MORNING KOMBAT WITH LUKE THOMAS AND BRIAN CAMPBELL - Edwards vs. Chimaev OFF | Dustin Poirier | Holyfield vs. Tyson 3? | Ep. 89

Episode Date: December 2, 2020

Luke and Brian are back as they discuss all the latest combat sports news including the December 19th, Leon Edwards vs. Khamzat Chimaev fight being called off due to Edwards testing positive for COVID-19 (6:14). The guys also discuss Dustin Poirier's latest interview (21:18), women's boxing star Claressa Shields signing an MMA contract (33:35) and Evander Holyfield claiming that he wants a trilogy bout with Mike Tyson (52:37). --------------------------------- '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

It is Wednesday, the 2nd of December, 2020. And it is time, donks, ladies and gents, for Morning Combat. Hi, everyone. My name is Luke Thomas. I'm from CBS Sports, Showtime, a bunch of other places. I am one half of your hosting duo. I am joined by a man who can also rep those places of work, as well as NBC Sports, which brings him to the left coast, the west coast. Some say the best coast it's brian

campbell hi brian how are you i'm doing great luke i am quarantined so i'm not seeing the sights of la there'll be no hanging out with javas or jerks for me but i hear not for you though not for you bro little bonus little bonus content this week all right i hear there's a little there's a little birdie in my ear we shall see but uh But for now, we have bigger fish to fry. You are out there for, let's see, Ring City. And the fights are not tonight. They are tomorrow. Are any fights of note for our audience's sake that they should pay attention to?

Yeah, Thursday, 9 p.m. Eastern, NBC Sports Network. Brandon, the Cannon Adams, former contender, season five winner, Boxino veteran, fought Jermall Charlo and lost that title opportunity, he'll be in the main event against late replacement Sonny Duverson should be some good fights and your boy, the beige one, on the call along with Sean Porter and Bob Papa

so shout out to my bank account and also, are you in the same hotel? How's the setup from Jay in terms of the technology, because as folks know, Wednesday is a no-Jay Wednesday, but I think he did upgrade your travel kit. Is that right? Yes, yes, my man kit. Yes, it's working up to this point. I do have that McDonald's Wi-Fi here at the nondescript motel next to the wildcard, but I'm ready to rock and roll as long as this feed allows it, Luke. And we are ready as MK overlords to keep filling your in-hole with content.

We're coming, Luke. Luke, we're coming. Your face hole, if such a thing exists. All right. Sort of standard disclaimer. Thumbs up on the video. Hit the subscribe button. Always appreciate that when you do.

Share this with a friend. By the way, we should tell folks, if you are getting your Spotify sort of year in review, and we feature prominently on that, in particular number one, because I know some of you, it'll be that case. But you know, if we make your top five, send us a screenshot of it. Send us some evidence of it. MorningCombat at gmail.com. Let us know you're listening.

We might feature it somehow on social media and some other place, but we appreciate your patronage and we would like to thank you for it. So morningcombat at gmail.com if Spotify tells you that you make Morning Combat a priority. First things first there. Okay, with that out of the way as well, if you want to try Showtime, you certainly can. 30 days for free. If you like it, you can keep it. If not, you can pound sand. It's just a trial. No more, no less. You can go to Showtime.com for more information there.

If you want some sweet swag, which I don't have in terms of clothing, but I do have in terms of mugs. Or see, I should say, I guess they call these tumblers. It's a glass. Morning Combat. It's even got our names on the bitch. I don't know if this thing can catch it with the autofocus or not, but there you go. Morning Combat, the glasses.

Go to store.show.com. Brian, am I forgetting anything? Morning Combat, where the glass is always half full. Okay, thank you. Oh, yes, we have the documentary. Hey, when is your interview with the director for the Hector Camacho documentary coming out I believe that publishes today his name is Eric Drath and he has a long history of providing fantastic boxing documentaries from the no mas one to the assault in the ring one a few years back

this macho documentary is not only must see but the interview with Eric Drath has some very incredible inside stories about rolling with the Camacho family, the investigation of the unsolved murder. The whole project altogether is A++, and I'm not just saying that. So shout out to the Hector Camacho story, Eric Drath. Check out our bonus MK content this week, where you not only get that, Luke, you get interviews with Errol Spence Jr., Danny Garcia, Luke sitting down with Dustin Poirier. I'm telling you, Luke, they don't make shows like this.

They really don't. I mean, I'm trying to get the band back together with the MK Hardcore Bang Bros Boxing Club. I mean, we got a lot of things on the iron, bro. Yeah, what happened to that? You did that for like two weeks in a row, and then I haven't seen it since. I've been busy, but, you know, look, there's plenty of room in the MK Nation for all of us, except for Jay, only on Mondays. Yes, fuck Jay, for now and forever.

Okay, with that in mind, let's get this party started. Five topics to start your Wednesday. We go first to the breaking news that I briefly addressed with a quick video that I put on the MK Channel last night. Kamzat Shemayev will not be fighting Leon Edwards, at least not on December 19th. The fight is falling through. Now, I want to be clear about this. Here's why it fell through. Leon Edwards contracted COVID, so they're not going to be fighting on the 19th. What we don't know is if

they're going to try and make that fight at a later date, which they commonly do when there's this kind of an issue. That's been the sort of, I won't say they do it every time, but they'll push it back three weeks a month or whatever, and then still try and make that fight. That may still take place. And the good news is the card is still very stacked. And Ariel Helwani from ESPN, who was the one who reported the news, also reported UFC is kind of eyeing Wonderboy versus Jeff Neal as your replacement main event, which would be great.

It's a fantastic fight. Again, not sure what the details on that yet are. UFC has not made it official. So those are the basics. UFC on Vegas 17 main event falling through, blah, blah, blah. I gave my quick piece on it last night, BC. We go to you first. What is your overall takeaway of this news?

The ship be sinking here, Luke, from the idea of keeping fights together for COVID. It's not just the succession of UFC main events, which has now lost somebody to COVID seemingly every week. I mean, I don't know if you saw that PBC on Fox card with Julian J. Rock Williams' return December 26th just got canned because J. Rock has the COVID as well. It's getting out of control here, Luke, and specifically this fight was going to tell us a lot. And, you know, there's people trying to make a back alley argument that Kamzat Shumayev could be your fighter of the year if he wins for, what, a fifth time and keeps climbing the ladder. I mean, there was a lot you wanted and needed to see. Obviously, the health of the fighters is going to take preeminence.

And we did talk about it on Monday's show, sort of the idea like, what do we do? Do we build a tighter bubble? How do we fix this? But, Luke, I went to the interwebs. You ever hear of a guy, famous laptop stealer and jiu-jitsu practitioner Jake Shields? Did you happen to see his tweet, Luke? Laptop stealer? No, I thought you were going to say Hunter Biden. But yes, I know Jake does not. I mean, I don't want to put words in his mouth, but he does not seem as alarmed about COVID as others. Well, he said, quote, Luke, it's amazing no fighters have died yet with how deadly this virus is uh

don't don't ask for that don't don't be asking for that okay all right we're just trying to keep main events together here bro okay yeah you know what's interesting about this bc is we'll talk about in just a second but i uh obviously it's on the mk channel interview dustin poirier i actually started the interview asking him like you're a prize fighter in a huge bout in January. What does a guy like you do to mitigate it? And his answer was, I think, as fair as you could possibly give, which is, I mean, I'm obeying the rules. I go out in public.

I put a mask on. You know, if I'm not at the grocery store, I'm training. If I'm not training and I'm not at the grocery store, I'm at home. Like, he's not out there socializing. You know, he's not out there taking unnecessary risks. But he is taking risks in the sense, BC, that the guy's got to train. And his training partners are, you know, it's a small circle, but who knows what kind of life they're living. Which is to say, BC, Dustin Poirier, I mean, the only way to do more than he's doing is to have significant financial resources to test everyone and to have some kind of a dorm where everyone

lives together and blah, blah, blah. This is very, very difficult to do. And if not impossible for the overwhelming, I mean, maybe McGregor could do it. And that's really about it on the MMA side. So what is a guy like that supposed to do? He is obeying all the rules. And yet when you think about it, dude, that's not much to keep yourself safe from getting COVID. Now understand, we're not saying if Dustin gets COVID, the world has ended. That's not the claim we're making, although certainly I wouldn't wish it upon him because, again, we don't know a whole lot about this stupid-ass virus, but it is enough to scuttle your fight. All you got to do is test positive, man. That's it, and the whole thing comes undone, and it's like, dude, this is different than March

and April where, you know, we didn't know know a whole lot and it was mostly a function of what they call the Acela corridor, everyone from D.C. to Boston and New York especially. That was really where everything was getting kind of heavy hit. And now it's spread everywhere. And we had, dude, there's 100,000 Americans hospitalized with this shit. I know people don't want to talk about it, but here's the deal. I'm not necessarily worried, to Jake Shields' point, about any individual one-fighter's health, although I don't think we should totally discount that. But if all that has to happen is you test positive for it, and it's spread far and wide,

and there's not really much you can do without significant financial resources to stop it it's like dude this is i mean correct me if i'm wrong bc i don't know what the future holds but just it stands to reason this is gonna get way worse before it gets better i think yeah look separate from the fighters health which is obviously like you mentioned paramount and we hope nobody gets you know i mean look the the details of the details of what Leon Edwards that went through, I believe it was Ariel or Brett that put it out there on ESPN on Twitter of, like, you know, losing 12 pounds and really, I mean, look, he, you know, Leon Edwards went through the ringer with COVID, although it seems like a lot of fighters are, you know, asymptomatic or just, you know, they're young, they're in great shape, they're beating it. Separate from the health, though, the long-term effects of what this second wave might have on the fight sports we love will be interesting. Because, I mean, look, even this

NBC sports show that I'm at, Unbeaten, Serhei Boachuk was supposed to be in the main event in this fight. The hardcores were waiting for him. He got the COVID and he's out. And, you know, I think you're going to see what they're doing here, what Showtime's been doing, a lot of UFC's been doing, you're going to see a lot more Luke of trying to protect the main and cone of main events by paying guys to train or, or, or

loading the undercard up with potential guys who can repair it. Now, certainly that in a short-term sense as a bandaid is a good backup, but I think to the question you gave Poirier, it's going to be interesting whether this eventually ends up affecting the fighters preparation and the quality of fights. It's a topic, Luke, that we talked about a lot in May when UFC first came back. And it's like, you know, did you get the same access in the gym to the sparring partners you're used to? Where, you know, some guys were saying, I trained in my garage the whole time. I think we went back to some form of normalcy over the summer and fall.

