MORNING KOMBAT WITH LUKE THOMAS AND BRIAN CAMPBELL - McGregor & Masvidal Arrested | UFC Fight Night Blaydes-Daukaus | Tim Tszyu | Ep. 281

Episode Date: March 25, 2022

Luke and Brian are down in South Florida for Episode 281 to Preview UFC Fight Night: Blaydes vs. Daukaus. What fights should we be watching for? Next up the guys discuss Conor McGregor and Jorge Masvidal's arrests this week. What is going on with them? The guys also preview One Championship: One X. It's not all about MMA though as the guys discuss Tim Tszyu vs. Terrell Gausha and a few more fights. They close out the show with some quick hitters and dead wrong. (10:40) - UFC Fight Night: Blaydes vs. Daukaus (55:00) - McGregor & Masvidal Arrested (64:30) - One Championship: One X (99:00) - Weekend Boxing Preview (89:00) - Quick Hitters (95:00) - Dead Wrong Morning Kombat’ is available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, Castbox, Google Podcasts, Bullhorn and wherever else you listen to podcasts.    For more Combat Sports coverage subscribe here: youtube.com/MorningKombat   Follow our hosts on Twitter: @BCampbellCBS, @lthomasnews, @MorningKombat    For Morning Kombat gear visit:morning kombat.store   Follow our hosts on Instagram: @BrianCampbell, @lukethomasnews, @MorningKombat Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Reveley, reveveille, 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.

Oh, yeah. It's Friday. It's's morning combat it's back uh uh the only combat sports show willing to televise an ongoing uh editorial uh uh you know divorce if you will call that. I'm Brian Campbell, the beige one. There's my co-host, Luke Thomas. Friday, March 25th, 2022. Luke, you're under the weather here, so thank you for gutting it out. MJ flu game style, but you're home. You're safe, I assume. Yeah, I'm all right. By the way, that was a very low T intro.

I was waiting for i was waiting for the pepe lepew kind of uh thing but yes everyone's asking do you have the rona well i don't i don't know uh because i've taken three tests since i've gotten home two rapid one pcr they've all been negative but my wife thinks that i went to like the big lots of covid testing that the testing was bullshit so i should go to this other clinic, which I'm going to after the show today. If I test positive, I'll let you know. You ever shop at Savers, Luke? We don't quite have Savers this far south in the country,

even though we're not like south. Savers is like if Goodwill slept with a member of the Target family. And even though the Target family doesn't recognize them as legitimate department stores, they're like, all they're family now so we you know that's savers luke yeah that's me that's like big lots you know around these parts um so i'm all right i'm just tired that's it really okay all right all right luke um we promised though a great show for you today from morning combat this show that wins all the awards and uh there ain't nothing like it

right for good or for better or for worse uh please like this video please subscribe it because nobody quite sets up the weekend like we do ufc fight night showtime championship boxing uh 1x we got a lot to chat on today to set things up we'll get some pics get some odds maybe a laugh or two we'll see what happens here but uh luke thomas has asked permission to uh uh editorially promiscute outside of the of the mk bed and um i've yet to i've yet to decide my thoughts on that i i don't know i literally i'm being dead serious i honestly don't know what you're talking about wow i hope i get to keep mikey in the divorce as well as the only thing i got to say about that um please uh showtime the label the great label

that pays us uh we did have a very productive uh couple days down in fort lauderdale the cbs sports office with our folks from showtime a lot of great stuff to come from that but if you want 30 days of showtime this weekend is is another great example of why you should. Showtime Championship Boxing, back in a big way on Saturday night with Tim Zhu's U.S. debut. Get 30 free days right now on Showtime.com. All the Bellator you can handle just in time for the Grand Prix Tournament kickoff at Bantamweight. McKee Pitbull, 2 April 15th. You're going to need this leader in combat sports.

They call it showtime we call it home okay and we must protect this house yes so please try that shit out or pound the sand reverse uh mk merch i got a lot of it on here and you can go to morningcombat.store right now to get your uh mk tube t-shirts if you're into that gross by the way luke thomas today on our pre-show was like you know because because luke you and i do have non-negotiables in life as anyone would right of course i'm like i can't wear this shirt and i can't represent that you're like you all wear it at the splash pad right now yeah i will literally wear that at the splash pad it's not going to be open this weekend because

it's going to be in the 50s but in the 40s but yes i would wear this without even the slightest degree of hesitation all right well that's morningcombat.store where you know they nobody got merch like us so check that out when you wear shirts from the band dying fetus where they're literally curb stomping people you know and talking about you know eating their entrails wearing a shirt that says morning combat that kind of looks like the porhub thing is frankly a step up towards being classier, so it would be an improvement. All right, there you go. We've got a lot of great merch there, by the way.

The Factory Town MMA line, the Dead Luke line, the tie-dye line, so check all that out. All that, and then some tall, pale, and handsome. It's your boy BC back at it with LT, and we want to remind you of, I don't know, our favorite partner in the game right now, Luke, as you can see in this glorious bottle. This is what gets me revved up to start the day, Luke.

This is how I stay fired the hell up. It's our friends at Athletic Greens. Well, I got to tell you, BC, I didn't take my Athletic Greens when I was in Florida and then i came back sick is it a coincidence i don't know but it certainly caught my attention and i gotta tell you that i love it tastes great it doesn't taste like it's super healthy like a mild tropical taste and i look forward to taking it every morning i should have had it when i was at work and here's the maintenance you need every morning one delicious scoop of athletic greens into your water your beverage of choice and you'll be absorbing 75 high quality vitamins minerals whole food source superfoods probiotics adaptogens

they help you start your day right now if you're a guy like me who doesn't know what any of those words mean start your day clean you know what i'm saying like yes eat clean bro is a thing apparently but luke if you however you start your day that's usually how you end it luke that's usually probably why i pass out all the time watching bad movies you know yeah i understand and listen it's what's in this as you indicated it's a blend of things that help you with your gut health nervous system immune system immune system, right? Energy, recovery, focus, aging, all that stuff. Yeah, and you can travel with it too, which is very easy. So you talk about being lifestyle friendly, easy, whether you eat paleo, keto, vegan, dairy-free, gluten-free.

Look, we all are making some type of concessions to stay healthy here. This contains less than one gram of sugar. No GMOs or no nasty chemicals or really artificial anything that's the thing at the end of the day it tastes good and it feels good it costs you less than three dollars a day you're investing in your health and it's cheaper than your cold brew habit or cold vape depending on your personality but taking athletic greens is a small micro habit that has big benefits it's one thing you can do every single day to take great care. Look, I don't always eat right, but I do start my day right thanks to AG1.

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There's no need for a million different pills or supplements to look out for your health, which you want to be around a while or not. That's really what I got to ask you. To make it easy, Athletic Greens is going to give you a free one-year supply of immune-supporting vitamin D and five free travel packs with your first purchase. All you have to do is visit athleticgreens.com slash morningcombat. And that's, of course, combat with a K a k athletic greens.com slash morning combat to take ownership over your health and pick up some ultimate daily nutritional insurance yeah there it is there i was wondering how are you doing bc you started all very low t are you

all right is there you know i'm all kinds of exhausted, Luke, okay? But, you know, I'm going to persevere because... Bro, traveling in your 40s is nothing like traveling in your 20s. It's not even close. Third week in a row for me, but I ain't complaining about it, Luke, because at the end of the day, it's what it takes. You know what I mean? It's what it takes to be great, Luke, okay? You have to go get communicable diseases in the sunshine state.

You want to hoist those awards at the end of the day. You want to cash those checks. You got to get in that airplane. You got to go fight with your co-host. You got to turn things around, Luke. That's what we did. Thank you, Athletic Greens as well. That's about it.

I'm not here to sell you anything more. I'm just here to sell you a good time and a good setup for the weekend to come. And we begin UFC Fight Night. Las Vegas. I think it's Las Vegas. We back at the damn Apex? I think we are. No, no, no, no.

This is a special one. Remember, they're in Columbus, Ohio. Matt Brown is on this main card. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's Friday. Dead wrong territory. Let me take that, Al. Columbus, Ohio in the Nationwide Arena is your home on Saturday.

We talked during storylines about this big heavyweight bout, not initially set to be the main event, but it got bumped up. They're going to go five rounds, and there is so much at stake when Curtis Blades and Chris Dawkus touch gloves here. In terms of obvious future title contention and placement, close or within the top five of this division, but in their own individual stories having tasted an L here

and there that has been met in theory, especially the recent one by Chris Douglas against Derek Lewis to wake up and fix whatever needs to be fixed for that run at the top. Luke, as they are set to do this, and in my mind,

potential crossroads fight, maybe if Blades looks like he's going in that other direction. But the odds, Luke, and I get it. I know what the odds are meant to do. I know that they induce betting, but they are also great at what they do for a reason. And these odds makers right now, let's look at our friends from DraftKings.

Plus 340 Chris Dawkins is your underdog minus 450 Curtis Blade your betting favorite look at the end of the day I do believe Curtis Blade should be the betting favorite I don't think it should be that wide though I really don't at all yeah I understand the point there Blade's been knocked out granted by a dominant experienced puncher in Derek Lewis the way that he was. And, of course, I don't think anybody can take Francis' punches, right? I mean, Gon had to roll with him and then just not take them.

But you can't just eat them and then survive. Everyone takes an L when they do that. So I agree with you. I mean, there's no denying that Blades has done... This is the difference between this fight, right? If Blades, excuse me, if Dawkus beats Blades, Dawkus will have done something in his heavyweight career that he has not done yet.

He has not beaten somebody this good. If Blades wins, it's very important and valuable, but it would not be anything new. Now, he could show us new things, but I mean, beating Chris Dawkus in that way would not necessarily not be anything new. Now, he could show us new things, but I mean, beating Christakis in that way would not necessarily tell us anything new or represent a brand new milestone for Curtis Blades. So I think that explains some of the differences there.

