MORNING KOMBAT WITH LUKE THOMAS AND BRIAN CAMPBELL - Jon Jones' Future | Canelo Alvarez | Teofimo Lopez Jr. & Top Rank | Ep. 119

Episode Date: February 17, 2021

Morning Kombat is back to discuss the future of Jon Jones in the UFC after his interesting tweet. Plus, Canelo Alvarez says he wants to fight 4 times this year and for 6 to 7 more years total. Is that realistic? Also, in boxing news, Teofimo Lopez Jr. says if Top Rank can't meet his terms he is ready to move on. Where could he go? Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

You hear that? Ugh, paid. And done. That's the sound of bills being paid on time. But with the BMO Eclipse Rise Visa Card, paying your bills could sound like this. Yes! Earn rewards for paying your bill in full and on time each month.

Rise to rewards with the BMO Eclipse Rise Visa Card. Terms and conditions apply. TD Direct Investing offers live support. So whether you're a newbie or a seasoned pro, you can make your investing steps count. And if you're like me and think a TFSA stands for Total Fund Savings Adventure, maybe reach out to TD Direct Investing.

Reveille, Reveille, dogs. Look at us now, tip to tip. This is our life. This is our passion. That's the spirit we bring to this show. I'm Luke Thomas. I'm Brian Campbell. This is Morning Combat. It is Wednesday, February 17th, 2021, and it is time, ladies and gentlemen, for Morning Combat.

Hello, everyone. My name is Luke Thomas. I am one half of your hosting duo. I am joined by the gentleman on the other side of your screen who is shilling for a promotion in the weirdest way imaginable, but only because it's free swag. The conspiracy to my theory, the cue to my anon, the peanut butter to my jelly, the one and only

Brian Campbell. Brian, how is that factory town upbringing treating you? Ah, so good, Luke, and so uneducated. You gotta love it, brother. It's Wednesday, it's hump day, it's no J day all day. Happy birthday, though, to my older sister, Jen, who turns 45, and Michael

Jordan, I believe, turns something old today, Luke. Hopefully his yellow eyes have gone back. That dude has been drinking himself into jaundice since he left the Wizards, it seems. Or maybe even while he was with the Wizards. I don't even know. But Jesus Christ. My man needs to lay off the bottle a little bit there.

He thinks he's got liver problems. He's headed towards my territory, BC. Yeah, yeah. Believe me, you don't want to be there in a Norwich hospital after midnight. Okay, believe me, folks. Okay, we've got a lot to get to today. So let's see. We have some boxing news with Teofimo Lopez.

We have some MMA news with Colby Covington. We've got some Jon Jones stuff going on and a bunch of other stuff in between. So, oh, your submissions. We're bigging back for today, Social Justice Wednesday. So we've got a lot going on. We're going other stuff in between. So please, oh, your submissions. We're bigging back for today, Social Justice Wednesday. So we got a lot going on. We're going to spin that wheel. We're going to spin the wheel of death. Of course, I got to spin the wheel of death. How could I forget? It's Wednesday. So thumbs up on the video. Hit subscribe if you're new here. If you've already subscribed and you're still kind of new here, welcome.

This is our Wednesday show. And yeah, we got a lot to get to today. So first, Showtime.com is the label that pays. If you want to give them a try, you can do a couple of options here. One, 30-day free trial if you want to give it a look. As you can see, Brian is noting that Bellator will now air exclusively on Showtime. And if you sign up, you'll get the first six months for $4.99, I believe, is the deal. I get mine through YouTube TV, so I think I pay full price. Yay. Let's see. If you want some merch, BC, I've actually got merch on today.

You can go to store.show.com. Here's the Tumblr. This is the glass. Oh, yeah. It's a little too zoomed in. This lens sucks balls, as you can see here. And then I got the shirt, the sweatshirt anyway, the Morning Combat sweatshirt anyway the morning combat sweatshirt like this very good my mom my mom told me this morning that she recently ordered the green t-shirt Luke and she wears it to the gym in south in in north northern Florida every week just hoping and

waiting somebody says I love that show I told her keep waiting yeah you're gonna be there for a while all right it's good it's gonna take a little bit of time uh and i think that's it for right now we see anything else to plug before we get this show started uh we got some great interviews as always luke uh believe that just publishing today was our fantastic roundtable inside the bellator cage that you and i can talk conducted excuse me with steven espinoza showtime sports president and sc Coker, the president of Bellator MMA, which is a very interesting business talk about the future of the sport. Also, please check out our multitude of one-off interviews.

Luke, I had a nice chat that's going up today with Oscar Valdez, the unbeaten junior lightweight who, Luke, this Saturday on ESPN, I don't know if you if you're aware of this is fighting miguel berschelt for that 130 belt and this is going to be an all mexican war brother also going to be chatting with curtis blades later today so a lot of great stuff in the bonus section of the mk youtube channel i see that all right so plenty to get to without further ado let's get this party started on the five main topics that we have. We've really got four we have for today, and then we'll get to all the other pieces here. First things first, BC. So Dana White comes out talking about Jon Jones, and what he basically says is, as I pull my notes up here, Dana told TMZ that Jon would face the winner of Stipe vs. Francis, which is tentatively scheduled for next month.

But then Jones tweeted out something like this, quote, Been seeing lots of different things in the media lately. I would absolutely love to fight for the UFC again. Really hope we can come up with good financial agreement and give the fans a few more great fights. BC, what is your reaction to this seemingly mixed message between the two parties? Oh, John, I forgot you retired last year.

Remember that same week that Henry Cejudo, Conor McGregor, and everyone else retired as well? I forgot about that, yes. I know he would absolutely love to fight for the UFC again. Luke, that's why he's been in the gym successfully, you know, building up them traps, them backs, them thighs, and all that. Look, John's going to— Them backs? Yeah, all the babies got backs. We all know that, right?

Yeah, okay. All right, back to the nature at hand here. Look, let's make it happen. It makes sense. I would have loved a warm-up fight, whether that could have been Alexander Volkov volkoff or ovarine before the loss or heck even brock lesnar which had been thrown around 58 times in the past decade but it would make a lot of sense that the greatest of all time who gave up his 205 strap to finally move up to heavyweight is going to face the winner of this

can't miss must see rematch between stipe and and Francis. Luke I love that it gives him the time. To move up into the weight successfully. But I also love. Even though again I would have liked a tune up fight. Or a get. Not a get well but a welcome fight to heavyweight. It also adds some cool questions. When he steps in there with either Stipe or Francis.

It's automatically going to be a must see. I can't believe it's happening fight. But to not really know what John's going to look like with the added muscle, how much his speed advantage and defensive advantages will be there against slower opponents. I mean, this is going to be some high theater. Obviously that weird cryptic tweet from John is his way of saying,

you better pay me for this. I mean, seriously, folks, what else do I have to do? You better pay me for this. And that's going to come down to him, his management, Dana and company at the negotiation table. But are you for immediate title shot for John or what?

Where do you stand? Yeah, I think so. If you're talking about the greatest light heavyweight ever, maybe the greatest fighter ever who had long expected to move up, I think a while ago, quite honestly, but whatever, decided to stay at 205 and then does make the move, do you grant that guy a title shot? Yeah, probably, especially if you've got someone at heavyweight who is ostensibly the most decorated fighter in that weight class in this organization up there at the same time, or the person that beats that person, right?

I mean, that sort of makes a lot of sense. I don't think, nothing about that is especially controversial to me because after Francis gets his title shot which was the appropriate call remember there's a moment in time where we were saying well maybe Francis might get leapfrogged again um that's not going to happen which is the good part the I don't think there's any controversy about that the part that's weird is the money part here, where he's like, yeah, I'd love to fight for UFC again. And by the way, there's another piece there, and have a few more great fights. I don't know how much longer John plans on doing this.

I don't think he's going to have another 10 years. I mean, he may not even have another five. He may not even have another three, depending on the way he's talking here and how much he gets paid. I mean, I think partly that will determine how long he keeps doing it and how long he keeps doing it is also going to be a function of how much he gets paid per fight. Like, you know, is the juice worth the squeeze?

But, you know, remember he had these unsettled issues about he wanted Deontay Wilder money and he thought that if he was going to go up, he was accepting more risk. And if he's accepting more risk, then he needs more money. And that was never really settled to my knowledge. I know they had, going to go up, he was accepting more risk. And if he's accepting more risk, then he needs more money. And that was never really settled, to my knowledge. I know they had, according to Twitter posts, a series of good conversations, and they're in a good place. But it sounds like John wants a little extra money.

I don't know what those terms are, but as we've discussed many times on this show, he never was really properly compensated for any of the pay-per-views he did the last 10 years. He made money, but he wasn't paid what he, I think, ultimately deserved or whatever under a more equitable financial arrangement. And so getting the last bit now, BC, this one's kind of important, right? If you don't get the last bit of available money when you're going to heavyweight, he says he has no desire to go back to 205, when are you going to get it? This is the time to extract as much money as you can for the organization who says they're doing better than ever despite the pandemic yeah i mean he if

any you're right if somebody can should deserve to get paid here for taking this type of type of hell yeah it's john a proven pay-per-view commodity and also let's not forget like you mentioned possibly the greatest fighter of all time there is sort of corner counter arguments to this which is you know which is, you know, John has offered some trouble for the UFC over the years, and they've certainly done, them and USADA together, have done everything they could to keep him around and keep him active and keep him back in there.

Is that me talking or the picograms? You ask yourself. But yeah, I hope he does get paid. I get that the UFC has these hard stances to prevent from having to pay everyone. But good God, can we treat our very best, our all-time greatest, the way they deserve? I mean, seriously, if Francis Ngannou knocks out Stipe, this would be as dangerous a heavyweight debut as Jon Jones could ever possibly imagine. You know, can UFC pull off paying boxing purses on the regular? I don't know. It's worthy of a

debate. I mean, they're making money hand over fist, it seems, Luke. But at the very least, can we pay these guys when they get to this level what they're going to deserve here? John moving up to heavyweight, you'd have to think it's going to be a boom for pay-per-view sales, for stardom in the division. The guy deserves

it okay all right i don't i don't care if he got a call from boo-boo wild thing when he got pulled over that time that's that's all his personal business but pay the man his money luke okay i don't care about that at all but the thing i did notice what do you make of how much more do you think he's going to fight he says a few more great fights i mean that's probably a little on the euphemistic side but what do you imagine? Two, three more years? It probably comes down to how successful he is immediately. I mean, straight up, Luke, if he goes in there and gets knocked out by either Stipe or Francis, I could see him not fighting for a while, you know, or ever again.

But if he goes out there and has the kind of success that I still, to this day, believe he will. Yes, I know, look, Stipe's great, and Francis is the most dangerous fighter on the planet. I'm not discounting those. But I do believe, and this day, as I said it last year, said it forever, his speed, defensive abilities, IQ, toughness, I think it's going to be too much for every single heavyweight. If he starts out on a roll, Luke, and he's not losing and he's not taking damage, where's the incentive to walk away.

So it's going to be interesting. I tend to think he moved up when I doubt he thinks he can't win. I'm sure he can win, but he moved up to heavyweight when the division. Well, I say caught up with him. I don't know that that's accurate, but they made huge strides and closing the gap. I'll put at that point, the difference between John and the early era light heavyweights of his title reign and the one in the end of his title reign, in terms of how close they were to beating him, significant difference. Even if they still came up short in the end, a significant difference. And I tend to think that, like,

here's the interesting part about going up to heavyweight BC. I would agree that there's some additional risk there, especially in terms of fighting someone like Francis. I mean, Stipe has big punching power, but Francis has otherworldly punching power. That is a challenge he does not necessarily face when he's at 205 pounds. You could have argued maybe rumble, but he never really faced that, right? So that wasn't really in the cards. So in that sense, going up to heavyweight is more dangerous. On the other hand, I don't know, unless he's really over the hill, we'll have to see. I don't know that going to heavyweight is a tougher fight for him. And I wonder if UFC is sort of making that claim like, dude, 205 is actually a little bit harder than heavyweight on average,

individual matchups notwithstanding. Why should you get, you know, maybe they'll budge a little bit more, but not a ton. I do think he might be up against that as well. It's not quite as hard and as much risk as maybe he might be saying. Look, if he wins, and let me ask you this, the whole idea of facing Adesanya, which if Adesanya beats Jan Blahowicz

and is suddenly a two-division title holder, I can't help but think this conversation is going to get geared up again. Are we more likely to see Jon Jones versus Adesanya if Jon Jones wins or loses against the winner of Stipe and Francis? I don't know. I don't know. Because Jon losing, especially if it's spectacular, is going to be so shattering to everything that we've understood about him for so long.

