpen, let's play light heavyweight bingo, let's find out what we have in this absolute psychopath Luke with that dong hanging out of the top of his head.

What do you call that, Luke? What do you call that? Didn't he call it like an antenna? Antenna, that's's right that guy's fantastic I love that man yes I'll just say this I I mostly agree with your analysis I'll be a little bit different I think Blachowicz is really good backing up when he's striking I think he's very good at and you know Glover's gonna come forward Glover by the way getting rattled against Anthony Smith and other guys like dude you know Blachowicz might put his lights out pretty quickly if that kind of thing happens on the other hand I do think Blachowicz is good on the ground but I think Teixeira is very good

on the ground plus the big difference is he loves to pass has good subs and has very good ground and pound um so I think you know depending on where the fight takes place if it's mostly on the ground I think Teixeira smokes him by contrast I don't I don't how Teixeira, even with as good of a jab as he does, I don't see how he beats him on the feet. It's going to be a really, really interesting contest. And then last but not least, BC, this is a fight. I mean, I've got to hand this over to you because you put this on my radar. This was supposed to be on Showtime on August 14th, I believe,

but it's now off. Nonito Diner, the good friend and training partner of UFC flyweight champion Brandon Moreno, was supposed to fight in an all-Filipino bantamweight clash against John Riel Casemiro. Casemiro last fought on that Charlo doubleheader. But the fight is off, BC. And not only is it off, Nonito Donair is absolutely butchering this guy in the media with some of the things he's saying.

What is he saying, BC? And more importantly, why is he saying it? All right, let's set the table properly. This originally was going to be Guillermo Rigondeaux challenging Casemiro for his title at 118 pounds. Showtime and the PBC made a very interesting decision in which Rigo agreed with. Rigondeaux was like, okay, fine, I'll step aside.

I'll still fight on the card, but we'll let Nonito Donair, who's fresh off on Showtime, that knockout of Nordinu Bali, to win back a title at 118, to basically have an all-action, all-Filipino war with Casemiro for two of the four belts at 118. The other two are in Na'iwa Inoue, the monster's hands, Luke, and this would have set us up for potentially another undisputed champion at 118. We had a couple hiccups on the road to there. Most importantly, Casemiro's team not sending in the paperwork in time to do VADA, the voluntary anti-drug testing. And the reason why, in this case, that's super important, Luke, because you might not remember,

Donair was the first fighter 10 years ago when Vada launched who said, yes, I want a clean sport. I will agree to do 24-7, 365 all year, no matter what. You know, test me, I'm clean. So basically, Casemiro's team did not send the paperwork in time. Donair called the fight off a week ago. Casemiro's team in the next, you know, 12 hours sent in the paperwork. We seemed all good to go. Since then, Luke, here's what happened.

Now, we know Donair's wife, Rachel, is also his trainer and manager at this portion of his career. And Casamaro's team reportedly put out a meme online, which essentially, to cut through the chase here, Luke, implied that Nonito's wife should suck a D. I mean, that's really what it said Luke okay this in this incited no Nino rightfully so to the level Luke that he did a video of Manish if we can throw to it this is a video no Nino did I think it's like an Instagram live or something with a member of Casimiro's team can we throw to this quickly oh no you're telling my wife to suck some fucking dude's dick? Say something, motherfucker.

Say something. Let's talk in Filipino, Nonito. Let's talk in Filipino. Okay, say something in Filipino. You're disrespecting me. I'm not saying anything to you. Champ, I mean, I know you're emotional now, but I'll just say the part of Champ.

Champ, Champ, I know you're emotional now say something motherfucker so luke what happened back up back up do we know what they were saying in tagalog uh i had rafe bartholomew uh translating it was basically the same things they were saying in english almost like come on say some shit you know talk some shit whatever brother stand up for it so uh last night nonito donair by the way i'm like remember that thing that we used to tweet out which was a link to a longer tweet what was it called twit something yeah yeah twit longer or something yeah people haven't used that in like seven years but shout out to donair maybe he's got a flip phone too by the way i love nonito i'm just kidding so he put out a long message that said lu Luke, because largely of the misogyny shown by Casemiro and his

team, and because they are so against bullying, and because of course the whole Vata situation pissed them off, Donera has pulled out of this fight officially 100%. Now, I did reach out to our brethren here at Showtime to sort of get an official statement

on what's going to happen next. They're in the process, Luke, of trying to figure that out. So what that could mean is maybe Rigondel comes back into the main event against Casemiro, which would not be the end of the world. Maybe they find a different opponent for Casemiro. Hey, maybe they found a different opponent for Donair. That's all up in the air. But Luke, the crux of this, at least in terms of us talking about it, I don't know if Donair did the right thing. Look, here's the deal. Combat sports is, as the great Burt Sugar, the late boxing historian and writer has always said, is, you know, boxing is the red light district of sports. I think we can agree that that covers all of combat sports.

We're fighting at the end of the day. Do you know what fuels fighting, Luke? Attention. Do you know how you get attention for a fight to create the illusion, and sometimes it's not an illusion, that two men hate each other and they're going to settle it in the ring? Talking some shit, Luke, okay? I'm not here to tell you that the world should be built upon a structure where one man can tell another man's wife to suck a D. I'm not here to tell you that. Just like I'm not here to tell you that we've all taken part in some form of hazing, but I don't want to live in a world where like bullying is a thing. No, not at all, Luke. But this is still the fight game, bro. Can't we talk shit about each other if we're going to settle it in the ring? Shouldn't this motivate Donair to get in the ring against his countrymen and go guns blazing and be like, see, I told you

my wife only sucks 1D, right? I mean, shouldn't that be where we're going here, Luke? I respect Nonito's principles because he is an honorable man, a great champion, a future Hall of Famer, and everything I love about the sport. But doesn't this seem like a bit of an overreach to be like, no one says that about my wife. I ain't fighting you, bro. I mean, every fighter's a little bit different, right? I mean, Ricardo Mayorga told De La Hoya he was going to drink his wife's breast milk.

And then De La Hoya told the media, I'm going to make that fucker pay. Like, in those words. And he did. He beat the fuck out of him. So, like, for certain fighters, that is the best way to do it. It's like, wow, I get to beat your ass and I get to be paid millions of dollars to do it. 100%. I mean, where do I sign?