But I agree with you, even though he didn't have a great performance also Christakis against Derek Lewis, you know, you'd look at his numbers, BC, he lands 7.71 strikes per minute. I mean, that's like, I think there might be five or less fighters who have a higher strikes landed per minute in all of the ufc so when he is out there dealing it is it is quite a storm the question is of course can he do that yeah and i don't want to

be naive to the to the reasons why blades could be this big of a betting favorite. And let's be honest, he's arguably among the most well-rounded fighters this division's seen in a while. Now, look, I think the real question, obviously, and we talked about it on Wednesday, is Blades' striking going to ever level out a bit and get to that next level? Not level out, excuse me, just keep climbing. And round out is really what I'm trying to say,

to get closer to the strengths he has on the ground and his tendency to lean into those strengths he's got to answer that but I think he's a better class fighter than Chris Dawkins he certainly has the experience factor he certainly only loses to the very elite and when when he has felt comfortable he has shown traces of offensive ability I mean look at what God look what he did over him. I mean, we forget that sometimes. A long time ago. Brutal. But brutal, where he can deliver. So, yes, I like him as the favorite. But if he decides to stand and trade with Chris Dawkus,

that's still pairing together Blades' biggest vulnerability mixed with Dawkus' biggest advantage. So, Luke, strategy Luke strategy wise intention, whether you want to look well-rounded or not, if you're Curtis blades and maybe this is why the betting odds are this wide, dude, you're going to rinse and repeat and try to just drag this guy and smear

them all over that canvas, all over the place on the ground. Luke from start to finish. There's, there's just no denying. I mean, yes, I obviously think that we talked about this on Wednesday.

We want to see some development from Curtis Blades, especially if he wants to be able to beat the kind of guys that have so far remained a little bit ahead of him in the division. But, you know, the lopsided nature of this bout is crazy. Now, here's a good stat for Chris Dawkus. What's his takedown defense rate in the UFC overall through five fights or whatever it is? It's 100%.

It's pretty great. Here's the problem. He's only had to defend one takedown, and it came from Alexi Olenek. This is what I mean. He's never even wrapped up with anyone even close to the level of Curtis Blades as it refers to the ground game. Listen to this number. When was the last time you heard a heavyweight with this number? Takedowns average per 15 minutes.

And by the way, Chris Dawkins has only been to the second round one time in his UFC run, so like a third round would be totally new territory. So per 15 minutes, and this is a 25-minute bout, Curtis Blades averages 6.27 takedowns landed so he's basically good for at least two around as it continues dude that is nuts that is extremely high for heavyweight this really tells you where it's going to go we just told you about Chris Dawkins's number striking when he is out there dealing he doesn't have all stoppage wins in the UFC, including his own loss, I suppose, but all of his wins have come by stoppage on the fee KO or TKO, right? I believe that's correct. I'll verify here. Yeah, I think

that's right. So the point I'm trying to make here is it is utterly lopsided. On the one hand, Chris Dawkus is a very active competitive striker in that heavyweight division and has some great wins behind him. On the other side, he is totally untested against someone like Curtis Blades. And even Curtis Blades is something, as it relates to the wrestling anyway, he's something unique, BC, because even the other guys in this division who could wrestle your DCs, your Stipe's, they still kind of mix it up a little bit. Curtis Blades is just kind of, I'm not going to say one-sided, but pretty close to it, pretty close to it, right? That's where the best offense he gets comes from by a mile. Like that's it really, you're talking about the Overeem win. Where did that happen? Elbows on the ground. That's where it happened.

That's where he does his best work. And so really, can you keep it on the feet or can you not? That is the only question here that seems to matter. Yeah, it definitely seems to be one of those. Upon examination, even with induced betting and even with Vegas tending to be right in these situations, it could very well end up this way, a five-round clean sweep, you know, ground-dominant victory or a late stoppage, if you can guess, Doc is out. But Luke, we did talk Wednesday storylines

related to Blades's arc and his just to quote a phrase upper bound limits and I was a little bit harsh because Luke although the losses have only come to those super elite and although I've been believing in Blades's you know title potential for a long time, early even, he has a self-destruct button. I mean, everybody does, Luke. But that self-destruct button isn't as easy to find as, hey, Dawkus, go out there and stand with him for two minutes, throw a couple combinations, and you get the knockout win.

It's not that easy. There's going to be takedown attempts. There's going to be, you know, Blades can handle himself a bit on the feet. But if Dawkus digs deeper, Luke, where is not the self-destruct button, but the strategy he can lean into that could open up, you know, a turn in the momentum of this fight in his direction. Two things have kind of stood out with Curtis Blades a little bit, right? So the numbers with him, what did I tell you before? He lands 6.27.

I mean, I just can't tell you. That is extremely high, extremely high for any weight class, by the way. The fact that he's doing it at heavyweight is truly remarkable. Here's the one knock on that. Take down accuracy. Not that low. It's 53%. Take down defense, 33%.

There's a couple of things I think Chris Dawkins could do. One is you've got to stay off the fence. I mean, just matter-of-factly. If you're up against the fence line, that is going to... I'm not saying he can't win if he gets put there routinely, BC, but you know as well as I do. If you're up against the fence while winning is possible, it is going to be a lot harder.

Again, you have to expect that some of that might happen, but you got to really have a sense of urgency about creating separation, getting off the fence line, and then resetting back to the center. Taking that fight at the center of the cage will be critical for a guy like him. By the way, I think backing up blades a little bit, putting a jab in his face, fainting, faking, stuffing the takedown in the middle, even threatening one of his own, to be honest with you. If he can manage that, then that gets a little bit dicey depending on your ability, but sometimes we've seen

that that actually can be a pretty powerful and impactful deterrent. But the other one is, look at some of the times that a guy like Ngannou has had some success with him. Or Derek Lewis caught him coming in. Of course, that's something you could do, but that's a little risky because if you miss, if Derek Lewis had missed on that punch,

and Blades gets under it, he's getting taken down. So it's harder to do than it might look. You have to thread a bit of a needle. But if Curtis goes for a double leg that you can stuff and turn, or a single leg, I've noticed that Francis had a ton of success hammer fisting him into either getting him to let go, or to make the attempt pointless to

the you know where he was forced to just like completely abandon the effort and you know obviously Francis hits really hard so it's going to be somewhat unique but it really was quite quite effective in in swelling up the eyes of Curtis I would say that like obviously first order takedown defense is going to be as important here but if these if this keeps going a little bit and he has to kind of wrestle through his balance a little bit, hammering Curtis, elbows, hammer fists, creating separation, throwing a knee up the middle, things to really cause him problems on these takedown attempts. Because what do we do?

What do we talk about all the time? You see when we have these come forward strikers that just never stop pressuring forward. That will break a lot of guys. But for the better fighters, they're able to use that pressure against them by making them run into traps that they can set or otherwise meaningfully find offense. I think Chris Dawkins is going to have to wrestle pretty hard here, but he's got to find punishment in those transition positions as well

and keep the fight at the center. Yeah, I think that's well said. You do have to make them pay that toll for getting close to you or threatening it to, in this case, Blades with the takedowns. But it's interesting here because what has made Chris Daucus jump off the screen, I do fear there's some fool's gold element. Meaning, look, I think Chris Daucus has certainly with his hands, the punching, the variety of elbow strikes right there, the speed, the combos.

You know, I want to lump them, Luke, in that group with Tom Aspinall, Taito Iwasa, this next generation of guys who seem to have a more advanced skill set earlier in their career than heavyweight generations of past have had. Meaning when Chris Dalkus has looked the best on his rise, sometimes though, Luke, he's in there with, you know, like you fall off a cliff pretty quickly in the heavyweight rankings historically. And even now, even though it's been reshuffled nicely to where, you know, it's the elite and then it's sort of everybody else.

And Chris Daukus can lure the everybody else's into firefights early in which his advantage and speed and technique and his approach just lights them up and quickly the fight's over. And I think he surprised a bunch of guys in that regard. Can that work against the very elite level, Luke? You know, as much as like the Derekis loss was a sobering sort of early ceiling moment okay first l on this level let me let me go back to the the lab and figure it out um do you think he has the style and and enough of a well-rounded game meaning doc is to be able to do this on this level against someone who's going to have the same level of technique of him and have the

experience needing to adapt in these key situations? I don't know. I don't know. That's why this fight is important. It will tell us the answer to that. What I do think is let's assume for a second, he's taking into this fight what we already know for him to have, maybe not necessarily a whole lot new, right? Here's another number I want to give you for Curtis Blades Curtis Blades only absorbs 1.65 strikes per minute why do I think that really attacking the level change if it if it leads to a takedown or attacking the you know someone's on a single and he's moving you to off balance why do I like a lot of yes you have to wrestle through that first but if you can find a safe or reasonably safe attacking position you have to go for it it's not that I think Curtis Blades is not tough. I think he's very tough.

But what I also think is he can be over the course of a fight while he is relentless with the takedown, and he is very good at not taking damage. If you can score damage on him, I think you saw this in the Volkov fight too, it can deter him for long periods of time from going, relatively speaking, from going back to that takedown.

He can be a little bit deterred by it and he can second guess himself. And I think that's going to be the priority. If it's just Curtis Blades, as we understand him, against Chris Dawkus, as we understand him early on, that's a fight Curtis Blades,

again, in theory, should not lose. But if you can get him hurt a little bit and now he has to respect any kind of entry, any kind of level change, any kind of wrapping up scenario, now he'll do it a little bit less, and he might do it a little bit more cautiously, meaning to say that it's not set up quite as well, or he doesn't get as deep every time. That, I think, is a very really going to be necessary because early on before he's been deterred or affected he is and even through the middle parts of a round two he is he uh the middle parts of a three-round fight anyway he's relentless he is uh all over it but he can be deterred by some of the better guys who can place good damage on him it does affect him i think he's got a hope that in Dawkus that he can come out and his, his hand game is at another level than blades is.

And, and that's going to have to be a big part of this, right? How they're, how each other's weaknesses matches up with the strengths of the other one. And I think in theory, it's always like,

well, how do you lure somebody into a standing fight or maybe even a brawl in which, you know, you can again, argue in this matchup that Dawkus will have those same advantages. It's hurting them of course. But Luke, do you think blades getting hurt early with punches leads leads to a fight or flight ending meaning stand in and fight off the threat or or go even more desperate in terms

of uh takedown only uh approach to this that will that will depend on Chris Dacus right let's say he can meaningfully stop a couple of takedowns he He gets one, but he gets up, right? So that one of them counts and he's in there and he's competitive with it. Then he has to decide, how do I want to pursue this? Because just deterring Curtis Blades is not going to win you the fight because it's not going to stop him. It will deter him a little bit, but it won't ultimately prevent him from trying. And if he's still got enough of a good gas tank and everything else, which also could be somewhat questionable here depending on how much he has to work, but you get the idea.

