MORNING KOMBAT WITH LUKE THOMAS AND BRIAN CAMPBELL - Nate Diaz's Future, Jake Paul to Showtime, Dana White | Luke Thomas' Live Chat, ep. 76

Episode Date: May 20, 2021

Today on the podcast, we'll discuss Nate Diaz's future and how his fight with Leon Edwards might go, Jake Paul signing to Showtime, Triller's next move, where and who Dan Hardy should fight next, how Jan Blachowicz vs. Jon Jones would've gone at 205 pounds, who the heir to the Dana White throne is, whether my daughter might pursue a career in mixed martial arts (MMA), Charles Oliveira winning a title in the UFC and more. 'Morning Kombat’ is available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, Castbox, Google Podcasts, Bullhorn and wherever else you listen to podcasts.    For more Combat Sports coverage subscribe here: youtube.com/MorningKombat   Follow our hosts on Twitter: @BCampbellCBS, @lthomasnews, @MorningKombat    For Morning Kombat gear visit: store.sho.com   Follow our hosts on Instagram: @BrianCampbell, @lukethomasnews, @MorningKombat  To hear more from the CBS Sports Podcast Network, visit https://www.cbssports.com/podcasts/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hi everybody, it is the 20th of May 2021. My name is Luke Thomas and this is episode 76 of my live chat. Hope you're doing well. I am from Showtime and CBS Sports. I'm also one half of the hosting duo of Morning Combat, on which this chat appears on that channel. Yeah? Thank you so much for joining me. I greatly appreciate it. Let's do this here very quickly if we can. Like this.

You guys know the drill, right? Thumbs up on the video. Hit subscribe. If you're new here, welcome. If you are a regular, welcome. Whatever reason brings you here today, I am glad you are here. What will we get to today? I'm sure whatever is latest and greatest in the news of combat sports and anything else that's kind of on your mind.

All right. By the way, I'm only one minute late because if you look at the schedule, we're set to start at 3.05, start at 3.06. So not too bad. Okay. With that out of the way, let's get this party started, shall we? All right. If I look a little haggard, it's because I am. I was out in the front yard.

Boy, the cicadas are here, huh? Anybody who lives on the East Coast or around the area where, what are they called? Brood X? They've been underground for 17 years and now they're back. And you can see little holes all in my front yard. I think I have a picture I took of one of them, of the shells. Yeah, here it is. There's two shells here. This is my old phone, but if you guys can see that. See that? These are the shells of cicadas. So there's nothing in them.

This is what they shed. Almost like a... I mean, obviously they're very different creatures, but something relatively akin to a skin... Or, excuse me, a snake shedding its skin. And, yeah, they're everywhere. Not quite everywhere yet, but you're beginning to see them. I look like shit because I was trying to squeeze in a little fitness time

because I'm old and washed and pathetic. So you can see I'm a little sweaty. Sorry. I doubt anyone really cares. All right. Again, I have these because I like them. You're under certainly no obligation to have them Nor do I necessarily recommend them, I just like them

Let's see if I can open this without tearing off the plastic Take that, Thor Huh? You can deadlift Almost a thousand plus pounds But, 501 kilos But I can tear off the lid of a Sports drink

Eat shit Alright Let's get this party started. Yeah? Questions. Okay. If you were in Nate Diaz's corner, what would be your game plan to beat... Let me turn this off too. Sorry. If you were in Nate Diaz's corner, what would be your game plan to beat Leon Edwards? I don't see how he beats him without pressure. I think pressure is going to be absolutely key. And pressure doesn't mean blindly walking forward. But it does mean if Leon Edwards is able to effectively blitz, angle off, stick and move, maintain distance, if Nate is following versus cutting, it's going to be a real problem for him.

I think he's got to keep the fight, certainly within his punching range. I think you've got to stay out of kicking range to the extent possible. And I think you got to really, you just really have to put Edwards on the back foot because Edwards is not going to be like the pure boxer that Nate is. And he's certainly not going to be the ground technician that Nate is. I think that's pretty clear, but he doesn't really have to be. I've gone over this a lot. Edwards has a very interesting game. To me, it's a little on the boring side, if I can be honest. But I can't really, I'm not mad at it because he's the master of positions. But really getting to them halfway.

We've gone over this a million times. Whether that's 50-50 standing. But he's the one doing the pressing into the fence. He'll put one hook in on the back, or he'll just stay in half guard, or something like that. He's the key of kind of riding out these positions where he's the one doing well. If the person scrambles, he can either let them go, or if he really wants to fight for it, he's in a more dominant position to be ahead in that scramble. And he can do that for five rounds, no problem. So it's not like you

really have to test someone's ground game, so to speak. Like who has a better ground game, Edwards or Nelson? Gunnar Nelson. Gunnar Nelson does, but Gunnar Nelson lost that fight. I mean, lost it for a variety of reasons, not simply related to ground game issues, but you get the idea. So it's not really about that. You've got to make him fight under your terms. I would take a very similar approach to what he did to like, you know, obviously he's a very different fighter, but something like Pettis or third round, second fight McGregor, firing an underhook, getting him against the fence,

draining on him, pulling him off, balancing him, working the body over and over. The fact that they made it five rounds is super smart. I mean, Leon Edwards had COVID, which, you know, not the biggest deal in the world at this point in terms of his long-term future. But between that and, more significantly, the layoff, you know, you got to put intense heat on him.

And Diaz can do that. Especially over five rounds, he can do that. It's a tough fight, though. It's a tough fight. This is a silly question. I'm going to skip the second one. People hating on BC. I don't know why, dude.

BC's killing it right now. Oh, that's funny. Hey, Luke, what was one of your memorable FDC moments? One of mine is when a sister battery shot outside of the safety box. Oh, fucking Lord. And put the battalion into check fire freeze and we had to walk over to the gun line and help ram out a 155 millimeter round. Jesus, I never had anything like that. I only had one moment where one of the, we had an FO, forward observer, on the hill, and you gotta be able to read a map, see what you're looking at,

and then you make the call for fire, right? You do a call for fire mission. And the charge was fine. I mean, when we were going over it, everything was fine, but I forget, God, the mechanics at this point. I was a brand new FO. I forget what it was, but I remember that either they misfired on the gun line or we gave them the wrong number or something, but what ended up happening was the round

landed really close to our tower. Not close to the tower in terms of life-threatening, but close enough we were like, whoa, what happened? It knocked shit off the top of it. It sat a couple of us down. It was like, ooh, that could get dicey if that happened again. That was kind of bad, but that's it. I've never had any crazy scenarios like that.

Do you have any opinions on Scottish Taekwondo Olympian Jack Hall? Almost had me complete the whole thing. Almost. Almost, you fucks. Almost. Almost. That's funny. Alright.

Thoughts on the fallout between Habib, Chemaev, and Kadyrov. I have barely followed this. In part because this is mostly a Kadyrov thing, which, from what I can tell, Chemaev has kind of, sort of cheer-led and played along with. Habib, you know, maybe speaking cryptically here or there, but largely silent about it. I'd say good for Habib, you know, the less you're under that guy's... You ever seen these movies, I think I've talked about this on this chat before, like, go back and watch the Christopher Waltz depiction of the Nazi officer that he played in Inglourious Bastards.