But I have seen fighters on occasion be like, dude, you're such a piece of shit that I don't even want to like, I don't want my presence to even grace yours. You are a fucking crumb. And I, and by the way, to be clear, Donair, a champion again, he at least can claim that. Of course, you know, Casemiro I think is one of his own. But the point being is you're just, I'm a Filipino maybe not Manny Pacquiao but I am what I am you're not on my level and I don't know if that's exactly what his feeling is but I have seen a little bit of both where I'm happy to get paid to beat your ass but also you're such trash you're you're so not even on my level you're not on my radar you don't deserve a fight with me you don't

get the red panty night so to speak that I'm just going to reject it. It looks like Donair has taken the second of those two, which I'm with you. I would have rather have seen the first. I would have made the first one even better. But listen, man, Donair has earned the right to be like, I'm going to fight who I'm going to fight and fuck this guy. I honestly believe he's earned that right at this point.

Okay, I agree with that. And if this was any old fight, him saying, look, you're not going to make money off of fighting me when you do this to Okay, I agree with that. And if this was any old fight, him saying, look, you're not going to make money off of fighting me when you do this to me, I would respect that. But this was a unification fight for the chance to move forward and fight Inouye for all four belts.

Now, this doesn't mean Donair can't fight Inouye next anyway and maybe do it for three of the four belts. But look, you get the point. There's some sort of historical connotation, titles at stake. And again, I'm not supporting misogyny at all, Luke, you get the point. There's some sort of historical connotation, titles at stake. And, again, I'm not supporting misogyny at all, Luke. But if your wife's going to be your manager and trainer and be a part of the public image, I don't know, Luke.

Is she off limits for somebody to tuck trash to in a fight sport? Again, I'm not really sure, right? Here's how it works. She should be off limits. I would never say anything like that and i know you wouldn't either but just knowing how the fight game works it's like a speed sign speed sign says don't go past 65 you probably shouldn't it's a bad fucking idea you might get a ticket for it but are people gonna listen to that in the fight game of course not they're just gonna completely blow past it that that's how it works to me all right hey he is a man of his word luke and he he drew the line in front of him and he stood behind it so at the end of the day

you've done that a few times in your life and career luke i've got to respect it all right yeah all right real quickly before we get to the uh the wheel of death here bc i just wanted to throw this up here because everybody and their brother has dm'd me tagged me sent this to me so we have to comment on it we got this deontay wilder bench press video and i gotta tell you man you know listen he looks to be happy first time he tweeted in like a year or something or not much in the past year or so um this is terrible this is not the flex that he thinks it is at all even zoo collection is like this form is shitty right zoo culture zoo culture it's more than that it's more than that first of all to borrow from infinite elgin intensity look at his spotters there's more hands on the bar than the moss eisley cantina number one number two you're wearing gloves okay you're a boxer so maybe you got to protect your hands more than normal i'll let it slide and the 310 you know what is what is deontay way about 215

220 somewhere around there give or take that's a fine bench for somebody like an average person if you're an average person and you weigh 220 or so 215 and you can bench 310 that's perfect that's actually really good but for a pro athlete to have the gloves your friends are are picking the weight up for you it's the worst fucking bench form i've ever seen. And then he runs into the wall. The second he stands up, I'm like, dude, what are you doing here? Understand something, BC. You can say I'm being pedantic about all this,

and that's fine. But there is one thing to consider here. Why do you have to, whatever you're doing, benching, overhead pressing, deadlifting, squatting, whatever, that's his one rep max, right, whatever. That's his one rep max, right? BC, it's his one rep max. He could not have done another one. That was RPE 10. There was as much as he could possibly do. In fact, he couldn't even do it because his friends had to help him lift it. Dude, when you get to that level, that's when the weight gets dangerous.

That is when, if you are at your fucking limit, that is when the weight gets dangerous. If you don't have proper technique, it's not just that you can't move the weight and there is some form breakdown when you get to one rep max, but if you don't have good form, that's where you risk injury. Why is any friend of his, how close is this fight? Less than a month. Why are you doing one rep benches with horrible form that potentially risk injury when you don't even need to the carryover to boxing is actually floor pressing where you just bench straight from the floor it's just the end of it and even then it doesn't really have a ton of carryover that's some it has some dude like every part of that decision there from the gloves to your friends helping you to not being a whole lot of weight for a

professional athlete to the form being terrible to the risk being somewhat unnecessary and then he ran into the wall it's like dude what did no one counsel you to this being a horrible idea i guess not i guess not i don't think could dionte listens to the counseling luke i mean he puts people in the camp who it seems like will support him undyingly. So that's where we're at with that. He should have done a Gus Farad and just ran headfirst into the wall in celebration, Luke. That would have ended badly. And I know you won't get this reference, but it did remind me of old school WWF 1986.

Do you remember legitimate bodybuilder Ted R. Seedy? He became a WWE wrestler and they had that little skate where he tried to break the bench press record, Luke. He put up 755, and Jesse the Body Ventura was the spotter, but he kind of helped him pick it up, and Jesse was like, no, that's only two pounds of pinky pressure. So he lifted 753. That guy on the right, Luke, he put a lot of pinky pressure in that

to get that thing up there. That was, yeah. But who am I to talk, Luke? I got a black liver and i'm a you know i'm a skinny old dad but this is the problem like i weigh more than dionte uh but dude like that's i'm not i'm not gonna say i can easily do that but like i can do that for reps man and i'm a fucking nobody like that that was my problem. Like, this did not. Here's my thing.

Everyone's like, oh, you think you're fucking tough? No, I don't think I'm tough. People are like, why don't you film your shit? Because here's how it works, BC. If you film your shitty ass lift, whoever you are, and you put it on the internet, you gave that moment to the internet to have. It's now theirs. And they're going to do what they want with it. And if it's not all that great, they're going to fucking roast you to the n to have. It's now theirs, and they're going to do what they want with it. And if it's not all that great, they're going to fucking roast you to the nth degree.

Some shows build segments around that, Luke, right? Yeah, well, here's what I'm saying. I know I'm a nothing lifter. That's why I never filmed them. I got nothing impressive to share ever. I lift for my own personal sake, and that's it. But I'm not dumb enough to put on the fucking internet I just didn't know what he was thinking dude I was like a real bad thing adult films

either Luke I understand that a lot all right Luke let's get into the segment everyone is waiting for so each and every Wednesday uh there are certain questions that you know I try to stick in the rundown but Luke's like I ain't talking about that shit so we created a segment where he must talk about that shit, whatever shit I want. In fact, I provide 10 categories. Luke gives five spins. These are good faith responses to decently faith questions. Although, Luke, sidebar, when we do this in the studio when it's better,

you're really getting bitchy in our pre-show meeting saying, hey, BC, it can only be questions. It can't be stunts. I'm nobody's circus clown, bitch. You wouldn't even arm wrestle our cameraman. What the hell's wrong with you, Luke? It's entertainment, bro. I know, but I'm not a circus bear.