Now, Luke, you wonder if with everything pulling back, I mean, just for me in this hotel, the security standards are out of control. You can't even leave your room. There's a security guard waiting for you, which is understandable in all things considered. Meals delivered to you. You can't even leave the room. But what are we going to do, though, Luke, if this starts affecting people's ability to properly prepare? Will you see more big-name fighters pull back and be like, I'm going to take another six-month, nine-month break until we can figure this out? Yeah, I hadn't even thought about that

because I'd just sort of gotten into autopilot on the training. But it's a totally fair point. So let me bring up sort of a different question here, okay? Obviously, we hope Leon's okay and everyone else who has had this and will get it but do you want to see them rebook the fight in short order I mean I don't know how quickly Leon Edwards can make a turnaround if COVID hammered him that badly but is the because here's the thing Neil Magny was on Twitter last night being like dude I'll fight Kamzat on December 19th no problem five rounds

not an issue for me is that the direction go, or do you still retain this particular pairing? I like to retain it because the beauty of this fight was that there was, you know, sort of equal opportunities for both to really cash in. Now, in theory, Kamzat could face any credible, you know, upper-middle-class welterweight for us to still learn what we need to learn. So if it's not Leon Edwards and it's Neil Magny or if it's whoever else, yeah, we can still get it out of it. But for Leon Edwards, who was the, you know, the bridesmaid at the altar in the title picture, Luke, this was, you know, we originally joked about it. Remember we originally

said, hey, if you're Leon and you really want to make a splash, go beat the boss's boy toy, go call out Kamzat and, you know and parachute your way into the title picture for real. There was legit opportunity in there for him to make a monster splash with a win and maybe cut the portions of the title line he'd been shut out on. So it really depends on how much it took out of him. I mean, we saw Luke Campbell in the boxing match with Ryan Garcia get COVID. They rescheduled that three weeks later. It's going to be January 2nd. Now, looks like we're all good. If you can tell me, Luke, that we can push this off to mid-January,

you know, very little harm, no foul. Let's make it happen because I feel like on both sides, it was a very interesting matchup that was going to tell us a lot. Yeah, that's a fair point. Again, I would prefer to see them retain it but I hope that they can retain it in relatively short order I just don't know um how likely that is and the last point that I think that this raises and Sean O'Shaughnessy brought this up but you brought it up as well um again to me comes out Shemayev well what he let's say he had beaten Edwards I mean that would have been an unbelievable year but if F Figueiredo comes back, and again, no COVID issues, and is able to get his fight off and wins here next month,

and again, these are very much speculative, but let's just say that he does, that basically locks him up for fighter of the year. I don't know who would be in contention. Some people may have had one singular win on the MMA side that may have been more impressive, but we're talking about a body of work, what somebody did. If Figueredo crosses that finish line with his hand raised against Moreno, now that comes out, Chimaev is certainly, it seems like, out of the running.

And even then, because one was a championship fighter and one wasn't, maybe it wasn't all that close. I'm just saying, even if there was competition, it's falling away pretty quickly. This is the year, out of nowhere it seems like bc of devison figueredo oh absolutely and let's get a couple things straight here the calms out argument was a hipster one he can't win fighter of the year even with a win over edwards even with a you know look this is newcomer of the year stuff yes could he enter the discussion in the ballot yes but i don't like when people make certain hipster argument when cowboy won like five times in a year a couple years ago

People like Matt that could be fighter of the year No It's not like in a great year and it's the same argument Luke for me of why I'm still upset even though in reality doesn't matter No that Jorge Masvidal won it last year amazing year last year, but I thought Israel Adesanya I mean, let me be Kanye West here and interrupt Taylor Swift and tell you Israel Adesanya had one of the greatest years in MMA history last year and somehow was pushed to number two. So here's how I think it plays out now. And I love the fighter of the year debates. And yes, this year is a weird one. If Figueiredo doesn't fight again, he wins it. I think he's got the best body of evidence right

now. He's got great body on top of that. So if he wins though, Luke, he's nailed it. If he loses though, I think it opens the door back up for Adesanya. I mean, there are a couple other fighters with a small case, but I thought Adesanya got screwed last year. I think he's the second best resume this year, you know, with Romero and with destroying Costa. And, you know, I know the Romero because I scored it against him, right? So certainly that's part of the debate against Izzy winning it.

But imagine if Izzy next year fights like Whitaker again and Jones. I mean, look, this could be his time. This could be his era unless Figueiredo goes out there and beats Moreno or unless he catches the COVID because, Luke, I think right now he's your clubhouse leader. Who are we missing, Luke? I know Stipe had one big win, but I don't want to. Who are we missing? We're missing somebody. it's a good question I'm going to pull it up here because

honestly on the boxing side we talked about this uh Teofimo Lopez has just the one win but it's such a monumental win that there's just no way to deny that he is if not the winner of that consideration he is at the very top of it so let's's go through 2020 here. Oh, Jan Blachowicz, Luke, is the other one in this category. Okay. I would have said if Justin Gaethje had beaten Habib, you would have said Justin Gaethje, but obviously that didn't happen.

So I'm trying to think here. Who else would it have been? Amanda Nunes had a nice win, but that wasn't really enough. Curtis Blades was doing some good work, but I don't know if that would have put him in a fighter of the year contender. It goes back to the Masvidal debate. If someone's winning titles and defending

them and doing big, it means more. It really does. Yeah, Calvin Cater is going to have a good year, but he's not really in contention for it. Usman had the nice win in the sense that he beat a top-level guy, but has not really built upon it. Peotre had the nice win in the sense that he beat a top-level guy, but has not really built upon it. Peotre had one big one, but I think Blahowicz, when you package together, Luke,

the Corey Anderson with the upset title win, I think that's your number three. Yeah, it could be. It could be. There's not really a standout. A lot of the guys who had multiple wins and multiple fights are sub um championship fighters at least right now in their career there's been a bunch of them like uh um like zalal has had you know i think four four wins or so in this year um but in terms of elite super like who's fighting the very best all the time yeah it's not it's not really a runaway until you get to devison figueredo and again if he beats moreno it's like that's your dude that's that's the guy so it's not really a runaway until you get to Devis and Figueiredo. And again, if he beats Moreno, it's like, that's your dude. That's the guy.

So it's interesting that UFC has had such a strong year, all things considered, and yet your standout performer is in the least coveted male weight class. Yeah, you give that man four times to get finishes, and he gets finishes in all four and waves that swag flag around. I'm going to give it to him. Luke, do you hold the Romero fight against Adesanya in this argument? Not like other people do. Not like other people do.

I tend to think that, look, was it? Are you crushing your bills? Defeating your monthly payments? Sounds like you're at the top of your financial game. High school. Rise to it with the BMO Eclipse Rise Visa Card, the credit card that rewards your good financial habits. Earn points for paying your credit card bill in full and on time every month.

Level up from bill payer to reward slayer. Terms and conditions apply. So Adesanya wins, and I thought he won, I won't say comfortably, but without controversy. Controversy in the sense of who's the rightful winner. I mean, it was a boring fight. Even Adesanya would tell you that. The way I look at it is I don't count it certainly against Adesanya. I do count it for him, but I don't count it for him very emphatically

because the way you beat top opposition also matters. So getting the W is the most important consideration. But if you're evaluating two fighters, let's say, who both have similar records, one's 20-0, the other one's 20-0, one's defended his title five times, the other one's defended his title five times, so then how do you separate the two, if at all possible?

You have to look at how well they did against those opposition. And if one guy has decisions including splits in there another one has you know second third first round finishes you have to give the nod to the person provided they are you know reasonably similar levels of difficulty in terms of the strength of schedule you got to give it to the guy that did the better work now obviously i'm not comparing out of sign in any one particular regard here to another uh fighter i'm just saying you got to give him the credit for the win.

He's got the tick over Yoel Romero. But that it was so lackluster and that it wasn't particularly exciting, and less than being exciting, it just was not dominant. I think that's pretty clear. It was not at all dominant. That lowers the overall value of what it could be. That's how I look at it. That's fair.

That's very fair. I mean, look, you don't see a lot of people lining up to Romero and you don't see a lot of people dominating him. So at the end of the day, I scored it against Izzy, but that's that. It may be boring, but it ain't an awful win, Luke. OK, people aren't trying to fight that guy. So, you know, it doesn't I don't think it really counts against him so much. But roll on, roll on. All right. So with that out of the way, let's get now to we talked about Dustin Poirier I spoke to him yesterday the video is up on the uh the YouTube channel now I think some articles are going to go up for it on CBS Sports looking forward to those but for the time being BC um he made a comment about the interim title and here's what he said yeah we

got it we got it do you know that we have oh I didn't know that we had it so let's let's let's set this up here um i asked him a series of questions about it like you know if if listen if habib is not in the picture anymore yeah it should probably be for a title when he fights connor in january but let's assume a world war that doesn't happen would you want to fight for the interim title this is basically what he says if they if they decide for whatever reason that habib is going to stay and compete which god only knows what's going to happen at this point but let's say that that's what actually does happen should there be an interim belt for your fight do you want an interim belt unless khabib is uh taking you know a lot of time away from the sport i don't think an interim belt should be introduced you know there's already been two in the lightweight division.

Khabib's unified both times that an interim champ was introduced. No, there's been three. Tony was an interim champ as well. So I think the division needs clarity and needs an undisputed world champion. And there's no reason for that unless Khabib is out for a long time if he's retired then then two two guys have to fight the next two guys in line need to fight for the belt if he's not retired you know it has to be in the next five six months right the guy can't take a year off between fights.

BC, I couldn't hear a word of that, but I'm wondering if you could, and either way, your reaction to him basically saying, you know what? I'm not super interested in an interim title. Yeah, I have no idea if the public heard it either. Hopefully they did, and if they didn't, please check it out. It's a fantastic interview from the professor there.

Very good stuff. Hell yeah. F the interim title professor there. Very good stuff. Hell yeah. F the interim title, Luke. F the BS. I love it when Justin Gaethje took that belt and threw it down. I love these type of emphatic statements where it's BS. And I know you're in. Look, what we didn't show there was your response, which was an educated one about, well, doesn't it bring you more pay?

Isn't there a plus for a fighter to want to get into the interim business? And while he did eventually, you know, bow down to that and say, yes, if you're telling me I can get more money going the interim route, of course I'm going to do it. But I love his foundation and principle. And when any fighter does this, that's just a trinket. That's just part of the process. The real thing is the championship. I want the championship.