It's hard to assess how badly the damage might affect him. He'll obviously get a chance to redo the wrong. Is that what he wants to do? I don't think he'd leave the sport. I think he would come back to try and fight again. So it's not one of those things. But it's like, what is the anticipation of that matchup? Yes, these two guys hate each other,

but you kind of want them to see each other while they're still dominant figures. If John has passed it and won him, and maybe he compounds it with two losses, sort of proves that or at least proves that up at that weight class does that make people i mean it removes obstacles to making the fight happen in a certain way because now heavyweight's not really a viable option but at the same time it doesn't increase the market potential and maybe in fact undercuts it in a pretty significant way i i are you do you have a different sensibility about this one or what?

You know, like let's say he goes up to heavyweight and it goes disastrous. Would he want then to cut back down to 205 and face Adesanya to regain his old title? Or how about this? Let's say Adesanya wins the 205 belt and Jones wins the heavyweight belt. Is a heavyweight champion Jon Jones against Israel Adesanya as the reigning middleweight and light heavyweight champion trying to become the first triple champ. Is that the biggest fight in UFC history? Yeah, that's up there.

That's up there. I mean, if we get that far along, that is up there. Again, dude, we talk about it like it's, oh, it's impossible. It's not impossible. Someone is going to be the first triple champ. I think the likelihood that it's at a weight class situation where they're all 10 pounds apart is the likeliest scenario. And I do think that's real.

We'll see what Patricio Pitbull wants to do over in Bellator. But someone's going to do it. And Izzy, we're putting the cart before the horse here, big time BC. But if he goes in there and beats Blachowicz, and let's say he beats the brakes off of him, which again, may not happen at all, but let's say for the sake of argument that it does, I think that actually ratchets it up. It's the winning that ratchets it up. It's not the losing, even though the losing in some ways creates fewer obstacles.

I think that is probably the closer of the two scenarios, but I guess we'll have to see. I guess we'll have to see. And one final question. Yes. Percentage chance if John Jones becomes your heavyweight champion in 2021, percentage chance that he would fight DC a third time for the belt? Two. Two percent?

Get the hell out of here, Luke. Two percent. Two percent. I'm saying it's a lot more than that, brother. Like the milk you drink, two percent. Okay. Like the milk they served in the factories when I was small. Yes. Yeah.

One percent. All right. Topic number two. So there was a – this is why, dude, you can't – I'm not telling you when Dana White talks, it's automatically wrong. That's not what I'm saying. In fact, a lot of times it will be right. But this is always why you need to wait to see

if he makes a pronouncement about things they're working on or even if he declares it, it needs to be double-checked because you simply cannot rely on him as a single authority about the source of things despite his elevated position in the sport. So he says they're working on Colby versus Leon Edwards as if they had made traction with that. And he says they're working on Colby versus Leon Edwards as if they had made traction with that. And I suppose they still might. They might just lean on Colby to make the whole thing happen. Who knows? But Colby did an interview, Colby Covington, talking about Leon

Edwards, did an interview with the boys over at Submission Radio out of Australia. Shouts to them. And in the interview, he says, I don't have even the slightest desire to fight this guy. He's fought bombs, talking about Leon Edwards. He's fought bombs. He has been out for two years. He's a nobody. There's no chance. And I think the words he used were, I'm like doing this guy a favor. No way am I doing that. In fact, if you watch the entire interview, BC, the overwhelming majority of it is based on the rivalry, certainly the first parts of the interview, about Jorge Masvidal, about Kamaru Usman. He wants the title shot. If not, he's happy to do the ultimate fighter with Jorge Masvidal. He even says he had signed the contract for that. How true is that? I don't know. Okay, BC, unwrap this a

little bit. Colby doesn't want to fight Leon. So what do you make of the situation? And now what does the UFC do if in fact Colby remains this intransigent? Uh, well, look, I think this is a smart public move. We talk a lot about public negotiation, which happens much more in boxing, but you know, look from that John cryptic tweet that we just talked about, it does happen in MMA too. I think this is a smart move because, uh, Usman beating Burns as dominantly as he did and staying with the belt here. And there not being an obvious name of a challenger left who he hasn't faced. And I want to dead wrong myself right now, Luke, from Monday's show. I completely forgot that Kamaru had already fought Leon Edwards, although it came back in like 2015 when both were not household names, even within the house of UFC. So, you know, that leaves really Stephen Thompson, who's injured as the only guy in that ranking system that has not faced Kamaru.

So this is smart by Colby because let's talk about the reality of Leon Edwards. He's the perfect fight for Hamzat Chemaev, who's looking to come out and really prove right now that he's legit and he's the next big thing. This is not a fight that does a ton for Colby. In fact, it's a potential trap fight. Because up to this point, that's what Leon Edwards has presented himself as. A less marketable guy who's really tough to beat.

Colby is in play right now for the two things you mentioned. The two biggest money opportunities available to him. A rematch with Kamaru. Or a fight with Jorge after an Ultimate Fighter build. Or maybe an Ultimate Fighter build with Kamaru to a fight with Jorge after an ultimate fighter build, or maybe an ultimate fighter build with Kamaru to get the rematch. And what he also has in his favor, Luke, along with sharing the same political principles of one Dana White, is the fact that every time Dana's had a microphone in front of him in the past two weeks leading into the Usman Burns fight, he cannot stop telling people how great the Usman Covington fight was

and how it's on his short list of greatest fights in UFC history because both guys, as we remember, didn't go for takedowns. They stood and traded until one fell and couldn't get up. It was an absolute war. There is some money in the bank here

for Colby with the boss. And this was sort of the right move to go, why would I fight Leon? This means nothing to me. So it's interesting. How do they fix this? I don't know. A little update we do have from Brett Okamoto this morning on Hamza

Chamayev is they're flying him the UFC to Vegas to get checked out by their doctors and get treatment there. And, you know, they're hoping Luke that Chamayev can come back in June. Well, that doesn't fix the Leon Edwards situation right away. Luke,

I don't know who Leon Edwards should face. I don't have that answer. I got no freaking idea. The guy's been in, as Mike Tyson would say, he's been in Bolivian for a long time. I mean, I don't know what to do here. But if you're Colby, you might end up being forced to face Leon if Masvidal gets the Usman fight.

But until that is decided publicly, I actually support Colby in this gesture. What am I going to gain from fighting Leon? Nothing. Yeah, this is the interesting part about Jorge Masvidal. There is a way for him to hurt himself, but not irreparably, and to hurt Colby a lot more in the process. What do I mean?

It's in his interest, if you just look at it from a macro perspective, BC, to say, if I'm Jorge Masvidal, what are my choices here? I might get a title shot with Kamaru, but I don't know what the UFC is going to do with that yet. If that's not in play, another option is to get a fight with Leon Edwards, and then another option is to get a fight with Colby. But I can make my chances of getting the Kamaru fight a lot better why because I'll just deny the ultimate fighter opportunity they're not going to make me do the Leon Edwards one because they've already attached Colby with that name if I say no to the ultimate fighter Colby doesn't really have a lot of choices he

might have gotten the last win with the win over Tyron Woodley but the first thing that Kamaru Usman does when talking about his rivals is talk about Jorge Masvidal. He didn't really talk about Colby. He's put that energy out there already. So if I'm Jorge, if I have to take the ultimate fighter, you know, the winner of that fight gets a title shot and blah, blah, blah. That's a good option.

But you might be able to fast track it if you're Jorge to just say, you know what? I'm not taking the ultimate fighter, which now makes Colby's options either Leon Edwards or bust, and then I get a chance to get closer to Kamaru the entire time. It's a little bit of a risk because you never know how things could go awry, and then he might end up fighting Kamzat Shemaev in June, in which case the whole shit is a disaster. But there is a way, if he's careful with it and he plants some seeds in some other directions, to just jump right back into the title fight and force colby to fight leon yeah uh i don't know where leon goes i mean leon says told ariel that he he definitely wants to stay on that march 16th card and but who do you put him in against luke for for leon who has no

leverage in this situation although he's you know he's been active and ready his fights just keep falling apart what would leon game from fighting of asante luke or even fighting situation, although he's been active and ready, his fights just keep falling apart. What would Leon gain from fighting a Vicente Luque? Or even fighting a Wonderboy? He's going to gain nothing, Luke. I mean, I think it's tough that the best advice I can offer Leon and Colby is to try not to fight each other because neither can really... This is not hard. People make this out to be hard.

It's not hard. Here is what you do for Leon Edwards. Okay, now he has to be accepting of this risk. All right, so it takes two to be hard. It's not hard. Here is what you do for Leon Edwards. Okay, now he has to be accepting of this risk. All right, so it takes two to tango. But if I'm Leon Edwards and I'm his team, I go to UFC and I say, look, we got to get this guy out here. We just have to. We cannot let him not fight anymore.

If you're happy with him being on the card on the 16th, we're happy. Just get us somebody who's a welterweight, who's UFC level. Why not just give him a tune-up fight? The guy has been out since, what, 2019, 2018, whatever it's been at this point, when he fought Dos Anjos in San Antonio a lifetime ago. I mean, just get him back out there. Put him on the prelim card if you want. Put him on the main card. You've got other good spots around there. is a perfect fight this is what reminds me of bc it reminds me of the time when uh habib was out for a long time was supposed to fight tony tony fell out the last minute and habib ended up fighting um what's the dude's face daryl horcher luke daryl horcher what it ended up doing for habib was yeah horcher was totally overmatched but UFC doesn't as a policy do tune-up

fights but by hook or by crook they can find ways to make it happen who is more deserving after all this time off given his position and given to your point BC I think you're right you don't even have a better option at this point if the Colby thing is off the table give the guy a fucking tune-up fight and very similar to the Horcher situation let's's not forget that TJ Dillashaw got Joe Soto that time just to keep it going, and also Daniel Cormier got that barista, Patrick Cummings, that time. Just the same point. But here's how you fix it.

There's a platinum parent who's already tweeted out, if no one wants to do it, I'll fight Leon. Is that the stay-busy fight you're looking for? Because as a fight night main event, Leon Edwards, Mike Perry yeah I'm kind of here for that Luke sure I think that's I think that's okay if I again if I'm in his team and the goal is to really stay on that March 16th date and they come back to you with Mike Perry I think you take that fight I do think you take that fight but I'm just pointing out you don't have to change your rules about we don't do tune ups okay you don't do tune ups as a matter of rule but every once in a while you get in the elite fighter you don't have

a better option it's short notice just give the guy somebody who's a good fighter and let's see what happens i think it'll be all right i think the world won't end you know it's knowing the ufc knowing the ufc we're gonna see uh leon edwards versus cowboy serrani and any minute now luke okay they already fought they already fought le Leon beat his ass, too. I know that. Yeah. All right. Topic number three.

Let's get to your favorite sport, BC. The one that's filled with bureaucracy until the end of days. Canelo Alvarez says he wants... Get ready for this. He said he wants to fight four times this year. He wants to fight six or seven more years. What is he? 30 BC?