I'll do what the segment is. I won't do what the segment is not. That's how it goes. By the way, it's like, you know, I'll do adult films, but the back door ain't open and it certainly ain't free. Luke, I'm not trying to get in your ass, bro. I just want to, I mean, seriously, all right?

Anyway, this one's called. You made this uncomfortably weird. When is our, I'll leave it at this. When is our, when we went to the Jersey basketball courts, when is that going to be published? Do you know? Our Billy Madison academic decathlon? Yeah.

Yes. We filmed the first event. I don't know. I'm told by Matt Snyder, our producer, that Doc 4 is coming any day now, and that video you're talking about will come right after it, Luke. Okay. So we'll see what happens. All right.

All right. Let's do it. Here we go. This segment is called The Wheel of Death. The Wheel of Death. Uh-uh. All right, Luke. segment is called the wheel of death the wheel of death all right luke here are your 10 categories this week number one corporate text messages number two utah give me three we've got midriff firearm tats four touchdowns in one game canadians never friend. The state of love and trust. Liberal cage fighters, if there is such a thing.

Yeah, there's not. All triller, no filler. Becoming one with your Indian heritage. And finally, sent to haul. Luke, there's some good ones in there today, but you get what you get. Spin number one. Big money, big money, no whammies, no whammies. And stop.

Utah. Hey! Give me three, okay. All right, a play on words from that great moment in the movie Point Break with Gary Busey, but this time instead of two, we get three. Luke, unlike the sport of boxing, the history of mma has produced very few legitimately memorable and transcending trilogy fights luke yes we've got edgar maynard velasquez dos santos cormier miochich and melendez versus big john mccarthy's podcast partner but luke the good news

is that connor dustin three is right around corner, as is the potential, if I can keep willing it into existence, for the Israel Adesanya-Robert Whitaker rivalry to also eventually reach that level. But let's say you had the ability, Luke, to pick two fighters who are currently in or around the same division, within the same promotion, who have yet to even fight each other a single time,

but you could manipulate the future to guarantee that they would sign a three-fight deal and have a trilogy against one another with the hopes that this trilogy could eclipse all the great ones i just mentioned luke which two fighters would you pick based on your preference as a fan? Wow, that is a great question. That is a great question. Man. Boy, that's a tough one. Candidly, this is going to sound like a fucking corporate answer,

but you know how I feel personally, BC? I'm just telling the truth here. I honestly feel like Pitbull, AJ McKee, you could probably do. I mean, we've never seen one, so it's a little hard to declare two and three would be great. But if you're just thinking in your mind, matchups that could be entertaining over a series of time, plus, you know, I don't want to spoil the resume review,

but if you just look at the career of a guy like Pitbull, even if he loses, he's really built himself off of those moments. So like it would give you hope for a second one. And you could do it at, they have two titles at stake. Like you do like one at featherweight, one at lightweight. Oh, great point. Great point. Yeah, you could do that as well.

So I would say, I won't make that my official answer, but I would put that in the books as one that like you could look at today. But okay, let's look at UFC. Man, man, what a great question BC what a great question um well they're both gone you could have done Diego Sanchez Gilbert Melendez that's gone but you could have done that one well no they've already fought these are people that have not fought have not fought at all yes but you can sign a deal that they're going to go all the way to three Luke okay they could do now are these three back to back to back or like you know three over the course of like

three years or something let's say three year deal just to fight three times whenever it makes sense okay i am gonna say let me think about this for a second because i want to make sure this is right i'm gonna say um Let me think about this for a second because I want to make sure this is right. I'm going to say, man, fuck, that's a tough one. How about this? How about, I don't know if this is the best answer, but I'm going to say, I'll say Jon Jones and Francis, something like that. That's not a bad one.

I'll tell you that. That's not a bad answer, Luke. Because I think that no matter who wins the first one, not that you could throw it out, but you'd have to at least think that the second time around would be a lot different. There's ones I would want to see it doesn't fit your question but like uh you know would i want to see max and dustin mix it up two more

times i know that again i know what you're saying they have they've already fought so it doesn't count but like that's just built to i mean you know perfectly situated for another two more fights um i guess if i could throw one more in there, let's say a lighter weight class, I'm going to say, I'm going to just pretend, I'm going to say Corey Sandhagen, Peter Yan. I think that one has a lot of ability over the course of three fights

to show you something pretty special. I thought you might bite in the BMF area and be like, okay. I thought about that. I thought about that. Here's the problem. You could do Conor and Jorge, but I'm a little bit concerned that this could be totally wrong.

I'm a little bit concerned Jorge blows him out, in which case, would you want to see it two more times? I don't know. Well, I'd be concerned. And Ganu, seriously, let's say he flatlines John to the level where you're like, maybe John should go back to 205. You know what I'm saying? There's a lot of weird potential scenarios. Or maybe John does a Stipe-like victory against Francis the first time to your point where it's close, but you're like, man, he almost got caught.

You know? Not that Stipe was close. But that's the thing. Like let's say Francis just flatlines him inside 30 seconds. You've seen Francis do it before. You have to think John would have a much different game plan the second time. And dude, John's got really high fight IQ. I would love to see that.

So even if it's a disaster for him the first time, I would still want to see it a couple more times. Very fair, Luke. Very good answer. Let's go to spin number two. All right. Give me one about BBLs. Is there a BBL on this one? Four touchdowns in one game. That's funny.

Let's face it, Luke. Is this an Al Bundy reference? Yes, every average American Al Bundy who never quite made it as a pro athlete has that one athletic claim to fame that they cling to for the rest of their lives al bundy the fictional father of the 90s sick on married with children once scored four touchdowns in a single high school game for polk high my uncle tony luke he caught the game tying

touchdown and two-point conversion when nagatuck tied ansonia in the 1970 thanksgiving game giving the greyhounds the nvl title, Luke. We have heard that. There are pictures. There's paintings. I mean, it's like a family history moment. Luke, I don't even have many myself, but I did sack the best quarterback in eighth grade football that time, Mike Maester-Petro, when he slipped in the rain and I jumped on top of him, Luke.

Oh, when I was 27, I ran a mile in 5.56. That's not that bad, Luke. Okay, maybe I'll cling to that. How fast? 5.56. Dude, not that bad, Luke. Okay, maybe I'll cling to that. How fast? 5.56. Dude, sub-six is good. That's good. It was a mile race.