If Habib is still going to fight in some form, why would we have an interim championship? You make one when you need one. We don't need one right now. I love that attitude. I love everything about, really, let's be honest here. I love everything about who Dustin Poirier has evolved to become, not just as a fighter, but Luke, even more as a man, a father, a more evolved sportsman. And you had some really interesting questions in there about how much there is to learn as a fighter as you mature and how you're never ending. You're constantly learning. But just how much we maybe as viewers don't understand how much there is to master from planning a training camp to planning a weight cut. I mean, there's so many layers and levels to this game he is certainly in a fantastic spot not just the run he had before the Habib fight but coming back and beating Hooker the way he did it was very interesting to hear how that that machine inside his head works and takes us all in but yes for the sake of the interim title Luke I know that that's the way Dana gets

them paid I hate it Shane Carwin's not my UFC heavyweight champion. Carlos Condit was never my UFC welterweight champion. It's a trinket, all right? So don't make it a belt. Make it a gold jacket or a ring or something or a sock on a cock that says, I got next. That's fine because that's all that really means, Luke. But I like where he's going with it right here. How much do you feel like your background in covering boxing all these many years I mean I don't think that the position you adopt

is in any way like controversial or the not the norm I think most people would probably agree like do we really need an interim title like we probably don't so I think in that sense it's quite mainstream but what I mean to say is I have noticed that when you get guys who, and you are 50-50 at this point, but when your career historically has been predominantly covering boxing, you talk to those guys about the interim titles and how rare they are, relatively speaking, to boxing. They love that.

They love that there's very little part of it. They love that you hardly ever see it. They love when fighters, to your point, like Gaethje, take it off and say that's not for real. I see a lot of that on boxing, Twitter and boxing Instagram. Do you feel like that colors your perspective at all? Yeah. Look, you ever grow up? I didn't specifically, but you ever grew up in an alcoholic house? You come out of there not wanting to, uh, to, to play with the sauce. And I grew up in this, uh, in this bastardized environment of the boxing political structure where they will make a damn belt for anything, Luke.

But they don't tell the people that the frontline old guy Black Lives Matter championship doesn't really matter. And they don't tell the people that there's four lightweight champions in the WBA right now. Yeah, I don't want any of that bullshit to come to UFC. And, you know, my argument was always, if it gets you more money that way, well,

can't Dana just pay you more in a number one contenders fight? Cause that's really what it is all about. But yes, the UFC Zufa, their success for Tito's and Dana was in building something that was the opposite of their dying favorite sport. Right. That was,

so it's like, why, why are we going back in that direction? In terms of the rest of the interview favorite sport, right? So it's like, why are we going back in that direction? In terms of the rest of the interview from him, he had a quote in there. I hope he can share it at some point later, which was, he's not looking for a lighter load. He's looking for a stronger back.

It really resonated with me. I mean, the thing I took away from this... Yeah, don't use your water bottle there, guy. That's what the producer says. But my point bc is that my lesson from this interview was i don't know if poirier is going to beat mcgregor you know it's hard to know like what state mcgregor is going to be in assuming he's in any kind of state relative to the abilities as we know it he is a handful generally and especially early he's so good. He's dialed right in from the word go.

And Poirier takes a little bit of time to get going. It's not quite right to call him a slow starter, but his early rounds are not necessarily against the better opposition, sometimes his better rounds. So there's a real question to be asked about whether he can win this fight at all. But what I will say is, if he's going to win it, I do think now is the time. His level of maturity and understanding what makes him tick, what the ingredients are of success,

how to thread those needles, he has come around a lot. And I feel like, listening to him, that, again, we don't know if he's going to hide an injury or whatever, but BC, I felt like from this one, you're definitely going to get a different fight. Conor may get his hand raised again, but this idea that Dustin's going to go in there and just get run over in two minutes or something,

I don't buy it. Well, Luke, Dustin doesn't admit to it, doesn't cop to it anymore in interviews. And he didn't in your interview, didn't really take the bait. But McGregor owned him mentally in that first fight. And I think there are reasons why the fight went that way. Conor was better at featherweight and he was at a point of just rising with every performance that he was an unstoppable train. But also Poirier cutting down to featherweight

didn't have the same level of punch resistance. So those are foundational elements as to why that fight went the way it did, Luke. But also, he got in his damn head. I mean, he owned him, as you correctly laid out in the other instances in which Conor has done that to Alvarez, to whom? I mean, to everybody, basically, even at times with Nate, even though Nate is sort of prenaturally wired to not let that bother him. So I respect and love Poirier's responses, even the illustration of taking a piece of paper,

drawing a circle and trying to just put in the middle of there the things he can control in a fight camp and not worrying about the rest. Love that. And I love the veteran response of, you know, I don't care about the trash talk game, blah, blah, blah. But I do wonder, Luke, it's one thing to say that, but it's also another thing to get into a camp against Conor McGregor. Now, we don't know if Conor is going to be the featherweight madman he was back then,

or if this is the more mature cowboy Cerrone level camp of Conor, who was more like giving praise to people and being redemptive. Either way, it is one thing, I think, Luke, to say I've evolved past being subject to that. I'm more mature. and another thing to execute it because that is one thing Conor does great unless you believe Luke that the magic is gone from what what the mental side of the Conor attack used to mean yeah there's a big question of if Conor doesn't play those mind games anymore we don't know if he will or he won't it's still a little bit too early to tell but to the extent extent, and also, by the way, COVID might help Dustin Poirier in that sense, where there is no big fight week.

They're not going to have, you know, at the Figueredo pay-per-view, they're not going to have, to our knowledge, I guess we'll have to see, BC, but my hunch is they're not going to have a press conference that day for the media, certainly not for the fans, with the next pay-per-view's headliners. You know how they used to do that at the beginning of this year and at the end of last year, you know, to set up the next pay-per-view where there's all these fighters on stage and the fans are screaming. You know, you get chewed up at those kinds of things. In fact, during the interview, I had referenced, you know, RDA getting chewed up by Conor. I don't think a lot of fans realized

RDA was the original opponent for Conor, UFC 196, before he fell out and they substituted in Nate Diaz. And when they had that press conference, you had RDA in a very conventional suit saying very conventional things. You had Conor showing up intentionally looking like Pablo Escobar and just from a verbal standpoint, eating him alive, right? Just going after him. It was a thing to behold.

Because of COVID, BC, and again, we don't know what choices Conor's going to make, but certainly because of that, you don't have to deal with that anymore. You don't have, at least not nearly as much. Maybe on Fight Week at Fight Island, I'll have to deal with some of it, but not a lot, dude. It's not a big deal like it used to be. And so I really wonder if Conor either doesn't choose those weapons anymore or doesn't have them as readily available. What does that do to the fighting itself where we have believed for the longest time that the mental aspect played a key component in his wins? I still believe he's talented enough, again, if he has retained his abilities to beat most of the elite 155ers. But it's a serious open question and I don't know the answer to it. I mean,

it's wild. And this is a debate that only really happens with somebody like Connor, who has had that kind of level of fame and left the sport for so long. I mean, we're talking about a guy, Luke, who had, has had two lightweight fights, two Luke, two lightweight fights, and they were years apart and they were both title fights. And I know that there's a lot of people who are, you know, always say there's there's people who believe he's Jesus and then there's people who think he's always sucked and is never good but the people that are very critical of him they quickly always point out you know like do we even know if he has legitimate lightweight power meaning like legitimate get you out of there like he did at featherweight yes he threw a

absurd four-punch combination and just bedazzled Eddie Alvarez but you know we only learned so much from the the uh Habib fight in which he got you know dragged down and gassed out and he had no zip on his punches even in that round that he won it seemed like Luke so it's hard to tell I mean look if the mental games mean nothing and I think you laid out why it might mixed with the maturity of Dustin even though I just gave a disclaimer that it's one thing to say you're mature and another thing to deal with a guy like that if this fight is more about just the damn fights yeah you gotta favor Poirier in this one and I think that's a big part of why we need to see this uh want to get them both in their own particular solo COVID bubble and just say train in

there eating their crap in there don't leave because we need you. We need you. The good news is Poirier said he's going to go to Fight Island even earlier than before. So, you know, hopefully he can get there unscathed. And once he gets there, I'm pretty confident he'll be fine for the duration of his stay. All right. Topic number three, BC. And this is one where, again, this is why I like this show, BC. Well, I like the show for many reasons. One, it pays but two you know we try to treat boxing uh seriously here we take it seriously on the show obviously it's a much bigger part of your background than mine but I'm trying to make it part of my future in a much more full-throated way and this is where having a little bit of knowledge on either side of the game comes in handy Clarissa Shields who is the

would you call her the best female boxer alive, BC? Maybe Katie Taylor, I guess, is somewhere in that conversation. Yeah, in the discussion. In the discussion, we'll leave that. Certainly she is a premier, if not the premier talent on the women's side of the game.

She has signed with the Professional Fighters League on the MMA side of things, I guess to fight at 145 pounds. BC, what can you tell us about Clarissa Shields, the boxer, first? And then second, given those facts, how you think she might do in signing with the PFL? And we'll unpack everything through that conversation. Look, this is big news in a lot of ways. I want to tip the cap to an organization I don't always speak awesomely of, the PFL. This is a fun signing. It's very interesting because, Luke, and I'm going to

answer your question shortly, it's one thing for somebody like Shields to say, I'd be willing to do a big MMA match. And in our idea, it's sort of a celebrity crossover one-off. It's one thing to say, well, what if she boxed Cyborg? All those things are just curiosity it's another thing to say no i'm i'm going for it i'm making a legitimate move into mixed martial arts give me a year of step-up fights and then let's see 2022 you know where i stand among the big names and the champions there whether it's a kayla aris and a cyborg or whoever she can get in with so let's break this down um she's an incredible athlete Let's say that first and foremost. Women's boxing only gives you two-minute rounds rather than three. So there are a lot of people who believe that has robbed from the potential of getting more knockouts. When you look at Clarissa Shields' boxing record, unbeaten, has won titles in so many different weight classes and unified and became undisputed.

I mean, in such a short time, yet doesn't have a lot of stoppages. So I think that's telling you, Luke, she's not one punch knockout puncher it's just not but she's big quick athletic do you remember her big fight on Showtime against Christina Hammer that was hyped up for a few years when that finally became a fight it wasn't one because Shields was so far ahead of Hammer who was a decorated champion in Germany for like a decade, in terms of everything, IQ, carrying out of a game plan, and again, the athleticism. And I think that's what separates her from everybody else in boxing. She's a two-time Olympic gold medalist. I mean, she is the real deal when it comes to her fighting heart and her knowledge of this game.