Something like that? Yes. Yes. this year he wants to fight six or seven more years what is he 30 bc something like that yes yes uh his trainer has forbidden him from fighting again at 175 so i guess that means no but terry be a fight for quote giving away too many advantages what do you make about canelo alvarez saying he wants to fight every quarter for basically uh almost the entirety of the 2020s. Look, I never expected Morning Combat or my previous podcast, State of Combat, to be a home of puffing up Canelo Alvarez. He doesn't need any puffing up, right?

He's the biggest star in the sport. He's the richest star. He's the biggest draw. All that stuff. He's an insanely decorated champion. And it's not that I've never pointed out the rare fails, the rare misses. There's a few of them, Luke, right?

Remember that time, the tainted beef? That was a miss. Remember that time Archie Solis was messing with Canelo's girl and he knocked out his teeth on a Guadalajara sidewalk and the police covered it up? I remember that, Saul. That was a miss. Oh, yeah, remember the time he got his wife's eyes tattooed on his forearm, Luke?

That was a pretty freaking big miss there, too. Everything else, though, he's pretty much awesome. eyes tattooed on his forearm look that's a pretty freaking big miss there too everything else though he's pretty much awesome what else would you want from the biggest star in the sport who goes out of his way to take on tough challenges and oh by the way fresh off a quarantine year in which barely anybody fought once let alone twice is willing to fight four times this year if you're not aware a week from a week and a half from now, he's going to fight Yildirim in the mandatory fight inside Dolphin Stadium, wherever the hell you call it, Miami.

He's going to try to fight Billy Joe Saunders in May, which would be important unification. And then in the fall, Luke, Gennady Golovkin's in play, maybe David Benavidez, maybe a Caleb Plant. I mean, there's some fun options. And then he said, I want to come back in December on top of that. His goal is to unify all four belts. I'm here to tell you, Morning Combat has become a praise Saul channel.

It has, because this guy's doing what the sport actually needs. And I'm also not mad at him or his trainer and co-manager, Eddie Reynoso, for saying, look, we feel like light heavyweight is a bridge too far. Yes, we went up there and cherry picked against an old Sergey Kovalev, although I hate saying cherry pick. Was Kovalev old and past his prime, Luke? Yes. But he also had the power to knock Canelo out at any time.

And oh, by the way, Kovalev was kind of almost winning that fight at the time of the stoppage in like round seven. So it was quasi competitive. I didn't like Kovalev's style. He boxed instead of fighting, but whatever. I don't hate them for saying those guys are too big. He says 168 is my weight class. He's trying to get all the belts.

There's still going to be monster fights against Jamal Charlo, guys like that down the road. Yeah, thank you, Saul. Thank you for doing what the sport needs. Look, he's also a free agent, right? He's got a two-fight deal with Eddie Hearn now, but he's willing to go to any network to make the biggest fights possible. Can we build a statue for him already in this broken sport, please, Luke?

Yeah, I mean, this is the reality. If you get a guy like Canelo Alvarez, who's willing to do the kinds of things he is willing to do to accept risk in the way that he is accepting risk and frequency and everything else, this is everything he has incentivized in many ways not to do, and he is still yet taking that path, at least short-term interest, not long-term. He's paying much more attention to the long-term interests.

Okay, but it's more than that, BC, and this is like the good and the bad of what he's doing. Now, to your point, I have nothing but praise for him. When I say bad, I don't mean his bad. What I mean to say is when you're telling us you want to fight, I mean, let's just do the math, four times a year, at least six years, that's 24 more times. That's probably an exaggeration, but still, he wants to be doing this at a high level across multiple weight classes. Okay, maybe 175 is a bridge too far, which I would probably agree with, but the point is this. It tells me he doesn't really have rivals. The game is the rival.

The ultimate greatness is the challenge that is really pushing him. It's not any one individual fighter out there. He doesn't have somebody who can really say, that is the guy that keeps me up at night. I don't think he has it. He takes his opponent seriously and he trains hard. But what he's trying to do is look far beyond that about ultimate greatness. And I got to pick off all the pieces along the way, whether it's 160, 168 or whatever it may be to get there. I admire that.

That's great. And I look forward to his competitive schedule. Don't misunderstand me. It'd be awesome if he fought on Showtime because we'd probably get to go cover that. Wouldn't that be great, BC? I know it is. We've discussed it in person a number of times. But I do lament just a little bit, just a little bit, BC. I think you can give me a little bit of room here. As good as the news of this is, it's not as exciting as knowing, and I'm sorry, Triple G ain't that guy. He's got somebody out there who just is the boogeyman to him that he,

we, we, we don't know if he can overcome that. It doesn't really exist. It might look, it might be Jermall Charlo at the end of the day. I know he's at one 60 right now, but he look,

he's a complete fighter and he has a certain element that we don't see Canelo fight off in, which is foot speed on top of everything else. That's why I like Caleb plant in this matchup, even though I know Caleb plant did not, you know,le against caleb truax but i like the plant fight i like the benavidez fight who's big and will brawl there's some decent challenges out there there's no no let me just clarify picture right back to you just clarify there's plenty of very good fights but there i mean tell me who you think is the guy to beat canelo i i can't find him right now

i hear you on that he's also number one pound for pound for a reason right maybe because of that but i just want to say this about when you are in this position when you are the face of a sport um membership has its privileges right you get to call the shots which a lot of these guys do when they get to this point whether it was oscar or floyd or whatever but there's also i believe a responsibility and this is why i just sent up set Oscar or Floyd or whatever. But there's also, I believe, a responsibility. And this is why I just set up and praised Canelo. I think there's a responsibility when you're at this level, when you can call the shots, when you have all the leverage to do exactly what Canelo is actually doing, which is trying

to take some chances, which is staying busy, which is being willing to fight anyone. I want to say this about Floyd Mayweather, because his time at the top of the sport, and he was at the top of Showtime, right he was at the top of Showtime, right? He was the face of Showtime, the face of boxing. There were times that Floyd ended up fighting everyone you wanted to, for the most part. But Luke, you remember that stretch when it was selective, hand-picked matchmaking,

I'm going to fight this guy on this terms at this time and all that. And there were times that we rightfully, I think, said as critics and columnists, is he taking advantage of the sport? And what I mean by that is he's sort of picking where he wants. And everyone else, instead of fighting each other, we're all trying to just get in line to get a chance at their one big payday to lose against him. You could argue that he did great things for the sport because twice a year he brought giant attention to big pay-per-views. But you can also argue, Luke, that that took away from the sport for other reasons as well, because it didn't, it wasn't

so much about competition anymore, it was all about business. All I'm saying is what Canelo's done so far, once he got to this spot, once he took that baton from Floyd, this is what I want out of my stars, right? This is what I want, because boxing, you have way more leverage than you do in something like the UFC. Yeah, Conor got to a point

in 2016 of leverage that no fighter had ever known, but even at that point, he still had bosses, Luke. You know what I'm saying? In boxing, you get to this level, you're like a god. Canelo could be like, screw you guys, I'm going to fight smaller guys with no chance the rest of my career. No, he's not doing that, Luke. No, but here's what's interesting.

Because of the way the weight classes are structured in MMA versus boxing, part of the idea, and we are structured in MMA versus boxing, part of the idea, and we could be wrong, we could be right about this, nobody really knows, but at least there is some thinking to the idea that if Jon Jones goes to heavyweight, again, all this remains to be seen, but some believe that he'll finally encounter more difficult opposition by virtue of how much bigger they are and how much harder they hit and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. That is at least one theory about how the things go. Canelo's in a weird position where, hey, the weight classes are closer together, obviously,

you know, 160, 168, blah, blah, blah. But he is actually fighting outside of his weight class and yet still cutting off that one weight class where you are pretty sure guys could maybe give him a real run for his money at 175 like you know but terby of right but here's the thing about it's like dude that is such a high jump you can't knock him for it you know it's just that in mma those are the jumps so either you're gonna do it or you're not it's a it's a it's a situation where i'm gonna put in quotations canelo benefits from but to your point and I hope everyone understands this, this dude is routinely, routinely fighting

and in many cases stopping people significantly bigger than him. And he's doing it with both skill and then power that translates up. But there are some differences between this sport and MMA. And just to be fair, the last few years when Floyd was just absolutely dominating, any welterweight or junior middleweight he was in against, and there was not a guy on the planet who you could pick that would beat Floyd, right? Once he beat Manny and all that, even though he was old. You mean up to what, 150?

No, 147 and 154. He's just destroying these guys. I was the guy who was right in the column saying, Hey, Floyd, you're so great, it's almost your responsibility to find out your limit of greatness. Move up to middleweight at this point and go for it, right? Even if it's against a smaller middleweight. And he never did it. And I get that that's the same argument against Canelo.

So let me tell you this, in all my Canelo love here. If Canelo unifies all four titles at 168, Luke, and has as easy a time as he's been having, if Jamal Charlo doesn't turn out to be his boogeyman that could either beat him or give him a really tough fight yes at that point i think you and i will be saying that same thing let's try 75 again bro because there's no one that can touch you i think the problem here is as much as i love but turbiev is he's just not marketable enough right now right if we had like an andre ward or somebody with a more of a name and and maybe a little bit less danger it would be easier but let's let saul get through 68

first which does have some fun names and then I'll be willing to to criticize him as well as anybody to say bro it's too easy go up higher uh last thing on this you kind of mentioned but this is the one that gets kind of interesting I don't know if he'll go to 175 for uh Baterbiev to your point because he's tough as shit and also just a guy who insiders know and outsiders don't. It's a really, I don't think, I don't know. If you don't need that fight and you're already going up in weight, do you really need to go take that risk?

But the one name you did mention, this guy is kind of like boxing's GSP a little bit. Yes. Andre Ward. Andre Ward is, do you like that analogy a little bit? Again, there's totally a million differences. But he's got that thing out there. It's always like, what if Andre Ward comes back? Could Canelo beat him?

I think Canelo would take that fight. I think he would too. And that's a great freaking fight. I'm not trying to tell you that Andre Ward is so much more marketable than a Baterbiev. He's not. But he's also, to your point about the GSP correlation, I mean, he's a guy who took long stretches of time off in his career, either for court battles with his promoter or just basically going,

I don't see any challenges, I'm going to sit out a while. And, Luke, every time he came back, including the two fights with Kovalev, I mean, he figured things out, right? Those Kovalev wins were almost like GSP, you know, fighting Bisping in a lot of ways. So even though Ward's been retired for a lot of ways so even though Ward's been retired for a bunch of years even though he's in his late 30s I feel like every interview I hear of him