That's not going to win the fight by itself. There has to be another offensive component behind it, and that's where I think he has to pressure Blades into making mistakes. How did Derek Lewis find that uppercut? It's because he timed it. He timed it. He got timed because he was shooting from way outside

and he didn't set it up properly. That is a thing that quite literally we have seen works it's hard to do and only the better ones can really do it but it does have an effect it's it's it's noteworthy it's going to be up to him to do that now of course there should be noted Derek Lewis did that on the back foot a little bit not the same kind of thing I don't think Chris Dawkus is necessarily going to be like I would argue derek lewis is probably going to be a lot better of a counter puncher than chris dawkins is he's a little bit more of a trap setter kind of sneaky in that way chris dawkins is more of a come forward kind of heavyweight and so i think that's what he's going to eventually do just think about like under what conditions does chris dawkins win he has to bring that into

this fight but i don't think you can do that unless you have meaningfully put Curtis Blades on the mental and physical back foot. We've got to see him do that. And then within his ground defense, Dawkus, it's not just preventing the takedown. It's being able to, to your best effort, cancel out the ground and pound attempts of Blades

and make it a no-win situation on these takedowns. That's going to be a big part of it, as will, look, when you're making a jump like this, if you're Dawkus, you're going to have to potentially show the five-round cardio. You're going to have to show a lot, and that's why the stakes are this high. Luke, the heavyweight iceberg has clearly broken into two in the past two months, and the elite one is going that way, and Aspinall and Tui Vassa

are on there, and a guy like Blades tends to jump back and forth often between the two, but if Chris Dawkus wants to join those guys on that one, you gotta win this fight, and this would be a monster win in his overall arc. Luke, does he do it? What does this

look like? Who wins and why? I'm going to say Curtis Blades. Again. I just feel like. I like Chris Dawkus' game. But that's a tough two fight stretch. The Derek Lewis back to back. With Curtis Blades.

That's something you're asking a lot. From a heavyweight. To do that. And so. While I recognize. That Curtis Blades himself. You know. Obviously he rebounded.

When he fought Rosenstreich. But you know. He is. He. he can be beaten. He is not some unstoppable force in all ways. But I think he's much more battle-tested. He's beaten much better guys than Chris Dawkus has. He's been around a lot longer. He should win this.

In fact, it'd be somewhat surprising. Obviously, the odds are what they are, but it'd be a little bit surprising if Dawkus won and Blades lost. This is a fight Blades absolutely should win, so we'll see what happens, but I like Curtis here. If you're Dawkus, you've got to hope that things happen in threes and these young heavyweights that are riding this momentum, that he's going to be a part of that. You nailed it perfectly.

Is Blades capable of giving up this fight and losing it? You're damn right he is, unfortunately, but I don't think Dawkus is capable enough to make that happen will he eventually he's it's still young in the process and there's a lot from chris dawkus that i have loved you know look offensively no doubt i tend to believe there's a fighter in there coming out of philly his brother's a ufc fighter like i tend to believe that intangible wise, he's got a ceiling to show us a lot. It just may be wrong matchup at wrong time.

Now, we've both been wrong on some picks lately, and that's the game right there. I mean, if you get it right all the time, you're probably living in Vegas. But give me Curtis Blades on the ground, man. Give me a fourth-round stoppage, Luke. He's going to gas on that tank. He's going to pull the gas. He's going's gonna siphon it out he might steal the catalytic converter too

luke i think he might do the full job on him he might change the alternator yeah i'm with you i we're gonna change your oil yeah change yeah but i will say this if chris dawkus wins this fight man and like wins it cleanly like the judges didn't do some screw job or the ref didn't fuck it up or whatever that's a big big big win for Chris Dawkins. So a huge opportunity in front of him for sure. Hey, this card's good, man. We said that on Wednesday. I got to say that again.

Luke, co-main event, women's flyweights Joanne Wood, nay Calder, versus Alexa Grasso, who we talked on Wednesday, seems to have a nice home here in the new division. She's still got to prove a little bit more, but it's a short ladder to the top for Valentina Shevchenko awaiting any viable contender. Grosso with the two straight wins over Jiyeong Kim and then Macy Barber being the big one there.

She's won three of her last four. That extends to five of seven she's the fighter certainly rising against what has become the old battle axe here luke and joanne wood uh the odds though have grasso minus 255 under draft kings is the favorite plus 205 for joanne wood how does this go any differently than three competitive rounds but 30 27 grasso thanks to the boxing yeah i'm with you like okay my my first thought is and my last my last thought is this is a fight i'm sorry you may have said the odds did you read the odds yes on this one one more time for me if you could hell yeah luke um plus 205 joanne wood minus 255 alexa grasso okay i think that's about right

actually i think that's much much more accurate here's the thing for me on these two they're pretty similar in some certain dimensions um there's one height uh one inch difference in height with with wood being a little bit like a little bit taller um grasso has a one inch reach advantage but in that sense they're basically the same height, same reach. So that's okay. But they're both orthodox fighters. Here's what stands out to me in all of this. Joanne Wood lands more at 6.71 strikes per minute, which is very high. She takes a lot at nearly four and a half, actually higher than four and a half. Alexa Grasso deals at almost five strikes per minute, which is a lot, and only absorbs 3.61, so she's a little bit more efficient with that.

But the biggest, biggest, biggest difference to me that stands out is, one, Joanne Wood, my brain keeps saying Calder Wood, she might go for the takedown a little bit more. She does mix that in. She has 1.57 per 15 minutes. Grasso just 0.28 so that could be something that shows up especially if grasso is pumping that jab and it's landing and it's working and wood can't find a way to counteract it would a little bit more we should be noted a little bit

more kickboxery and and then grasso a little bit more pure boxing again that's all relatively speaking but the other part that stands out to me b, and this is the one I think will really matter in the end, Grasso, or excuse me, Wood, striking defense, 52%. It's about normal, something like that. Grasso, 64%. Dude, that is very high. That's actually like rarely do I see someone have defense that high. I think she's going to be, I don't know how active she's going to be relative to what Wood does because she can be active herself.

But I think over time that a bit of a pace might get put on her that could deter her. And if Wood can't find those counters, right, if that 64% holds up, that's going to deny her. And I think that will then push her to the takedown. And if she can't get the takedown, that's when the wheels might start coming off the bus a little bit. Yeah, for me, it's not only that Calderwood is 34 and has lost three of four,

but I haven't seen a lot of life from her, Luke. Next level potential during some of these runs, even when she's fought the more elite foes available to her. If she does get the takedowns, I just don't see her being offensive enough to make that a difference, Luke. I think this fight will be on the feet longer than it will be on the ground. And when it's on the feet, Grasso's footwork and combinations, she knows what she's doing there, Luke.

It's going to take a different type of fighter to stop her momentum at this moment. So give me Grasso by decision. That's my lead pipe lock, rock solid, rock hard with emotion like Jake Hager pick of the week luke three rounds your phoner right there yeah yeah i'm gonna establish that uh luke there's so many other fights to care about but storyline wise this one is looks like it's getting bumped up pretty high 41 year old matt brown uh coming home here to ohio and he'll be taking on brian barbarina

certainly luke in a fight that screams you, fun and sloppy action and all that good stuff. But dude, Matt Brown, 41, as I just mentioned, he may not be getting enough of this sort of Jim Miller victory tour that he's going on this sort of like, you know, guy who had his day, but, but look at the longevity, look at the toughness, look at the track record. And now you got Matt Brown saying in interviews this week, I'd like to sign a five fight deal after this one with the UFC and fight until I'm 46 and try to become the oldest fighter in the history to both win and and appear. Luke, this is a little bit improbable, this second half turn for Matt Brown. Not that it's been super like it's not not that this is you know, it's impressive.

It's not crazy impressive, right? But it's impressive to extend your career longer than we think you would or should or could. But don't you remember there were times where you're like, yeah, he should probably go away now, like action star bending through the wars. He just never stopped. I don't even want to say evolving.

Luke, are you seeing a Matt Brown that's evolved or just a guy that hasn't hasn't let himself fall off yet because he's so damn tough no i i think you misdiagnose it here a little bit actually yeah tell me it is it is true that as you get older improvement becomes more and more difficult in part because you already know a lot and in part because your body won't let you and there's just a lot of difficulties that you know it's it's if if you get to if you're a peak bodybuilder just imagine this you know it's easy to build the first 20 pounds of muscle but like whatever your your you know olympia peak is to get the last few pounds of that muscle it takes years and years

and years to get the very end it's much harder to develop gains when you're at your genetic peak and potential than um than otherwise than if you're at the beginning of it right that's why beginners can put on muscle like that the point i'm trying to make here about matt brown though matt brown's a little bit different people talk about his toughness and his cowboy grittiness and things like that and they should because they all stand out to you he gets he's do you did you ever watch his season of the enforcer, Matt, or the ultimate fighter? Matt Brown was like an enforcer on that season

where they wanted Matt Brown to fight all the people in the house that they hated. Cause it was like, oh, you fight Matt Brown. He's going to fuck you up, man. You're like, they didn't necessarily present him to be like the best fighter, but they kind of presented him as the one, like the boogeyman.

Like you, you know, if you're a reject on the show, you don't want to fight Matt Brown. Matt Brown will really hurt you. And it's, that's been the reputation that followed, but I would humbly submit to everyone. If you really watch the tape on Matt Brown through the course of his career, here's what stands out to me more than most fighters. He is a dedicated student of the game. He has remained extremely humble about his journey and has constantly invested in learning, learning, learning, learning. He is a wealth of knowledge. If you talk to him, by the way, that's true as it relates to his, I should bring it up, Louis Simmons, who is an icon in the strength sports world, he was the guy from this famous gym that's out in Ohio.

He invented this thing called a reverse hyper. I have one. Matt Brown studied under him. If you talk to Matt Brown about the conjugate periodization methods and all that kind of stuff, which Louie Simmons had a big hand in creating, you'll learn that this dude is invested in the academics of it, quite frankly. He is always trying to refine technique and what are all the dimensions of my game that I can get better,

and he does it in ways that a lot of fighters don't. That's why I think he's still out here doing that, on top of the fact that he is a savage and he wants to compete in this. I mean, he's a savage. And I didn't mean to underscore, no, to overscore, medium score, medium nog. The argument here of how he's done this, I just don't, I mean, it's not like he was a striker and then I just meant, it was not like to save face he became a wrestler just to linger.

Right, right, right. Obviously, there's so many veteran tools and tricks and he's not, he hasn't stopped learning. But, you know, you do remember when he got head kick KO'd by Cowboy Cerrone in 2016, that was five losses in six fights at the elite and, you know, sub elite level still fighting one tough guy after another. It looked over at that point. He's three and two cents. And that knockout of Diego Sanchez from a few years ago is among, you know, with the lead down driving elbow forearm is among the among the nastiest. We talk about the nastiest finishes, the most like angry, like Dan Henderson over Hector Lombard, just just nasty finishes. Luke, that was certainly one of them. But do you think he can pull this off? The idea of, you know, he's already in win some, lose some mode.