But the real question is, how does that change to MMA? Now, look, there's certain things Luke she's got to get over she's got to be able to stop takedowns she's got to be able to absorb kicks to the you know leg like little foundational things that doesn't that that allows her to feel comfortable and want to do this in her favor Luke she's 25 so this is still you know early enough to to do this and you would think that they're going to be smart and really try to match her in the type of fights that can not expose her but allow her to keep going deeper into the water to figure it out um until we know whether her ground game and ability to do

some of the foundational aspects beyond punching are have bright potential or are going to stay remedial, it's really hard to try to gauge. But I think the advantage she'll have, Luke, over the other women, remember we saw Heather Hardy, Anna Houlton, decorated female boxers who made the move, and obviously Holly Holm's the biggest one. But what she has that they don't is youth, age, real athleticism, and again, just a mind and spirit for this, you know? So if she dedicates herself completely, and just so you know, she did say in subsequent interviews to Brito Komodo that she doesn't want to lose her belt in boxing, so she will stay busy fighting. She wants to fight three to four times in boxing to keep all her mandatories going and fit in two to three

MMA fights. It's ambitious, but she does keep a busy schedule. But Luke, I can't sit here and tell you we have a future champion on our hands. The proof will be in the Putin, as Floyd says. And yes, I'm excited for every step of the way, Luke, to see what she has and how she might be able to evolve. You love that. You love that. You know, Floyd's thing works because you can kind of use Putin as a, you know, it's a clever play on words. It's a lot better than Emmett Smith when he tried to be a Monday Night Football commentator. You remember that?

When he would accuse teams who lose of getting blowed out and things like that? It didn't quite work that well, did it? I find this story to be fascinating the more you think about it. On a surface level, you're like, okay, that's kind of quirky. But then when you really begin to dig into the details, BC, it's very interesting, which is, I want to say this. The thing that I think is absolutely unassailable about Clarissa Shields is one thing you were very clear to emphasize just now, which is her athletic prowess. Her athletic prowess cannot be challenged. She is very, very, very elite in that regard. I think whether she is competing in boxing or in MMA,

PFL, or any other organization, honestly, if she was signed to the UFC, would she be the best 145-pound pure athlete? Is she a better pure athlete than Amanda Nunes? She might be, just in pure athletic terms, right? However one wants to measure that. Obviously, she's not even close to the overall MMA fighter. It would be irresponsible to even suggest such a thing. But in terms of just athletic talents, she is on that level, if not exceeding it. So I think that is clear.

The thing to me that is not a foregone conclusion, though, is how she translates. So on the one hand, the change in boxing gloves, and I think the one thing that promoters and regulators get wrong on the women's side of things is they make their gloves too big. Women's boxing gloves should be six ounces, in my opinion. Here she's going to get down to four ounces. What is that going to do for her punching power? It can only improve it. But if you actually watch her box, I'm not going to say she doesn't hit hard, but being a power puncher is not her defining quality. She has a very educated and consistent jab.

She has good timing on her counters. She knows when to attack and when to defend in terms of the overall strategy through the rounds. But she's not some kind of like, you know, she doesn't have Amanda Nunez punching power, at least relative to her own sport. Again, we'll see how it translates to MMA. But like this idea that because you're a boxer, you automatically hit hard.

Power punching is different than boxing. They can intersect, but they're not the same thing. And I think that is not an obvious thing that people should just assume. The other one is, BC, true or false, she is the best boxer to try MMA in terms of both their ability and then doing it in their prime because James Toney is, you know, just one of the all-time greats but he was so far past his prime it didn't matter. Clarissa Shields, to your point, is 25.

So is that a true statement? I want to build on it. Well, I mean, Holly Holm was a very good boxer, right? Very good. Okay, but Clarissa Shields, gold medalist in the Olympics. I mean, we're talking about pedigree all the way through. And one other part about Clarissa Shields that is a plus to her, Luke, I think you're right. You're right. This is the most decorated, talented person to make that move. But Clarissa Shields turned pro at 168 and won titles. Now she's coming down to

54 was her recent. She's talking about moving down to welterweight and boxing if she can, which would tie into fighting at featherweight potentially, 145 in women's MMA. Somebody that's been able to do it over different weight classes and in different you know body types she's a true great fighter so we'll see if that translate but i think your point is right this is probably in the age is the the age is the key luke the age really is the key where there is time if she shows promise in those certain foundational aspects that we talked about you know trying ground game for the first time being able to do some of those things, you know, kicks and knees that there is room to improve. And, you know, we'll still be honest here, even though women's MMA has evolved exceptionally from where it started, uh, it's still centered largely around straw weight and sometimes Bantamweight. I mean,

145, they're just not a deep pool so that, you know, if she can get good quick, you know, there's no... Look, you want somebody who's an athlete and is smart, and she's got that. But she's got a fighting spirit. I mean, she's tough as nails, Luke. And she's going to need that eventually in the cage when somebody's got her down going for a choke and it's a real fight. I think that there's elements to her fighting spirit that haven't fully been quenched in the boxing realm that if it's as real as I think it is, could really blossom in MMA

where it is more about a grapple and a fight than just throwing hands. All right, so here's the thing that, again, I am not declaring to you these are reasons to say there won't be success. I am merely identifying some markers that remain somewhat unknown and we just don't know what the answer will be, positive or negative, until we get more information. One is the punching power. Again, I think it'll be improved, but hard to say exactly how much. That's the first. The second thing I'd say is while she has that pedigree, Holly Holm had kickboxing experience before she ever tried MMA. Why is that relevant? Because in MMA, fighters stand further apart than they do in boxing.

That enabled Holly Holm to keep people at range when they wanted to take her down. That enabled her to use a wider variety of weapons. That is not going to be available, at least immediately, in terms of the ease of things to Clarissa Shields. It's something to keep in mind. It's not as obvious as people think it is. And it should be. You should take it seriously. Because that actually, I think, really aided.

If I can fight at range and, one, you have to cover more distance, that's going to make my takedown defense, which is probably not very good, a little bit better because I have to use it less. And also, hello, kicking is maybe Holly Holm's best weapon. I mean, that's just really reality there. Clarissa Shields doesn't have those things. But the other part about this conversation, BC, is something she told, I think, The Athletic, which is that she said boxing is a sexist sport, and that's why she's leaving. They don't like the way that they're paid. She doesn't like the way that they're promoted. She doesn't like the way that they're talked about, and she feels that MMA is a oasis in the desert. I got news for her. I mean, she's got a point about the paychecks and some other things, no doubt about it.

But I don't know that it's like some progressive alternative to the sexist boxing world. I see her point. Even though we're going through a mini women's boxing renaissance right now. It's on TV more than it has been in years. You got the Katie Taylors. There there's some good fight there's actually some

really good fighters out there um at the same time she is right it's still looked at as an attraction they don't get the the promotion or the or the money on that level unless you are a shields or a katie taylor um and in mma it's it's it's normalized it's you know women's fighting is legitimate and normal and everything else. So, you know, that's what led people in the past when we're talking about Heather Hardy or Anna Hulett and going to Bellator, the bigger paychecks. And I don't think it's wrong what she said. And I think it plays into, again, her attitude of wanting to be the best and the greatest.

She called herself the quote. We can all agree that GWOAT is one of the worst things we ever heard anybody come up with, Luke, the greatest woman of all time in terms of just acronyms there. It's lame, but her point is well taken. I've always loved about her that she's got this chip on her shoulder and this passion to prove herself and to prove that her fighting sport is legitimate,

that she's always called out the best, has always been willing, as I said, to go to different weight classes. And now her goal, Luke, seems to be become the first to hold a major boxing title and a major mixed martial arts title at the same time. You couldn't ask for anything more from somebody trying in while they're, yes, there's probably financial implications of why she wants to do this. You couldn't ask for anything more from somebody who's calling themselves great and then is going out of their way to try to prove it. And again, at just 25, if she can make this a career, we could be talking about the kind of fighting career we haven't seen yet in terms of being able to cross over back and

forth on that extreme high level. This could be long-term, you know, a monster move from her in terms of maximizing her legacy, which again, is something we don't talk about enough because everybody is so much more about the money. Yeah. But here's the thing though, that I want to push back on her and you in terms of this argument, like, oh, MMA is, you know, it's got more progressive attitudes about women. Well, it does. I mean, yes. Okay. And that on that surface level examination, that is true. You do see a lot more hospitable attitudes towards

the participation of women and their marketability inside mma than you do in boxing well i mean can i just say this out loud women's boxing is not especially exciting in fact it's usually fucking boring women's mma is not i mean there's something to be said about hold on let me make a point here there's something you want her to make you a sandwich too, Luke? No, listen to me, listen to me. It's got nothing to do... This is what I'm trying to tell folks. Men's and women's gymnastics, for example, are not the same.

They do some of the same stuff, but there's a lot of differentiation because they figured out there's ways to make the different body types and the physical capabilities work for different ends. The men do the iron rings, for example. There is, again, the pommel horse and some other things are – there's an overlap there. But the women have some of their own individual events. Here's what I'm trying to get across. What the insight is of MMA is that when you let the full breadth of someone's athletic talents shine, women's game in MMA is phenomenal to watch.

In many cases, as good, if not better, than the men's. But if you just want to make it about what boxing can provide under a limited set of rules, particularly with heavier gloves, the punching power isn't there nearly as often. Of course, there's some depth of talent issues as well. But what I mean to say is they haven't, to me, figured out the proper rule set and included glove size on the women's side of boxing to make it as exciting and frankly, as competitive as it should be. In MMA, you get a lot more of that. There was a lesson I learned from someone who was teaching arm bars. It was a little dude. And he was like, what's going to win in a contest, your arm or my body? And he was sort of showing, if he puts his whole arm or his whole body against my arm and he tries to break it, my arm can't win. It's a way to leverage size, no matter what your size is,

for maximum end. That's why Ronda's arm bars are amazing. Now, yes, you get the Amanda Nuneses out there who have significant punching power. But, dude, are people going to really sit? I mean, this sounds like I'm doing some kind of, you know, Archie Bunker bit, but I don't believe that's really fair. How many people can sit here and raise their hand and say, truly, that they get as much entertainment from the women's side of boxing as they do the men's, even when you have the elite side? I like Larissa Shields fighting. I certainly do. entertainment from the women's side of boxing as they do the men's even when you have the elite side i like lorsa shields fighting i certainly do i respect her tremendously as an athlete but the

way in which that sport is structured dude it's not that exciting is that controversial to say no it does come off at first like a like a you know women's suffrage debate but that you're right and i think the main point of why you're right is that women's boxing at the moment, even though it's going through a renaissance period, is still so largely underdeveloped. And when you have a sport that's underdeveloped, you don't actually have the best in the world competing at it. Or if you do, there's only a couple that are really the best in the world. And everybody else after that is so damn average. And when somebody is so damn average, they don't have a ton of power. They don't have a ton of dynamic. It's just a fight. so it doesn't mean that there's no that there aren't exciting women's

fighters there is doesn't mean that there hasn't been exciting fights i mean the delphine pursuant and katie taylor uh two fights were fantastic but you're right luke um i'm just saying all pointing out is it's a it's a lesson on this it's a for-profit business. And the reason why it works in MMA is because women's MMA is fantastic. The open rule set and the way in which the body can be applied for violent ends in MMA, it just works, dude. It works really well. And so because people realize you can make money behind it, they've got much more open attitudes. If women's boxing was able to be that dynamic relative to the men's side,

I think you you see open attitudes there but it just doesn't work in the way that it's supposed to yeah and again look ronda opened the door and i remember specifically like in the karmush fight when ronda was in that face crunch submission we were like oh my god if she taps does that kill women's mma well it turned out she didn't tap it also turned out that we were able to, they were able to, excuse me, put out such high-quality fights in the wake of Ronda, right? Creating the UFC Women's Strawweight Division and seeing how across the board you have some great athletes. You're right. Deeper pool, better stuff.