Yeah, it was. All right, enough of that. Luke, I'm sure even you, with very little recorded history of actually doing anything athletic, save for your mathlete brain skills as a nerd in Old Marietta, you had to have done something that you cling to at some level from little league to youth soccer to rec basketball that can serve as the one achievement you are most proud of, Luke. Half court buzzer beater, first place finish in swimming, whatever you got, Luke. Looking back at your sad history as an athlete, what was your Al Bundy moment that one day

you will regal your grandkids with at family get-togethers? I will regal? You mean regale? Regale. I mean, I'm from a factory town. We have different pronunciations. I see, I see. Okay.

First of all, you've had two questions here. These are fucking great. I'm very impressed. These are much better than last week. I had two moments at boot camp that I was fairly proud of. So I've always been the world's worst runner, which is why I'm wearing these barefoot shoes these days, because I'm trying to slowly run on the forefoot. I've always been doing the heel strike first. And dude, I had shin splints so bad in the Marine Corps. I was,

every run was fucking just mercilessly painful for me i was really really bad at it and i remember uh that if when i went to boot camp it's still now the case it wasn't the case before i went they instituted right when i got there there's something called the crucible basically the lat book uh the marine corps boot camp is the longest of all the services it's 13 weeks weeks. And then the last week, well, the second to last week, you spend the entire time on this like long march. It's like 70 miles. It takes several days and you don't sleep about an hour or two a night. Very little food. You have to do all kinds of training activities. The third day of it, I was just fucking miserable. I'd slept for maybe a couple of hours, just completely covered in mosquito bites, hungry as shit,

you know, just unhappy. And I remember I had really, really bad blisters from all of the, because I was at the front end of the platoon, so I had to lead with pace. And these boots are terrible. Why do I bring this up? Because the blisters hurt so bad BC that I couldn't run my normal average pace, which was not good. I mean, maybe an eight minute mile, like not good at all, but it was so fucking painful that I was just, I had to sprint to get them warm because once they got warm, I didn't feel them anymore, at least not very badly. So I was like, man, fuck this shit. I'm so fucking angry. I'm so fucking pissed shit I'm so fucking angry I'm so fucking pissed I'm so hungry I'm so tired I'm just gonna go as fast as I possibly can and uh again this is not an achievement by any stretch of the imagination but for a guy like me who ran about an eight minute mile I finished that

three mile race in 18 minutes so I had a six minute average um over the course of three miles that's fucking legit Luke for a big bastard like yourself i was very very happy with that i couldn't believe it i knew i was going fast because i was passing people in my platoon i didn't normally pass but dude like a little bit of anger and a little bit of frustration is a hell of an engine for average people like me the other moment i had a boot camp bc was we do, uh, they got rid of boxing right before I got there, but they still made us do the bit where American gladiators, where they give you like the fucking hockey mask. And then the stick, when you put your hands in and then you have to just fight the other guy. The first time they matched me up, they matched me up with, I mean, I do, this kid was frothing at the mouth.

Okay. I was like, oh fuck. I'm about to get fucking wrecked and I tried my best but he fucking laid into me and whipped whipped my helmet so far it came across my face and I couldn't even see I mean he he demolished me okay at that same crucible at that same crucible, at that same crucible, they matched me up with him again. And dude, I'm telling you, I was so fucking angry and so tired and so pissed. I was like, you know, what have I got to lose? What's he going to do? He's just going to fuck it. Cause it didn't hurt because of the helmet, but it was just embarrassing the way he had rearranged it. So this time I went in there and dude, I just charged like Braveheart over the fucking hill. Because what am I going to do?

I can't beat this guy with strategy. He's just a better athlete and he's a fucking maniac. And I went over there and I just jumped in the air and fucking slashed him. And he was so surprised because it's first clean shot wins. First clean shot to the head wins. And I ran over there and I jumped in the air and i fucking slashed him and he just couldn't believe i had the gall to do something like that and i won and i fucking beat him and i will never forget i went back to my platoon and uh this is exactly what

my drill instructor said to me he goes wow thomas you're actually going to leave here not exactly the same piece of shit you came in that is a quote that he said that i'll never fucking forget so uh yeah those are my two al bundy moments the guy that you took out is he still around no idea he was in he was in another platoon i have no idea i doubt it luke uh real quick i uh probably my my real best one is uh i played uh in the espn rec basketball league in my mid 30s and there was an a division which had like xd1 guys like j williams from duke and then the mbas j williams was in that the point guard but i played in the b league luke which was like wash dads and i had a 20.20 rebound playoff game luke to advance to the championship wow okay now

now look the other team center got in foul trouble early, and they didn't have any subs, so there were some asterisks involved, Luke, but I brought it that night, okay, or that afternoon. Impressive, impressive. All right, Luke, spin number three coming your way. I have to do the weird credit card swipe motion. The state of love and trust. Great Pearl Jam song there, Luke.

All right, this one, Luke, is all about MK's future and its relationship with the hardcore fan who helped us build this thing. Luke, let's face it. Between new merch, Versace robes, live ad reads, healthy livers, more boxing talk than ever before, and an upcoming trip to Las Vegas for UFC 264 that will, for the first time, be a step closer to the original vision that you and I had of what MK could one day be, everything from the look, feel, and taste of this show has been rapidly changing. Yes, it's still BC, LT, and a bunch of dick jokes. Yet, Luke, it would be hard to overlook two things

as we continue to get crazy close to the finish line of the race to 100K subscribers. One, MK's growing really fast. Two, a bunch of our hardcores in the comments are having a hard time, Luke, adjusting to that. Now, look, this is no different than your favorite indie band that you used to watch in the local club. Move up to the stadium show level. Start writing pop songs, right?

Go to the salon, get their hair colored, right? In some ways, yes, MK is selling out. Because that's what happens when you get successful and start to fulfill your dreams and goals. But in another sense, Luke, Emskay has instead also not really sold out, but bought in on what this bright future could mean to our access, our reach, the events we cover, the shows we can produce for the fans. So since your name is higher up on the marquee and you have the producer credit that you bitchedly brag about as the more responsible and patriarch of this show. nondescript bomb shelter when it was all MMA talk and no filter and are now sick of the long intros, the ad reads, the super long wheel of death intros to the questions. They're sick of the boxing talk. They're sick of me interrupting you. They're sick of not getting to hear the real story

about the infamous text message and the missing show number 171. Your question, Luke, that is in need of a good faith response for our core listeners is this how does mk fulfill all of its goals and dreams without driving away the very people who helped us get here well let's take it piece by piece here on the ad stuff it's like i mean listen guys i know people don't like hearing ads especially for products they may or may not need like some of you listen i bet more than a few of you unkempt disasters need some manscaped help. You know, I wouldn't be so quick to dismiss that. But maybe you don't need Moneyline or a cash app.