That's what you're like when you're veteran gate gonna he's already in win some lose some mode that's what you're like when you're veteran gatekeeper who's in there to test people but you know what you're still gonna win some of them uh can he pull off another five fights another another five years of this loop well it's funny you know the jim miller thing is the right is the right comparison because he also is a huge a big time of the game, constantly working on stuff. There's a few guys that the UFC will let age gracefully. Have you noticed that? They don't do it for everyone,

but when they realize, okay, Jim Miller can't beat the best lightweights in the world right now. He can't do it. It wouldn't work. And Matt Brown can't beat the best, what is he, welterweight at this point? He can't beat the best welterweights out there. It's not really in the cards.

But fans like them. They are competitive with other people who are under contract. And Brian Barbarina is up and down, but he's experienced. This is not his first rodeo. Against those types, and these are somewhat still relevant fights in a sense about where people are coming or going, because Jim Miller just fought a guy making his UFC about where people are coming or going, right? Because Jim Miller just fought a guy making his UFC debut.

That was a huge fight, right, for his opponent. Matt Brown is in this stage where he's still able to have these really, not super important fights, but he's able to have this old man tour, and it's because people love him. He is a hometown hero here, but also because he has kind of accepted, okay, if I can't fight the best, I'm not going to get out of the game. I still want to compete, and I want to keep getting better in sort of smaller ways. Maybe the UFC will let me do that.

And for him and for Jim Miller and maybe a few other ones, they have agreed to that. It kind of works in limited circumstances. This is one of them. And, you know, that does happen in other sports. Guys who for a season were, you know, the all-star level or just short of that, but then figure out how to get a role, you know, whether it's basketball or whatever,

and can play that role. We just don't see that a lot in fighting. We don't see the old age gracefully and keep getting better. What Orlovsky's doing, even what Diego Sanchez had done, his last little run there in the UFC, what Jim Miller's doing. I'm very impressed with this when you really look at what it takes to keep evolving and need to be that student with the physical grind,

with the inevitable stretches of losing. I talk about that stretch where Brown lost a bunch. I don't want people to forget and only think of him as either an action fighter or a fun, tough old guy. And remember that his actual run, Luke, when he won seven in a row and got as high as that Robbie Lawler fight that, you know, right there, he's a fucking good fighter and he was nasty and he was dangerous. And it was like that run, he got a decision win over Wonderboy in that stretch. But that was four straight finishes.

Mike Swick, Jordan Mean, Mike Pyle, and Eric Silva leading into the Lawler title eliminator defeat, Luke. Don't forget that that guy could play in this league at that level, Luke. Yeah, dude. I mean, you've seen guys who maybe were, you know, once on one of the starting lineups in football sometimes kind of just finish out their career in special teams or, you know, sort of role players, and that's the way that it goes. Here's the thing.

Is there a meaningful difference? And I think there is, but I want to ask you this. Is there a meaningful difference? To me, what Jim Miller and Matt Brown are doing is very similar. Arlovsky is also doing something similar to that, but it seems like the UFC uses Arlovsky as much more of a dedicated, like, you know, measuring opportunity for his opponents. Whereas maybe Jim Miller's last fight was like that, but I don't feel like Miller and Brown are,

are quite the same utility in that, in the, in their respective divisions. True, true. No, that's true. It's different circumstances, yet all falls under the same halo. And you know what, Luke? If you go on a run, a little mini run with wins, they'll give you the step-up opportunity that you're still looking for.

You know? They'll level you up for you. Yes, that's right. With, although, respecting you in the other ways of matchmaking. Let's not forget, Clay Guida's kind of in that category as well, Luke. Another guy I never would have guessed. would have guessed yeah a little bit and

you know and again what do all those people have in common what do all of them have in common super crafty especially miller especially arlovsky and especially uh brown dude they're they're they're they're not just veterans in the sense they've done a lot and that entitles them to some measure of respect although that's true as well but dude they've got a lot of tricks up their sleeve, and that's why they're still doing relevant MMA. DraftKings has Brown and Barbarina both even here at minus 110. So it's a pick-em at the end of the day, Luke. Barbarina younger, but you can get him hurt, Luke,

and he's got some mileage on him. So I know you could be feeling a Matt Brown win here. I know that because I heard you say it this week. Your audio cut out for the last sentence what'd you say i said matt brown uh could win a knockout here and i know that's a pick you like luke um yeah brian barbarina takes a lot of punishment now here's the thing barbarina's got really well i'm gonna say he's got pretty good cardio you know and matt Brown has I'm sure trained his ass off but at his age I have noticed he and Jim Miller you know it's fair to say that they're probably not the same kind of physical force that they once were in terms of their overall

cardiovascular push so there might be an opportunity for Barbarina to do something a little bit later in this fight if he can stay alive and keep moving and make matt brown work but you know skill for skill matt brown is way more skilled i think than brian barbarina and uh i gotta tell you i like i like his chances of winning here a lot especially in his hometown which you know we talked about this all the time how a lot of guys don't get to fight ever in front of their home cities and of course matt brown's not headlining here but when it rarely happens we, we should still call it out good for Matt Brown that he gets an opportunity like this to fight in front of his own home city.

I remember he fought Eric Silva on that last fight of his prime run win streak, and that was in, I think, Cincinnati. It was a Sunday night UFC fight night card, and the crowd went apeshit, Luke, when he got that finish. It was great to see. All right, Luke, we got to speed it up here,

but this might be the best fight of the card and it comes in the flyweight division and maybe a potential title shot at stake as asker askerov and your boy kai car france from from the ckb life luke who is rising following that stoppage of cody garbrandt luke minus 425 askkarov is your favorite. Plus 320. Now, Luke, you labeled me as a beat super fan, and I'm going to tell you you're damn right. I love me some Askar Askarov, and you know that. But I would roll the dice on a plus 320 KK France every single day of this week, Luke. What are we doing there, Luke? Yeah, I mean, this isn't quite like the main event.

I don't think that's fair because I think Askarov can strike a lot more competitively with France or Cara France than what we've seen from what Blades might be able to show Chris Dawkins. I guess we'll have to see. But this is the one that I think will define the entire fight. So in a sense, this is what binds them, right? Takeown average per 15 minutes for Askarov, 2.75. That is high. He's nearly good for a takedown around, and that means he's going to be trying for a lot more than that since his takedown accuracy is only 28%. So think about that for a second. He fails on 72% of his takedown attempts and still ends up at 2.75 takedowns per 15 minutes.

That tells you he is on you like a dog on a bone. And that doesn't mean he's going to get every takedown. Far from it. But you are going to have to fight this fucker off constantly. Constantly. Kai Karfrance is a much better striker than askerov although i think askerov can strike respect respectively quite well especially if you can mix in that takedown threat right well that might actually end up let me just say this about askerov whether you look

at him as a like one punch finisher or not and he's not his strikes are hard his jabs his body shots like he he bites down on that, man. He goes after you. 100%. 100%. I'm just saying to you what really makes him come alive, and you saw this in a lot of his fights, he can scramble well. He doesn't get tired, to your point. He actually has some power in his strikes.

And when he can strike through scrambles, and obviously he's good at taking the back, he's good at maintaining the back. He's good at, you know, maintaining top position at times. He just is a workhorse through many more dimensions of the game. Kaikara France, I'm not saying if it's strike, he can't win. That's not true. But it's going to be a lot truer for him that if he's not striking BC, that's going to be a way harder fight for him to win.

And when I say striking, I just mean at range. That's all. A lot of our listeners always reach out after we talk about Askarov and say, how come you guys don't shout him out for being deaf? So is he partially deaf, Luke? Completely deaf? I know that... Can you hear me?

Hold on, BC, I can't hear you. Am I on the show anymore? I don't know if that's... Is Askarov fully deaf? Like Matt Hamill deaf? I think so. Hello? I think so. Hello? I think so.

Yeah. Yeah, BC Zoom is messed up. So let me just give you some relevant information about this contest while we wait for BC to return. Kaikara France, this is kind of interesting. Five strikes landed per minute, pretty high. Strikes absorbed, 3.79. That's also a little on the high end. Askarov doesn't take nearly as much damage. It doesn't dish as much out 3.37 landed, but just 2.65 absorbed. So a big

key component of Kaikara France is not merely going to be avoiding scrambles and avoiding takedowns, really creating separation, but, um, you know, finding ways to get accurate strikes off, which by the way, this is why he doesn't take a lot of damage, in part because he can deal a little bit on the feet as well, but he puts his opponents in positions where they're constantly having to, I think, throw strikes in suboptimal situations. And because they're suboptimal,

they're not going to be nearly as accurate, and he might be able to have some decent defense. In fact, his striking defense, 56%, which is a little above average. It's pretty good. I will say Kaikara France's striking defense, 65%. Now that is very high. So again, on the feet, if you're Askarov here,

it's not at all unwinnable, but that probably isn't the path of least resistance, right? It's probably not that. The grappling has got to be the key here takedown average as i mentioned 2.75 for asker askrov just 0.51 for kaikara france not really a threat in that way takedown accuracy is low 28 but when you just think about that that means there's 70 of those unaccounted for obviously he didn't score them but they were all attempts either to set up strikes cheat the distance cut, cut an angle, faint, fake the whole nine. Well, it would be a fake in that case,

not a faint, but you get the idea. You get the idea. Take down defense, 64% for Askarov because I do think he's a little bit susceptible and open due to the somewhat open nature of how he competes. He's not a shutdown grappler type. He's more of a out hustle scrambler kind of top position guy. That's a little bit more where he is. By the way, my producer says Askarov was born deaf and through his hearing, through life, I guess, his hearing has improved. He can only hear approximately 20% of the sounds most people can. By the way, it should also be noted, I can hear 0% of the sounds that Brian Campbell makes, especially when his Zoom shits the bed. Getting back to the numbers here a little bit,

as I mentioned, takedown defense for Askarov, 64%, pretty decent for Kaikara France, 87%. Neither is a big submission threat, both at 0.0 per 15 minutes. Would be interesting to see if that somehow gets weaved in here. Does one of them go a little bit outside of their comfort zone, a little bit outside of their previous sort of territory of what they consider high percentage attacks for them, and really kind of throw in a wild card here with a submission attempt if one is there, a guillotine or maybe something from the back or whatever. percentage attacks for them and and really kind of throw in a wild card here with a submission attempt if one is there a guillotine or maybe something from the back or whatever that could be kind of interesting all right i can hear bc now do we have him i'm here i'm here what's up bc

i mean you know yeah nobody wants to hear why i had tech issues but i had him look it was my fault i'm back at it uh luke is is uh askrov deaf did i get that right yeah he's he's got 20 he can hear 20 of the sounds most people can so he's that's that's incredible i mean shout out to matt hamill who had a very respectable career um with the same um setback there luke i i don't know where you're at in this preview but i will tell you this the best flyweight in the world is in this fight, Luke. And his name is Askar Askarov. And he's going to win this one.