I hear the itch in his voice you know what I mean I hear it Luke if that's a big ass fight I would I mean I would if they did that light heavy look I would love the shit out of Canelo and Andre Ward you talk about pound for pound I mean that is incredible I gotta tell you that's one fight out there and again you know what the last thing on this will move along i don't want to lose sight

of this i'm with you on charlo at 160 i don't know if that fight is the right one right now but based on what he showed when we were there for his double header and also you know he's the much bigger of the two of his brothers i actually think he's like significantly bigger i think he could make 168 and fill out into it oh yeah and be very competitive up there it's just it's a little too early right now that's all i would say yes yeah that's fair that's fair uh all right takes us now to teofimo lopez who is just an absolute barn burner of a interview and a talent so he was on the espn broadcast on sat on Saturday BC and he said quote I'm looking forward and I'm moving forward talking about what's next for him we'll get to in just a second if top rank can't meet the terms I'm taking my talents somewhere else we paid our dues I am

your favorite fighters favorite fighter that sets the tone and I think everybody else needs to realize that I am the truth I am the best in this division. And of course, he says he's going to stay at 135 for now, and we'll be watching closely to see who wins Jose Ramirez versus Josh Taylor. But of course, we're talking about the situation where he has a mandatory. Top rank is on the cheap, and his talents, as a consequence,

for the next fight, for that mandatory, could essentially end up on any other network. Now he has responded, BC. What do you make of Teofimo Lopez's's response to what do you want to call it i won't say bad faith by top rank but being a little bit cheap yeah this is going to be very interesting we as we talked about last week quickly ahead of this about how that purse bid's coming up february 18th for that george cambosos jr uh mandatory fight it's an okay fight obviously not not great not going to move you although cambosos is unbeaten kind of hungry and all that. But this is interesting

because what I had teased when we broke that down, Luke was let's not forget when you don't take care of your stars and you don't get them what they feel they want and deserve. And obviously there's always, whether it's even Dana versus Connor, there's always going to be a negotiation, right? There's always going to be a middle ground. But let's not forget, Oscar and Floyd both got to certain levels of fame under Bob Arum in top rank and basically said, I feel like I could make more. I deserve more. I'm going to go on my own. Oscar started his own damn company. Floyd got Al Heyman to get him out of the deal and they became a fighter for hire. Could this be Tao's future? I think this is the right quote in the public statement to make oh by the way i'm the top rank on espn broadcast luke because he was ringside to

watch richard comey in that main event the guy who he knocked out a year ago um the that the specific terms in there if top rank cannot meet the terms i'm taking my talent somewhere else now obviously you can't just get out of your promotional deal luke without a legal battle or in in Floyd's case, some sort of monster buyout. It all depends on the language. And I don't think Bob Arum and company are any, any, any position now to try to let that happen. But this is an interesting power play from a guy who in the extended quotes of this same interview, Luke basically said, I already took the risk. I fought the best guy in the world, Lomachenko at a time that wasn't advantageous for me. And I went in best guy in the world, Lomachenko, at a time that wasn't advantageous for me,

and I went in there and beat him. And so I've earned the right now to kind of sit down on this and call my own shots. I don't know where this standoff is headed. Hopefully a middle ground between them, Luke, where they can agree on the price. But this is one of those times where you've got a loudmouth fighter wanting more money where I kind of go, kind of agree with him here luke okay i mean he's done that like to become a star it's one thing to talk but you don't really become a star until you win the big

fights and you beat the big ones and you win the fights that maybe you shouldn't win he just did that so i don't hate this idea that pay me what i'm worth and by the way you mentioned that foot note there uh josh taylor and jose ramirez both are unbeaten they're going to be fighting sometime So I don't hate this idea that pay me what I'm worth. And by the way, you mentioned that footnote there. Josh Taylor and Jose Ramirez, both are unbeaten. They're going to be fighting sometime this spring for all four titles at 140. They both fight under the top-ranked banner. To have Teofimo say, I'm watching that fight closely to maybe fight the winner for all four belts. Look, he just unified all four belts kind of at lightweight, right?

Remember the whole WBC bullshit. If he moved up next and did that at 140 and fought the winner of that, I mean, this is a guy who's telling you, I am ready to dare to be great. Eventually, I am going to end up at welterweight. I'm not afraid of Terrence Crawford and all those guys, right? I'm only 23. I'm just growing. If I'm Bob and company, and I don't know the financial specifics, but I take care of this kid.

Because, Luke, have you seen anything up to this point anything up to this point that tells you he's not the next Oscar or Floyd now look that's a bold freaking statement there's a lot of people that look like the next Oscar and Floyd and they flamed out but right now all the money is on his side of the table

he's got all you know what I'm saying Luke like this guy's a stud right now take care of the kid yeah and's got all, you know what I'm saying? Look, this guy's a stud right now. Take care of the kid. Yeah, and again, on this show, and not because BC and I coordinated, but because we have the same worldview about boxing in the following way, we are always going to give much more favorable coverage, just not out of spite,

just by the way we are as people, to the boxers who go out there and willingly accept tough challenge and risk, and sometimes not the most favorable treatment from their promoter, to chase greatness. Now, obviously, Canelo is going to have the wind at his back promotionally, but a guy like Teofimo Lopez, you know, it was a big question about how good he was,

and Topp Rigg believed in him, of course. They signed him, but, you know, against Lomachenko, who knows, and blah, blah, blah. There's just a lot where you could be maybe not sidelined, but not get as much love as another person in your stable. Anyway, neither here nor there. The point being is this. This is a guy that they absolutely need to push and push right now.

It reminds me a little bit of McGregor. McGregor had achieved peak popularity by the time he fought Aldo. So this guy already fought his version of Aldo, but hasn't reached peak popularity. But that's all the more reason to keep him active, keep him out there. I really believe, and I can't be clear about this, I think Teofimo Lopez is one of the most talented boxers we have out today. Not that he's a complete product, but as I've said before,

I said it to Brian, dude, there are guys when they box, man, they just jump off the screen. They are doing things very, very differently. Teofimo Lopez has extremely high fight IQ. He is a A plus level athlete. He's 23 and he wants tough challenges. He has Latino background. He is an American kid from Brooklyn. Dude, what more do you fucking want out of this guy? He is a born winner. It is time to get behind him as best you can. I know he's asking for more money than top-ranked wants. I get it. This is the guy.

Pete BC, this is the guy you make exceptions to. Not the other Jermokes. This guy. Yes. And look, boxing is such a wild, wild west open market, Luke, that every fighter wants to be the next Floyd and control every, have leverage in every situation but again there are some guys that just

show you that specialness that they might be worth it okay they might be worth it let's not repeat the sins of the past let's take care of this kid and then lastly it's all we'll just put it together inside of the boxing conversation BC this is one as I always see this dude's name pop up as like a tough

challenge for next big thing. So Devin Haney is set to fight dot, dot, dot, uh, apparently, or at least there's talks for Jorge Linares, uh,

April 17th. Um, and this comes to us from the athletics, Mike Coppinger, BC, Jorge Linares, always a tough out, not,

not necessarily a whole lot more anymore. Huh? Yeah. Look, he's been the bridesmaid a lot, although he's won titles in two different divisions. you know, he's a tough out. Not necessarily a whole lot more anymore, huh? Yeah, look, he's been the bridesmaid a lot, although he's won titles in two different divisions. You know, he's a pretty boy. He's a beautiful boxer.

I mean, a beautiful man and a beautiful boxer. But you want to remember how good this guy is. I mean, go watch the fight he had against Lomachenko. He dropped Lomachenko. He was in that fight before being stopped late, Luke. He is a tough ass out. Don't forget, before Ryan Garcia fought Luke Campbell, which was originally supposed to take place in December,

took place in January instead. Originally, it was supposed to be Linares that they were talking about, who fights for Golden Boy. This is the perfect next step for Devin Haney. Look, I said it before, I'll say it again. Devin Haney's in that group. The new four kings at lightweight, the new five kings, whatever you want to say, Wischuk or Stevenson.

He has been, though, Luke, let let's be honest the least flashy of late you know the gamboa win the recent performances before that they've been a little bit flat like in fact when he fought on on showbox a while you know a couple years ago he was much more maybe it's a different level of matchmaking now he's moving up higher but it much more sensational. But don't let that fool you. Devin Haney's been playing it a little safe, Luke. But he has the goods, dude. I mean, he's like 21. He's got everything across the board.

All the boxes tick in terms of his ability and what he's showing you. But you've got to prove it against the elite. Linares is that old school, still quick despite in his mid-30s, crafty veteran who fights a fun style, who will put the pressure on you. He will make Haney show us how good he is. Make this fight his own. Please make it. Thank you.

Yeah, I mean, he went dating all the way back to what was the fight where he fought on the Paul Brother card? Paul Brother fought KSI. And was that the Alfredo Santiago fightantiago fight uh i gotta look up on the uh old box rec page luke but he's looked flat twice in a row dominant but flat right yeah was that that's the fight at state yeah i mean yeah exactly he looked fine in that fight but like nothing special and then he followed up with the gamboa and gamboa was super washed at that point and you know obviously haney put it on him and he's 21, dude. I mean, to your point, some of this criticism is really kind of silly because we don't really know exactly how good he's going to get. And there's plenty of reason to believe that he

has gotten good. I actually liked this fight for Haney. It's not the one that I think should necessarily be next, but I'll tell you why I like it because Linares has, correct me if I'm wrong, BC, but from what I've seen on the tape, good firepower. I don't know how good his chin is anymore because people have laid into him a little bit. His chin's always been a little flashy on the elite level. A little flashy.

Okay, but fine. It could create for excitement. And he's certainly faced very credentialed, tough opposition. So to me, I actually kind of like it because you have a guy with big firepower, who I think, by the way, has fought higher than this weight class before too,

if I'm not mistaken, although I could be wrong about that as well. Yeah, Linares tried it. He moved up to 140, Luke. He got sent to hell by Pablo Cesar Cano. It was a bad experiment. He's back down to lightweight where he deserves to be. In any case, credentialed, battle-tested opposition

who is known for having some decent firepower and can make things interesting. For a 21-year-old guy who's is known for having some decent firepower and can make things interesting for a 21 year old guy who's not looking for a win in any capacity but you know a statement maybe this is a great opportunity plus look you know how many weeks do we go on here or me just going oh my god teo fimo's next gervonta's next shakur's next ryan garcia's next oh devin haney is probably going to be next, but he hasn't looked flashy of late. This is the fight to come out and show every tool you freaking have, Luke, okay?

Show me your toolbox, brother. All right. By the way, as a reminder to everyone, the Champions League is back, and if you're a soccer fan, you should be listening to K. Golasso, part of the CBS Sports Podcast Network. You can join the team for two episodes a day, including daily previews and recaps of all the Champions League and Europa knockout stage action.

You can find K. Golasso, that's Q-U-E, by the way, K. Golasso, on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, and wherever else you listen to this podcast. Don't wait to download and subscribe and make K. Golasazo your ultimate audio destination for soccer and Champions League coverage. BC, who's your Champions League team? Luke, did they say two episodes a day?

The day is daily. Two times a day. Daily. Two times a day? Good God. Shout out to KGalazo. What does KG Golazo stand for? Is that like you dip the chip in the yellow sticky stuff?

It's not salsa. Nachos and cheese? No, it does not stand for nachos and cheese. K. Golazo, what a goal. Golazo is like a really nice goal, is what they say, if it's super slick or kind of awesome. And then K just means what? But what they're saying is like, what a goal.

Okay. So how do you say what a booty in Latino? K cool. Which, by the way, I say about 50,000 times a day in my head. So gross. All right. Hey, look, want to get into a little SJ sjw what do you think here let's do it let's do it all right some wednesdays we do this we take a uh a recap of the latest beefs and

debates between fighters on the old social web sometimes we bring in uh the his his highness uh doctor sorry uh what do we call you uh ruth, Ruth. No, Luke Bader Ginsburg. The honorable, the dishonorable Luke Bader Ginsburg sliding in. The dishonorable is the key there. That's the key. Yes. All right. Hey, Usman and Masvidal, as we know, have a little rivalry going,

so let's check out this little thing here on the old interwebs. Can we go to it? Maniche. Maniche. Maniche. Alliche. Maniche. All right, Jorge Masvidal quote tweeted the MMA Junkie article which stated that

Kamaru said, I'm going to put him in a coffin this time. And Jorge said, game plan to putting me in a coffin, hug, and toe stomp. Who is this guy fooling? He's, he knows the resurrection. He knows? Is that a Helwani reference?

What the hell is that? I don't know. I don't know. All right. Well, Usman saw that, Luke, and he responded. Okay. I'm feeling generous. Okay.

Okay. And then he followed it up. Big boy business being done with the boss man. And Usman tweeted out a picture of him with manager of the stars Ali Abdelaziz and Dana White, presumably inside the UFC offices. So then we got a follow-up from Masvidal to this. And he said, you feeling generous? And I'm feeling gooned out.