But you can see this in Sophie's Choice and any time really the Nazis were played. They just seem so pushy. And obviously that's the least thing about them to worry about. But I mean like when you watch them on screen or things like that. They're just always making you go along with what you want what they want you to do and they're very much about having their own way and um you know everyone just kind of goes along with it to the extent that there's a rift between habib and kadirov that's good for habib quite frankly i bet he is glad to be outside of the uh i mean you can never really fully separate yourself,

I guess, unless you really did move all of your family out of that region. But to the extent that you're not their focus and you're not being asked to do things at their request or on their behalf or for their various needs, I would imagine Habib is frankly fucking delighted. I doubt, seriously doubt, he is broken up over this one way or the other. The other part might be that Chermayev is natively Chechen. Obviously, he lives in Sweden,

but he's natively Chechen. And perhaps Kadyrov was like, eh, that guy is Dagestani. They're kind of like, you know, same, same, but different, but still same. And obviously there's some history there between those people. Chemayev, there's not. Maybe that's partly what it is. Kadyrov's sort of hard to read. I mean, the idea would be like, you know, to the extent that he can get benefit of Khabib, he would still be using him. I suspect that behind the scenes there must have been some kind of rebuffing that's happened, which is interesting if true. I'd love

to get more information about what really is behind it, because we're kind of asked to put the pieces of the puzzle together. I would just say if you're Habib you're probably delighted. You're probably delighted. Again, that doesn't necessarily mean that Habib and Kadyrov don't share

similar worldviews. It's hard to exactly parse what this says about Khabib's views on the world. But if I was him and I no longer had to answer to the same degree to a murderous tyrant that I did before, I would consider that something of a relief. MMA reports, usually on big sites, often complain about working hours and sometimes pay. We always talk about fighters' pay structure. What can you say about MMA media pay structure? Yeah, it's pretty bad.

I could tell you who is making money if you want. I mean, not that I've seen everyone's pay stubs or anything, but I kind of know. I'll tell you who's making like, you know, once you get to like, he just left the athletic, but let's, you know, once you get to like a Ben Fulks or I think a Mark Ramundi kind of level senior, very important. Well, at this point, I would say that Fulks is insanely important to the athletic, but you know But once you get to one of those positions, I don't know what he makes from his podcast, but those guys are going to be very comfortable probably. I don't know exactly what they might be making, but they're probably going to be pretty comfortable. Anybody who does any kind of broadcasting or television is going to make the most.

So Ariel is probably making very good money. I bet Okamoto makes a decent check. Karen Bryant probably makes a good check. I wouldn't count Laura Sanko in MMA media because to me it's like if you have to get a credential, that is more media. I don't think she does. Well, everyone has to have credentials, but

to apply for a media credential, I would count Karen Bryant in that and not so much Laura Sanko. Anybody who does any broadcasting of any kind So I would count Karen Bryant in that and not so much Laura Senko. Anybody who does any broadcasting of any kind, and in particular on television, is probably going to make some good money. So BC makes decent money. I make decent money. Not crazy good money, but I make good money. Who else out there could you say Makes a check

Who's MMA media Not many Kevin Aioli I know makes some decent coin From what I've heard Some good coin actually He makes good money from what I've heard So basically the answer is You need to be really important to the media outlet

Of which you are a part To the extent you can do any television broadcasting, any broadcasting in general. Radio pays, but only if you're like really, really, really, really, really high level. Like you have to have national syndication or something like that. You know, so there's maybe a dozen less than that who are making, I would say, no, there's probably even less than that. There's probably seven or eight of us who are making what y'all might consider to be really respectable money. I can tell you that for me, what was happening was, I'll just tell you guys the truth.

I had money coming in from SiriusXM. I had money coming in from Showtime. And I had money coming in from my YouTube channel. And when CBS tried to hire me, I said, you got to match, I'm not taking a step back. You got to match the sum total of that for me to give it up. And a little bit extra on top. And they did.

They did. So now I get one check that reflects the totality of the previous three. Which is luck. You know, I mean, yes, I've been working hard. But there's a lot of people who work hard. Like, working hard, you know, that's not, I mean, people always be like, what you got to do is you got to work hard. And that's true.

Like if you don't, unless you know someone, it almost certainly won't happen. But you got to understand something, just because you actually put in the work does not necessarily mean it will translate to that. You have to have a vision. You have to network. You have to really show skill. You have to set yourself apart. There's a lot of pieces of that puzzle that go into it. But in general, I think you see a lot of guys, man, part of, there's sort of a two part problem. One is that

one, there's not a lot of jobs. It's like Supreme court vacancies. You got to wait until someone dies or gets fired. And, and you know, I mean, how many times have you seen guys? I mean, if you're new to the sport, won't you won't really appreciate this but like when I came up the people who were ahead of me you know they were they're basically all gone not not in totality that's not quite true but they're nowhere even close to what the top of the food chain is now because once you lose a job, sometimes you can,

like if you get fired or you get laid off, sometimes you can transition to a new place, but you can see like, look at how many of those guys got laid off from the athletic, and they're all fucking gems, every last one of them. It wasn't like fighting or junkie ran over to go pick them up, you know,

or bloody elbow or whatever. I mean, they got certain places they did okay, you know, But, so there's not a lot of jobs. And then most of the jobs are going to pay, you know, a respectable amount if you can get a full-time gig. But there's not many full-time gigs. And so what you see is a lot of guys or ladies cobbling together to get a little bit of check here, a little bit of check here, a little bit of check here. And then when you combine all of that, it turns into a really nice, or I should say, you know, a decent, like you can't complain, so to speak. It's a nice middle-class living over the course of those three. But that's a hard way to go. If you lose one of them, it can be precarious because you were kind of counting on that. It's a hard way to make a

living. I mean, if you can make good money in MMA media, ask yourself how many people in MMA media, either now or ever, have made consistently, year over year, over 100 grand per year? Not many. Not many. Not many at all. If you take out anyone who's got any television experience,

that would fall, I think, almost to a few people. I mean, that's how hard it is. But that's not necessarily the case, although it still could be quite difficult in some of the more traditional sports. So the answer is you can make good money. It is possible. It's going to take a really long time.

You're going to have to work really hard. You're going to have to get a little bit of luck. You're just going to have to wait your turn. And there's not many jobs, and the jobs can be quite precarious, and you may have to have a few of them at a time to make a check work. It's tough. It can be tough. What did you think of Gregor Gillespie's performance? What matchup would you like for him next? Islam, Paul Felder, RDA, or Kevin Lee rematch?

God, if the Lee rematch had not been so utterly dominant, or the first fight, I should say, so utterly dominant, that I wouldn't really care to see that again, but now that he's been off so long, maybe. Maybe the Paul Felder fight, I think, is a good fight. I thought he looked... That was a better example of who Gregor is and what he's capable of than the Kevin Lee fight. I jode. I think that's pretty fair. Didn't necessarily... You know what? That's actually a really good win because it was... What's his face? It was Carlos Diga Fajeda, right? If memory serves. I don't want to talk completely out of my ass. Yes, he had lost to Kevin Lee in 2019, took basically almost two years off, not quite, and then came back at a catch weight because Fajeda had missed weight and then had a fight of the night sort of thing. That's his best win by a million miles. And the wins before this were really great too. Honestly, a lot of people get really down in the details.

Like, I need to see this fight. I need to see that fight. Any of those. Kevin Lee won probably not. But an Islam probably... I like that more than the Islam-Thiago Moises fight, candidly. RDA's a good one, too. He's looking for a fight.

Yeah. There's a lot of different ways you can go. I mean, I guess I'm just trying to figure out. Cardio's great. Obviously, wrestling's great. Aggression's great. Scrambling's great. But there's a lot of other missing pieces there that I don't know we have a full grasp on.