And then the next one. And, you know, he's going to end up your flyweight champion, Luke. I think he's the most well-rounded threat. He's tough as nails. And everything that you said good about him, you're damn right. This is a great test. I think he already deserved the title shot, but he's got a historic rivalry now above him and

Brandon Marino and the new champion, the old champion, same as the old boss there with Devis and Figueredo. But Luke, I just can't see. I mean, I can't see. Those odds are tempting because I can see kaikara friends win this he doesn't have the firepower to win this luke does he have enough firepower

yes he does he does uh you know the firepower by itself is not enough to win i think he would need a few other things in conjunction with it but you're asking does he have you know the kind of like round or fight altering power um and accuracy to to to really hurt ask her off here yeah sure he does i love this fight give me ask her off okay luke there it is all right that's what's happening um luke did you pick did you do you care you don't care I will pick yes I'll pick Askarov I know you think I was going to pick Kaikar France because he trains in New Zealand but I have respect for him but I think this might be

a bridge too far I had respect for you by not mentioning that at all okay I kind of like this sloppy fight that they're going to give us Luke as Alexiolonic and Beefy Latifi touchdown down here at Heavyweight. It's largely gross and unnecessary, Luke, but your quick thoughts, very quick, on Heavyweight Latifi.

Very quick. Yeah. Yes, great. I mean, I don't have anything bad to say about it, but it's not like a big editorial priority for me. And the producers are begging us to move on. Yeah, I mean, you know, it is what it is, Luke. Mark Jocasey also against Vlachislav Borshev

to open what could end up being a six-fight main card, Luke. Dov lets Dan Yagshimura, Dov. Is there any fight you are loving on the prelim card as much as I have love for Jennifer Maia replacing Jessica Ai against Manon Ferreau? Luke, this is a tough-ass matchup for your woman of French kickboxing renown, correct? Yes, tough fight.

Obviously, we know Jennifer Maia, well-rounded, and again, herself, experienced in this division, great on the ground. Manon Ferreau, great on the feet, or at least in this division. Great on the ground. Man on FIRO. Great on the feet or at least, you know, has been mostly pretty good on the feet. So this fight, this card has a few of these sort of got these ladies or guys with very different ways in which they win. And we're going to have to negotiate that and see which one comes out. It's a it's an interesting kind of coincidence also chris gutierrez taking on um uh dana or bat garell dana who i think trains with brandon gibson over at jackson wink so

another and chris gutierrez i think is out of uh not elevation but factory x and mark montoya so you know two elite teams elite coaches that should be another fun one as well yeah absolutely and neil magni max pain griffin could end up being the featured preliminary bout 41 year old Sarah McMahon returning for the first time since that finished loss to Juliana Pena. She'll take on Carol Rosa, few storylines there, Luke,

few fights that are be interesting. So I'll be checking that out. Luke, let's keep this, this train wreck rolling here and go back into the police blotter of all things, UFC and, and a couple headlines that we keep making Luke Wednesday's top story. and go back into the police blotter of all things UFC and a couple headlines that we keep making.

Luke, Wednesday's top story was certainly Jorge Masvidal, two-piece and a fractured tooth on Colby Covington at a Miami steakhouse. We're all through that, Luke. We're mostly through the moral conundrum and all of that, but news has changed a bit since then with covington now pressing charges telling police that his ninety thousand dollar rolex suffered fifteen thousand dollars in damage so luke he's going full on with this and we do know that this uh what masvidal has been charged with can become a felony if fully convicted there.

So, you know, there's no shortage of stakes here. But did we rightfully or wrongfully receive some criticism from our viewers for going? You know, I mean, it's an unfortunate situation all around. But not only did, you know, Jorge kind of announce it well in advance that's his style that's what he does and Colby may or may not have had it coming I'm seeing a lot more regular life response to that from fans going nah eff it at the end of the day that's assault brother the guy you know he had his chance in the cage yes maybe because I look at the fight game as so not pro wrestling necessarily but just an alternate universe.

Sometimes the life these guys live to me is just like this weird game, ultimate universe, try to create fights out of beefs and all that, that yeah, our, our fans reaction of holy shit, that's some shitty shit done by Jorge Masvidal is a hundred percent damn right. And Colby is the victim in this case you know we never uh you know argued that but um you've seen a a wide reaction from fighters that seems to differ from the reaction from the fans and what in supporting jorge yes there's a lot of jorge support well dude i mean this is one of the situations where it's a little bit unique and i i didn't i haven't noticed i have noticed that the fans have very much taken colby's side listen i said this

yesterday and i'll say it again here dude if like what would you think if colby sued him nothing dude whoever punched him and jorge is of course alleged to have punched him but whoever the assailant is made a very clear choice about what they wanted for their future right you and you accepted all of the things that came with it colby cuffington is entitled to uh legal remedy he absolutely is the victim legal remedy through the criminal justice system as well as um any kind of civil uh suit that may be launched uh consequently and i wouldn't judge him for it even a little bit he is absolutely entitled to all of that my only point can be is again if you were trying to explain to an

innocent bystander how this could have possibly happened it's not especially confusing what the law is and what we should tolerate in society of course is one conversation and then a separate one is that has nothing to do with whether or not it will. There is just very, it is absolutely true. It is absolutely true. Colby Covington is a victim. Full stop. No argument about it. Period. That is the full nature of what happened on that night in Miami. It is also true that he agitated and provoked and showed incredibly poor risk management through an act designed for self-aggrandizement. Well, dude, the bill came due on that. He cannot act surprised by that. Even if I fully grant that what happened to him 100% makes him a victim. It does. Right. Like as stupid as my explanation for that is in theory,

it's true it becomes this alternate world when you play this character publicly that this is some of the price you pay just like luke i like to live in a safe uh daily world that has the kind of rules that if somebody runs up with a mask and does this type of premeditated attack that yes like you said about colby i or you or anybody would have every right to sue for damages and press full charges and all of that but you enter that weird world just like luke we all live under the same rules but go into certain neighborhoods i'm sure in washington dc or harford connecticut or anywhere and they got a different set of rules luke okay they do it's just

there's no freaking questioning that so i didn't never said any of that to glorify masvidal i do seem to be the only one that it thinks it's premeditated to a degree in hopes of getting bigger fights but even that aside luke it's shitty though but is it not shitty under street rules because masvidal has long stood by that being his style and his way to survive? I mean, this is a stupid question, Luke. You know it's a stupid question. You're asking the wrong guy about what the proper etiquette is with street rules. Is that why all the fighters are backing him,

or are they only backing him because they hate Colby more? Is that what's going on? For sure they hate Colby. For sure they hate Colby. So that's a big part of it. The other part is, I don't know know I can't speak for the fighters I do think though it bears one thing repeating here listen this is what Colby I think thought that the risk management side was a big of a bit of a bit uh game and it hadn't really cost him in person yet up until this incident. So he probably thought it just wasn't going to happen, right?

You know, what was the likelihood of him being attacked? He probably thought it was much lower than it actually was. But the thing I want to point about Jorge is it's like, okay, here's what Colby got wrong about all of that. He went to Oregon State and, you know, I realize he went to colleges before that, but he was a two-time All-American. He went through this kind of process that a lot of middle-income Americans get to do. You go to college and you graduate and you can do things after that. He chose an unusual career path afterwards, but he had a relatively normal-ish upbringing in terms of that kind of experience.

Jorge Masvidal, did he even make it to the ninth grade? He dropped out I don't know what if any kind of post-secondary education he has I don't judge him for it everyone has a completely different life circumstance in fact he made great work of himself coming from the place where you know you're dropping out of high school or whatever and then you're competing in the backyards with Kimbo Slice and now you're headlining UFC cards and and you know you're a multi-millionaire This is the only point about Jorge that I feel like needs to be said as well. It's like, dude, isn't the point of getting to a place where you're making this money and you're headlining these cards and your life is a lot more comfortable than it ever was before, isn't the point of getting to that place so that you can leave

the street shit behind? One is supposed to be the graduated departure from the other life that you can leave the street shit behind, right? One is supposed to be the graduated departure from the other life that you didn't like for yourself and you didn't want for yourself. You wanted something more, and he did it, and he earned it every inch, every dollar he earned. You cannot take any of that away from Jorge, but I just don't understand the mentality where you finally get a chance to leave that, and then you bring it back against a rival in a career path where you get to fucking fistfight each other,

and you just did a few... It's just bad judgment. Super bad judgment. I guess that's why I'm so firmly in the idea of, like, no, guys, Masvidal, although I do believe he stands for this, that's why, again, if there was no idea at all of a second fight or pay-per-view bonus for having done this, you know, is he still wired like that? Yeah, yeah, of course.

I believe that. But I have to believe that this was at least financially motivated for the future of getting a fight only because if it's not, Luke, why the hell are you going to this length to prove how tough you are when, again, you just had 25 minutes against him um and now you've got a strong army of people luke on on replying to our tweets and adding us in the comments and all that saying hey luke and brian how are you not mentioning that uh colby actually never said anything about his kids and because that's irrelevant it's irrelevant colby said a lot of other shit about deadbeat wives and all that right i mean our deadbeat being a like colby went deep enough where where that's you know i know it's not a fine line like you have to be a third grader to think that that is some kind of

meaningful difference it doesn't yes would that have been even worse if he had really gone out and be like this kid and that kid is this and that yes that would have been completely awful dude please everyone out there stop it with this and that. Yes, that would have been completely awful. Dude, please, everyone out there, stop it with this nonsense. In the end, it was just harmless talk. Yes, I agree that if you live in a dignity society, it doesn't matter what anyone says, it shouldn't affect you.