I'm taking everything. What's yours is mine. Hashtag super necessary. Luke, this didn't move me as much, but it's continuing. It's moving the yard markers and their little war words and rivalry. Does this make you feel like Dana, Ali, and Usman

were talking about Jorge in that meeting? Had to be. Had to be. They got to figure out, because they know at this point, we've said it before i don't know how popular kamar usman can be but it feels like the last fight at least for insiders was the one where because he was fighting two battles right one was mainstream visibility which is still an ongoing battle and two was no respect from insiders he had it from like the insider insider but this time by beating gilbert burns and doing it the way he did especially coming back

from adversity and showing some new tricks with his jab and everything else you're like dude you got to give the guys credit so now the trick is building on someone who might just be better than every other 170 how do you do that I guess I guarantee you they were talking pay update they were talking schedule they were talking who's who there's no doubt they were getting down to business on all of that the question is how bad do they want that Jorge Masvidal fight versus what they want for the Ultimate Fighter? Man, fuck the Ultimate Fighter, dude. Seriously? Think about how much easier this would be if it wasn't like

we didn't have to worry about this shit. But we do, so what are you going to do? Luke, Masvidal was once, especially in that incredible Fighter of the Year run he had in 2019 where he stole MMA and even casual fight fans' hearts. He was one of the best trash talkers of the sport for a season do you feel like his trash talk game has fizzled out ever since he went so pro trump or has your appreciation of his trash talk game

done that because of your differences in political opinions well i don't really read his tweets so i don't i'm not i saw some people on twitter being like oh jorge really damaged his brand with who with who you know there might be people who saw some of the political stuff he did he was on you know laura ingram show and he'd done various things in person i'm sure that turned off some people but that dude most mma fans are probably in agreement with his political position to be candid number one and there's not enough of that it wasn't it wasn't shameful in the way that he did it uh depending on your your your perspective and so um you know I don't think it endeared necessarily a lot of hardcores I think that's probably true but a talking about being gooned out that's a return

to it and b do I buy that Jorge Masvidal damaged his brand with casuals? No, I don't buy that at even a fucking little bit. However, he does need to figure out what the right next step is. And a title shot against Kamaru Usman is a pretty good option if he can secure it. Well, on this segment, Luke, we typically weigh in and judge who won the trash talk war. I mean, Jorge, I guess, got the better of this exchange. But what do you feel about Kamaru's comments during the post fight press conference last Saturday,

where he said, Jorge won't fight me next because essentially like the first fight, he'll only fight me if he has a built-in excuse to lose. So what he's saying is Jorge turned down attempts to make that fight originally, but accepted it last minute. So he would have that built-in attempt. Do you, you do you think he's right i mean because look i was critical about one thing about jorge in that fight they had in 2020 i know he had the short camp but i feel

like he was just looking to survive down the stretch of that fight when this may have been his only opportunity right for all we know at that moment that could have been his only shot at true greatness in championships. And I didn't feel like he just let his hands go and just went for it and was willing to get stopped in order to try to win the title. I felt almost to a small degree that what Kamaru was saying was almost like there's almost a kernel of truth in that pile of shit. Do you agree? No, no, not really. I do think that if you lose on six days' notice,

yeah, you're probably going to milk that fact. Why wouldn't you? You have nothing to lose. It sounds incredibly plausible. Oh, I took the fight on six days' notice. Oh, well, okay. Yeah, you lost, but okay, it's understandable. Yeah, I do think that they exploited that to the extent possible,

but I don't fully believe, I don't think I believe at all, that a guy like Jorge Masvidal, given all he's done in his career, is looking for some kind of excuse knowing that a loss is inevitable. I think he's realistic about his abilities, but I bet he believes he can win that fight too. Maybe not 10 times out of 10. But do you think that hurt his brand? Since his brand is, I'll fight you in Kimbo's backyard, I'll fight Leon Edwards

backstage if he talks trash after I just had a fight. His brand is I'll fight anybody, anytime. I'm a gangster. I'll dress like I'm in a movie at a press conference, you know what I mean? And then I don't feel like he just went for it. Now look, I don't want anybody to pull this quote out of context. I'm the basement keyboard warrior.

I'm not getting in there and fighting, right? But for the brand of who he was as, like, this street-tough brawler, I don't know if I saw that against Kamaru. Maybe not. I mean, I'm trying to think about this, like, in a way that's fair to both competitors. Listen, I just don't, at the end of the day, I just don't buy the idea that Jorge thinks he's out of that contest. I don't really believe that. I'm sorry.

Maybe, again, if he fought 10 times, he might lose 7 and win 3. But he believes he can win at least one of those threes on the next time that they fight. I really, really, truly believe that. And so, you know, his brand works best when he's fighting in competitive grudge matches or at least fights that are perceived to be competitive grudge matches, right? Which is why the Asker fight on paper was the one that was so good. And then the fact that he made it as amazing as it was, it's partly that knockout and partly

that greater story. I'm not sure how much the fans buy into that with Jorge versus Kamaru and the fact that he made it as amazing as it was, it's partly that knockout and partly that greater story. I'm not sure how much the fans buy into that with Jorge versus Kamaru and the way that they do with Jorge versus Colby. But Colby, in many ways, is probably a real bad matchup for him because of his sort of takedown intensive motor that he has. So, you know, he's just trying to find the best angle to work this. But to answer the question, who had the best on social media here, who got the best of the exchange, the trash talk was better from Jorge.

But I have to say, the trash talk from Kamaru was very, I'm above this as the king of the hill, which is kind of what he should be doing to some extent. I have to say, I kind of like that. All right. Thank you, Judge. Let's roll on here. Nate Diaz back in another little social dust-up. Luke, Leon Edwards tweeted out Friday night, quote, Nate just dribbled for an hour about wanting to fight at 170 against winners. He was referencing, of course, the Ariel Helwani interview. Let's see it then. Nate Diaz, eight-fight win streak and number three in the world. That's Leon talking about himself. Let's go. If you still think you're a real one. So this was Leon Edwards quote,

tweeting Ariel's tweet, which was in reference to talking to Leon's manager and saying that they'd be willing on short notice to replace Hamza fight Masvidal Covington or Nate. So Nate got word of this Luke and he hit him with a Photoshop. Let's go to it. Man each quote. And who the fuck is this? So Nate got word of this, Luke, and he hit him with a Photoshop. Let's go to it, Maniche. Quote, and who the fuck is this? And it's a picture of Leon Edwards' face on top of Jeremy Stevens' body at that infamous press conference where Conor sent him to hell.

By the way, I forget which fighter that was that got captured there. Is that Karolina Kovalevich? I don't know. But even that fighter in the bottom left-hand corner of the photo was laughing. Yeah, that's our girl Karolina right there, Luke, okay? And then Leon responded, quote, Nate, your Photoshop skills are as bad as your fight record, and you used Conor's line.

What the F? Emoji with a crying face. Luke, A, who won this exchange? And B, are you in for Leon versus Nate on March 16th? Dude, the problem with Edwards is not that you can't find interesting fights to put him in. You just can't realistically make any of the other fighters want to sign on the dotted line. That's why fights against Cowboy and... Dude, if the last couple fights you have are Cowboy and Dos Anjos and you won them two things we know one you're a good ass fighter and two

nobody else would say yes because those guys they're elite but they just say yes all the time no one who ever says no actually said yes to you so that's the problem there so uh you know in that sense i like leon edwards's win. However, who won this exchange? I don't give a shit if it's Conor's line. It's great. And he kind of remixed it. Nate won this one. Nate won this one walking away.

By the way, I don't believe there's any chance they fight March 16th. Not on short notice. Not on a UFC fight night main event. No, Nate's not doing that. All right. Luke, we haven't had a Wednesday show in a while. So not only can you expect today, luke an overloaded fan submission segment but we haven't had you spin the black circle in some time let's head on over to the wheel of death if you're new to these parts the premise of this

segment is very easy when making the rundown each week for these episodes luke is very very stringent and open and honest and hating on the topics and questions he's not willing to talk about so bc created a segment which he's got to spin that wheel and if he gets asked it he must answer under good faith so here we go luke your categories this week 10 10 categories, five questions. It's all random. Our lovely Latinas. Luke hates interviews. Dating war machine. Brown pride. Canadian micropenises.

I really, really want a Joanna. Helping Rhonda. Famous co-hosts. Butt stuff. Wow, maybe it'll be your week for that, Luke. Uh-oh. And finally, eating pie. Luke, which one are be your week for that, Luke. And finally, Eating Pie. Luke, which one are you hoping for

here? Which one are you hoping? Which one do you want? Butt Stuff. Alright, Luke, it's all random from here. We're five years old and we deserve to be fired. Yeah, get what you get. Spin that black circle, Luke.

Maneech, please. All right, spin that bitch. We need the sound. Oh, yes, I do. Hey, Luke. Hey, Luke, no need to hide it anymore. You hate interviews. We all know it.

But you have, Luke, to be honest, have done a shitload of them throughout your extensive combat sports journalism career. I don't want you to give me a long list. I want you to think about this and be succinct. Who have been your two or three at most favorite fighters to interview over the years and why? I've had some good ones with Daniel Cormier. I've had some good ones with Daniel Cormier. I've had some good ones with Adesanya. Who else was really good to talk to who was on? See, to make the claim about why I hate doing interviews,

they're largely phony. 90 plus percent of what you see is just not real, or if it's real, it's partly real. We're doing a performative act uh that looks like a conversation that's not a conversation like this show huh yeah just like this show i'm pretty honest during the show bro so that's the difference it's like this show is filled with performative acting but with real things uh completely anchoring it that's not what's happening with an interview in MMA or combat sports, not often. And so as a consequence, there's no point talking to these fucking guys,

for me anyway. So I'd add that. I'd add, I've really enjoyed talking to coaches. Eugene Berman's been a great one. Javier Mendez has been a great one. He doesn't do many interviews now, but Trevor Whitman's been a great one. Brandon Gibson's been a great one uh uh brandon gibson's been a great one i did an interview with chael sonnen that got that's been named one of the best pieces of sports writing that year um in 2013 can i ask you your favorite female mma interview and your favorite boxing interview although by the way chael does a lot of acting too uh say that question again favorite who female mma fighter you loved interviewing the most and favorite boxer you've interviewed um some of my favorite interviews from boxing have got to be

actually freddie roach uh bernard hopkins because he'll spin a tail oh yeah um um you know i i'm partial to lamont peterson only because he's from here not that they were great interviews per se but those meant a lot to me. And then favorite MMA fighter interview? I don't do a lot of them to say that. Ronda was fun to talk to for a time.

Early on, she was fun to talk to. Yeah, that's about it. All right. I will say, I'll agree with you on cormier i think he's my favorite mma interview look because he's funny but he's also brutally honest he's one of those rare guys that you can challenge him with criticisms of himself and he'll think about it

and be honest and respond that's rare in a fighter when you can straight up be like you know this is the criticism against you how fair is it and for him to look at himself, I think he's fantastic. Bernard Hopkins, definitely my favorite in boxing, even though that can go off the rails because one question becomes 45 minutes. And also Tim Bradley Jr. in boxing, freaking fantastic. The only thing I'd say is I don't know if it's become his natural position or if it's just something due to his occupation. I agree that Cormier's personal self-reflection is peerless.

He's smart. He's smart. He's funny. He's well-liked. I do feel like there's been an increasing amount of support for the UFC's business model over the years and how that affects fighters. Again, maybe he believes that genuinely. Maybe he doesn't. I don't really know. But I didn't detect as much of that until he had kind of transitioned into this part of his career where you know for

a time he was a fighter and a commentator an analyst and now he's just one again you know make your own judgments about how valuable that is but um i have noticed that all right maybe you're critical of his choice of co-hosts as well let's move on to the next one here luke spin number two come on butt, butt stuff, butt stuff. Hey, brown pride, Luke. How about that? No, Luke, this is not a question about Cain Velasquez's chest tattoo or people with brown skin.

Luke, this is trivia time this week on Spin the Black Circle, and it's centered around Big Brown himself. Yes. Our Showtime colleague and former UFC heavyweight, Brendan Schaub. Luke, you remember his career, right? Yeah. I actually called his second professional fight.