Look, Clarissa Shield has done so much in 10 fights. But there's a reason why so many of her fights, Luke, have been unifications and stuff. And you're like, how is she fighting for three or four titles in a different weight class every time? Well, it's because there just aren't a lot of great fighters. And sometimes there's a lot of vacant titles and they're just thrown onto her when she comes into a fight to make it even bigger. When, yes, the reality is the pool is not, it's so shallow. And the sport, comparative to the elements of MMA and women's MMA that can become pretty exciting, really exciting. And you know what happens on the ground and the concept. Yeah, you're right. You're right.

You're not, you're not Archie Bunker. I'm just, I know it sounds Archie Bunker to be like, but I like women's jujitsu. I think it's just as exciting as men's. I mean, it's actually a little bit better. Oh, true. And you made the gymnastics comparison, but I think basketball might be the best one, Luke. There are times I live in Connecticut where UConn women are the biggest thing ever so there's certainly times when i've gotten into yukon women or wmba for certain seasons but luke i think it's not wrong that there are is such a large male population even to this day in 2020 they're like the women's game is just not exciting enough for me and it's not wrong to say that right you compare the two if you look at the crime rates who commits most crimes men men commit most crimes including

violent crimes right i'm the first person to admit that the data just shows what it shows but it tells you a lot about physical aggression and physical abilities and if you're going to make rules for that and then try to adapt them for women where you're just throwing those hands, I don't know that it translates as well versus just opening up the rule set and then it translates fantastically. It's not a comment on women or women's sports. It's a comment on that particular way it works in that rule set for that particular gender. That's it. That's all I'm suggesting to you.

It's not women don't have a place or we shouldn't be as exciting. I'm just saying if people can make a buck off of something, they're going to have a good attitude about it. And there's a better way to make a buck off women's fighting. I think in boxing, again, I think that the gloves are way too big. But, okay, different question. By the way, you started this debate by using the term full-throated argument. And I can't get Rocco out of my head. So let's just get out of this topic altogether.

Okay. All right. BC, you know, I won't eat crow, but I will say I was – because I still thought it would do well, but it did way better than I thought it would. Dan Raphael of whatever site he's with these days. Boxing scene. Okay, good.

Shouts to boxing scene. I don't know. Shouts to boxing scene. Okay. Excuse me. I should say Mike Tyson and Rojoins Jr. pulling in apparently one, maybe 1.2 mil on the pay-per-view buy rates. Now, we knew it did really well just from a sort of a casual observation of interest.

But then on top of it, you know, I will say this, BC. They sold it for $50. I wonder if they had tried to sell it for $75, how much that would have hurt it. But either way, it did extremely well, BC. Your response to these great numbers. This is a separate argument from the one we had Monday, which was, was the pay-per-view actually entertaining? Did it make you want to watch more? The sales come in, obviously, before the show happens. So this is a monster success. Rayfield reported that it could be as high as 1.5 million, maybe even 1.7 due to

some people's projections once all the receipts are tabbed. Let's talk about why this is massive. The promotion was horrific. I mean, just horrific. And I really thought, Luke, the whole scare about will this be a real fight or will the commission get in the way would have killed it. But yes, at the end of the day, it is Tyson. And it is Tyson returning from a 15 year absence. But look, I think the main reason why you and I were, you know, dismissive of the odds of it going over a million. I think I said, you know,

I could see it doing seven to 800,000 is because like pay-per-view is not in the healthiest place. Numbers wise at the moment, people do have to realize when Manny Pacquiao and Floyd Mayweather were on that five-year road to fight each other they both benefited so much from the fact that they never cashed in on that fight and we were all just sitting here going when are you going to fight each other so each time Pacquiao would fight Margarito or Mosley and Floyd would fight Ortiz and Marquez we're just hoping okay if they win they're going to call out the other guy at the end of the fight I got to to see this, you know, blah, blah, blah. I hope they can not lose and keep the fight together. They were doing a million plus almost every time.

The reality is Luke, it's so hard to do a million plus. It was 10, 15 years ago. It is even more now outside of, uh, let's be honest here over the past five ten years okay outside of may mac may pack and floyd canelo do you know the fights that have done over a million luke sort of uh you know specifically the last five six years glovkin canelo one and two and that's it luke that's it i mean koto canelo was a big fight for hbo pay-per-view in 2015. Puerto Rico versus Mexico, like, colliding. And it was a great promotion, and it still did like 800,000. And it's just, that's where pay-per-view is. Specifically, that's where pay-per-view is after Maypack, which, if you remember, Mayweather Pacquiao was the first fight to raise it up to 100 bucks and it was the fight where like everybody had to see it after not watching a big boxing fight for years and it didn't live up to people's expectations blah blah blah that did sort of kill the market you're telling me that two guys over 50 no matter their name value and yes the name value in this case was the reason why but no matter their name

value can come in here and draw over a million when pay-per-view is basically dead, Luke. And I say dead because how many times have you seen the last couple of years, Luke, whether it's Wilder or Spence or whoever's in the main event of a pay-per-view, Gervonta will find out they did three, four or 500,000. We're like, that's a monster win in this era, in this day and age. Dude, old man Tyson just did maybe a million and a half. That's insane, Luke. Okay. How much would a $75 price tag reduced purchases? 10, 20%. I can't, I mean, was that a major differentiator? And it certainly had to help Luke, but I don't think that was make or break. No, I don't think it's make or break. And again, who the hell knows what the answer is? I think you're probably right.

Somewhere between 10 and 20%. But if it does sell a million and it's 20%, well, now you're back at 800,000, the Canelo, excuse me, the Canelo Cotto territory, right? So, like, how much of a whopping difference would there be in that case? I think your point about boxing, boxing basically doesn't have many stars

right now that can sell shitloads of pay-per-view buys. It's got plenty of TV fighters, plenty of those, but not so much you can sell pay-per-view buys. I just, again, massive success, way more than I thought it would be, totally underestimated it, and I'm willing to call it just as I see it. Still, it's just a curiosity for me. I really wonder what the relaxed pay-per-view price means in the end. And look, even comparative to MMA, let's talk about that same time frame, the last five years. What has done big business outside of Conor or UFC 200?

Like, you haven't seen a lot of million pluses, right? Ortiz, Liddell, three. It did 350 buys, right? Yeah. No, literally, 350 buys. By the way, same pay-per-view price i think it was just 50 bucks tells you a lot about that doesn't it it's it's why i mean look okay so that's tyson in a tight you can't overlook tyson is a ma is the reason okay at the end of the day it is the reason so luke we talked on monday about we both believe there is a market for all guy fights we both believe the the a market for all guy fights.

We both believe the, the window could end up being short for a bunch of different reasons. I mean, eventually someone's going to get hurt or it's going to suck or whatever, but what could this do to the fight that everybody's trying to make now? And everybody being Evander Holyfield, putting out press releases and coming on the internet and all that. I mean, Holyfield Tyson three, even given what we know from Tyson Jones, that it was fun, but it wasn't a war. Dude, this fight is a bigger fight on paper, right?

I mean, Roy Jones is great, but he was never a crossover mainstream star on the level that Holyfield was. And specifically with the, look, look, it's the casuals that get a pay-per-view up to two million, right? It really is. That's the market. It's the casuals. get a pay-per-view up to 2 million, right? It really is. That's the market.

It's the casuals. No, dude, up to a million. Sorry. I mean, I don't think there's a million households are hardcore boxing fans. I mean, in some kind of general way. But to me, if you saw a million, you have crossed into casual big time. So casuals know the bite fight. Look, this, Tyson didn't, Tyson's performance was so surprising and good, even though it wasn't a war and there were no knockdowns,

that I have to believe, can this do two million pay-per-view buys, Luke? Tyson, Holyfield 3? Here's the deal. I mean, think about something. If Roy Jones fought Anderson Silva, how well would that do in terms of pay-per-view? Probably pretty well. I don't imagine, and maybe you disagree, but I don't imagine it would sell anything close to this one.

And so you have to ask yourself, why is that the case? One, Mike is a towering figure in boxing and in combat sports. Two, something that folks just don't really appreciate, the dude has remained relevant. Whether he is doing his podcast, or he's in The Hangover, or he's doing that one-man show or whatever. There's a roast where he's involved or something. Dude, Mike is just kind of always hanging around in a way where you notice him on major networks, opportunities,

movies, whatever. Mike is everywhere all the time. There's this continuous fascination about him. He's got this weed business. I mean, people are fascinated with this dude. Roy Jones Jr. does not capture that same kind of attention, and neither does Anderson Silva, even if both obviously are, when they competed, were legends of the game. So you take that, plus maybe his most, I don't know if it's the most iconic fight, but one of his most iconic moments, bad or good, and you run that back again against the guy who was also part of that heavyweight experience in the 90s where heavyweight boxing was kind

of the shit. It's like, how do you miss with that one? It's wild. I mean, look, just the simple element of this will be the first time they're fighting since the bite fight. Even though all of us fight fans know they've made up a million times and they're both ambassadors for the game and they love each other. Just that casual person that's like the last time I cared about these two, the dude bit the dude's ear off and there was a brawl in the ring.

Look, I mean, 2020 is so freaking weird. And obviously we can't get to this discussion of Holyfield Tyson trilogy, maybe doing stupid numbers, maybe without having seen Tyson Jones first and waking up and realizing that the market is there. But Luke, at the beginning of 2020, if I would have told you this year would play out the way it did COVID wise, you'd think I'm crazy. If I would have told you we would have cared that much about Joe Exotic for some season,

you would have thought I was crazy. And most importantly here, if I told you we would close the year on morning combat by saying could tyson holyfield three in an exhibition when they're both old as shit do two million pay-per-view buys look i mean is that what's the ceiling on this fight what is the damn ceiling right now on this part about it dude what fight was promoted worse than this one and did as well honestly i don't know the answer that usually to get over 1 million buys you not only need the kind of headliners who can do that you have to have a reasonably competent team who knows how to promote it could you imagine seven all access showtime you need one of those vehicles that

people care about you know bingo dude could you imagine if they actually promoted this correctly with the right team, the right assets, the right media, the whole nine yards? Could it do three? I mean, that seems ambitious, but two-five? Honestly, at this point, I'm going to go all in and say two-five with the right promotion, I don't think is crazy. I really don't. Dude, if Tyson goes in there and he's in such great shape that it's not impossible, a 2-5 with the right promotion, I don't think is crazy. I really don't. Dude, if Tyson goes in there and he's in such great shape that it's not impossible, and let's say him and Holyfield put on a fun fight because they're both action guys, and let's say Tyson stops him.