But a lot of people don't live in that kind of headspace. And so the question you have to ask yourself is, did Colby sufficiently agitate enough people that over time, someone decided to sock him in the face for it, whether or not he brought up a kid? That's the argument. Not like, well, in my playground, you can talk about the older kid if he's a teen, but you can't talk about the little one if it's a girl or if it's five. But if it's three, you can kind of like these stupid ass rules that only a simpleton would consider as like the meaningful difference. No, the dude agitated violent people and they reacted.

Period. That's the argument i lean more toward that knowing there's a price to pay when playing a schnick like that and and that's what it is at the end luke quickly here but ufc has not really responded and i don't expect them to ufc's track record luke obviously very controversial at times is just a oh we'll let the law handle it. But I think in this case, and look, maybe it's the same case with Habib Conner. We just felt like the dolly with the window in the Habib Conner was different. I mean, it's different, Luke, but it's close, but it's different. But with that said, it's kind of like hockey in the NHL in a way where it's like, I think UFC's got to like this.

You can tell me, be sure you're crazy. It's a bad look. These are pro athletes represented on Disney-owned ESPN and blah, blah, blah. I think they kind of like this, Luke. I do. Don't get me wrong. That part, you might be. I mean, like it, I don't know.

I think they would rather. Wouldn't prefer it. Wouldn't prefer it. Wouldn't i think they would rather prefer it wouldn't prefer it wouldn't prefer it wouldn't prefer it yes but like they're not cracking down saying you guys need to show up in suits on your way to the arena you need to act something i mean here here's what here's how you know that they don't care that much i mean i'm sure they're not like happy about it but here's anything they didn't cut anybody right like if it really bothered them if it was like no fuck this guy we cannot do business with him anymore forget it you're done go live your life this is not how we're gonna you know proceed yeah that would tell you that they probably had enough no they didn't it's business as usual it was um it was the you know former head of the nwo eze um, on a pro wrestling side here, Luke, that,

um, Eric Bischoff, who said, you know, controversy creates cash, Luke. Okay. So, um, the end of the day, Luke, Jorge's gonna have to pay a lot of cash. Um, and he's got to hope everything goes his way legally, but they're both gonna, they're both going to benefit from this as well. their employer more news at 11 luke uh he wasn't the only one oh sorry quickly uh is habib out of line with this response i think we have the tweet to throw to um some people argue you know habib's never tweeted and this could be ali you know you could go a lot of ways with this but here was the response of habib of this incident if you are stronger than someone inside the octagon it does not mean that you can insult his children.

No one has the right to insult someone's family. Once you have gone down this path, then be ready to back up your words. You were attacked by a pro fighter the same as you are your own size and you go press charges against him to the police. I think all Walter Wade should refuse to fight Colby. Just don't accept fights with him. Let him sit without a fight, it will probably significantly affect him and all fighters who even think of insulting families who is provoking the fighters to look for someone in restaurants to deal with him. Luke, we did see a lot of tweets from fighters going, hey, I didn't see Leon Edwards,

you know, get the authorities involved. I'm not here to debate that, Luke. I'm here to hear you debate Habib's take. I don't agree. I don't agree at all. Like, dude, I don't want to live in a world where people think that because I or anyone else said something that another person doesn't like, another person can go and sock him in the face for it. I think we can all agree that, you know, certainly at a bare minimum,by made a dedicated effort to be as indecent as as you know a person probably could again i guess suppose other limits he could have gone to but you know he was trying to fuck with people pretty hardcore and so i understand that you know that's going to agitate people if if you do that so i understand that but that doesn't mean i then secondarily follow that up with well i guess we just yeah we should live in a rule live in a world where you know

if someone doesn't like something you say they can fucking punch you in the face for it no that's that's barbaric and and i don't agree at all the fans backed kobe though the fans backed kobe big in this uh debate dude he is the victim i'm sorry like what he is just just ask yourself what did colby say as as awful as it he said many awful things yeah what did he say that was legally actionable nothing right like again in regular life i'm not supporting any of this this ain't regular life to me it's a little different like you know like look when i get into you know dust-ups on the basketball court i always think you just you leave it in that court though you know as long as i didn't cross a line with my mouth we leave it in that court right

right i understand that but again it also just bears repeating like people like yes this is what i mean like people who speak out on principled stances and then bad things happen to them you know that's that's one thing but like you're knowingly agitating against people for self aggrandizement and doing it in very questionable ways even if he may or may not have said anything specifically about the children seems what somewhat irrelevant you also have to weigh the pros and cons of that because dude tons of people we should say this tons of people have agitated and haven't had the record of having people run up on him like colby has i think people should reflect on why that has

happened or not. Luke, if I went through with it, or maybe it's more like when I go through with it, and attempt the rear naked choke to force you in that same, you know, tap or nap bitch moment, and I do, because of your stubbornness, put you to sleep, when you wake up, would you sue me? When you wake up from that dream that you're having you let me know okay okay you know i i i wonder that sometimes luke i do wonder that you know

yeah you can you you should leave it there you should leave it as i wonder yeah you know i am wonder uh luke your buddy connor mcgreg, arrested again, this time in my best friend. We hang out all the time, pulled over and his vehicle was seized, charged with dangerous driving charges. Luke, he was driving a Bentley Continental worth one hundred and eighty seven thousand dollars. If convicted here, it's a hefty financial penalty and up to six months in prison. Luke, is this a wake-up call, or is this just the price of being famous, Luke? Yeah, it's the price of being famous.

They actually have video of it. It's like two guys were driving in Ireland on the highway. They spot McGregor, who had the top down on his car, or looked like it anyway, and they kept saying, up the Mac, like Big Upstam or whatever, and he was shouting back at him so he was loving it and i don't know if i don't know if he would have done something

before that or he was doing something during the middle of that but then the cops flag him you know um i mean listen they said he passed sobriety tests which frankly to me is the more important infringement but you know we'll also say this we got errol spence jr coming back and he had the retina surgery which is what prevented the Pacquiao fight and everything else. But before that, he had his Porsche or whatever it was being flung into the air because he just wasn't reacting or he wasn't being a good driver. And there was more to the story than that, obviously. I'm just saying, is this the biggest scandal?

No, but I would prefer him to not being pulled over and arrested for driving like a maniac. While Conor has had too many arrests in the last four or five years, and there's always controversy swirling around him, this doesn't scream as, you know, scary or ridiculous. In 2017, he paid a $440 fine for speeding. And then in 2018, Luke, he had his license revoked, and he faced a huge fine when he got pulled over doing 154 kilometers in a 100.

So, you know, when you're a risk-taking pro athlete, like, you know, did you expect Lawrence Taylor to do anything for the style he played on the field for the Giants? Could he be anything than what he was off of it, Luke? Just a full-on, just, you know, get after it in the personal life, life in the nightclub scene luke driving sports cars at ridiculous speeds i mean our us our favorite rock stars our favorite action heroes we almost expect that i ain't saying it's a safe thing though okay no it's not you know in florida they don't make anyone who's driving a motorcycle or a vespa wear a helmet boy they don't give a fuck down there huh well they don't want they don't want to be told luke and i see that okay so yeah it's just like hey you know um we just don't mind dying like we

it's just the thing that we do every day more than most it's great yeah it's great um luke we've got um uh nate diaz making a lot of noise about both conor mregor, Jorge Masvidal, and then Dustin Poirier jumping in. We have some tweets to throw to you. I don't expect you to care necessarily that he's jawing back and forth with Conor of who submitted who and who should play who in a movie because Jared Leto got involved and said he'd love to play McGregor. But again, I ask you as we run through these and look at it, why the hell is Nate Diaz versus Dustin Poirier not been freaking booked already?

Like, what the... Luke, I can only conspiracy, you know, web together a lot of ideas because why the hell is this not happening? He ain't capable now or this year, okay? Incapable ass. Been trying to fight for seven months ufc let's fucking go don't forget that nate tweeted about wanting to fight for bellator on the hawaii card luke as well yes all ufc fighters need to stop getting arrested for stupid shit you're acting like

animals irresponsible little kids get your shit together drive safe please and act right luke would you have survived being raised in stockton do you think you could have i mean you did the marine thing um you know i survived maybe happily i think not that i've not that i've known what that's like at all uh throughout 42 years of life but probably whatever i've experienced would be even less okay should we be concerned about this diaz fourier thing or is it you just think they're kind of waiting and plugging it plugging it in on a large card in the fall or something yeah i think they're trying to figure out their calendar and then they haven't done that yet that's what i think because they're very meticulous about their planning how many shows where are they going to be who's going to be on them what what belts need to be in rotation with

who you know they're very good about that so i tend to think that's probably what the holdup is oh i think i'm reading uh potential quick hitters here luke off the wrong i think i copy and paste it on my list i'm glad you're so dialed in for today's show as host that uh we great we don't have these problems um so maybe i'll talk about that other thing later all right luke uh topic three is uh one championship is gonna have their anniversary card called one x signifying 10 years um making um rap tunes luke ever since honeys was wearing sassoon um for sit for um chatri sid young tong and company luke it's a big celebration there will be a it's almost like three cards in one across multi different, of course, disciplines, MMA, kickboxing, Muay Thai, all that, Luke.

But the main reason for us U.S. MMA fans to be pumped up is that co-main event when Demetrius Johnson does the multi rules, mixed rules fight against the kickboxing sensation Rod Tang. Rod Tang. Is it Rod Tang? I think it's Rod Tang. Luke, he's a savage. He's an action fighter. This is creative. This is fun. We nailed all that already. What the hell does this actually look like?