Second or third. Really? That's awesome. I would love to see straight up, not joking around. You know, I do story time with Rashad. I'd love to see you and Brendan just relive that over a podcast one time. Anyway, another story for another day. As you guys know, Brendan Schaub, before becoming a professional comedian and podcast star, when it combined 6-5 in the octagon from 2009 to 2014, Luke, trivia time, can you name five of the six fighters

that Brendan Schaub defeated under the UFC banner? Shit. Okay. I'm about to see if we can figure this out. Here we go. Ready? Crocop. That's one.

Gonzaga. Correct. Mitrione. Correct. You're halfway there, Luke. i'm more than halfway there um there's six you said right there's six and you need five yes luke yes uh uh chase gormley yeah wow look at this guy and um i just remember that one because of where i was that day but um oh chris to share chris to share he fought him wow luke perfection five for five can you go for

it can you go for the bonus and get the six can you do it luke um LeVar Johnson. Wow! Six percent! Yes! Big Brown super fan alert over here. Fantastic job. Fuck what you heard, bitches. Look at that. Look at that. You thought I might be surprised. I am surprised. Wow.

All right, Luke. Let's see if I can name his losses. I'm not sure I can do all that. Those are easier, Luke. Hold on. Arlovsky, Rothwell brown no gara mitrione i thought he beat mitrione no he beat no gara or did he beat no gara no sorry not nelson no gara sent him to the basement floor of pf chang's yeah yeah yeah so so sorry one

more time so that would be no gara, Nelson, Roy Nelson from The Ultimate Fighter, Arlovsky, Brown, and what's the other one I'm missing there that I said before? I don't know. What is it? Yeah, all right. Well, it was a good run, Luke. I mean, if you give me one more second here, I mean, it's not like, you know, it's a Wednesday show.

It's not like we have anything to talk about. I said it just a second ago. Rothwell. Rothwell, yeah. That was the one that got gifed a lot and memed. All right, well done. Let's go to spin number three, Luke. Yes.

All right, let's see. You get what you get. It's all random here. Here we go, Luke. Oh, shit, dude. I thought I was about to get Latinas, man. Fuck. Helping Ronda.

Speaking of Big Brown, right. Helping Ronda. Speaking of Big Brown, right? Right? Helping Ronda. Okay, Luke. Former UFC champion Ronda Rousey turned 34 in February and is now four full years removed from her last UFC appearance. Let's just say, okay, let's create a fantasy scenario that tomorrow you received a phone call from one fellow armenian mma legend and celebrity edmund tarverdian and here's what he said luke i'll share with this secret to you on the download

because we both share the same blood ronda wants to make an mma comeback but she wants to do it right luke she's committing to one full year of private training before announcing this comeback. She'll make her have her first fight at age 35, but it will be in the UFC and she's coming for it. The only problem, Luke, is I only know how to teach her a head movement. I don't know anything else, Luke. What do I do? So here's your question, Luke. If you had one year to help Edmund out and round out ronda rousey's one

dimensional mma game what specifically would you work on to give her her best chance of competing at bantamweight in the ufc in 2022 jab the jab i would work on her jab and then everything that comes with the jab because if she can safely get into distance to then get the overhook either on the arm or the collar tie around the neck, that's what's going to put her in business for her takedowns. The problem she had in all the fights was she couldn't really corner anybody. You saw this in where she lost anyway. She didn't really effectively corner Holly Holm,

and she couldn't really do that to Amanda Nunes. And so because she had such a problem with that um she was getting countered coming in um the fighters were able to roam so the things that i mean that with are you know getting off the center line uh moving in a v for body shots right getting off uh jabbing and circling we saw kamar usman do against gilbert burns and then getting in and getting out all the things that come behind a jab not just the mechanics of throwing the punch but everything else built around that. I think if you did that,

you'd be in real good shape with her. Luke, I don't think it's going to happen, and if it ever did, I'm thinking more of a one-off, but let's say this scenario was real. She would fully commit it, came back a full year of training. Do you think she could end up beating most of the Bantamweights out there today?

Or do you think she could end up beating most of the bantamweights out there today uh or do you think it comes down to whether or not she wants to and can take a punch yeah i think it's much more the latter yes all right well let that hey that's going to be one of the better uh better uh cohesive duos in our in armenian uh m MMA history if we can ever pull that off, Luke. I am crossing my fingers. All right, Luke. You have two more spins. Let's spin it. Hey, it could be wacky. It could be personal. I hope it's uncomfortable. Here we go. Come on.

Yeah! Finally, Luke! Finally! Bunch of stuff it is! You okay, Luke? finally. Butt stuff it is. You okay, Luke? You good over there? I'm ready to go. Sorry. I'm ready to go.

So, Luke, the butt stuff is about kicking some ass, not about buggery, where I thought you probably hoped we were going. Luke, we all remember what happened in early 2020, right, when Deontay Wilder and Tyson Fury fought for the second time. We all thought it would be an epic and Tyson Fury fought for the second time we all thought it would be an epic and competitive rematch like the first one where they both had dominant stretches of doing what they do it turned out to be a one-sided demolition Luke an ass kicking and a fight that has been subsequently marred to a certain degree by Wilder's excuses. But if an MMA fan asked you, Luke, what's the UFC equivalent for Wilder Fury?

So look back throughout title history in the UFC. Is there any fight that had an equal level of anticipation that it would be special and competitive and two-sided between big stars? And it turned out to be a completely one-sided dud demolition. Is there a UFC equivalent to Wilder Fury 2? Oof. I wonder. This doesn't quite fit.

No, it doesn't really fit. But Jones. Oh, Jones-Guss 2, maybe? That's fair. Something like that? Yeah. But does it have to. Something like that? Yeah. But does it have to be at heavyweight? No.

Yeah, probably that one. I mean, that was not competitive the second time even a little bit, and he got finished, what was it, in the second round, third round, something like that? Third round, but like with ease. He got finished with ease. And he got beat the fuck up before that. Yeah, I'd probably go with Jones-Gus.

All right. It is rare, Luke, when you hype up a big fight and it's that one-sided, right? Now, it's different if there's an early knockout. That's different. It's sort of a flash. But, like, a one-sided ass-kicking. We don't typically see it. Tyron Woodley, Kamaru Usman?

Maybe? Yeah, but they didn't. You're talking about Wilder Fury 2. There was no Usman versus Woodley 1. Well, that was, but there's no 2. Yeah, that's a fair point. All right, Luke. Sometimes they're duds.

You never know. Let's spin it one final time. Eating pie. Oh, hair pie yes okay luke whoever made the comparison that sex and pizza are the only two things that are still good even when we know deep down they are really really gross and poorly made was genius because it's so true we luke there's no such thing as bad pizza, right? So forget baseball, apple pie, or tax evasion. I've had bad pizza. But you get what I'm trying to say here. I'm sure you've had bad and gross sex, too. Forget baseball, apple pie, and tax evasion, Luke.

I think the true American pastime, seriously, is eating pizza. I mean, you look back in your life, you might have eaten it four days a week at certain points. It's the meal we eat the most. And Luke, even if I know my only option is the shittiest version available, I often still go after it because sometimes it's got one redeemable quality wherever you buy it from. Okay. So with that in mind, let's consider that there might be five elements that go together to make a great pizza pie. Sauce, cheese, crust, toppings, and oil slash the grease. Okay, Luke? All right.

I want you to rank sauce, cheese, crust, toppings, grease. In order of importance, which elements are most crucial to you as a pizza consumer? Because sometimes, you know, you go to a shitty place, you're only getting one of those five, Luke. Which elements in order are most crucial to a great pizza? Man, that's a really great question. I'm going to say not that it's my favorite, but without this piece, it's just too hard to do it right. I'm going to say crust. I think you have to have the right kind of bread, and I think it needs to be cooked the right kind of way.

And I think if you don't get this, even if you have the good sauce and the good cheese and the good oil, you'll still eat it. But when you have that other piece there, you can do a lot with that. You can do a lot with a really appropriately. There's this dude literally down the street he has a 2 000 pound clay oven he makes his pizzas in they don't even make that oven in this country he had to fly it here from italy okay and so you can go and order a shots to minimali who is uh near my house uh dude the pizza there it doesn't have a ton of ingredients on it and the oils are nice and the cheese is nice, whatever, but that crust, bro, when it comes out of that clay oven,

it's another ballgame. So I'll go crust number one. Next level crust is a game changer. I'm surprised you put that at number one. That's maybe your taste, but yeah, next level crust is a game changer. It's not my favorite part. If the pizza is done right and I'm eating it, the crust is not my favorite part.

But I feel like if you don't get that right, a lot of it falls i think that's yeah no you're right especially when you get that like you know when you go to like little caesar's something shitty and it's like puffy gross airy just it doesn't you don't get the same satisfaction from eating it yeah so secondly i'm gonna go cheese i'm gonna go cheese i really feel like a lot of problems can be solved with more cheese a lot of problems can be solved with the right cheese A lot of problems can be solved with the right cheese. It's hard to do. It's fucking hard to go wrong with bread and cheese. I mean, you got to fuck that up, really,

to not have that edible. So cheese two. I will go... I'll go sauce third. I'll go oil fourth. And I'll go toppings last. And now, when I say that, if a pizza is done,

right, the toppings might be my favorite part, but if I had to strip pieces away and just eat the other right portions, I can do without the, I can have a margarita pizza. I can have a cheese pizza, you know, that's fair.

That's very fair. Um, I almost want to put the grease number one and it's because I came up on pizza made by Greek people, which is very heavily oiled. And it's so like the kind of great pizza to me is the kind that that women need to take two paper towels and just wipe the top of the slice, which to me is just like heartbreaking that somebody would do that. But I think great grease mixed with sauce. So sauce has to be too, because if you get a tangy sauce and you get it greasy, it doesn't matter if you're cooking with Walmart, you know,

ingredients, Luke, you know what I mean? It's going to be top. It's going to be great. All right. Thank you. All right.

I love me some gross pizza. Okay. Thanks Luke. That's it for the week on that Luke. Now we hit our, our weird final weekly segment. It's fan submissions. And luke this one is overloaded because we took a couple we took a wednesday off so buckle up it's going to be a long journey

thank you to all our people who hit us up at morning combat at gmail.com with your artwork with your pictures of photos with whatever you got here we go bro fidelity on twitter sending a picture of his little one said my cat melvin jetson awaiting the next mk show he loves the have you seen the shit clips but is a massive fan of the entire show all right look i love me some cats you know this you big fan here of melvin jetson yeah he looks uh you know like he takes classes down by the boiler room in his high school. Yeah, he's in the metal and shop class. Yes, yes. Shout out to Melvin. Yes.

All right. The king of home ec. Let's go over to at Kate Raider on Twitter. Here's a pic, Luke, of his. I'm sorry, on Instagram. Here's a pic, Luke, of his outdoor workout setup and on the tv you can't see it maybe if we zoom in maniche that is a picture of morning combat luke you said the dude's name is kate kate raider k k 8 t e raider kate raider i don't know i don't know cody i don't

know uh well i gotta tell you for an outdoor gym't know. Well, I got to tell you, for an outdoor gym, that's pretty fucking nice. I'll tell you why. Floors are covered. You can press overhead and not hit the ceiling. It's wide enough you can go in a lot of different directions. And it's covered so you don't get rained on. Plus, he's got a squat rack built into the wall or at least the floor. He's got an adjustable bench.

He's got kettlebells, a heavy bag. Dude, you're cooking with gas with this motherfucker. This is a great outdoor gym. I'm going to look this guy up on Instagram. If it's a guy, he better be jacked with this right here. But I love the MK all day. And you can attach a pull-up bar and do pull-ups. Dude, this is one of the better outdoor gyms I've seen.

You should see my shit. My shit is like a fucking circus tent. I've got to set that bitch up every time and take it down every time. It sucks. All right. At Shamrock Show Pod on Twitter, he sent in this pic. He says, my dog doesn't know why I watch these donks. At Morning Combat, at Luke and Brian.