Exactly what did he learn from the Kevin Lee fight? There's a little bit more that has to be shown. But he has high athletic potential. It's just, but he's 34. He's got to get busy. So really, you're like nitpicking about, I'm not you, I'm not saying that. But like, there's a little bit of nitpickery. Like, what makes the most sense?

Dude, get him back out there. Because the clock's ticking. Would it ever be possible for you to watch WrestleMania with BC in exchange he has to watch ADCC? I gotta tell you, watching the last few rounds of ADCC sucks

because of the way the rules go where they're not that great at wrestling wrestling and until they allow guard pulling you just see this like terrible inability for one guy to ever do anything to the other one like they're trying to force wrestling more into submission grappling and it to a large extent it has worked but in terms of the rules they haven't quite tweaked them enough where dude the last couple of rounds of ADCC it's a lot of dudes stalling out like now Gordon going through and just running through motherfuckers is

a little bit different but like I don't know like uh I remember ADCC what was it 2017 it was just interminable. Couldn't believe how bad some of the wrestling was. And also, you know, well, I guess WrestleMania is too nice as I understand it. But, you know, ADCC can go for a few days. So, I don't know if that's a fair trade. I've watched WrestleMania. I watched the one with Rousey and whoever the fuck.

You know, it was dumb. But people loved it, so whatever. Luke, big fan. I was wondering if there's any chance for Britain to ever close the gap to the U.S. in terms of wrestling. Wrestling classes seem to be a lot more common than just a few years ago, and some schools are now offering as part of their PE classes. With the growth of MMA and possibility of Olympic success with prospects such as Nick Gurr, do you think UK and Western European nations will start producing wrestling specialists in the near future? Or is it always going to be a niche sport that people train at as part of their MMA preparation? Well, listen, I have good news for you if you're from this part

of the world. In terms of MMA, I'm not going to say the gap is completely closed. I don't think that's fair because you're still getting a lot of D1, you know, high level studs coming over and giving people who, who might've even wrestled D2 or D3 or even other D1 guys. There's still some of these hammers that are coming through and giving everyone problems. So in that sense, uh, there is still a little bit of a gap in MMA. But dude, the gap relative to when I first started... Dude, let me tell you something about wrestling in the UK in 2000. When did I first start writing about it?

2005 or so? Something like that? You know. Michael Bisping was far and away your best wrestler. And he had great takedown defense. Don't misunderstand me. But it was not great at all. You. Don't misunderstand me, but like, you know, it was not great at all. You had good strikers coming out of there for sure. Mark Weir was a guy early on who was a phenomenal striker out of the UK. Um, Ian, the machine Freeman sort of all around kind of guy. You had some good fighters and you definitely had some great talent,

but the wrestling 15 years ago, dude, it was fucking terrible. It was not good. Now look at all of these guys coming out, man. You got Fabian Edwards is fighting tomorrow. Obviously, he's the brother of Leon Edwards. Both of them have pretty good takedown defense. But more than that, you can just go down the line. Arnold Allen, phenomenal takedown defense. I think Darren Till has good takedown defense. I mean, all of them. In that sense, in MMA, the gap has closed almost immeasurably. I mean, a massive, massive amount. And I think you should take a lot of pride in that. Like, dude, London and all the cities, really, that produce high-level fighters out of that part of the world, the level of wrestling has gotten just infinitely better. Okay? I really don't look...

You used to look at a European fighter and be like, okay, but what about... You know, what about that? And you kind of knew if they fought any American Frankie Edgar type, I'm not talking about Championship Edgar, like pre-Championship Edgar, they were going to get run over. You know, they just didn't have a prayer.

It doesn't feel that way anymore at all. Like, I never look at it that way. I mean, yes, you need to be cognizant of what team they're from and what individual strengths or weaknesses that a fighter might have, but please don't misunderstand me. The level of wrestling in the UK for MMA purposes has taken off like a rocket in the last 15 years. Now, as it relates to the broader sporting community, that's a different thing. Because even with Title IX, if you guys don't know what that is, it's basically a law that was passed where colleges have to spend and then offer an equal amount of opportunity to both men and women athletically. And there's a lot of controversy about it. That has gutted a lot of wrestling. But even with that decline,

the U.S. men's freestyle team is not the best in the world by any stretch. Although, they're a very good high-level team. They're not going to beat all together every time, the Russians and the Iranians. But they're going to hold their own, and they're going to be very competitive, and they're quite good. Do I really ever see the UK competing like that?

Because that comes from wrestling in the age of the single digits, all through all your scholastic life, having a pipeline, having the tournaments to go to, having the competitors to drive you, having the level of instruction that's there. You know, if you're a high-level gym and you're getting guys to come through and you're teaching them just certain parts of wrestling that they might need for fighting and you can afford to buy a high-level coach and you get a young athlete who's dedicated enough, man, it turns out you can do a lot with that. Turns out you can do a lot with that. It turns out you can do a lot with that. But that next level where all they do is wrestling, where it becomes part of the

sporting fabric to a degree of the country. Now, I don't know. I'm not in the United Kingdom. I'm not in Wales. I'm not in Scotland. I'm not in Northern Ireland. I'm not in Britain. I don't exactly know what the picture looks like there. But to get to that other stage that I'm talking about where every year you're just producing hordes of super... I mean, you understand something here, right? Our universities, University of Iowa, Penn State University, these are huge. Like, what is the undergraduate population

at the University of Pennsylvania? Let's see. Population. Okay, this is just undergraduate. So this doesn't include any law schools, any med schools, nothing. We got 10,000 people there. Let's go University of Iowa. A little smaller than I thought it would be. Yeah, 24,000 people. I mean, how about arizona state what about that another super power house 74 000 they had 74 000 undergrads you know what i mean and you know that's that's obviously the entire graduating population i'm trying to point out like you got these all over the country stanford by the way is not getting rid of their wrestling program. And every year, they're churning out just demons, one after the other, in all these fucking weight classes.

And then, dude, have you ever been to, like, if you're from England and you don't know this, you should go down to parts of Minnesota and Iowa and see how big. In that case, it would be folk style wrestling. It wouldn't be the Olympic freestyle, though there's obviously a lot of similarities. See how popular that is as an attendance sport. People just pay tickets to go show up and watch that shit. You just can't believe it. You cannot believe it. So, you know, to get to that, because Iran's got what we've got, but even more. Russia's got what we got, but even more.

You want to compete on that level? I think that's probably generations away, if ever. But on the MMA side of things, yeah. And also, here's another part, too. Like, even if, you know, Great Britain never gets to a part where they're, you know, on par with the, you know, Irans of the world or whatever in terms of wrestling, that doesn't mean that they won't produce a couple of studs along the way.

Can you imagine a freestyle? I mean, there must be some at some point. But can you imagine a British or something like that, Jordan Burrows coming through, 74 kilo, just hammering everybody, winning world titles on a gold medal? Maybe the rest of that team's not necessarily so great, but you get to one standout. And to your point, there's enough development around it

where he or she can kind of do some things. That's possible, I think, in our lifetimes. But that other part, I mean, you're talking about, you know, I don't know how to say it. If you took wrestling out of Minnesota and the Dakotas and Iowa and parts of Pennsylvania, New Jersey, I think there's people who wouldn't know what to do with their lives. Literally, I mean that. They would not know what to do with their lives.