And maybe that Get Roman stuff is not necessarily for you. If it is, I hope you check it out. But okay, fine. But fellas, we got bills to pay. People want to make money off this. This is just a little bit of a cost that you have to pay. By the way, we don't have a Patreon where we ask for money. You know, we're not, we're not, we don't do the self-service thing. We're like, you know, we're a hundred percent independent, which by the way, I like that stuff too. But I'm just

pointing out, we're in a situation where you get all the content for free. We would hope, we would hope, and we'll try to limit it, but we don't. You've got to understand some of the business side here. We have to make this a financially responsible operation for the folks involved. Otherwise, it just can't continue, right? And we'd rather have some MK than no MK. So that's the first thing I'd say. The second thing I'd say is I wouldn't really worry about the rest. My only concern about the future BC is that we'll get too successful.

I mean, let me explain what I mean by that. The podcast itself has plenty of room to grow and I intend to make it grow. And I know you do as well, but I got to say BC and I are a little bit like Voltron. Our powers combined are even more than I thought they would be. I knew partnering with BC was a good idea for any number of reasons, but it's actually been way more powerful than I had imagined we would be two years later. It's to the point where BC and I are fielding, or at least, not fielding, but offers come our way for all kinds of stuff outside of MK. Hey, do you want to go do this gig? What about this role in the company? What about that kind of thing you can do? And those are to an extent,

not all of them, obviously, but to an extent, those are a lot of things that BC and I have long dreamed of doing. But I think the central tension that we have is that, and really the basic understanding that we have, and BC and I had a conversation about this in Miami, I think that all of those things are coming because we've done MK. Like MK is the nucleus. It's the reason. It's the catalyst of change, at least for this stage of our careers. I don't ever want to lose that. I don't want to do anything on the outside that makes MK change on the inside.

And my pledge to all the viewers and the listeners is I will not. I will take other opportunities or whatever that compliment MK, but it would be very, very extremely foolish of either of us if we just said, oh, well, MK led to this. Now I can just leave it. I mean, maybe it'll come a time, BC, where we've outgrown it. But man, I feel like we're just scratching the surface after a pandemic year where we had to kind of sit on the sidelines. Well, that shit appears to be over for the most part anyway. Now is the time where we talk about these things. We talk about our future. We talk about our present and we talk about where we want to go and no one's going to change that. And the day that it does change, I'm out. So simple as that. Okay. So deal with the ads, deal with the long intros. Hopefully you like boxing. That's what Luke's saying, right? Can we talk about why we cover

boxing? BC, we cover it for a few reasons. One, Showtime hired us, and they're big into the boxing business. Number one. Number two, you have, I would say now you're pretty 50-50, but obviously your background is a little bit more boxing than it is MMA, and so we want to bring some of those talents to bear. Number three, dudes, look around. If you just wait for the biggest MMA fights, you have a lot of weeks where you're

not talking about anything but if you talk about the biggest combat sports fights usually boxing and MMA although kickboxing can occasionally play a role dude you get to just be at bigger shit all the time it's a much better way to stay visible now of course you have to do credible coverage and I lean for that a lot on BC, especially recently. But over time, I'm hoping to be a little bit more self-sufficient in that way. I feel like I'm getting a little bit closer day by day. But over time, BC, tell the viewers, dude, it's a much smarter play for us to do what we're doing than just focus on one or the other.

Yeah, I mean, look, there's very many MMA-specific shows. We do have overarching skill sets that allow us to cover both and cover both at a very high level. And maybe we'll be 70-30, 60-40, whatever, MMA, because that does tend to fill the headlines more often. But boxing's not dead, and we do have the connection with Showtime. And also, it's a big part of my full-time job with CBS Sports as a writer, covering this stuff. And also, boxing really rules at the highest level so if you're a hater you're gonna have to get past that okay and the last thing I'd say BC is we said this

in Miami but it deserves repeating like you could say what you want about the Mayweather Paul fight dumb as balls whatever you hated it you know you want your money back whatever you want to say I don't care say what you want to say I'm not going to police it. But being there and doing what we did for a big boxing fight, exhibition or otherwise, dude, that was fucking huge for us. If we were just covering MMA, we would have never gotten that. To the extent that we're entertaining advancement and opportunities that are coming our way is a function of the fact that we had that opportunity. You'd be a dumb ass to turn that down.

So we didn't. All right. Very well handled. Luke, you were honest with the people of most of that. I mean, hopefully we'll find the missing episode one day. Spin number four,

Luke, let's get this going. Here we go. Are there BBLs in somewhere here? All triller, no filler. Oh, fucking Lord. Well, you know, you can't win them all. This is a little bit of a filler question, Luke, but you spun it.

Here we go. Triller head honcho Ryan Kavanaugh sent a letter to Mike Tyson this week that was obtained by boxing journalist Mike Coppinger, eventually also Dan Rayfield, I believe, or maybe I was wrong on that. Mike Coppinger put it out there on the interwebs. Triller claims, Luke, it actually did send the $25 million purse to Mike Tyson for his exhibition fight against Roy Jones Jr. and claims it has receipts to prove it. In fact, Luke, Kavanaugh went as far as possibly insinuating that Tyson's people,

including whatever that League of Legends thing, whatever the hell that was called, might be the ones who are actually withholding the funds from Tyson, which would be sad given this being a pattern in Mike's career. Luke Cavanaugh also said Triller has proof that it has Tyson under contract for one more fight and said it's hoping

in the near future they could get Mike to agree to get in there for a trilogy bout against Evander Holyfield. Luke, our guy Tyson is 54 and as unpredictable as any human being alive. So we've got some level of misgivings about ever wanting to see him fight again. Plus that Jones fight, it was perfect. Tyson won it, although there was no official whatever. It was a draw.