Luke, this guy's from Connecticut, I think. I ran into him when you were at Mohegan for the Bellator announcement. I saw him in the lobby. Look at this guy's TV. Could he have worse cable management than he has right here? I mean, you got cables coming out like dog hair on my jacket. Luke, shout out to his dog, though.

Just the same. Just so everyone knows, because the fans get a little sensitive, I'm obviously joking. I'm having fun with this person. Thank you for sending the submissions. Seems like a nice guy. Maybe he was following us. I don't know, Luke. Here's obviously joking. I'm having fun with this person. Thank you for sending the submissions. Seems like a nice guy. Maybe he was following us. I don't know, Luke. Here's Ben S. saying, trying to start a regular series on MK

with Ben's MK beers. This week, while listening to MK all day, nearly every day, shoveling the driveway in minus 6 degree weather and minus 17 with the wind chill. He must live in Texas, Luke. Drinking a phase 3 to the max triple New England IPA with his MK glass. Thank you to you guys for making it slightly less terrible.

I'm into this, Luke. I'm into this. BC, let me ask you a question. If there was an MK beer, if we got popular enough where a brewer came to us and said we want to make MK beer, but what does MK beer taste like? What's the answer? It should be like a badass citrusy IPA, but that's not your style. So it may have to be one of those hybrids.

Luke, have you ever had a, you know how they mix IPA with like lagers or sometimes they mix IPA with, they have Belgium IPAs where they mix the two things together. Some of those concoctions actually work, Luke. Some of them do. How is the answer not malt liquor? I don't know. I'd be into that. Yeah, I'd be into that for sure.

Dude, can you imagine? How is MK beer not served in a 40-ounce glass bottle? I don't know the answer to that. It won't be a real 40, though, Luke. It'll just be extra MK beer. That's right. Okay, this is from a different Ben. He says, enjoying watching today's show between sets of deadlifts in my garage studio.

I usually do the front yard lifting like Luke, but there's too much show snow here today. Love the show, guys. Ben from Leeds, England. Luke, yes. Bro, how are you deadlifting there? I think he sits on the couch, Luke. You're nearly sitting in the couch doing that. Also, you know, respect the gamer chair.

I've got one. Respect the studio. What's up with the 1984 Hulkamania set of weights there, my guy? Time to update that shit. I like the little studio he's got there with the guitars and the keyboard and the gamer chair nice gamer chair Luke the gamer chair is legit these gamer chairs they're not cheap they're fucking expensive

my kids wanted one I got them a bootleg version that's like a cheap version you're the dad that when the PS5 comes out you get your kids like a fully loaded PS4 that's like why the fuck are you doing this just get the five dude we don't need to be that family anyway luke uh did you see conor mcgregor make fun of the nate diaz ariel interview by right which i thought was silly it's like dude if you're gonna be sitting a long time playing video games these chairs are butt comfortable

fucking sit in them all right right, Luke. Okay. Okay. Well, let's see. Stefan sliding in. He says, hey, Luke and Brian, one of your more recent episodes of MK, Luke mentioned how the US hot dog was inferior to the Colombian hot dog. Attached is my most recent meal from Pal Rancho to prove his statement correct. It's a Colombian style hot dog topped with potato chips, bacon,

and three homemade sauces, pink, pineapple, and cilantro. Also, in the MK pint is a nice cold manzana in parentheses apple. BC, you will never go back to the gas station hot dogs after having one of these all the best Stefan. Yeah, and that one's not well put together and pretty but i'm sure it tastes really good dude i'm telling you i was like ubc when someone says like they've got better things that like food you eat on fourth of july you just assume as americans we do those better than everyone else right like hot dogs and to get to be clear

we do hot dogs really really well but i gotta say man when i went down there they made a big bold claim and i told you this i was like there's no fucking way you make better fourth of july food than we do yeah i don't assume anybody makes anything better than the shit i eat i just don't care luke it's there it's cheap you know no but you'll love these we have a place here in dc that them. You'll love this shit when you come down. All right. Antoine R. says, quote, hope that bloody shit went well. Love you guys. Moving to Alaska, and so I had to get my desert trip beforehand and break in the new merch. Tip to tip, Antoine Roy Condren from Long Beach, California.

Luke, Antoine is moving to Alaska, but before he does, he bought the green hoodie that you often wear. And this is his last pick in the Tatooine Desert. And this looks like a gentleman who may or may not have worn the MK sweatshirt when he stormed the Capitol on January 6th. You know what I'm saying? Yeah, he looks a little dirtbaggery, but he's one of us. Is this the Q Shaman? Who is this? By the way, everyone, I'm kidding.

We're just busting chops here. I wish this gentleman nothing but success in Alaska. We're just having a good time. Antoine's been to a few Pantera concerts. Luke, he was good at shop class. Yeah, all right. That's great stuff. Mark slides in and says, hey, guys, love the content.

Here's me and my boy enjoying some No J Friday. That's the way you should be enjoying a Friday, Luke. Pretty clean room. Shout out to Mark's son there. There's a nice guitar in the background, Luke. Honestly, though, if you've ever had kids, your room will stay clean for five minutes. Five seconds. Five seconds, yes.

What do you think about his stereo system there, Luke? There's a lot of... Better than mine. I'm not much of an audiophile when it comes to speakers. I'm much more of a... Well, like that size. I'm much more of a headphone speaker kind of buff. And yeah, I guess it looks okay.

I mean, you know. Do you think that table's the kind... There's been a lot of white lightning done on that table before the sun was born? Yeah, probably. A lot of rings of beast light cans have been left there for a little too long. All right. Anthony C. is next. He says, hi, Luke and Brian.

My name is Anthony. I'm writing to you from Chicago. Check out what my girlfriend, V, bought me for Valentine's Day. I've been working from home since March of 2020. I watch MK all day, nearly every day. In fact, I watch it so much, she now recognizes your voices and recently heard you guys on an MK intro talking about merch. She then surprised me with the famous, comfortable as shit, green MK hoodie.

She also bought me a box of my favorite candy so I can stuff my fat, stupid face. Keep up the great work and content, guys. And P.S. Given the recent Bellator Showtime announcement, I signed up for Showtime. So I won't have to go fuck myself in pound sand. This guy's fantastic, Luke. And shout out to his lady, right? I mean, you got enough Skittles there, guy?

Jesus Christ. But yes, this guy fucks, quite literally. Well, how about his girlfriend, V? She heard our voices telling people where to get merch, and she surprised him with the green hoodie, Luke. Yeah, she's a keeper, bro. You're not going to look, Anthony. You ain't going to do much better.

You need to figure this out right now and put a ring on that one. Please do it. Please. I like the hair though this guy's living i like that all right drogon b sent in quote merch and mask luke yes rocking the hoodie he's got the cannibal corpse uh mask maniche can we zoom in on this fine american please i think he's american his name's drogon lu. I don't know what that is. All right. Serbian or something? Yeah, all right.

Maybe he was that rapper that was like Dragon, who was part of the Rough Riders crew. Maybe this is the old Rough Riders. Look, I could see you and this guy hanging in that old Marietta High. I could see that. They call me Dragon. All right. All right. That's enough of Drogon.

Thank you, sir. Appreciate your service with our merch. Alan K. says, Happy Valentine's Day, BC. Dude, your fans are weird. They're super weird. Yeah, he's filling out the old green MK hoodie. Well done there. Is that one of ours or no?

I can't see it. I think it is. It's a little washed out up top, and I believe that's right. Oh, wow. That looks good on old Alan. Well done there, AK. Is that Alan or is that Canelo? Is Canelo wearing?

Can we just say that's Canelo wearing MK gear? Yeah, I think that's so. Let me check his forearm for tats. All right. David A. has two photos. Luke, here's his message, though. Wow, this is interesting. Hey, guys, check me out going tip to tip with former students.

Emmeline, this is interesting. Hey, guys, check me out going tip-to-tip with former students. Emmeline, this is the first photo, and then trying a tip-to-tip fivesome with Emmeline, Appeline, Elise, and Marie. I'm a Brit living in France in a former bar. If you look closely, you'll see I'm not Rocco, but there is a snooker queue doing the tip honors, and there is even a shitty poster entitled jujitsu knowledge behind us. I believe this poster along with Mike Goldberg's expert submission analysis made me able to display Ryan Hall like skills in a street fight.

Anyway, guys, I love the show and I've been sent to hell every DM for donks. Have you seen this shit? Apple podcast review, et cetera. I'm stooping to a tip for tip submission. Surely that deserves a mention.

P.S. I would be wearing my MK merch, but France is a long shot for ever getting that ish. Keep up the good work. If I get on the Wednesday show, I will be opening MK up to about 2,000 current and former students. So that has to be worth it. David Appleton, a.k.a. AppyFatathon on Instagram, the most ignored profile in MK history. God, this message is ridiculous. P.S., yes, in America, if you take photos like this with your students, you get fired and go to prison.

But in France, you get a promotion. So well done, David. Hey, Luke, are you down with? So here's what he's saying, Luke. He tried every avenue to get on this show. This dude basically just sent us an HR nightmare. But he lives in France, so I guess it's okay. He tried every avenue to get his name or voice heard on this show.

We shut him down at every one. So he Weinstein the crap out of these young French girls with a snooker cue between his legs. Luke, should we support this or what? I don't know. I mean, this dude is boozing with these women. Wow. What? It's like, dude, this thing is like, who sent you this?

Me too. I mean, what the fuck? Look, is this an adult film? Are we on the set of what's going on here? I mean, yeah. I mean, can you imagine this dude's job? Dude, what HR company or department looks at this and goes, you know what?

This man understands what we need from him as an employee. Well, France is a different. Luke, in France, they'll kiss fathers. Forget the lips. Right on the tongue, Luke. Okay? Why wouldn't you? It's normal.

Luckily, us French Canadians have a little bit of pullback on that. Okay? Dude, I'm at once impressed and alarmed by this photo. Well, if he could only wear our merch, he would, Luke, but you know the rules here. You need to live in one of the four or five boroughs to be able to be eligible. Chance M sliding in, Luke.

This is a marathon segment. Hey, Luke and Brian, wearing my MK t-shirt and going tip-to-tip with the new 135- pound BKFC champion Dat Nguyen at his restaurant Miss Saigon in Vero Beach, Florida. I feel fortunate to have seen him with this belt in person just a week before the photo was taken. Brian, Dat is a true grinder like you. He came to America when he was eight years old, not speaking any English, and he's hustled

to make it the land of opportunity as he says he was a pro boxer he had a win over miguel flores before he tried his hands at bkfc i saw your interview with britain heart and i think that would make for a great interview as well thank you for all you do sincerely chance morrow aka the greatest mma fighter you've never seen lu Luke, is he Datwin's manager? Are we getting duped here? Probably Datwin's manager, but I got to say,

that's a nice commitment from him, and that's a strange-looking belt. Yeah, yeah, it is. What do you think Dat's thinking when Chance was like, do you mind touching the tip of your finger with mine while I wear this MK shirt? Listen, are you going to buy the pad thai and the chicken satay?

If not, get the fuck out. Yeah. Well, hey, shout out to Chance. Oh, wait, no. Excuse me. It's Vietnamese. So the Ba Mien sandwiches or whatever it is. Luke, if we go to South Florida ever, we should stop by Miss Saigon and Vero Beach and say

what's up to that. Yeah. Once I get vaccinated vaccinated I'm happy to go to Florida okay all right maybe we'll run into this guy Chance he looks good in this medium Luke okay so well done sir thank you for sending it in uh Scott M Rizzo is back Luke he says wow San Hagen's flying knee really did inspire you hashtag the gloves are off hashtag art. Luke, this is a picture of you and I on top of DC and a fellow Canadian's body with the

graphic of BC and Thomas. Luke, at least I'm on DC's body with the double champ there. You got the two belts, man. This is bullshit. I do love Canada. Canada is a wonderful place. Alright. You kind of look like... Forget it.

Forget it. Forget it. Forget it. Let's move on. Luke Ryan Lopez on Twitter says, MK pain and gain. Their American dream is bigger than yours. So I'm The Rock and you're Mark Wahlberg? That sounds about right.