And how much does DJ after that loss, Luke, re-examine you know where what which direction in his career he's going Luke I gave you a yeah I mean this is this is one of those fights where you know what does the result mean you never really know because if DJ goes out there during the MMA round and chokes him out then who cares or maybe that doesn't happen he gets knocked out or it doesn't happen but then he's actually like pretty competitive on the feet or whatever you know who knows what the it'll look like you it's like it's like when you have the you know two like when a boxer fights an MMA fighter it's like well whatever

you know whatever round that happens and is the likeliest outcome now it is true that who was it I forget the guy's name it was a Japanese guy who fought Shinya Aoki who was a kickboxer Jienzo or was it Yamaguchi was his name or something like that anyway um and he survived on the ground and then need uh Shinya Aoki in the stand-up round which you know again sort of is one of the more plausible outcomes you're going to get I tend to think that what this fight signifies that it's fun could be kind of interesting one guy might outperform expectations in the side of the game that they're not in their best but in general like however it goes you'll probably be like oh

right it was always going to go you know in one of these likely scenarios are they fighting until a stoppage or i know there's two what two rounds that are mma2 that are uh what is it muay thai or kickboxing um i think i think muay thai i'm not sure and then do they go to a fifth if it's deemed a a draw there's probably something funky in there it'll be fun to watch luke just the same the guy that did beat demetrius johnson to defend his one flyweight title is also on this card adriano marais she'll be taking on yuya wakamatsu luke that main event is a lot of people talking even stateside about angela lee defending her adam weight title against stamp fairtex are we sleeping a bit on angela lee when we rightfully criticize one for its you know financial claims and all that and ratings claims what do you mean i mean like

she doesn't deserve praise should we be talking about her more and we don't because one's got a you know a little stigma on it well the other part is that she doesn't have a ton of fights she has lost two of her last three um so i think that might be part of it as well uh and now one of them was going out of her wasn't she daring to be great in a way yes and so so two things one she got the revenge in one of the fights the other one was michelle nicolini who was like michelle nicolini scored the most gruesome arm bar i've ever seen of all arm bars anywhere it was when she took i forget who she did it against maybe uh it was mikey musumechi's

sister and she'd pull the arm and it wasn't this's that she took this arm and bent it all the way across her own back. I'd never even seen anything like that, and it was the most gruesome thing ever. So losing to her is not the biggest deal in the world, but to the point, I think that has somewhat dimmed the relevant North American media from covering her more. Yeah, that's fair. She'll be essentially main eventing this whole event,

which, is going to have a seven fight main card called the grand finale that kicks off 8. A.M. Eastern on Saturday morning, Luke, or is it Sunday morning? I'm not even sure.

I think it's Saturday morning, but, uh, Shinya Aoki is going to have a, a fun old guy fight with sexy Yama and, uh, Ed Furlong. Luke is going Luke, from

Terminator 2, is going to take on John Way Parr in a Muay Thai bout. And plenty of kickboxing champions who I could never pronounce their names. But one is going to have its moment with 1X, Luke. Look, you got to check it out. Mighty Mouse in this weird fight, you got to check it out. Alright, Luke, quickly boxing this weekend. We went hard

Wednesday on Tim Zhu's Showtime debut, U.S. debut. Both will take place in Minneapolis at the Armory Saturday night. Terrell Gaucher, the opponent for Tim Zhu, and this is the first of the spring-summer schedule for Showtime, Luke, and it's a good triple header. We talked about son of a Hall of Famer and all that stuff. Let's talk turkey in the ring. Tim Zou has shown a lot, Luke, but it's been on the domestic level. This is the perfect step up in my eyes against Gauthier, who can counter fight effectively. Great technique and is coming off a big knockout second round stoppage of Jermonte Clark, which offsets the criticism you normally hear from Gauthier surrounding him of he's skilled,

but he's a little too passive, doesn't let his hands go enough. I think he's trying to resurrect that, Luke. Is this a fool's gold fight? I mean, a trap fight here for Tim Zou. Is he walking into something, Luke? Or are we going to see the next at 154 and take that one step closer? I don't know what to expect from him. I know you've been high.

I watched the Jeff Horn fight. He looked pretty good in that one, to your point. He actually looked really good in that fight. I tend to think he should beat Terrell Gauthier um who I think is a good if flawed fighter right I think it's maybe a fairish way to put it here's what I want to ask you though I have noticed that when you say to me and I don't find it all that controversial but when you say to me like oh I don't find it all that controversial, but when you say to me like, oh, he did a lot of stuff domestically, but now he's in the big leagues. A lot of the people in Australia are like,

hey, fuck off, bro, like, or mate, because what he did here was actually pretty important, not just from the box office perspective, because he's been on pay-per-view there for a while, but he actually beat some good names in here and showed some great ability. And it's you fucking assholes who didn't recognize George Kambosis was any good

because y'all are some haters in north america what about that okay so what that means is and shout out to you know down you shout out to australian boxing just like we're shouting out the explosively ridiculous rise in the uk and ireland at the moment is now y'all finally got a good you know you know amateur system and feeding system to create this type of run now have things changed for good in boxing in that regard that you that they're consistently putting out world-class fighters not completely but there's momentum right now so i get that nobody wants to be insulted but as things have gone in the modern time in boxing you got it you

got to prove it in las vegas on the pay-per-view level against the American champion of the moment or the champion from Europe or fighting in America or whoever. You get my point. But this is a big one, though. This guy has potential to be the best boxer in this country's history, Luke. And this country's had a few legends for sure. But he's coming on luke and if you look at the odds here and we've talked about why he's so good and why gauche is a tough test but unless gauche really lets his hands go and gets to another level it's certainly a passable test uh the betting odds

though luke which tend to be wider in these big boxing fights than the mma ones minus 1100 Tim Zoo on DraftKings your favorite plus 650 Gautier uh so they're the you know Vegas giving giving Young Zoo a ton of respect but Luke how is he going to do it it's going to be behind that big jab yep it's going to be a consistent body attack because that's what he does but I think if Terrell Gauthier gets too reckless or too offensive, Zou's too schooled, poised, and can time him, and I think he can get him out of there. So there's going to have to be a dance Gauthier's going to have to do, meaning he's going to have to really control the terms and pace of the fight, Luke,

but he's going to have to be offensive enough to take the shifter away from Zou. I don't know if he can do that that's the real question for me look because it's not just be more offensive you're gonna have to take over the terms of this fight that's right erickson lubin is showing you here a little bit of what i expect from tim zoo not so much the center of the ring i think tim zoo is going to push him back with that big jab as you mentioned and really begin to go you know probably do more volume i would say i would say i don't know if Gaucher is the bigger slickster I think Gaucher is going to try to be the bigger slickster in this one and I think the guy with the better fundamentals and the better punching power which I think is Zhu is going to get it done but the point I'm trying to make here is BC I think behind that jab you're going to see a lot and I think

you're going to see Gaucher how soon I don know, but eventually I think that stoppage is going to happen along the ropes. I think Tim Zoo is going to really press physically into him and make him fight along the rope the ropes itself and then the rope line and I think he's going to get picked off from there. So does it get stopped? I don't know but I'm expecting big damage late.

If Zoo is as good as we think he is these are the type of, these are the only types of fighters that Gchei really loses to. So, you know, he lost Erickson Lube and he lost to Erislandy Lara on a title bout. He had a draw with Austin Trout. That's the type of level.

So I think Zoo will do it. And this is a, look, if he can get a stoppage, it's a statement. It's, it's a statement. You know,

I don't know if he can get the winner of, of Castagno Charlo too right away, but you know, let's watch his rise. If he can win this one and continue on in the States in Showtime. And yes, I got the time limit coming here, Luke, the end of the tunnel. We're going to get through this in time.

But this is a triple header Saturday night for Showtime. And this co-main event, I don't want anybody to sleep on. Michelle Rivera is an unbeaten lightweight who is putting something nicely together that we don't talk about him with all those young lightweights maybe as much as we should. He fashions himself a young Cassius Clay and models and

dresses just like a young Muhammad Ali. His game isn't nearly as good, no disrespect Luke, but he is a talented guy on the come up. What I love is what this test is. Joseph Adorno Luke, just two, three fights ago was an unbeaten top rank prospect from Puerto Rico, a puncher, a guy who goes after it, and then he has back-to-back draws that were somewhat

disappointing. Now it seems like he's on the open market, and this is a tough out for Michelle Rivera. They know each other. They've sparred in the past, so I'm really hoping people will circle on this co-main event, Luke, because Rivera has looked special, but this is going to be a tough fight. I will take you at your word. I frankly would be lying if I said I knew a lot about either fighter, but certainly to just remind the folks at home, Tim Zhu and Terrell Gauthier is the main event for a reason,

but it's certainly not the only event. Yep, so that triple header, Elvis Rodriguez returns as well. Luke, quickly, ESPN is going to give us Miguel Burchelt against Jeremiah Nakatia, and here's why this is interesting, Burchelt does not fall You love this fight. I do, because Burchelt was the boogeyman at 130 until Oscar Valdez moved up and knocked him out in that sensational fight, you know, over

a year ago. Burchelt is now finally making his comeback, he's moving up though to 135 and he's taken on Nakatia who lost to Shakur Stevenson in his biggest step up but he has legit power and he made Stevenson to be fair Luke circle away from that power pretty much the entire second half of that this is a good test to see where Burchelt is he's got a new trainer he's got a new outlook he took a legitimate uh break off um if he wins this Luke he's a fun

b-side but he's a fun out at 135 with all these other big names there i mean he can make some big fun fights what's the biggest one let's say he gets the the spectacular win what do you think is a likely big fight that could potentially materialize this year for him politics plays a big part because, you know, he fights for, for top rank there, uh, on ESPN, but you know, we do have, um, look, Shakur Stevenson's fighting, um, Oscar Valdez in a fricking amazing fight. Could the winner of that be a great fight at one 35 against Burchella? Yes. It looks like Teofimo's moving out. So up to one 40. So that isn't a lane or an angle right now for him, but Lomachenko is going to need an opponent when he does come back.

These are the type of fights that would be great. Everyone wanted Lomachenko versus Burchella at 130. It never happened, Luke. This would be great to see those two against each other. Check out that one. Dazon's also going to give us a very interesting rematch. Kiko Martinez, the 35-year-old who had the upset knockout win to

become champion late in his career, is going to take on Josh Warrington a second time from their decision back in 2017. And Luke, Eric Morales and Orlando Salido, the two old Mexican legends retired are going to do a six round exhibition bout from somewhere in Texas. And it's going to air on fight TV. It's going to be 154 pounds.

And I love both of these two action heroes, and they're probably gonna end up thinking it's real and go after it and so that could be fun but luke should be worried that james vick is going to be boxing on that undercard at 168 pounds against simon alejandra heredia cortez who is a 38 year old with a zero and one professional record um no see here's the thing if if james vick was like really trying to go like, you know, make something of himself in boxing, which I think would be very difficult to do given the circumstances,

that would be one thing. But it sounds like he just wants to compete and test himself a little bit. I'll, you know, not quite as nimbly as Jim Miller or Matt Brown. But, you know, if you're fighting a guy who's 0-1, 38, how much are you really risking? It's not, you know, if you're fighting a guy who's 0-1, 38, how much are you really risking? It's not, you know, for a professional fighter, it's not that risky, all things considered. You know, you don't want to diminish the threat per se, but I don't have a big problem with that at all. I think a guy should be allowed to do something like that.