We talk about the redemption story and that angle from what Tyson got last week. Well, at age 50, I mean, come on. I'm telling you this. Remember the key to George Foreman's comeback commercially, right, was how much people, some people thought he was a con man in doing it, how much he charmed the American public. If you don't remember the 90s and George Foreman's comeback, and you're only thinking about the knockout of Moore, which was the real turning point that allowed him to do that.

Luke, George Foreman had a sitcom on ABC shortly after the Moore fight. He obviously had the grills line, which kept him so on the forefront of pop culture. But he was like a, I mean, he would come into the press conferences for his fights, Luke, with a tray full of cheeseburgers and laugh about how he was a grandpa and a senior citizen. Could you see Tyson going so far full circle that, forget mentioning a rapist, I mean, if he comes out, he was so nice after the Jones fight and so touched and giving the money to charity and all that.

What if he goes out there and fights Holyfield and some monster success and he wins? Could he have an about face publicly? Now, look, he already had the about face to fight fans with the one-man show and all that in turning his life around. But I'm talking about like mainstream. This guy could be the biggest star of 2021 if that's the case. I know.

Honestly, it's like, is there a reasonable possibility, a reasonable possibility that again, if promoted correctly, blah, blah, blah, Mike Tyson could be the biggest combat sports star in 2021? Is that a possibility? It's wild. I don't know that it's the likeliest one, but I couldn't discount it. I couldn't discount it. You have to at least take it seriously as a contingent moment.

It really speaks to his popularity. I don't think he can do a full reformation. I mean, he's tried the reformation thing all this time, and there are still some acts about his past, including he's a felon, but I don't know if they're alleged rapes or whatever. There are indiscretions in his past that he has very much apologized for, and there are some he has not. And to them, to critics, that makes him an unrepentant rapist.

And I don't know that there's any way around that, to be quite candid with you. That seems like— Well, look, let me pause you on that, okay? What was the key part about Ali becoming the the true legend that he became that that you know went so far above sports went into you know he refused when he refused to be drafted well no it was it was the turning it around late with all the philanthropy work and I mean he would you know they would send Ali out to the Middle East and try to do peace talks you mean you mean what got him on the good side I I'm talking about where he fit into the whole lot. Yeah, so when he went on the good side,

you weren't talking anymore about draft dodging, about being a Black Panther, about all these things that made 1960s and 1970s white America be like, this guy's a villain. I mean, look, you know, Ali was a villain for a long stretch to certain pockets of the world, and then he became everyone's hero and the ambassador for this sport. Tyson's on the fast track to doing that Luke where I really think it's going to get to a point where it's like he's this lovable redemption story and character like it and it's wild to think about he's already had so many ups and downs and personal turnarounds that there might be the biggest one possible for him he's going to be your Ali for the next 20, 30 years.

I'm a little bit skeptical of that because he went to jail. And you think about other athletes who have gone to jail like Michael Vick. Michael Vick has made a pretty significant rehabilitation. He's on Fox. I don't know if he calls games, but he's certainly a studio analyst. And even then, there are people who just will not forgive him. I'm not suggesting that they're right or wrong. It's everyone's decision about how they want to treat what he did

and then subsequently how he has tried to atone for it. It's a complicated debate. But the lesson I take from both Mike and Mike Vick is that rehabilitation is clearly possible, in some ways to a pretty strong degree. But to become America's dad, you know, there's a certain wholesomeness there that has to be there that I don't know that some of that baggage is ever going to quite get shed.

I could be wrong. We'll see. I mean, here's the thing. If you can sell 2-5 and you're still not America's dad, who gives a shit, right? You're America's, you know, funny uncle. Oh, but you still sell 2-5. I mean, America's dad who gives a shit, right? You're, you're America's, you know, funny uncle.

Oh, but you're still selling five. I mean, it gives a fuck at that point, you know? Well, let's see. Uh, Holyfield did put out a press release that said the quote,

Luke, my side tried to make the fight happen and we got nothing but excuses. Now I can see why he wanted to tune up fight before thinking about fighting me. There's a lot of back and forth here. You'd have to think the fight's going to happen. Mike seems to be interested, despite that quote. Also, I've seen Holyfield

in person recently. He doesn't move all that sprightly. I'm a little, you know, take these press releases with a grain of salt. Well, I mean, do you think this fight would be fun? It's not my thing, dude. It doesn't matter what I think. You're asking me will it sell? For sure it will sell.

Will it be fun? Two guys in their fucking 50s? I mean, a hard pass, bro. Super hard pass. Soft, come on. You got to soft pass me on that. It's a soft pass. Come on, Luke.

All right, soft pass. Soft pass, fine. Soft pass. Don't be salty. It's just not, you know, oh, Luke, let's play country music for your birthday. Nah, I'm good. You know what I mean? It's not going to make me happy on my birthday. You know what I mean? All right, but now let's play country music for your birthday. Nah, I'm good. You know what I mean? It's not going to make me happy on my birthday.

You know what I mean? All right, but now let's go to the side of boxing that nobody likes but is the most important, which is the actual side of boxing. This weekend, Errol Spence and Danny Garcia fight BC. Danny Garcia talking about being in the shape of his life, how he's routinely underrated. Left hook Garcia out from Philly. He wants to make it happen.

Set up this fight for everyone. What are you looking for and what is at stake? Dude, this is like in a weird way slipped under the radar. It's a Fox pay-per-view this Saturday at AT&T Stadium. Super under the radar, by the way. Super. Yeah, and it's a great fight on paper. And here's the key storyline. And here's the key element Yeah, and it's a great fight on paper. And here's the key storyline.

And here's the key element why it's not only a great fight on paper, but it's elevated because of the unknown. Spence, unbeaten, has two of the four welterweight titles, putting them on the line against Garcia, former two-division champion, obviously, fantastic fighter, still in his prime at 32. But the key is Spence hasn't fought since October when he beat Sean Porter in that classic pay-per-view duel they had.

And then two weeks later had that absurd accident. Flipped his Ferrari a bunch of times. Ejected from the vehicle. Not wearing a seatbelt. Charged with DWI. Yet, crazily, Luke, walked away with no broken bones. Needed a new set of teeth. Had a bunch of scrapes and bruises.

But, you know, he went to the Cleveland Clinic to have his brain checked and everything is kosher. He's coming in here on a 14-month layoff, no tune-up fight, went through the quarantine like everybody else. And Errol Smith is going right back in there for his third straight pay-per-view, headlining it against a guy who, look, there's been some hate through the years for Danny Garcia. People put cherries on the Instagram, right? He fought Rod Salka.

He got favorable scorecards against Mauricio Herrera and Lamont Peterson. I mean, look, there's been, but at the same time, Garcia's really damn good. And I think from a one-punch standpoint, I think he's the biggest puncher at welterweight. People give me so much shit for that. But that no-look left hook is absolutely brutal in both divisions um he's in this fight because he can box right same thing he did against lucas matisse many years ago when you and i were in vegas for that canelo floyd fight now the difference is errol spence ain't you know lucas matisse it's a different hurdle here but he's in this fight because he's patient he's, and he's got an exit game in terms of power.

Luke, just the questions alone of wanting to know whether Errol Spence can go through this life-changing thing and still be the same is without a doubt worthy of price of admission, as is what's at stake for the winner. Everybody wants Pacquiao. Sean Porter wants the winner. Keith Thurman wants the winner. I mean, there are no shortage. Terrence Crawford. there are no shortage of monster fights you can make, Luke. But it comes down to this. And I want to ask you this because it's the biggest storyline. And it's wild to think either way. There's one scenario, Luke, where Spence will not be the same from this, whether it's a physically, mentally, or a combination of both. And this could end up being a tougher fight

than we, than, you know, than the people favoring him expect. But what about the flip side? What about the fact that walking away from this accident, which he's called a miracle, he said he had angels, you know, protecting him. He was straight up drinking at a club. There were, you know, footage of it. He's driving a Ferrari with no seatbelt at extreme speeds in Dallas. I mean, like he was living a reckless life. What if this somehow makes him better in the long run? Because he admitted in the morning combat interview, you can watch it where, you know, he was living out of control.

What has he done since the accident? He bought a ranch and a farm. He's got horses. He's got his family there. He moved out of Dallas. Like he is taking it seriously, living, breathing, sleeping, boxing. Which side do you think that falls on? That he's worse off for going through that

or somehow even better long-term? Tend to think better, right? Worse off, he would... I'd be a lot more concerned if he was doing the same kinds of things. Now, obviously, with bars and clubs and restaurants being closed or impacted in the way that they are, it has put a real hurtin' on the town drunk's opportunity to go to his local watering hole. But I think moving out is probably a good thing.

I'm not a big believer that the crash is majorly impactful, to be quite honest with you. I think that it was maybe a wake-up call, certainly scary. It required some hospitalization, but it didn't shred his knees or his shoulders or his elbows. It didn't affect his mobility really in any kind of way other than for a very, very minor short amount of time. Caused some lacerations, but that's really about it. So that's scary, and that is is real and I take that seriously and thank God he is okay, obviously. But it didn't, you know, this wasn't Alex Smith or this wasn't Joe Theismann or, you know, I don't know, somebody getting in a car wreck and then having to get

their shoulder reattached. It wasn't any of those things where you not only have the trauma of the event, you have the physical trauma that you have to deal with. There was no videos of Spence learning how to walk again in some kind of hospital ward. It was kind of in and out, and then he made the switch. So to me, I take the trauma of the accident seriously, but given how lucky he was, there's not much more to it than that. So the question is, what do you really expect from Danny Garcia? You know what's funny, man? I'm with you. Danny Garcia can box his ass off. I looked at the odds. They're not too far apart. They've got Spence at about minus 400, Garcia about plus 300. Obviously,

Garcia has that monster left hook. But you know what I can't find? I can't find anybody who, when it's other than Angel Garcia, Mr. Angel, I can't find anybody when when it's other than you know angel garcia mr on hell i can't find anybody when it's time to say which way are you going on this i can't find anybody who's like you know i really got garcia you know they take garcia seriously as a potential threat but only if something goes like calamitously wrong that's for spence and i don't really see anybody like here is the case for danny garcia as the boxer. That's just missing from the conversation. So for those reasons, you have to think Spence is going to win. Well, Garcia does have like A plus chin. He's got great power. He's a better boxer than you think. But yes, is he going to go out there and outbox Spence?