Yeah, yeah. That's fair. That's fair. That's well done. Coming to theaters or a gym or luke's front yard i gotta get i gotta get whatever asparagus uh the rock is eating i need to get on that asparagus if you know what i'm saying i mean considering he's the biggest movie star and his new sitcom just launched on nbc luke do you like he must be able to afford like the the kind of shit that you don't even have to work out. You just inject it and you just, right? He's got somebody on his team who is like, I'm sure, again, all opinion, that just can do everything custom, whatever he wants, I'm sure. He's probably on that Ben Johnson 88 Seoul Olympics stuff.

That stuff's fantastic well whatever it is whatever it is it's fucking working and i want some money uh at this potu on instagram has a space meme if we can blow this up maniche so there's a picture of lu as an astronaut orbiting the Earth, and Luke says, wait, it's all dick jokes? And BBC is behind him with a gun pointed at him saying, always has been. Now, wait a second. I've got the American flag on my arm.

What flag is that on your arm? Is that Cuba? No, that is not. No, it's not Cuba. Cuba has the red triangle with the blue stripes. Puerto Rico has the red triangle with the blue stripes. Puerto Rico has the blue triangle with the red stripes. I don't know, Luke, but that's funny. Okay, all right.

That's very funny. I don't know who let Richard A. in for about seven clips in a row. Let's see how many we can take. Here we go from Richard A., Luke. He's got a couple. Check out this dick joke meme. Can they blow it up? Here we go. The most interesting jokes about dicks. Okay, that's terrible. What's next a couple. Check out this dick joke meme. Can they blow it up? Here we go.

The most interesting jokes about dicks. Okay, that's terrible. What's next? Okay, next. Next, please. By the way, it's your face on them. A little bit there. These are disturbing. We've seen this one before, I believe. Yep, keep it going. God,

Jesus. You actually got more handsome, and I turned into an absolute bottom feeding live under a bridge troll do you think joe exotic is is willingly getting it done in prison luke like willingly probably okay all right well shout out to him for that all right keep it going please get me out of this please okay uh all right thank you is that medusa medusa what is that luke um jesus christ dude i look like i look remember that picture that john wall took when he showed up to summer league and it looked like he'd been on a seven-day bender

that's me right here yeah we are the wet bandits they're the sticky bandits, Luke. Keep it going, please. This is Joe Exotic's one of his many husbands, Luke. I bet you have tattoos just like that. Okay. All right. If I... What is this? Well, you ain't that straight. Oh, my God.

That's so bad. Okay. Can we end this already? Where are we at with this? Here we go. This is from Marty. He writes BDE, the Brian Campbell story. Blow it up.

Blow it up. I want to see these words. A movie to take your pants off to, ending in a preposition. He really shows his art. Hilarious and entertaining. Fun for the whole family. And garbage. take your pants off to ending in a preposition he really shows his art hilarious entertaining fun for the whole family and garbage this is only a good movie if you're a trash panda who thinks arby's counts as food who gives your dad on the mouth one star from luke thomas by the way he could have saved us all of those except this one this one is awesome

uh marty also has another one bc's eggs okay okay that was just terrible okay and he has another one can we have some some uh judgment here on what we've put up here uh city cock boxing why are you putting me in that graphic yeah i put fucking bc in that graphic no it's you and adesanya touching tips there luca it's fantastic uh thank you marty for trying hopefully uh we should have a rule you can't have 18 things on that graphic. No, it's you and Adesanya touching tips there, Luke. That's fantastic. Thank you, Marty, for trying. Hopefully, we should have a rule. You can't have 18 things on here. Ryan says, hey guys, Ryan A. here from Buffalo,

New York. You know, home of the world's best chicken wings in Niagara Falls. One of the seven wonders of the world. Gotta blow it up. A place where haircuts are under $100 and feces aren't smeared on our downtown government buildings. Jokes aside, here's two picks for you guys. First up is

Art Art. And it's a picture of me. Am I painting Coach Latorre right there, Luke? I don't know. All right. All right. And his second piece of art, please.

Did you hear about the BKFC and UFC co-promotion? It's sneaky good. Knuckle Mania 2, PVZ versus Ioana, sponsored by RedTube. And it's got BC in a cup of noodle with a hot dog. I'm so glad I'm not in this graphic. Can I tell you that? Let's get that off the screen, too. Thank you, Ryanyan for your artwork

uh maybe we should limit these to uh 50 per show here's some artwork from chris h uh hello and welcome to the gas station hot dog and fine art expo of 2021 please see all the art attached and art yourself unconscious with all the art huge fan of the show watch every episode blah blah blah chris hagerman aka hager mania all right that's uh that that's that describes me now luke trying to survive this segment that that painting right there okay uh luke is now checking his emails here we go chris h has people are telling me that rush limbaugh died okay can't wait to hear your response to that didn't you't you guys co-workers once? No. LT, here's your art.

God, I wish. I wish I had a beard like that. Jesus. Although my nipples are super puffy. What kind of roids am I on? All right, Random Donk sends in this Luke Thomas meme. Oh, yeah, I had the hover hand blow. Hold on.

Only nerds and fucking virgins like anime. Yeah, hell yeah, I kept the hover hand blow or hold on only nerds and fucking virgins like anime yeah hell yeah i kept the hover hand let me tell you something i'm not trying to get in trouble i'm not trying to get in any trouble i try to live my life on the street i obey laws by and large anyway and you know and certainly just rules and customs bc that's an easy way to keep yourself out of trouble in 2021 you need the hover hand what do these people want from you BC. That's an easy way to keep yourself out of trouble. In 2021, you need the hover hand. What do these people want from you? Listen, it's an easy way to get in and get out and not play a whole lot of games. Fuck all that. Yep.

Julius H. says, please tell Luke to unblock me on Twitter. I've been blocked so long, I don't even remember why. Huge fan of MK. I even have an MK sweatshirt. I'm no longer a Donk Donkerson or Rick Rickerson. Just a humble fan. Luke, his Twitter handle is at Hodges Julius. Can you unblock this fella? Because he

bought merch, I probably will. But I just want to point out, a lot of times people will say two things. One, I got blocked for no reason. First of all, I'll be the judge of that. And second of all, it's like oh, you don't remember why you blocked me? It's like dude, I don't know who you are are i block enough people that you are you know merely me filtering my fish tank you know i don't know what microbes i'm getting and which ones i'm not it's not that serious a

relationship so uh but he bought the switch it's all plugged in julius looking like an og with this on i love it i love it right there shout out to. I hope he does get unblocked for his sake. All right. Alan W. has five. Five. What are we doing here? This is a little much. Although I like this one. Here's a room service diaries meme.

This is day one, Luke. It's me on the bed dressed like Ioana holding a 40 and you with a bag of Taco Bell. And also, don't forget the Van Gogh self-portrait in the back. Yes. As pronounced Van Gogh self-portrait in the back. Yes, as pronounced Van Gogh. All right. Meme number two from Alan is BC on the Happy Gilmore cover saying Morning Combat's Happy Campbell.

He doesn't eat hot dogs. He destroys them. You're a gross piece of shit, yes. All right, Alan. Let's see what else you got here. Here's a morning combat meme bc makes it easy i can i go now i gotta take a shit yeah i mean this one's a little on the simple side bc but there is truth in advertising

uh number five from no number four from alan as a Bob Barker-inspired meme. I'm Bob Barker, and I'm alive, bitch. Did I say he was dead? Yes, you did. In fact, this is what started. Actually, it was Jay. No, let's say it right. It was Jay who slid in and was like, yeah, Bob Barker's been dead for a while when he's still alive.

So shout out to Bob Barker there. Alan closes with a play on the old wrestling video game. Okay. It looks a little bit more like boxing to me. Luke dressed like Marvin Hagler wearing the war hat. No, I'm dressed like fucking Jake Paul. I look like a dumbass. And me dressed like Thomas Hearns with Emanuel Stewart in my corner flipping you off Brian the Hitman Campbell.

Okay, well done. Tyler K. here. We're almost done here, Luke, with a LT-inspired Wolfman meme. When the Latino booty is full, the legend comes to life. So true, Luke. So true.

Truer words have never been spoken. Todd M. has a Van Gogh for us. A Van Gogh. Dude, we look like the two members who got kicked out of Mumford & Sons. Jesus Christ, this is... Or the two guys not named Jay from No Escape. Yeah, that's for sure, Luke.

This is great. Only we look like them now. We look like them now. Okay. Ryan T. says, I found that this movie goes well with packaged eggs and gas station chili dogs meet the fuckos toe the line i love it star it's starring britain heart

brian campbell luke thomas and page van zandt that is uh can you zoom in on that is that dana sort of i guess i'm not sure again and there's a there's a quote at the bottom from applesauce fuckface mcgee luke uh oh that's hilarious okay yeah it's not bad all right all right i think we're petering out here luke okay we're gonna have to limit these to anything we can't this is too many this is too many all right uh let's keep it going here. Tyler K., Luke Thomas as Steve Martin, the jerk. He was a rich diplomat's son.

Now he's a 41-year-old loser drunk in a ditch somewhere. Lizard person Thomas in The Jerk, a Richest to Rags story. Yeah. Sometimes I feel like that's my future, so thanks. Three more, Luke. we're almost there uh here's steve b with an lt meme uh you you acknowledging bc's humor gets a three second uh reaction but you explaining ronaldo versus ronaldo 12 hours, nine minutes and 40.

I laugh heartily at your jokes. Number one. And number two, if you whores would stop bringing up this stupid topic, I'm happy to not talk about it. All right. Scott D has a Luke Thornburg entry. Oh,

by the way, when you say Africa, Hey, listen, what do you want me to do? What do you want me to do? It's a diverse country or continent. Excuse me. It's a diverse continent. Lots of different.

Finally, Luke, we crawl to the finish line here from Matt S. Dana White acknowledging that you and I make it look easy. Light heavyweight tournament. Make sure we re-air CM Punk versus Mike Jackson the same night. So it's a picture of Dana standing over the shoulder of a UFC editor, and they have on the screen, Luke, you and I hosting from the Bellator desk, the Bellator MMA tournament bracket on the other screen, and on the laptop is our live morning combat show from the day before.

Nice. Will Dana counter-promote this at all, Luke? No, right? It's on Fridays. It's going to be hard to do that. Yeah, you're right. You're right, Luke. Oh, Luke, we made it.

We made it to the end. I don't want to discount the efforts of our fine fans, although some of that was ish. But, yeah, Luke. Oh, God. Yeah, well, BC, you did a great job. Yeah, we need a little bit more quality control from Mikey. You know what I'm saying?

We need to get a little more stepping up to the plate. He's watching now. He's going to be pissed that we said it, but that's okay. All right, so a couple things here. Thumbs up on the video. Hit subscribe. The live chat is tomorrow. That'll be at 3 p.m.

If you want to get in anything for Friday's show, Dead Wrong, or any fan submission, you can see all the stuff below there for social media, you know, for Instagram and Twitter and everything else like that. But we're at morningcombat at gmail.com is the email. That's the place to go to to get anything in for Dead Wrong, anything in for fan submissions, anything that you want to contact the show about, morningcombat at gmail.com if you want to try Showtime you certainly can showtime.com 30 day free trial if you like it you can keep it if not you can pound sand

and if you sign up now I believe it's $4.99 for the first 6 months of your subscription and yeah we got merch you got the hat on I've got the glass I've got the sweatshirt you saw it in the segment there. You can go to store.show.com to get all of that.

BC, any final thoughts here before we wish and bid the audience adieu? Don't send us any more fan submissions for a long time, all right? Yeah. No, send them to us. Just maybe limit them in number a little bit, okay? All right, for Malka, CBS Sports, and Showtime, that's Brian Campbell. I'm Luke Thomas. Until next time, may all of your gains be loyal. We'll be right back. We'll see you next time.