That's a hard thing to say for some other countries. But in fairness, I've not been to the UK since 2004. It's been a while. I haven't visited the UK since 2004. So, you know, I haven't seen a lot of things. Is Sandhagen versus Dillashaw the most fascinating technical matchup we'll see in 2021? Probably.

I would love to see Lomachenko rematch Lopez. I don't think it's going to happen, but probably. Boy, this Triller shit. The fuck is on my lip? Jesus Christ. What are they going to do? Triller? Roy Jones told Chris Mannix on his podcast he's suing him for failure to pay, or pay requisite, whatever it was. Mike Tyson wants nothing to do with him. They've got a Holyfield fight that no one cares about.

They've got no Jake Paul. They've got no Logan Paul. They do have Tao, but they have Tao in a fight that they have grossly overpaid for and no one knows who his partner or his opponent is. I don't know what they're going to do. I don't know what they're going to do. I don't know what they're going to do. What do you think is Colby's hardest fight in the near future? Colby, Leon, or Wonderboy? The Wonderboy one is the dark horse candidate in terms of the choices you have laid out here. Colby, Leon, Wonderboy. He's the dark horse candidate, but gun to the head scenario, I'm going to go Colby. I think Colby, Leon, Wonderboy, he's the dark horse candidate. But gun to the

head scenario, I'm going to go Colby. I think Colby is going to give Kamaru the most chance of a problem. And I think probably a fair amount of problems. I think he's going to go much more active with the wrestling. There might be some stalling there. There might be some scrambling there. There might be some close, close rounds. I don't think he's going to go in there and just dominate Kamaru. That seems to me not likely, but he took a few rounds from him just striking last time. Granted, that's not the same striker that's there this time, but we shouldn't lose sight of the fact that Colby changed things up, went to MMA Masters. I know they don't get a lot of credit. That's a very good camp with very good trainers, with very good track record. I mean, they're solid down there, those folks in Miami.

So I think Colby versus Kamaru too. I'm not necessarily excited for the buildup and the Marty Fake Newsman and all that shit. That stuff's kind of lame, but the fight itself, the fight itself might be very good. Top five favorite fighters, regardless of promotion and why. All right, top five. I'll just say I won't rank this top five as in best,

because I don't think that really is a fruitful exercise. Top five I like to watch. I'll go, he's retired, so I would have said Habib, but probably him number one. I'll go Adesanya. I'll go, he's retired, so I would have said Habib, but probably him number one. I'll go Adesanya. I'll go Sandhagen. I'll go... And this is just right now. This can change if you ask me in a couple of months.

You said fighters. I think you mean MMA fighters. I do love to watch Teofimo Lopez box. I really do. I really enjoy that. Okay, so I'll go Corey, Israel. Max. Man, that's a tough one.

I might throw Kamaru in there. And then... Probably... and then probably Gaethje, maybe? Something like that? Honestly, outside of a couple, it's like one, two, maybe three, and then the four and the five would be way further apart, even though numerically it's the one right behind. The distance between what I would want to see, because there's a bunch at that point, like, you know, this top prospect out of Norfolk, Virginia, which, by the way, they pronounce

Naufuck, which I fucking hate. But out of Naufuck, Virginia, Miranda Maverick looks like a super interesting fighter to pay attention to. I really love it when she competes. You know, MVP for all the criticisms, and I think many of them are quite correct, of his resume. He's kind of interesting to watch, you know? Masvidal I get pumped for.

I like watching Rose. I'm excited for the return of Tatiana Suarez. These are fighters that, like, when they compete, I kind of lean into the screen a little bit, you know? Dustin Poirier is a little bit, you know? Dustin Poirier is a little bit that way for me, too. I really like his boxing, man.

He's really interesting to me. But the guys who are just kind of innovating, who have thought about the game, who are, you know, or in the case of Gaethje, made tremendous progress under the tutelage of one of the great minds of our time. You know, the ones who are just doing things a little bit ahead of the curve. That's where, because, you know, when you're ahead of the time, you know, the ones who are just doing things a little bit ahead of the curve, that's where, that's where, because, you know, when you're ahead of the curve, you just make the rest of the pack look so dummied, but if you've done this long enough, you know that that advantage doesn't last, and then when it goes away, the whole shit comes

apart sometimes, so it's fun to pay attention to them to see how long they can maintain it. Would Cowboy vs. Ferguson 2? Nah. I don't want to see that. Also, can merch be shipped to South Africa? I mean, they say that the new round of merch will be shippable to that place, but I'll believe that when I see it.

Luke, is there a way to get a thumbnail of a pay-per-view fight inside the Octagon instead of the weigh-ins? When doing post-fight results, it might generate more views and I think it's an old video due to the thumbnail probably probably yes i don't make those i make the ones for my own channel when i upload but um someone else handles it for morning combat but i can certainly relay that message to them sure so will there ever be a time when the sport of MMA is franchised to cities, like how other sports leagues do it? Fighters in their city compete for division championships,

then move on to national tournament-style fights and crown the ultimate weight class champions. Well, that already has existed, and in boxing it still exists. There's Golden Gloves, which starts out regionally and then moves national. I don't know if there's international Golden Gloves. I don't think that's quite true, but yes, that exists. And you missed the days of the International Fight League, which had the Tokyo Sabres, the Quad City, which is out of Iowa, Silverbacks. What were some other ones? There was a team in California, I think, like the Condors. There was, what were the IFL teams?

That's a funny little thing. Tokyo Sabres, Quad City Silverbacks. I don't know if I can remember the name of the other teams. IFL teams. What was their names? Here we go. Toronto Dragons, Tokyo Sabres, Tucson Scorpions. Let's see.

There we go. Quad City Silverbacks, Los Angeles Anacondas, Seattle Tiger Sharks, New York Pit Bulls. Yeah, it's crazy. There's a bunch of teams like this. They tried it. No one gives a fuck. It doesn't work that way. That's what I was trying to tell people. It's like, oh, we should have tournaments. Tournaments are fun. They're fine. You should do them when they make sense. Right? Like for Bellator right now with light heavyweight, I think that that makes sense. They lost Romero, but in general, you signed a bunch of names. You got some other ones. It's a pretty good division for your organization. Have them fight it out sort it and you know package it as something that fans should pay attention to that makes sense to me but just having tournaments all the time the way that bellator used to do it i mean you guys don't

remember the days of your own revenue i had so many phone calls with that guy where he would try and explain to me like the value of it and then i'd have a phone call fucking six weeks later be like okay we're gonna amend this and we're amend that. And right before he got let go, they were doing this bit where it was like, if you've been in a season tournament before, you now enter this pool where in the pool you could be a part of the matchmaker model. You wouldn't have to go back into the tournament because what happened was they would have these guys go through these tournaments. And what they found out, man, was like having a couple of tournaments is great. And they would do them much more in succession. They wouldn't do one-night tournaments.

They would do them, I think it was like a month apart. So you fought in August. You had to be ready by September, unless you had some kind of injury, to go fight the next motherfucker in line. By the way, he just beat someone to meet you, so you ain't fighting some chump. And they would grind these fucking guys to a pulp.

I think it shortened the careers of a lot of guys. Not Mike Chandler so much, but I think Pat Curran, it fucked him up a little bit, and he remained a very, very good fighter for a long time. Shabba Lash, I'm Alive was another one of these guys, but what you find is the point I'm trying to make here is whether you're trying to do this thing with cities or with tournaments or whatever,

the matchmaker model is like democracy. It's the worst form of matchmaking except for all the others. Like anything you want to point out about the matchmaking model sucking ass is probably, you're probably right. Your hunch is that like, wow, it shouldn't be this way.