Not likely unless there's knockdowns, right? Could he not? Could he finish Spence? Certainly it's in play, but Spence is absolutely ripped, Luke, and ready for this physically that if nothing's wrong and the recovery of the layoff and the mental strain of the accident and all that. And look, what he said to me was he doesn't remember any of it, Luke. He has no memory of the accident, no memory of the three weeks he spent in the hospital. His first memory is waking up at home the first day that he was brought home. And while, I mean, there's certainly something alarming in that, at the same time, Luke, I wonder if that has removed

some of the potential mental hurdles that could be there from this. You know what I mean? If maybe it was almost like a dream to him, and now it's like, okay. Well, I'm just going to say, if he was doing what he was doing before why would go why would be why would doing what he's doing now make it worse yeah and well he was starting to blow up between fights and get a little chubby and we saw look when he walked in on uh you remember when sean porter beat danny garcia and Spence walked into the ring and said

we good friends I love your daddy let's get it on dude he was drunk as shit during that I remember like none of us really wanted to say anything on Twitter and there was backstage interviews where he was slurring his words I mean he he said like this was the recommitment he needed to know that I need to be in shape all year long which is obviously what the greats do to always be ready and to sort of clean up some of the, you know, I'm walking on water, I'm a star, I'm a stud type of thing. If he comes out there and boxes, look, Danny Garcia's biggest kryptonite, Luke, is he does not have elite level foot speed. So people like Lamont Peterson, people in the past have been

able to, I mean, even Keith Thurman was able to use quickness to sort of outbox him. You got to have a big punch to keep him away. But if Spence decides to box and use his length, there are reasons to believe this could end up being a, you know, eight rounds to four clear and solid decision win for him. If he's back and he's ready, I can't wait to see it. Yeah, I mean, I think it'll be fun. I for sure think it'll be competitive. It's just like, what's the road to Garcia getting the majority of the rounds or, you know, knocking him down or stopping him with strikes? You know, it's like, I don't know that I see a clear path for that. handicapping this fight is not really all that different from handicapping when Keith Thurman

fought Danny Garcia in March of 2017 almost sort of the same thing Keith Thurman a complete fighter in the same way Spence's quick can box has great power all that um Thurman came out a little great against Garcia early but you remember that fight Luke it was a split decision everyone's scorecard was basically 115 113 either. Thurman tasted Garcia's power and he sort of changed. And he got more defensive and he left the back door open and Garcia filled that hole and he came on and he rallied.

You have to wonder if there's potential in that. I think Spence has a better chin than Thurman and has more of a willingness to stand in there like he did against Porter. But I just wanted to say that to say, I didn't think there was an avenue for Danny Garcia against Keith Thurman, even though I love that fight, and he made it pretty damn close.

Well, the last time that Garcia has fought elite opposition, it was the Sean Porter fight, which was September of 2018. Then he fought Adrian Granados, who hasn't fought since that time. And then he beat Redcats. He knocked the stuffing out of Granados, and nobody does that. Okay, but he had seven losses heading into that contest. It's not like he was fighting for the crown. time and then he beat red he knocked the stuffing out of grid auto so nobody does that okay i mean okay but he had seven losses heading into that contest it's not like he was a lot of a lot of controversial decisions but yes it was it was not an a plus win yes all right and then he fought

ivan red catch now we were there for that we were working with showtime and that was a dominant performance by um by garcia but you know he was also getting booed by the end there a little bit because it went the full distance for a guy who was basically getting booed by the end there a little bit because it went the full distance for a guy who was basically overmatched now maybe that was a stay busy fight no in fact it was definitely a stay busy fight and he was fighting a little bit more carefully as a consequence I'm just saying the last time you've seen like a shining like Garcia at his absolute best against elite opposition what would you say uh Brandon Rios even then a little bit uh rios a little washy peterson rios a little washy malanagi

was washy in that fight peterson was probably the last and guess what i i had peterson beating him so yeah i mean look this is a point well taken luke he's he's a great elite b-side he's look he was asked by uh mike coppinger on the Athletic Podcast, like, if you beat Spence, is this cement the Hall of Fame? And Danny was like, dude, I'm already in the Hall of Fame. And you know what, Luke, he's got one of those resumes where you're like, he has beaten a lot of big names. You know what I mean?

But yet, to your point, when was the last straight-up elite foe that he beat straight up? Was it Lucas Matisse in 2013? Maybe. Yeah, it's been a while. All right. Well, with that in mind, those are our top five. BC, it's Matisse in 2013? Maybe. It's been a while. All right. Well, with that in mind, those are our top five. BC, it's time to have a little fun.

What's been happening on social media, good sir? Hey, it is time for SJW Social Justice Wednesdays. It's an OJ Wednesday, of course, as well. And let's bring in the honorable one, Luke Bader Ginsburg. A lot of talk on the internet, Luke, whether this segment has run its course, but we're going to try to resuscitate it, alright? Has it really run its course? I mean, you know, we're trying to figure out what to do with our Wednesday and Friday shows. Suck a dick, everybody. Yeah, right. Well, look, there's been a lot of activity post-Jake Paul knockout

of Nate Robinson. Everyone's getting involved, including Dylan Dannis, who was called out by Jake Paul following the knockout so dennis tweeted you just fought a retired nba reject be careful what you wish for little guy at jake paul okay so then dennis tweets this photo of jake paul and writes dance for me bitch at jake paul wearing the uh winnie the pooh tigger costume. Okay, that's weird. And then Gervonta steps in. How do we get here, Luke?

He responds to the fan comments saying Jake Paul should have called out Gervonta and he said he would have been to sleep next to Nate if he did that. Okay, all right. I mean, look, if you're Gervonta, Luke, you're not going to let a fan clown you about Jake Paul, right? I mean, you're going to come out swinging.

So then Jake Paul quote tweeted that with Dennis' name in it and said, I at King Ryan Garcia handle this light work for me talking about Gervonta. Ooh, okay. All right. Interesting shot out there. Then things got weird, Luke, because, uh, our old MMA veteran, Jose Canseco, has entered the conversation. He said, I will fight any one of the Logan brothers. They have enough for anyone with any type of talent yet or fighting skills. I don't think that's English, Luke. But Jose wants in.

You remember that time he fought Hong Man Choi, right? Yeah. I will fight any of the logan any of the logan brothers they have enough for anyone with any type of talent yet or fighting skills jose having problems at home the tito ortiz concoct that tweet for him look all right uh sorry i'm all tied up here uh so then it continued to get weird because logan paul. By the way, I found out this afterwards that Logan Paul used to sleep with Jose's daughter. Because here it comes. Logan Paul quote tweeted and said, no problem. I love smashing Conseco's.

Luke, that's A plus work right there. Judge, can you weigh in on that? All of this has been unbearably stupid up until this point. And this is equally stupid, but that's a nice thing. Okay, very good. Well, hey, stupid, but that's a nice thing. Okay, very good. Well, hey, Luke, we got Daniel Cormier. Somehow he joined this. He posted an image with a caption of Dennis.

And during the DC and Helwani show at ESPN, I heard it's a popular fight podcast. He said, Connor beats Jake Paul in a boxing match, but Jake Paul beats Dylan Dennis. Dylan does not need to fight Jake Paul because he'll get beat up. Wow, all right. I mean, we said the same thing on our show, Luke, more or less, but DC brought it straight and direct.

Well, Dylan Danis didn't like that, so he came back and quote tweeted DC and said, watch that fat mouth before I shut it with a little bit of Photoshop in there. Okay. Dude, is Dylan Dennis the absolute worst? I mean, he might be. I love him. I love him. I don't care. I love him. And

he sucks. And I love that. I love the troll in him. Well, DC ended the debate with a quote tweet saying, Dennis, sit your ass down before I called Jake Paul for you. Oh, DC, get his ass. That is great.

All right, so let me adjudicate this one. Your winners here by absolute first round KO. Logan Paul for the Canseco's line, and then Daniel Cormier. Everyone else, including Gervonta being a loser in this one, because, Gervonta, why are you bothering with these vermin?

These leeches. They're not even in the same... I mean, it is insulting to even consider them of being in the same profession. Please don't do that to yourself. No don't do that to yourself. You know, no need. But that zing from Cormier was fucking hilarious.

That was great. That made my day. God bless Daniel Cormier. What an American. Judge Luke Bader Ginsburg, we need you to weigh in here, not on who won, but trying to decipher what these tweets mean

on Social Justice Wednesday of this morning. Manager of the Stars Ali Abdelaziz came out and tweeted GSP with triple I emojis. Luke? Okay, all right, that's it? I want you first, knowing that Habib's going to meet with Dana, what's Ali doing right here? He's stirring some shit up, right? Stirring some shit up. But, you know, it's hard to tell if he's going to meet with Dana, what's Ali doing right here? He's stirring some shit up, right?

Stirring some shit up. But, you know, it's hard to tell if he's reacting to something or if he's trying to create something to react to. You know what I mean? He is a smart man in that regard. Well, Conor McGregor saw that, I'm guessing, and he fired off the next few tweets here.

He tweeted, shitty jocks. Okay. Then he tweeted, you can run, but you can't hide. This is all this morning. And then Conor ended with, don't be scared, homie. Are these two things related, Judge Ginsburg? Didn't Habib also say, I've choked out Dustin and Connor why would I want to fight either of them

I think he did say that I have to assume this is all related right it has to be right it has to be but like why would you put the first two not in quotations but then the third one you would now I get it it's Nate's line

or it's Nick's line whoever said it anymore I't remember, but it's the Diaz brothers line. Why would you put in quotations? I get that you're attributing it to them, but you're applying it for your own ends. I wonder if that's a reference to Nate saying he slapped Habib and Habib did nothing about it. I don't know. Whatever. Maybe. I don't know. This is why I don't follow any of these people on Twitter. This is why. All right. We'll see if this segment lives another day. But that's your social justice for the week, Luke.

Let's get into a segment that always wins every Wednesday. Let's do it. Let's do it. It's called fan submission, so here's what you need to do. DM me. Hit us up at morningcombat at gmail.com. Can I say something very quickly? Don't hit me up.

I'm not the guy. Send it to BC or morningcombat at gmail.com. Don't send it to me, please. Yeah, yeah, I'm the one, the one you love. So please send that to me. So this is, if you don't already know, your artwork, your submissions wearing our merch, whatever you want to do to join our community and get on the show. Let's kick it off here, Luke, with Scott M. Rizzo.