All right. All right. Quickly here, Luke, to get out, we got a couple of quick hitters. Paige Van Zandt is going to be back in the bkfc cage uh or ring or however you want to call it but it's bkfc's first move to london july 9th no opponent announced but it's going to take place at alexandra palace luke would look like she was going the uh the pro wrestling route she signed with aw then she's telling everyone she's going to be back in mma before you know it this is a little bit of a surprise i don't think you care though uh i do agree that it's surprising i i i wonder where this ultimately will head to aw bellator pfl i don't really know what it all means but yes um i i agree with you that's something worth paying attention to because it does seem like there's something there i just

i still wonder if bk bkfc is the best fit but maybe they're paying her a ton and maybe it is uh gable steven stevenson excuse me after his uh stevenson stevenson after his second straight ncaa championship there at uh what does he have super heavyweight or heavyweight luke is there such a thing in college you are the heavyweight to see up to 285 is what they have i believe uh he talked with ariel luke and he's really not as much as he's headed right to wrestlemania he says he you know expect to see him on the broadcast uh coming up and then expects to go full-on into that world he's not ruling out the mma thing luke um it's one thing to tease it though but he sounds hungry

like he's going to take that bite so could he be one of these sort of freak celebrities who are like, I just want to come in for one big fun fight, whoever's the biggest bidder? Yeah, he could. Dude, that kid, he should be able to, until he's 30 at least, he should be able to be calling a lot of shots, a lot of them. Fre amazing wrestler dynamic personality loves to be a showman and is good at it he should not be

under anyone's onerous contract right that if if if he can't get a good deal for himself in this world nobody can you know that that's just the reality it's going to be fun to see uh daniel cormier this week on his dcnrc show luke said that he thinks uh if only if gable went full-time that he could become a you know heavyweight champion in this game like he sees it in him we all see a lot of athleticism and i know that brock lesnar like was crazy congratulatory after Gable won the NCAAs Luke and you have to think they're gonna I know it's not enough to get you back in like Stone Cold coming back at this Wrestlemania for that skit thing they're gonna do Luke I don't think that's enough

to get you back in could I get you in for Gable versus Brock doing like a Wrestlemania program no why would I care about pro wrestling I just wanted to know your limits luke okay i know your personal limits i've been there luke okay my limits are oh is there pro wrestling on the screen please change it that's my you want this or american gladiators gladiators yeah yeah yes i mean or you know you can put on violent pornography something that's got some redeeming value but we don't that's not for me about that on this show uh luke uh real quick here a couple of that bellator news benson henderson resigns with the promotion and he's going to be in a headlining role on an upcoming dublin card against peter queely okay that's a good fight for him actually i i like that dude these guys who are a little bit older they got a

little bit of name left they got a little bit of ability left not trying to like deny them so if i can go and beat the best please stop no you can't but that doesn't mean you can't beat you know some good respectable name opposition especially in ireland you know where he comes out it's one of the best walkouts in all of mma that one he had with zombie and the cranberries was fucking unbelievable so uh yeah great love it glad to hear it good the other bit of bellator news in addition to what we had already talked about with Sergio Pettis, the champion pulling out of the Grand Prix. Now we have an interim title fight with,

with Raffaele Stotts and the former champ Archuleta, but Luke, James Gallagher, unfortunately out as well. I know you were part of reacting to that breaking news on CBS Sports HQ yesterday. It looks like the result from Bellator is instead of announcing one alternate or two alternates to fill these two holes we're gonna get what is it three or is it two or four play-in matches to produce the four fighters so four fighters two fights on one side it's um jornell lugo excuse me jornell lugougo taking on Sabatello. Winner of that, I believe, will fight Leandro Higo.

On the other side, it's Enrique Barzola taking on Josh Hill. Now, Josh Hill was originally named as the only tournament replacement, but I guess the problem was when you lose a couple of your folks, including the champion, for crying out loud, you have to kind of play with this a little bit. So he will take on, it would be Hill and Barzola, which, by the way, is a great fight, but I got to tell you that Lugo-Sabate sabatello fight dude sabatello is a fucking hammer and i

think that's an att sanford uh att versus sanford fight as well he i think um sabatello just beat who's the kid out of wales uh who was in the ufc brett johns i believe he beat him and dude he's good i like he might go he might he might he might get some big fights i like the stakes that it adds to a couple extra fights that you may not have paid attention to with that level of focus now because we got these play-in opportunities i don't know if i love it for the nba playoffs luke you know we'll have to get we'll have to experience that a few years and see if it hits at all they do it in big time european soccer they might do an mls i don't really watch that much mls but like they have you FA Cup in the Premier League, right?

So it's this little tournament within the season. In soccer, it works just fine for me, but we'll see how the NBA fans take to it. Luke, quickly to close on the quick hitters, PFL is going to kick off their new season April 20th. It's a Wednesday night on ESPN. Main event, the 155 champ, Rosh Manfeo taking on Don Mage or Madge.

That's a sick fight. Yeah, and Anthony Pettis in the co-main is going to take on Miles Price, nicknamed Magic, who's an Irish kid from making his PFL debut that some people have said can do some things. Luke Screwface Jr. there against Delon Monte and Clay Collard against Jeremy Stephens

to kick that card off. What a great fight that is. Yeah, I like this. By the way, that Roush Manfeo guy, I believe he won the whole season, but he certainly beat Anthony Pettis. And Don Madge, man, I've been talking about Don Madge. This guy went undefeated in the UFC.

I guess there must have been some visa issues. I don't know why they let him go or what happened there. He never lost in the UFC. I think he had two fights and he won them both pretty spectacularly. Dude, he's from South Africa. That fucking kid is good. Very good. Especially on the feet. Now he's got a difficult opponent in front of him, but like everybody should be keeping an eye corner of your eye. Keep an eye out for Don Madge. That guy can fight. Yeah, I like that first card. So PFL won me.

They won me last year. Luke, I like a Wednesday night card here, too. I don't hate that at all. I love the Wednesday night cards. Yeah, I love them. All right, Luke, that's right. But some things we say in the microphone each week are not only wrong. Luke morning combat at Gmail dot com allows the people to tell us whether we are actually dead wrong.

So let's take a chance on these L's, see if we'll squat for them. This one's called Dead Wrong. Okay, on Friday's March 18th show, Brian talked about how Jon Jones' first main event in the UFC came against the janitor, Vladimir Matyshenko. He's dead wrong, though. Jon's first main event actually came against the janitor, Vladimir Matyshenko. He's dead wrong, though. John's first main event actually came against Brandon Vera in the fight before that.

Loved the show, listened to every episode. Only episode I couldn't finish was Luke's live chat a few weeks ago in the new spa. Yeah, yeah, it had some issues. But I was going to say, that Vera fight was big because Vera was the first guy who was like i'm gonna win two titles and light heavyweight and heavyweight yeah he had had some great success and had a little bit of trouble and then john absolutely buried that idea if there ever had

any life left didn't they screw vera on the cards against randy couture as well luke it was a close one i don't know if they screwed him but it was definitely pretty close it was a close one. I don't know if they screwed him, but it was definitely pretty close. It was pretty close. All right. Dead wrong number two. Hey, Donks. This is Eloy. During Monday's show, you were discussing where this past weekend's card, UFC London, ranked among all fight nights. Luke brought up the first Fox card with JDS KOing Velasquez and also said that Benson Henderson fought Jim Miller.

Oh, yes. You're dead wrong because Bendo fought Clay Guida. Clay Guida, yes. Someone wrote me in the middle of the week being like, you're going to get dead wrong on bendo fought clay guida guida yes someone also wrote me uh in the middle of the week being like uh you're gonna get dead wronged on friday fair enough fair enough also what did those argentinians say at the pool that made you think we are racist saludos i'll tell you what they said i'll tell you what they said and people in south america look the other way on this but to me it's fucked up but i don't give a shit what the culture is

they summoned him over to him to get them drinks by referencing his skin color that's what they said to him which i thought was and people excuse this shit down there i'm telling you they'll be like that's just how we talk down here fuck that that's how y'all talk down there because when you're fucking racist you do not summon a working class person over to you to get you drinks by referring to his skin color. Fuck off. I don't want to hear that ever. I'm not endorsing that at all, Luke.

I don't know what you're doing with this. Dude, I'm telling you, I bring it up to other people who are here who are from South America, and they're always like, well, that's kind of how we talk. We don't mean it the same way. Get the fuck out of here. I don't believe that for two seconds. This is from Jordan, who lives in Hawaii. On episode 279, in discussing Dan Hooker's previous losses LT mentions Mahachev, Alan Felder, and Pauiwe. Not sure if I misunderstood Luke he may have been

referencing the battles that Hooker has fought as opposed to the losses but he seems to think that Dan Hooker lost to Paul Felder when in fact it was a split decision win although although it was a controversial split decision. Let's put it that way. Mahalo for all of the awesome content. Thank you, Jordan. Do you think they call him Air Jordan, Luke, in Hawaii? I don't know.

I don't know. Finally, Luke, because I'm about to get a UTI if I don't find a restroom shortly. On Wednesday's episode, when Luke and Brian were discussing the Zoo-Gosucher fight, Brian referred to episode one of Star Wars and measuring levels, which Luke referred to mitochondria levels. I think what you're referring to is midichlorian. Midichlorian. Mitochondria is real.

Which are intelligent. It's the powerhouse of the cell, right? Don't you remember that from ninth grade biology? Yeah. Mitochondria, as you may remember from biology, are the powerhouse of the cell. Yeah? Don't you remember that from ninth grade biology? Yeah, mitochondria, as you may remember from biology, are the powerhouse of the cell. Yeah, there you go. There you go.

All right, I got to pee my pants. Thank you, fans. This show was terrible. It was a terrible show today. I mean, it was low-T, but I don't know about terrible. Terrible, Luke? Really? Terrible.

It wasn't great. It was not our best effort. I mean, we had just come off last week maybe of the best shows we've ever done, Luke. Also, I've got some combo of Ebola and AIDS coursing through my veins right now. Yeah, that's probably true. All right.

Thank you to Athletic Greens, one of our fine sponsors, Luke. And please, you can go to athleticgreens.com slash morningcombat, combat with a K, of course, to get your star in AG1, Luke. Okay, so that's what I'm talking about. I'm going to take some right after the show. The free one-year supply of immune-supporting vitamin D and the five free travel packs with your first purchase.

Tell them BC sent you. Okay, Luke, showtime.com, 30 days. People know that shit as well. Morningcombat.store, like and subscribe. Yeah, that's about all I got, Luke. Can you take them out of here? Thank you. For Malka CBS Sports, the big beige one himself,

I'm Luke Thomas. I'll see you all on Monday, and until then, may all of your gains be loyal.