Like that is inherently unfair to this party or isn't there a better way to solve for this problem than some of the problems associated with the matchmaker model? But the reason why the matchmaker model exists not merely across combat sports, but is just so enduring year over year, organization over organization, is not because other players haven't tried it. It's because they've tried it and failed miserably. How much money did International Fight League get in financing? I mean, they got hundredsus from Wizards. Anyway, it's huge, like comic book magazine. And they had all of these signatories. They had a broadcast deal. They had a fuck ton of money.

They had a decent roster. They really did. They had some legendary names. I mean, they had so much shit. And they bottomed out like that. People don't give a fuck about that shit. They don't care about the team aspect in fighting. They don't really care about all the things that we like. Well, they do this in other sports. Then

that's what they do in other sports. Dude, you just got to learn to accept it. If people want to try something, certainly I'm not here to talk them out of it. You know, we want to do things a little bit differently. We want to have some fun. Hey man, go have some fun. But be prepared to spend a lot of money and to lose a lot of money and there just doesn't appear to be a lingering consumer appetite for anything other than the matchmaker model. I don't know how else to explain it. It's just something that I have seen challenged over and over and over and every fucking time. It fails to an extraordinary degree. Now, you've got the PFL doing something a little bit different where they've got points and there's a blah, blah, blah, and it's a season, and they've kind of dressed it up a little bit. But at the end of the day, man, they're pairing them how they want to pair them, at least in the early stages.

Obviously, as they advance, it's a little bit different. But did they set out a bracket? I don't know if they set out a bracket, right? Like they think they can still match them up in different directions. I could get that wrong, but still. In general, it's like democracy. It's the worst form of matchmaking except for all the others. Does it surprise you that Brazilians have four belts again? Do they really have that good of a pool of athletes?

Yeah, dude. I mean, Brazil is home to absolute fucking hammers. You know, it's a huge population. It's a culture that loves it. I don't want to overstate the connection between material difficulty and poverty and the success of fighters. But I don't want to ignore it either. Nor do I wish to make that principally about how I identify with Brazil. Brazil is a wonderful place. My wife's actually got some family from Brazil.

Couldn't be sweeter. You know, it's got its problems like any wonderful place. My wife's actually got some family from Brazil. Couldn't be sweeter. You know, it's got its problems like any other place, but as a people, Brazilians, my experience with them has been just absolutely wonderful. It's been one of the best parts of my life is getting to know Brazilians. Through MMA anyway, it's been very, very rewarding.

It's changed my life and I think depending on to what extent you have any relationship with any Brazilians like that, it's probably changed your life too. I'm not at all. Okay. Okay. I'm not surprised in the sense of like the national makeup of what was there. I am a little bit surprised in the sense that I know internally there have been some concerns at various organizations, not limited to UFC, about the next crop of Brazilian fighters. You have to understand something.

Dude, when I came up, I mean, it was mostly Brazilians, or at least, you know, that's not true either, but like there were, you couldn't swing a dead cat and not hit a Brazilian with a belt around his waist, man. Everywhere you went, and they had fucking gym wars, and what I mean Brazilian with a belt around his waist, man. Everywhere you went. And they had fucking gym wars. And what I mean by that is not in the gym, but like, dude, pride was built to a degree, to a degree on the rivalry between shoot the box and Brazilian top team. I mean, they fucking hated each other and it was bragging rights and the whole nine yards and they

had different styles and they had fucking just great storylines and there was just i mean and then forget all that forget the pride you look over ufc and babalu was over there fucking people up and you do and then marilla sent and it's no sorry um not marilla santana he's the great guy out of unity bjj but um um uh bustamante you know one of the most forgotten guys in all of MMA history. Great champion, great guy. I mean, Ricardo Arona, you just go down the list. Dude, there have been so fucking many. And they were in so many weight classes, and they were utterly dominant.

Dude, it doesn't get talked about enough. There was a wave of, when the tough boom hits, let's say post-2005, there were so many Brazilians at a very, very, very advanced level already. Now, obviously, there might be more today because MMA has grown in national stature, not merely here, but there as well. And there's more gyms, there's more ways to recruit. In some sense, it's sort of more popular now. But there was this first graduating wave. And, you know, the Nogueras and the Hua brothers. And I mentioned a bunch of names already.

And, of course, you know, even the early Vale Tudo guys. And, dude, Brazil was home to these legendary battles between, like, the Jujube Boys and and luta livre and the and the jujitsu guys and like you know it was this rich tapestry of martial arts and then the pedro jizos came out and they were innovating like with the leg kicks and blah blah dude you can't tell the story of modern mma at all uh forget about the part about you, just the graces and everything that they've been. I mean, I haven't even talked about that part. But we're talking about a little bit past that, right? 2005 and so.

It was just, they just dominated the space. It felt to me like there was a Brazilian every which way. I felt like I learned more about the country Brazil than any other country. Maybe Canada had more of a profile in MMA's orbit at that time. But just a tremendous, just a wealth. And so the next generation after the Anderson Silva's began to retire and the Noguera's went away, you were like, where's that next wave? And the truth is the following wave isn't

nearly as big as the first one but some of those first names are still kind of hanging on a little bit like the Jose Aldo's he's part of the end of that wave more than the beginning or the middle part but I still kind of count him in there they're still kind of doing their thing a little bit and they're they're not as dominant because MMA has become so much more global. But it does turn out that they're still going to be a powerhouse, man. Even with an economic downturn, even with a pandemic, even with everything else, Brazil is a very, very important part. Now, there might be also arguments to be made about to what extent promotions have done something to prime the pump.

But actively seeking them out. By the way, we didn't even talk about the pitbull brothers they're sort of a newer generation i think there was just some the point is there was concerns about the handoff from one generation to the next and whether that second one would be as grand as the first and i don't think they're going to be as grand but it turns out that they're still going to be pretty good. Really good. All right, so let's get to this because everyone thinks it's like the big scandal, although it's not that big a deal, really. Luke, how do you feel as a big fan of Jake Paul about his signing with Showtime? You're now partners.

Yeah, it's funny as shit. I was texting some folks from Showtime. I was like, wow, y'all did. I was like, I can see that in the hallowed halls of Showtime that my heartfelt arguments have made quite the impression in that no one listened to a word of it and went in the opposite direction. What am I supposed to say? What do you all want me to say? Okay, here's how BCc basically bc and i talked about this first of all i don't think that showtime was going to send me to miami what is it the i have to go there the second week or the first week of june i don't think they were going

to send me i think b bc lobbied on my behalf to get like mk to go because showtime was like what are we going to do with you and which is fair like what are they going to do with me but if mk is fair, like, what are they going to do with me? But if MK is there, here's how I look at it. I'll break this all down. Obviously, that's not for Jake Paul. It's for Logan Paul, but listen, I've said what I've said. Showtime clearly disagreed with all of it.

It's here. What can I do? Do I now think that these fights are, these exhibitions are great? No, I don't. I think the whole thing is weird and really quite silly, to be quite honest with you,

and maybe a little bit worse than that. But as you can quite tell, it doesn't at all matter what I think. And the other part is that I think that these other players in the boxing space, your top ranks, your showtimes, your PBCs, they're feasting off all the mistakes Triller is making. A little bit different in what top rank is doing, like letting them overpay for Teofimo. You know, like, fuck it, let them pay.