I don't know. But Tyson looked great. Luke, why would you want to ruin that? But they always ruin that in combat sports so luke we ask difficult questions here that you don't want to answer so let's let's ask it let me ask you this give me three prospective tyson opponents for his proposed trailer finale should he agree to it that could beat the threshold of one million pay-per-view buys and then give me the one name whether it's a part of those three or not that you would actually get into wanting to see him box and could even be excited enough to like want to preview it in terms of how it would actually play out there is no

scenario where i could do the latter um i can name opponents that would do well. Okay. I would say, I mean, Holyfield. I don't know about that. I would have thought before maybe they could do it with, I mean, you know what? They might be able to do it with Holyfield. It's possible. So I'll say Holyfield. I'd even say especially a second Lennox, or not even a second, but a second crack at, well, not even that really,

another crack at Lennox Lewis, this time in an exhibition context. So that's two. But those are two old foes. So let's think of a new foe they could do it against. Honestly, Anderson Silva might be a way to make that work. That'd be interesting, Luke. I don't like that fight for a lot of reasons, but you're asking about what would sell?

Mike Tyson versus Anderson Silva? Yeah, especially after what he did against Chavez. That might do it. So I'll go Evander, Lennox, Anderson Silva. No Chavez Jr. there to watch Mike try to send him to the dark depths? Luke. He can be the hungover cut man, which is probably what he would be. No Logan Paul mentioned by Luke.

I'm not sure if he has more fights on any Showtime deal. They might do that. They might do that. I know there's some chatter that Logan Paul is kind of itching for that. I just don't have a good read on that. Maybe. Maybe. Here's the thing.

I thought that he did well enough against Floyd and that the Floyd fight did well enough from a commercial standpoint. But I don't know that you can like pivot off of that to something equally strange and everyone's like, oh, I'm still, I'm still invested in what this might look like. It feels to me you have to get something

a little bit closer to him in skill level to make that work. But maybe I'm misreading. I mean, I'm not, you know, I would have never imagined people would want to see tiktokers versus youtube but but they did what about the original Mike Tyson of MMA Vitor Belfort no I don't give a fuck no okay well you were honest Luke final spin here we go let's put a bow on you get what you get let's see what you get oh fart needles oh luke you've been sent to hall luke unlike in boxing where broadcasters and journalists can be

inducted into the international boxing hall of fame like our showtime colleagues al bernstein steve farhood jim gray and even jimmy lennon jr have all been enshrined in canistota mma currently does not have a hall of fame that includes media members or at least any one of major prominence in fact the only hall of fame i'm even aware of luke is the ufcs that will likely change one day when ufc luke in hopes of restoring its public reputation of how it deals with the media inducts its first class of broadcasters and journalists which will probably include Mike Goldberg John Morgan's blue shirt and the schmo's black vest that has his face on the back of it Luke well let's say a few years after that first class gets in good old luke thomas gets the call from the ufc

and you were told that not only are you going into their hall of fame in the media wing yeah right but that they want you to appoint a fighter active or retired to come up and induct you and say something nice about you so my question to to you is this, Luke. That's an interesting question. First of all, which fighter would you want to bestow that honor upon you in all seriousness? Secondly, what do you wish your peers would say about you and your contributions to the sport during that talking head video package that always precedes the induction?

They usually have Okamoto and murr and john morgan kind of just be like hey man rashad evans was a great light heavyweight champion and luke to spice up this question even more i'm gonna add a third layer similar to how baseball players when they get inducted to cooperstown the baseball hall of fame gets to pick the hat that will be on their plaque that typically represents which team they had the greatest amount of success with. So this could be SB Nation, Bloody Elbow, MMA Fighting, Showtime, CBS Sports, Sirius XM, that time that you worked at Chick-fil-A for a day in Old Marietta. Luke, which fighter's going to induct you?

What do you hope your peers say about you and which hat will you wear going into the UFC media wing of the hall of fame uh now you said the hat does the hat have to be any job I've ever had or does it have to be related to MMA yeah related to MMA yes okay I was joking about Chick-fil-a Luke okay um all right so the fighter i would get to induct me i'd pick this is an easy one for me chael sonnen um we've we've battled back and forth we've had our differences but mostly we don't have differences i think we see eye to eye for the most part i mean there's some different you know there's some there's some topics we don't but um i think he understands me in a way that a lot of other fighters never have and despite the fact that we don't agree

on certain issues the fact that i feel like he understands me is more important so i'd pick chael um that's a good choice i respect that i wouldn't have guessed that but that's a good one yeah uh what do i hope they say about me i don't think any of my peers really care for me so i mean understand something dude like i'm not the guy who at least while i'm around and probably not ever but i'm not the guy who is going to win awards you know i don't think it's because people have necessarily better content than i do um or in this case we but um you know i piss a lot of people off and mma is an industry that loves its own members to be very self-congratulatory towards you know MMA wants people who are inside of MMA who cheerlead MMA and don't focus on the

bad things on MMA and I've just never been that guy I feel like it's actually pretty fucked up that that's really what the you know if you want to look at who wins the awards you can definitely look at obviously the size of the audience that people can can can generate but also just notice is there anybody there who uh to this point anyway has a demonstrated track record of you know not just pissing off the powers that be but like sticking it to them um i don't think that you can not in a real way. Uh, but it's because the people who are in charge of the awards and the people who get the awards and then the fans who want to see the people celebrated are the ones that make them feel the best about MMA. And I'm just never going to be that guy. And so I, I understand that I, I value,

I think you need people in industry who, yeah, it can be celebratory, but I think you need people in industry who yeah it can be celebratory but I think you also need people who do what I do which is like wait wait wait all this is fucked up and I've been right I've been wrong but I think that role is not the kind that generates the accolades but it's the necessary one to have a healthier sport

so they're not going to say anything nice about me I've been very critical about MMA media I don't really give a fuck what they think, and they can say whatever they want. Wow, and they could suck this D? Is that how you're going to end this rant? Listen, there are some members of the MMA media that I like a lot,

and there's a lot that I don't. I don't ever wake up, BC. Maybe you're different. I don't ever wake up and think about, like, what do I need to do to get someone's adulation? I realized a long time ago, I can generate an audience and do the kind of media coverage that I want to do without any of those accolades, without any of the backslaps and the high fives from my peers. So I've just always been oriented that way. Um, so I don't, I mean,

some of them I like a lot. I, I'm not in this for their, what do you think of what I did? I don't give a fuck what you think I did. And then lastly, I would say what hat would I wear? That's a tougher one because Showtime has been indescribably supportive. So I'd probably go that way, but it would, I would do it with something of a heavy heart because I don't have anything bad to say about SiriusXM. They were just always, here's what you want in life, man. This is all you ever really want. It's all you really ever need. You just need someone to believe in you.