This guy's making some moves lately, Luke. Scott R.? I don't think it's Scott R. This is Scott Rizzo. Yeah, yeah, that's our guy. We got the looks to have. So what makes this great is you and I are the handsome, you know, darlings here of the early 80s, which was my favorite show as a kid without question. And our boss hog is Dana White with the cigar, which is hilarious, Luke.

So you and I are Bo and Luke Duke. By the way, you look like a Paul brother if ever there was one. You actually look like the dude that plays Tom Schneider or something? No, I look like some 1980s forgotten C-list porn actor in desperate need of a barber.

And then you got where's Roscoe Pico train? Where's all these guys? This is fucking hilarious. Well, Scott Rizzo was also working hard. Look, he picked out an obscure moment from our documentary, MK, The Return to the Studio, because he couldn't take his eyes off one part of it. So, look, I did feel.

I even mentioned this luggage to you. Let me guess. Rather than buying a normal piece of luggage and then putting some kind of sticker on it or some kind of identifying marker so you could easily get it at baggage claim, your idea was, let me go and rip out the carpet in a Motel 6 and use it to make luggage so that it is also identifiable at baggage claim. So I've had a few times where this became embarrassing that I have this in public. Why do I have this? My wife loves purple and she thought, let's pick out a bag that will be easily seen on the baggage carousel.

You're correct, Luke. So this has become my travel bag. I get some dirty looks and I always forget like, hey, maybe this bag's lame. I shouldn't travel with it. Well, then our folks at the MK did a long shot to end the documentary on that bag for some reason so uh yes it was distracting Scott Rizzo I need manly I need manlier man bags but I mean that is that I mean this is you know the good news is it's Bill Cosby pre-rapist but the bad news is it's Bill Cosby. Oh, wow.

That caught me. You caught me off guard there. All right. Well, speaking of the Campbell family, Luke, what do we got next? Oh, yeah. This is my dad.

That's my dad, Chris Campbell in Florida. He was gifted. Bro, this is your pops? Yeah. So he already owned MK merch because he's my dad Chris Campbell in Florida uh he was this is your pops yeah so he already owned MK merch because he's my dad and he loves me but somebody gifted him for his birthday with this MK sweatshirt so he's wearing it to show it off but look as I was looking at him I'm like are you on the road to becoming my dad I mean is this like looking in the mirror? You know what? I'm not too far away from that. I typically don't wear the black jeans with the black sweatshirt. My dad wears black jeans and black motorcycle t-shirt every day of the year.

You know what? God bless this fine American. I got to say, though, not too far apart. I am going to get a haircut later today, but not too far apart. Jesus Christ. Your pops, he got some thick-ass fingers, too. Look at those Vienna sausages. God damn.

Yeah, yeah, he's a big dude. Yeah. Shout out to pops right there. Bro, your dad and my dad do not look the same. Well, that's not quite true. My dad's got a beard and gray hair and all that kind of stuff. Will we ever get fan submission robert thomas wearing the mk gear will it ever happen you'll find the cure to cancer before you ever get that

okay okay all right well let's get weird here luke uh todd m has a very accurate representation oh yeah well luke let's uh you and i our old guys sitting on the toilet what do we have what do we have in our possession 40s all right we got some 40s by the way i don't know if you noticed this the and maybe this is unintentional but the empty 40s are the plastic variety and the ones that are filled have glass i know we had a conversation about that briefly um did we talk about playing battleship on the toilet i don't recall no but that is hilarious uh we both have laptops on our laps if you are only hearing the audio version and i'm exclaiming i sunk your battleship and it says toilet combat in the O.

Look at the O. Look at the O there. It's almost like the Oregon O. I'll say this. I used to play battleship with my brother when I was a kid, and I cheated on that game more than, you know, a pro athlete in the NBA cheats on his wife when on the road. Wow.

He would be like, oh, C7, which would be directly on one of my ships. And I would just put the red pin in one of my ships, but then not tell him. It was actually one of his things. And I would sink all of his ships but one. He'd be like, dude, how have I not hit any of your fucking ships? And I'd turn it around,

and it would be all my ships all sunk. I just wouldn't say anything. Is this a direct reference to Harold and Kumar? Was that the movie with the I sunk your battleship? Maybe. I've only seen the Harold and Kumar Christmas special. I've not seen the other one, the real one.

Oh, I rocked it on the airplane a couple months ago after a couple gummies. It was fantastic. It still absolutely holds up. All right. Let's roll on here. It wouldn't be MK Wednesday without our guy Dickles. Okay.

So here is a play on the movie I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry. It says I Now Pronounce You Morning Combat. I can't read what it says below our names. Yeah, I can't either death there is a great as can be but tell no one maybe see I recently saw this movie on Netflix they dropped the six-letter f

word several times in this movie not not as progressive as I thought I haven't seen it yet Luke I haven't seen it but funny well done there dick calls is back he sent us this edit from the movie Not as progressive as I thought. I haven't seen it yet, Luke. I haven't seen it. It's funny. Well done there. Dick Gulls is back. He sent us this edit from the movie True Lies, Luke. Are you Jamie Lee Curtis?

Yes. That's a great scene, by the way. An epic scene. I'm Jamie Lee Curtis dancing. Remember when she was undercover? And you're Arnold in the shadows sitting by the way. An epic scene. I'm Jamie Lee Curtis dancing. Remember when she was undercover? And you're Arnold in the shadows sitting in the corner. That is gross. She was pretty hot in that scene, Luke, okay?

Yeah, that was peak Jamie Lee Curtis. Jesus Christ, this is gross. Yeah, that is pretty gross. The camera turns off and we just bang. I don't understand that. There's probably more likely, Luke, that we fight, right? I mean, what is the shelf life of this show and our on-screen relationship? We're going to test it, right?

We're going to put it to the test. Oh, I think it'll... I mean, as long as they keep paying us, it'll last a while. Like I said, it will eventually flame out, but I just don't know. It won't be soon. So you think it'll flame out before we fade away is really where you're going with that. All right. Luke, we got another one here. I think

this is Dick Holes again with an Orchids of Combat meme. It's you and I knocking on the door of the studio from the documentary with a nice Orchids of Combat sign on it. And then it says, moments later, there's a couple weird O-faces going on there, Luke. Are you holding towels? I got an umbrella there.

That's an umbrella. And I've got a towel over my shoulder. Yes, those are towels edited in by Dickles. I don't know much about this man but he's uh he's in the web scream hall of fame so i'll give him credit now this is fantastic this is you know what again just two dudes exploring sexuality in their 40s apparently and we'll end with this luke uh dick holes i believe created a uh a video of all my rants. Can we play this?

If you shot me right here through my heart, you'd still be able to see through my ISO cam what I'm all about. Fucking, fighting. Yeah, I'm the sauce. You know, bro, you're just a, in the end, you're an important piece of meat. But you're an unseasoned dead animal at the end of the day, all right?

What Luke doesn't understand is that if you don't season beef correctly, it's just a dead animal. And while, you know, Luke may bring, like, you know, he's an ex-Marine sergeant. He may bring a powerful presence. He may bring a, you know, a fandom, an established, you know, audience, but... Oh, my God!

He's just a piece of meat at the end of the day if i'm not throwing that pepper on top of that steak you know he's just another carcass you need psychological counseling oh that's well done like the meat that is so good oh look up the damn sauce that is so well done wow dude that is that is they should have made you as like salt bae right doing the yeah that was uh fantastic that is so dude this guy dickles man i'm telling you him and scott what was it scott rizzo or whoever does scott are yeah they are they are quite the talents quite the talent they're very uh prolific yes they're fantastic well done thank you to all the fans uh morning combat very prolific. Yes, they're fantastic. Well done.

Thank you to all the fans. MorningCombat at gmail.com if you want to join the party. I know we got people working on new theme songs for us. We got a lot of good stuff going on. We do? All right. Yeah, people hit me up all the time. They're telling me the stuff they're going to work on.

I mean, people, they love this, Luke. They love this thing, okay? We're willing to give it to you more than three times a week. MK all day, nearly every day. So that's the story there. So let's plug it real quick. Tomorrow, 3 p.m., my live chat is back. It'll, of course, be right here at Morning Combat.

Secondly, BC will be on NBC Sports. BC, what time does the broadcast start? 9 p.m. Eastern Live from the parking lot of the famed Wild Card Boxing Club in Los Angeles. Are you going to have gloves on again like a weird murderer? I will try to remove them this time. See if I can pull it. The commission, they're on us,

Luke. They're on us, okay? I can believe it. I can believe it. Alright, so if you would like to get more Showtime and various other things, you can go to Showtime.com. 30-day free trial. If you like it, you can keep it. other things, you can go to Showtime.com. 30-day free trial. If you like it, you can keep it. If not, you can pound sand.

Let's see. Merch like this. Mugs, hats, cups, blah, blah, blah. Christmas, not too far away. Go ahead and get in on it. You can go to store.show.com. We are on social media as well. BC and I are both on Twitter and Instagram, as is Morning Combat.

Morning Combat is consistent. Same name all the way through from YouTube, Twitter, to Instagram. For us, it tends to vary, so take a screenshot there, and then you can find us. But please, you know, follow, like the video, hit subscribe, and then follow us on social media. And of course, BC plugged it, morningcombat at gmail.com, because we need your submissions for Dead Wrong, which we'll do on Friday. What did we get wrong? Either one of us, let us know. Send us an email.

And make sure it's correct, please. Double check your work, huh? Do your algebra. Because I'm Dirty Deeds. Oy, oy, oy. Dirty Deeds. I'm dynamite. Dirty Deeds.

All right, all right, all right. I win the fight. Listen, let me read to you my Hall of Fame list and then shut the fuck up, all right, all right. I win the fight. Listen, let me read to you my Hall of Fame list, and then shut the fuck up, all right? Do that. The Hector Camacho documentary will be on Friday. We'll have more interviews with that, I believe, out today from the director with BC.

So be on the lookout for it, plus the Poirier interview, Spence, Garcia, lots of stuff out there. Please take a look. I'm going to be chatting with Sean Porter today for Morning Combat. He's actually across the hall in the hotel room working with me on the NBC show. He fought both Garcia and Spence, obviously, so he'll be an interested spectator in Saturday's pay-per-view,

maybe fighting the winner. So look for that, Luke. Look for it all. Just keep looking. You're going to find it, all right? All right. Well, there you have it. BC, enjoy your broadcast.

Be safe. We'll see you tomorrow on television. I'll see you guys tomorrow right here at Morning Combat for my live chat. For everyone at Malka and Showtime, that's Brian Campbell. I'm Luke Thomas. Until next time, may all of your gains be loyal. Thank you. We'll be right back. We'll see you next time.