That's fine. Again, I don't think necessarily Bob Arum handled that all the best ways that he could. But on the Showtime side, like, dude, they're going to make a fuck ton of money off this. They're in the business with Floyd. Like, I'm going to talk him out of it because I think it's silly that a guy who doesn't box is going to box a dude who used to box really well but doesn't box anymore. Like, what is that? You know what it is? It's some shit that people want to see, I guess.

So here's what I'm going to do. I have to make peace with it. I've said what I've had to say about it. I'm not going to change my views. This is dumb shit. You know, I'm not going to change my views on it. But they're going to send me with Brian Campbell, who I care about a lot. I care about Morning Combat a lot.

I think you guys, if you watch this, you probably also care about morning combat a lot. They're going to send us to Miami. Why don't I just have a little bit of fun? I'm not going to change my views, you know? But if I went down there and I was like, man, this is kind of stupid. Like, do you all want to see that? I don't think anyone wants to see that.

I'm not going to pretend that I, you know, oh, wow, Drake Ball could really box now. Like, no. Until he actually boxes somebody who can really box, you know, whatever he's doing is somewhat noteworthy. But I said it before, the door is open for him and his brother. If they want to take boxing seriously and take on someone of a commensurate level in the boxing world, someone who's trying to make their living through that exclusively, you know, we'll evaluate him as such. Until that time, then it is, you know, it's sideshow-y. I mean, what else do you want me to say? But,

you know, BC basically, I think, is right to say, look, just go down there, try to have a good time, take it for what it is, and let it be. So for that week, that's my modus operandi. In terms of Jake Paul, again, I don't really understand the consumer demand for this kind of thing, except to say that I know that it exists. Jake, to me, is a little bit more interesting than Logan, although Logan's fighting Floyd. I guess we'll see what happens with him after all, or, you know, exhibitioning Floyd. I guess we'll see what happens after all that. But, you know, it's, I mean, again,

Triller let him walk after one, which is hilarious to me. But the other part is, like, this dude has absolutely dominated conversation inside this sport although maybe that's waning a little bit now not not boxing but mma maybe that's waning a little bit now um i don't know that i really think he's going to do this for a long time but i i guess the big players in boxing we're going to see how they, I don't know what Showtime is going to do to present it.

I need to talk to Brandon Schaub. I think he's probably going to be down there too. I mean, good for him. What do you want me to say? Good for him, bro. It ain't for me. It ain't for me. It's not for me. It ain't for me. It's not for me. You know, I'm not the guy that

is like, wow, this is fucking, I don't, I don't even know how to describe what it is, except it's like I talked, you know who, you know who it was? I asked Floyd senior at Mayweather McGregor. I asked him cause Floyd senior old men, and this is what y'all don't appreciate. MMA doesn't really have a lot of old men, like, hanging around, you know? Like, and I'm not saying this disparagingly, but, you know, Mark Ratner is in MMA, but, you know, he cut his teeth in boxing. But a dude in boxing, you go to a boxing event, you see a lot of old people, you know? And they're like, oh, this person works with the WBC commission or that person's famous in the regulatory world. Or sometimes they're just trainers or whatever. You just see a lot of people that are a little bit longer in the tooth, man. And I remember one time I talked to Floyd Sr. And the reason why this is so great is because, dude, people in like old men, they don't give a

fuck what you think about anything. They're over it, bro. They don't care about, you know, I got to parse my words or any of that shit. They don't care. And I asked Floyd Senior, I was like, dude, why do people want to see a guy who's never boxed against one of the best boxers of this generation, perhaps maybe ever? And his answer was, he looked me dead in the face and he goes people like to see weird shit

okay that's okay all right man you know what am i gonna do argue with that like that sounds correct people like to see weird shit i you know doesn't do much for me, but God bless him. As you can tell, my thought leadership in this podcast and the ones that I do and all the writing that I have done in the last 15 years, it has made quite the difference. You can see it has really affected people.

I mean, what is my legacy? Hey, all this shit I think is bad, all the people I work for then went to that direction. You just have to laugh. You have to laugh. You have to laugh, man. It's like, when I saw it, I was like, oh, that is too funny. You know, but I get it.

You guys get it, too. You guys get it, too. Showtime, I think what they, here's what I think. No one's told me this, but here's what I think. I think that they want to take what little is going to be there like do i think the pauls are going to have 15 fights i doubt they have 15 fights more between them they want to take what little is there they want to do it in a way that is not as off-putting as triller and uh you know put it more of a on the lighter side of, but a little bit more what you're accustomed to of a traditional boxing broadcast.

That's my hunch. And then make some cash, and when it's over, go back to what they're doing. Because you can't really say that the core business of Showtime is disrupted by this. I mean, you can't say that. They laid out their schedule for, I think, most of the year already. We already know most of the big fights that are happening to Charlo fights you got the fight in June with Tank in Atlanta like it's all kind of set out they just added this on top of it at a sort of a later date so what do I think I think

Showtime's gonna make a killing I think that no one gives a shit about my opinions inside Showtime or ViacomCBS even a little bit. And I'm going to enjoy Miami. Oh, by the way, if you guys have any, this is true. If you guys have, don't, and here's what I'm looking for. I am not looking, if you know the Miami area, I am not looking for, you know, a recommendation on on some fancy foo-foo place where there's reservations. I know Miami's real showy. Miami and LA are really image-conscious cities. What car are you in?

Who are you with? What clubs are you in? What clothes are you in? I don't give a fuck about none of that shit. Send me to the place that has great coffee. You know what I mean? Send me to the place that's got, what is that stuff that Cubans make? I think it's called mojo. It's like this sort of like acidy, almost like sauce or liquid that they have. I had it with onions one time and you put it on patacon. Oh my God, it is fucking heaven. I want real deal,

not bullshit ones, real deal hole in the wall spots. That's where I want to go. I want to go to the Arapahoe place that native people from Miami go. That's what I want to say. So if you have any suggestions about that in Miami, hit me up, bro. Hit me up. LukeThomasNews at GMO.com. You got any gym recommendations in Miami? Hit me up. LukeThomasNews at GMO.com. Listen, Showtime's going to fly me down to Miami for about a week. I'm not going to cry about it.

I'm not going to cry about it, you know. But I'm not going to change my opinion. Showtime knows how I feel. And they clearly don't care. They clearly think my opinions are fucking stupid. So, okay. Luke, with the amount of time it takes to earn a Jiu Jitsu black belt, is it worth it for someone that's trying to get into MMA to progress through the belt system and earn his black belt first, or would simply having a black belt... What the fuck?

These are stupid questions. What do you think... Excuse me. Do you think it's likely for the UFC to buy a promotion like they did with Pride and Strikeforce in the near future, one or two years? Which promotion would most likely be bought? Dana White has said he would never buy Bellator because he doesn't need the library. A lot of times, this sounds funny, but a lot of times you want to buy an organization if you can to get the fighter contracts. But the other part is to get the library,

because you can monetize the shit out of that library. You can do a lot with it. He has said he doesn't want Bellator's library. I find that a little hard to believe. But would Viacom sell them? I mean, they just put them on Showtime, so I doubt that. The other part is, if you're a UFC, do you need to own LFA or can you just put LFA on Fight Pass and no one really talks about this but wouldn't there be a pipeline between

Fight Pass excuse me between LFA and UFC through Fight Pass like if you're an LFA matchmaker I know that they do send some folks to Bellator in fact Jaleel Willis who's fighting on the main card tomorrow is from LFA a very very good very good fighter, as a matter of fact. But in general, it's like you're going to get a lot of the prospects coming out of that direction by virtue of that. So, like, you know, they're not in the same acquisition phase. Like, buying Pride was a big deal. It didn't just reduce the severity of a competitor out there on the other side of the earth. It gave you a roster to just change the game completely.