And maybe it's just one person. And that one person opens up one door. But the cascading effect of that can be transformative. And for a long time, BC, I was the only person who believed in what I was doing. Why did I buy all of the lights and the cameras to do live streaming and the cameras themselves and the lenses? And why did I take courses on the stuff? Because no one believed in me to give me an opportunity to do the stuff that I wanted to do. So I had to invest in me to give me an opportunity to do the stuff that I wanted to do. So I had to invest in me. But it was only after I invested in me that some other people began to see some of the things

that I was seeing in myself. And SiriusXM was one of the very first ones that really did that. So what I would do is I'd probably wear like a Showtime hat and maybe put like a SiriusXM sticker on there somewhere or some kind of nod because it would just be, it would not be fair to say that everyone has done for me what Showtime has, but it would be equally unfair to, to just leave serious XM out of the, out of the conversation. Would you wear an MMA fighting branded anal plug during the ceremony?

I don't think they even rate that. All right. All right, Luke, I know you were going to ask me, so I'll just answer it. I've been thinking hard about this. I would have you they even rate that. All right. All right, Luke, I know you were going to ask me, so I'll just answer it. I've been thinking hard about this. I would have you want to induct me.

I mean, you've got to be who you are, Luke, at the end of the day. You know what? That's a good call. That's a good call. That's funny. That's funny. I mean, she would make it all about herself,

but I'm prepared for that. Probably, probably, but, you know, whatever. Let's close the show with a bang here, Luke. MorningCombat at gmail.com is your email address to hit up our producers with your fanned mail, with your contributions, your artwork, and also with your dead wrongs for Friday's show. But today is Wednesday, so every Wednesday we got mail, and it's in the form of fan submissions.

All right, let's look through the mailbox here, Luke. First one from L Danny 413. Here's a fan submission from Las Vegas. Luke, this fella, I think actually this is his lady's account. Look at this fine couple on vacation. They went to Vegas and this guy's rocking the medium MKT shirt. Shout out, Luke, right? You know what? God bless this fella. Thumbs up. they went to vegas and this guy's rocking the shmedium mk t-shirt shout out luke right you know what god bless this fella thumbs up this is the iconic uh uh you know light display or

whatever you want to call this the sign and uh you know what they look like they're having a good time god bless this man for yeah they're wearing our shit around sin city shout out to this couple love Love that. All right, let's keep it going. George has two for us. Luke, the first one. Hello, my name is George. I'm in the long hair.

Me and my buddy Chip are from San Diego. We're currently doing our first bike tour from San Luis Obispo to San Diego. We even listened to Monday's episode, June 21st, on our first 20 miles of the tour. One photo is from our highest point of the trip. I know you can't see any reference to elevation, but that's because no one was around to take the pic. But the other photo is from our lowest point on the tour. This is at CSU Santa Barbara. Wow.

A day one fan who loves the show and wishes everyone involved with it well. Just two more things. Luke, you're a metalhead just like me. Quit getting pumped up to Skill Rex and listen to some Suffocation, he says. I like Suffocation. Suffocation's good. And also Big Beige Campbell, I love prog rock just as much as you.

Selling England by the Pound, the seminal album from Genesis, is one of my all-time favorites. But quit being a Big Beige pussy and listen to some metal. Yeah. Much love, George. Well, I'm very happy that George on the right with that rock star hair and his boyfriend Chip went on this trip, Luke, and listened to our songs or our shows. I appreciate that.

But, you know, I like some metal Luke but it's just it's you know you can only listen to it so long before you become angry and buy your own camera equipment and have your own YouTube channel and are hard to work with right I mean I think the last of those things is slightly overstated I just have a few principles I like to adhere to but you know what God bless these two I don't know how far San Luis Obispo is from San Diego but I bet it's pretty fucking far and yeah God bless these two man this is great really appreciate the support love that they I don't know how far San Luis Obispo is from San Diego, but I bet it's pretty fucking far. That's a pretty good drive. Yeah. God bless these two, man. This is great.

Really appreciate the support. Love that they took some time out to make these photos, and they probably banged after this. Right, BC? Yeah, probably. I mean, they went from tip to tip. Shout out to Chip. You think Chip is the...

No, enough of that. No power bottom jokes. Let's keep it going, Luke. Our fans can do whatever they want with their private parts. Yeah, exactly. This one's from Kina F. Hello, Lukeke big fan of mk i'm from london what do you make of my budget home gym first of all it's better than my budget home gym so let's go through this he's got some kind of um he's got some kind of uh aerodyne assault rower not rower a bike there he's got some kind of nordic bike on the some elliptical

excuse me on the side he has a proper rack he's got tatami pads on the bottom which aren't the best you want the horse stall horse stable flooring is better but you get what you can get so that's pretty good he's got i can't quite tell if those are like i guess those are boxing gloves on the right he's got some warm-up stuff with the banded stuff on the right he's got an ab roller a wheel at the top of the uh white uh uh like cabinet tree there and i don't see how much i don't see how much free weight he has and it's hard to tell what he's got on the left there but i gotta say all in all, pretty good. My only concern, BC, would be could he do standing overhead press work? He obviously can do sitting overhead press, but I don't think he can do standing overhead press.

Let's hope that also the women in his life have a proper rack as well. He has a question for you, Luke. What conditioning machine is more torture, the air bike or your sled? Oh, that's a tough question i get harder workouts with the sled but they're shorter because especially with the heat there's only so much you can really do the the thing about those bikes um like the uh assault bikes or whatever i feel like they can kill you and you can they can kill you for longer periods of time so like the assault bikes or whatever, I feel like they can kill you and they can kill you for longer periods of time. So like the torture is for me worse, so to speak, on the sled,

but the torture is much longer on the bike. So I might go the bike because you really have to have mental focus with that shit. You also turned down my offer to race me in a 50-yard dash for our academic decathlon because you said you're physically unable. That's right. I can't really sprint.

I just exposed you right there. What's the guy's name? Kina? He's hoping for international merch soon. Hey, bro, go to morningcombat.store right now and get your ish. I'm sure you can buy it in pounds, baby. Okay. Courtney S has three of them. Luke, hey,

donks, I started listening to the show because my boyfriend Dan loves it. Thanks to Dan, I'm now a subscribed listener and a huge fan to show my support for the show. I bought both me and my boyfriend matching MK hoodies. Yes, Luke! Yes!. Yes, Luke.

Yes. Hell yeah, dude. We have a female listener. She's one of three. She gets all our jokes and she buys our merch. I feel like she's the official queen of morning combat. So she says, we live in Detroit, but over the weekend, Dan decided to take me on a backpacking trip to the west side of the state on the shores of Ludington, Michigan.