Now, there were actually some issues about which contracts they could take, which is why they could buy Pride and they never got Fedor. It's a whole thing. But that would be the idea in theory, right? If you bought this, you would get access to these fighters, and now you've totally reshaped the industry. What happened with Elite XC and IFL, when they went out of business, they had liquidation sales, I think.

And then there were just bids, these auctions that happened on various pieces of what they had, including but not limited to their libraries. And UFC, I think, bid on them or bought them outright. I forget how the whole story goes. So sometimes you don't want their fighters. They get released, but you still want other pieces. They might do something like that, depending on how it goes.

Would they buy one? I don't, like, why? There's not a lot in terms of what they could meaningfully add that they don't already have. There are individual pieces. That's true. But, like, do you need to buy one to change your position in the industry?

No. Your position at this point is pretty solidified. Is Cruz's win over DJ the best aged win ever? No. No. I'm going to say, you don't have to win that, and really his whole resume. Conor's win over Max, and it's a very different Max, but you look at Conor's resume in general, good fighters he beat along the way.

I was right there, I was in D.C. when Cruz fought DJ, and it's a great win for Cruz, but it was just really apparent that the size difference was a big problem for DJ in that fight. It wasn't like he was skill for skill out of his depth. It was like Cruz and DJ, both super high-level guys, right? I don't have to tell you that. But Cruz was a lot bigger. He was a lot bigger.

And that's not a knock on Cruz or like, oh, the win doesn't count. Dude, you beat DJ. I don't give a shit what weight you do it at. It's, you know, 10 pounds or not. That's, you know, that's going to be a hard, that's going to be a hard task. But it's hard for me to call the best aged win in MMA. One that like really stands the test of time. One that is, I want to be very clear, absolutely a product of the insane level of skill and championship metal that a guy like Dominic Cruz had, but a big, big, big component was size. You know, it's hard for me to put that as the pinnacle example. What are some crazy stories that you know or have experience with soldiers or friends in general having roid rage episodes roid rage is almost entirely made up there are certain um anabolic

agents and certainly if you just take them recklessly, that can cause significant mood alterations. But the idea that if you take steroids, it results in this inevitable place where you have hulked out and you have uncontrollable rage, it's simply not true. BJ Penn had his first pro fight in the UFC at 22 years old on May 4th, 2001. If this exact BJ Penn at 22 years old debuted today, how would he fare? I think he would do pretty well. Remember, he'd already won the world championships. He was the first American to win the world championships in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu. So he would still do pretty well. I mean, who did he beat? Cal Uno in his debut? Or was it

the Gilbert dude? Who did he beat? I forget sometimes about the early stage of his resume. He's got some weird ones under like Rodrigo Gracie and stuff like that. That's another name folks have just utterly forgotten. Rodrigo Gracie. So he made his UFC debut against Joey Gilbert. Okay. But then he beat Dean Thomas at UFC 32 and then Cal Uno and he beat both of them in a matter of minutes. He beat Cal Uno in 11 seconds. Then he lost to Jens. Yeah. I mean, you know, the game has evolved. I need't tell you that in the last 20 years, pretty far. But I would say for a guy who's got a Jiu-Jitsu World Championship, and obviously, there's nothing about BJ Penn.

I've said it before, dude. When BJ was in his prime, that was the most exciting and most, you know, image. Not image. Certain fighters, you guys know this, right? When you watch them, they make you imagine possibilities. Not ones you have seen but ones that quite literally you think god could they do that like what else could he do what else could they be what else is they make you begin to imagine the the possibility of what is

there bj penn was like that times a thousand understand he, he came in, right? First American to win the black belt world championships, okay? And then his first three fights, he had a combined, let's see, two minutes and 53 seconds, and then another round. You know, about a round and a half and he's dusting off all these guys. I mean, you couldn't imagine a more exciting one.

And then for the lightweight title eliminator, he beats Cal Uno in 11 seconds and then walks out. Dude, he was a fucking phenomenon. If you missed it, I'm sorry because it was so special. It was so special. So I still think that that guy would do okay. But yeah, like has lightweight moved on pretty significantly since then? Yes. I mean, he was wild and untamed in many ways. His jiu-jitsu was extremely technical, but otherwise he was wild and untamed. What is the best interaction you've ever had with a fighter as well as a fan? Best interaction I've ever had with a fighter.

I've had some good ones, man. I've had some good ones. I've had some good ones, man. I've had some good ones. I've had some good ones. You know, it's not necessarily along the lines of professional conduct, but there are some times where I've had some difficulties, and out of nowhere I've had a couple of them check in on me, very surprisingly. I thought that was really nice.

I've had a couple of them check in on me, like, very surprisingly. I thought that was really nice. I've had a couple of UFC fighters. This is true. I swear on my mother. I've had a few of them ask me to do tape study for them. That's less than nice more than it is, you know, affirming. Asking about nice. That's a really nice thing? Listen, man.

Anytime they spend, they give you a moment of their time, I really believe that. Nate Quarry really invited me into his world, so to speak. Like, you know, meeting his kids and meeting his, well, his kid at the time anyway. And his significant others

and like they share their lives with you and then they ask you. Like a lot of times, you know, you're always asking fighters about their lives constantly. Not that my life is some interesting thing but it's this real one way thing. The beauty I have found is when the fighter begins to get

curious about you. Let me explain what I mean. Not that again me or this journalist or you are all oh we're so interesting and we haven't been asked about it we're waiting to break out and We're going to be stars. In fact, it has nothing to do with what happens in public. It's quite private.

I have found that they have a guard up and they view media quite understandably as something a little bit transactional where you go to media day, you do interviews. You develop a tighter relationship with some of these guys than others, but you try not to be super buddy-buddy with them. But when you work with them for long periods of time or something like that, they begin to...

You see a lot of the different strains on their lives that they don't ever talk about. And then you begin to have a relationship with them where I would call it friendship, not in the like, hey, do you want to go get some fucking wings and hang out and drink beer? It's not in that sense. But I have found that the most profitable, lasting relationships in the business with fighters have come from when they have ceased to view my interaction with them as merely transactional. And then we can share a bit of our lives with each other. I have found that that is really, that cements something lasting. I've got that with a few fighters, but it's rare, and it's rewarding even when they retire.

There's a few of these I'm going to skip. Graphic novels, no. Who is the most underrated fighter in the pound-for-pound rankings? All right, let's take a look. Here is your top 10 pound-for-pound. Jon Jones is one, which I don't understand.

Two is Usman. Three is, well, I guess Habib is out, right? So I guess I kind of understand it, but even then I have Usman one. John Jones is one. Usman two. Volkanovski three. Adesanya four. Francis is five.