I swam in Lake Michigan for the first time and captured this pic of us take me on a backpacking trip to the west side of the state on the shores of Ludington, Michigan. I swam in Lake Michigan for the first time and captured this pic of us both wearing our new hoodies on the beach. Also, she says, thanks for putting a smile on our faces and for all the great content, Courtney and Daniel. Luke, did they really break those hoodies in, if you know what I mean? Do you think so? Well, two questions. One, how warm is it where they can wear fucking hoodies in if you know what i mean do you think so well two questions one how warm is it where they can wear fucking hoodies this time of year it's the summer bro come on oh yeah you're right oh you ever been up by the great lakes it's windy as balls luke well i guess that's right i've swam in a swum swam in lake michigan but only in august which i'm told is the only time it's really warmed up and it was phenomenal but But this was in Chicago, not

this part. But you know what, dude? This is the power couple of morning combat. It's pretty impressive. Big fan. Well, I mean, Bill and Jen in the RV. Yeah, they're important, too. Yeah, I don't want to lose sight of that. Bram and Nettie up there in Ireland, the Manning family as well. But this is, I mean, hey, this

lady's a keeper here, Dan, so can you you know you know what to do bro okay thank you let's keep it rolling here luke uh physio w says hi uncle luke and campbell soup this one's for luke if training gloves are so bad then why am i setting bear traps with this heavy shrug then uh from deutschland he's got some some gibberish written in german here luke but uh what do you think of this guy, Luke? He is not shrugging very much. I got to tell you.

That is not a lot of weight. 95 pounds? Is that what he's shrugging? Can you critique his ink, Maneesh? Can we blow this up a little bit, please? Oh, his ink is atrocious. I mean... First of all, it's like...

First of all, it's like... Are those trash bags on his hands i don't even know obviously he's doing a bit he's got the dream catcher on the right arm which i'm told people in europe think is like kind of cool okay um and then he's got a tribal tattoo on the left that just goes into dark ink that's indecipherable on the yeah at the bottom yeah you know what's funny lifting in the same basement of the final scene of the movie uh blair witch project where that kid had to face the corner and then probably i've never seen that movie oh wow luke that's that's uh that was a dude people people make fun of that movie now but they don't realize when it came out it broke so much ground it was it was great it was a bigger deal when it came out it was a big deal for a lot of different reasons yeah

it's true yeah and people even i watched in the theater with some people like oh that wasn't scary at all the movie sucked i'm like bro that movie is genius okay anyway let's keep it rolling here devin slides in from lake stevens washington he says i think i found bc's workout gloves see the attachment ps keep the badass content going. I'm an electrician in Washington State, and I can't get enough podcasts while I work. I look forward to all day, almost every day. Thank you for your hard time and work,

for your time and hard work. Luke, what do you think of these lifting gloves? Perfect. If you're going to wear those kinds of things you should wear ones that look like this yeah look like men's underpants tighty-whities luke i love that this electrician this laborer this this guy from lake stevens wisconsin he could probably hang in my factory town right these are our people i support this man okay he keeps the lights on all right in more than one way okay thank you anthony m slides in merch 1.0 came in and i love the quality mk is part of my wfh setup what the hell does that mean luke work

from home oh okay you're good on those uh things there can we blow it up and see how anthony looks in uh oh yeah He's balling. He's got the, I think that's one of the new shore mics or road mics. Oh, Jesus Christ. I got a phone call coming in. I mean, he knows his way around the gym a little bit, right? Yes. Yes, he does.

And he's got, let's see, the three screens. You can see the light above his head. That's pretty good. He's a professional. Yep. This is good stuff. It's good stuff. He kind of looks like our merch guy, Krupp, a little bit,

which that might have been an insult, but that's all right. We'll keep it rolling here, Luke. Peter M has two for us this week. Here's the Wheel of Death meme to kick it off. Or maybe that's the other one. All right. That's good memeing. That's good memeing. That that's good memeing that's good memeing that's pretty good memeing do we have a second one from peter maniche was that all of it in one meme

oh here we go let's blow this up do you smoke only when luke and brian talk mma your lungs are there's been a lot of boxing recently bc you got to admit that you got to admit that that's why when we went 35 minutes to open on in ghanu and maniche was tech you know sending us a little mess like hey guys going a little long i was like hey jay pipe down the people need this mma fix all right thank you uh final one from rodrigo hi i'm a big fan of the show and made this looping animation for morning combat let me know if you need the video in any other formats. Let's check this out, dude.

That is fucking killer. Look at that. Badass man. That's is that McGregor's chest hat? Yes. Pauly is sauce. It's a traditional American traditional gorilla gorilla with the king and then like you know the background behind it with the hot sauce in his mouth making him sweat

fucking a that is great wow and i like the the font there at the bottom luke for uh mk and poirier mcgregor three next week can't wait vegas be there uh very well done rodrigo thank you to all of our people for buying our merch, sending in the pics, creating the art, all that good stuff. This is for the people by the people. It is Morning Combat. Thank you so much, folks. Luke, that's all we got. Two hours. Luke, we're pumping

it more than once this week. I mean, we went like 2.15 on Monday's show. I know. That's way too long. Let's remind the folks that a couple of things. We still have Dead or Wrong for Friday, morningcombat at gmail.com, plus we are going to do a room service diaries in Las Vegas,

which means we need, you don't have to send them to Morning Combat, but we need to scam Apple, which means we need you to leave a review there, that's five stars, and then put your question there so that we can artificially inflate our numbers in that way. What else, BC? If you want to try Showtime, you can.

Showtime.com, 30-day free trial. You like it, you can keep it. If not, you can go and do whatever you want with your life. If you would like to buy some merch, you can go to morningcombat.store. We have some merch available up there. And yeah, we're back live chat tomorrow at three.

Show is back again on friday at 11 and assignment for friday luke final warning on the homework oh yes we're going to watch the night comes for us it's on netflix we will discuss it on friday so watch it ahead of time and then of course at morningcombat.gmail.com, you can leave any questions and comments you might have about the movie that you want us to address. BC, anything else? No,

that's our show. We hope you enjoyed it. Thank you for coming along on this ride. We addressed our future. Our future is bright. So bright that I've got to wear shades. Come along with us. Okay.

If you're going to come bro, come on. Okay. All right. So with that in mind for Malka, for Showtime, for CBS Sports, I'm Luke Thomas. Until next time, may all of your gains be loyal. We'll be right back. you