Poirier six. Blachowicz, the answer is Blachowicz. Figueiredo is sitting at 10, but even, you know, Blachowicz the answer is Blachowicz Figueiredo sitting at 10 but even you know Blachowicz and that's a fucking guy that you know just wrong more times than I could ever imagine 100%

and he jumped up a spot he was sitting at 8 he's now at 7 it's good that he's finally getting his due and I don't want to overstate things do I think he's going to be

a dominant champion for the next 5 years even the next 2 years no I don't really think that could be wrong about it of course but doesn't even have to be I think what he's going to be a dominant champion for the next five years, even the next two years. No, I don't really think that. Could be wrong about it, of course. But it doesn't even have to be. I think what he's done up to this point has been pretty special. And the way he's turned it around has been pretty special.

And I still have not fucking put out the tape study. It's all done. I just haven't put it out. It's all done. I really should put that out because I really grew to like his game a little bit here. And I saw the differences. You know what I did? I was like, what the fuck am I missing about this guy a little bit?. And I saw the differences. You know what I did? I was like, what the fuck am I missing about this guy a little bit?

So I went back and I had two screens, right? I had on this side and this side. And on this side, I had the first fight with Jimmy Manoa, which may or may not have been his UFC debut. And then I had the rematch with Manoa. And I went round one, round one. Round two, round two. Round three, round three.

And I watched the differences between them. Because it's not a huge shift in what he's done. It is a incremental refinement that has added up to something quite significant in terms of the results that you get. And it's pretty impressive. It's a guy who was always good, but through refinement and just slow adaptation became great, or at least very good anyway. And it's impressive, man. It's like, people always ask me, do you have to go to a new coach? Do you have to like really work on this, really work on that? And the story about Jan Blachowicz is, and of course he's had some changes around

that related to coaches and that kind of thing. But if you just look at the game, it's just about better timing, patience, picking your spots, understanding what works for you, and then making the fight look that way. One of the challenges I think Adesanya had against him was Adesanya was, I think, comfortable with the pace, sort of slow down-ish kind of pace. But that is exactly what Blachowicz thrives off of. I mean, I think Adesanya thought he was fighting at his pace when in fact he was fighting

at Blachowicz's because there may not be too much of a difference between them, but there's enough that matters and he was doing it to like that kind of rhythm. And the reason why I think that might've been confusing for him is because A, there's not a dramatic difference between them, but more than that, Blachowicz has this way to kind of like pull you into it very subtly. And all of a sudden, you're like, why am I fighting this fucking way? Boom, you know. He's impressive. He's impressive.

He's an impressive guy. Favorite MMA show or podcast other than MK? I don't listen to any of them. I might on occasion, on occasion, listen to Man in the Hat, Man in the, whatever the fuck it is, Man in the Myth, I think it is. So Man and the Man in the Hat, which is kind of a silly name. But no, shout still those guys, Sean El Shadi and Chuck Mendenhall. I'll listen to them on occasion. But in general, and again I've said this before

It's not out of spite, it's not out of like Fuck those guys or whoever, it's nothing to do with that I found myself when I was watching And listening to other MMA podcasts I found that it had a very dramatic impact On my own thinking In a way where I wasn't coming up with my own ideas And I'd rather be right or wrong on my own

You want to hear what other people have to say Especially if they have like wise things to say. And so I try to make time for it in that sense, but I really don't... I don't want to be influenced in that way. When Contender Series is back, would you consider having Laura Senko on MK To break it down like what you did in your SiriusXM show

No, probably not Not that I wouldn't want to I think Laura's a great mind for the sport But I don't think it would work for the show Did Laura get paid for that? She did not I'm going to end on this one You got no thumbs up But I kind of would like to get to it

And then we can call it a day on here. How did you financially survive when you first started out your career in MMA media, as I'm assuming it wasn't the most rewarding in terms of salary back then? This is a true story. So the place that I was working at the time, okay, so I had a job lobbying, basically, on Capitol Hill. I didn't spend much time there, but that was what the company I worked for did, and I had various assignments. And it was so awful, and I hated it so much, I was desperate to get out of it.

So then I took another job, and then at that job, which was also not necessarily all that great, but there was a weird thing that had happened. Now, Bloody Elbow at this point is in full swing, okay? So this is around 2007-ish. There was, I was working in one of these office buildings with a gazillion floors in D.C., and there was a company that worked above us, and this is a true story that,

um, they didn't secure their internet. So what I would do is I would bring my personal computer, my laptop to work and I would have it to the side and mostly it'd be closed, right? Like most of the day, but on my lunch break or I'd get there early or I'd stay late or when my boss wasn't looking or whatever. And this is terrible.

I don't really recommend this, but I did this. I would post to Bloody Elbow. Like this is when the reverse chronological format was big on blogs. You guys remember that? When like, you know, you would just read blogs and then they would put a post up, and it would just stack on top. And now that's still kind of the way, but you can arrange things a little bit differently. This is when it was strict, reverse chronological order. And so the law firm, I think it was a law firm, they, who had the free internet,

they never, ever put a block on it. So this lasted for several years where I could take the laptop or my phone when phones got better and better, and I could just blog more or less, not in totality, but I could more or less blog from work. And what I would also do on top of that is if I had to take a radio interview, I would get requests for radio. I was the editor of Bloody Elbow at the time. I would go down to a different floor ahead of time and try and find an open room on like basically trespassing on someone's company property. And then I would try and quietly take the call in there. Sometimes I would go in the street and I would hide in the alleyway so that coworkers couldn't see me.

There was one time I had to hide under my desk, turn all my lights off because it was such an important interview. I forget which one it was in terms of the content. But it was when Chad Dukes was on with LeVar Arrington here in the city. And it was about breaking news. It was something big and I had to do it. Basically, by hook or by crook, in any way I could, I just built up my career over and over and over again. And then around 2009 or so, Washington City Paper did a feature on me, which kind of made the jig was up at that point. Work kind of got wise to it. But at that point, you could begin to post, I think, a little bit off phones.

I can't remember exactly how I adapted. And then around 2010, SB Nation made me a full-time offer, and I think I went full-full like January of 2011. So to answer your question, I was a shitty employee at a place I worked because I refused to let this go away. And then, dude, don't misunderstand me. Like, when I got home on weekends, the whole time, just constant, constant,

never, ever, ever, ever taking my foot off the gas. I realized if I was one of these guys who was like, I mean, here was basically the choice that I made. I could do the job well enough while doing all this side bullshit, not to like really succeed at the job, but not to like, you know, I never got warnings for bad work

or I got raises every year like everyone else does. You know, there's 3%, you know, like they always do. And I did all that stuff. I made it work. But the reality is like I knew that if I kept that up and I didn't fuck up on the job too much, I could just kind of wait it out until I built enough with the MMA where I could convince SB Nation at the time or Vox Media to give me a full-time job. If you actually go back and you read the article in the Washington City paper, you'll see in there I explicitly told the guy because I was like begging for a full-time job. I was like, yeah, he wants a full-time job and to be paid for it.

That's his goal. Because I had a show on the weekends on 106.7 The Fan, previously WJFK, called MMA Nation. And so I was broadcasting over the weekends. I was like, dude, when is someone from my job going to hear this shit? This is going to really affect me. I don't know if they ever really did, which was kind of funny. But the Washington City paper article kind of blew the whole thing up. So that's how I did it. Lie, cheat, and steal. That's really, that's what I did. All right, do me a favor.

I didn't steal, but everything, well, I kind of stole, I kind of stole. Thumbs up on the video, hit subscribe. Thank you guys so much for watching. MK, live tomorrow, you, me, BC, the whole nine, and everything else in between. So, lots of content. Bellator is tomorrow as well.

Don't forget about that. So, I appreciate it. All right. Until next time, appreciate you guys watching. Stay frosty.