MORNING KOMBAT WITH LUKE THOMAS AND BRIAN CAMPBELL - UFC 276 Results: Adesanya vs. Cannonier | Volkanovski vs. Holloway 3 | UFC 276 Post-Fight Show

Episode Date: July 3, 2022

At UFC 276, Israel Adesanya looks to defend his middleweight title against Jared Cannonier in the pay-per-view main event. In the co-main event, Alexander Volkanovski will aim to defeat Max Holloway a third time and defend his featherweight strap. Also on the card is a middleweight contest between top contenders Sean Strickland and Alex Pereira, a welterweight bout featuring Robbie Lawler and Bryan Barberena as well as a bantamweight contest between Sean O'Malley and Pedro Munhoz. 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

Introducing the new McSpicy from McDonald's. It looks like a regular chicken sandwich, but it's actually a spicy chicken sandwich. McSpicy. Consider yourself warned. Limited time only. At participating McDonald's in Canada. You hear that? Ugh. Paid.

And... done. That's the sound of bills being paid on time. But with the BMO Eclipse Rise Visa Card, paying your bills could sound like this. Earn rewards for paying your bill in full and on time each month. Rise to rewards with the BMO Eclipse Rise Visa Card. Terms and conditions apply. Hi everybody, how are you doing? It is, let's see, Saturday, July 2nd. I'm here in Las Vegas, Nevada. In fact, I got my credential for, I went to the fights tonight. I'm actually here, T-Mobile Arena is just beside me here.

My name is Luke Thomas. I am one half of the Morning Combat Duo. By the way, the other half, Brian Campbell, he is right now doing a CBS Sports HQ hit. Yeah, we'll turn it down just a little bit. He's doing a CBS Sports HQ hit. He will be here as soon as that hit is done. So you'll get the both of us here in just a minute. But for right now, we are going to go over all of the results from UFC 276, which just

finished moments ago. So if you're joining me, well, me and Brian now, I appreciate it. Thumbs up on the video. Please hit subscribe. If you watched Friday's show and you're like, is Luke sober today? Good news. I am completely. So we're going to get to all the results from the main event, from the co-main event and the entirety of the main card. Maybe a little bit from the prelim card, but I do want to save some of that for the Extra Credit Podcast if we can. Okay? What to do beyond that? I appreciate you guys tuning in. This was a long one. This was a long week. That was a long event. And I saw that people were

streaming out in the arena there, the T-Mobile arena, just prior, well actually during the main event, which tells you a lot about sort of how folks interpreted it. As a reminder, if you don't want spoilers, now's the time to go. I know you're like, why would you not want spoilers if you're here? But people complain about it because they're crazy, so I have to give that warning. All right, without further ado, let's get this party started, shall we? Oops, whoopsie. There we go. Let's get this party started, shall we? Oops. There we go.

All right. Here we are. Okay. Let's see. One more time. Sorry. My bad. All right.

I hope everything looks good. I think it does. I think we're good to go. I think it's all set in stone. All right. I hope everything looks good. I think it does. I think we're good to go. I think it's all set in stone. All right. Let's go to the results. And again, Brian Campbell will join us here in just a few moments.

If we pull them up, Israel Adesanya, however you would like to pronounce it, he remained your UFC middleweight champion with scores of 50-45, 49-46, and 49-46. I had it like 49-46. I suppose I could see a case for 48-47, although that would be very generous. I don't know how accurate that would be. But the problem was the fight was not great. It was not a great fight. It was not particularly entertaining. It was not particularly scintillating. And the first thing the champion said when he was interviewed by Joe Rogan post-fight was that he and his team did a really good job of not letting him up having any of his follow-up shots. You really kind of saw that.

Everyone was just kind of picking at each other. In fact, the time that there was any kind of volley of strikes, and they weren't in any way, I'm using it in the more colloquial sense, significant, was when they were pressed up against the fence. Cannoneer would go for double underhooks or something else. And he would kind of have pitter-patter shots or maybe some knees to the leg of Izzy or something like that. But there wasn't really any volleying.

Now there were some good parts in either direction to an extent for Izzy. I thought that his jab was pumping pretty well through certain stretches of the fight. I talk about this all the time. It drives the fans crazy, and I understand it, but if you don't take it away, he's going to win. Namely, Izzy's leg kicks. Izzy's leg kicks at this point are his jab, in a sense, like if a boxer had a jab, right? Where it's the centerpiece of your offense, everything builds behind it. And even if it's still a little loud, it's okay. And even if that's all that lands, they accumulate, they add up, they play a role, they have a function. And so that is really what Izzy does with these leg kicks these days. I mean, it's pretty

remarkable, but it doesn't really create for the most interesting action to a lot of the folks, and I understand that. However, that was the thing that I pointed to ahead of time. You did see, by the way, Kananir land his own leg strikes, but that's not really the issue. The issue is not so much how much is Kananir landing with leg kicks. The issue is more so, what is he doing to stop Izzy? I bring this up all the time.

I talk about it constantly. You go back to the Blachowicz fight. Yes, later in the fight, the wrestling played a significant role, but it was the checking of the leg kicks in the first part of the fight that took Izzy a little bit out of his game and brought in his second order offense behind the hands. And that fight was a very different one. By the way, it's hot as balls in this room. brought in his second order offense behind the hands and that fight was a very different one. By the way, it's hot as balls in this room.

So you really didn't see that from Kananir. He did a good job of being away and not really getting caught with additional sort of combination strikes from Izzy. Again, the jab landed a little bit. The leg kicks were landing pretty significant through all five rounds. Couldn't get taken down. Didn't get super out-muscled in the clinch. Got kind of held against it, but not thrashed or beaten up or moved around. And then Izzy also does a really good job of not allowing long-term... Well, let's look up some of the numbers before I sort of commit to that idea. Let's look up some of the numbers on what the control time was along the fence line.

Because he typically is good about not really stopping any takedowns, but then extricating himself off the fence in a pretty quick manner so as to avoid bigger problems. Let's look at the numbers here if we can. These are from 3027, aka Fightmetric, and I believe these are official. Yeah, I mean, 0 for 4, Kananir went on takedowns. He had a total amount of control time. This would be, again, pressing Izzy against the fence of 4 minutes and 14 seconds. Jeez, that's a long time. He had, in the sense of how much there was not a lot of action behind it, right? That's

a lot of time for the crowd to kind of get restless. Zero control time in the first round, zero control time in the second, a minute 29 in the third, a minute 18 in the fourth, and a minute 27. These are fairly long-ish stretches, but there just wasn't a whole lot behind it. You look at the numbers overall, again, these are quantitative, not qualitative assessments, but quantitatively, not qualitative assessments, but quantitatively, Izzy had significant strikes relative to Kananier in round one, 22-18. In round two, 28-19. In round three, 17 apiece.

That appeared to be the one round that was Kananier's best or perhaps the easiest to score for Kananier if you were so inclined. Again, one of the judges had it 50-45, so it wouldn't even necessarily be that. Round four, 24-16 for Izzy, and then round five, 25-20 for Kananir. Kananir really never got out into third or fourth gear on this one. It wasn't like he was totally out of the fight. There was never a point where you were like, well, Kananir can't win this, except if you just sort of assessed that he didn't have the technical skill or whatever. But in terms of getting beaten up, in terms of the fight slipping away from him in the way that things slipped away from Max, which we'll talk about, obviously, in just a second, you didn't feel that. But he never marched past a certain limit.

He never marched through anything. He never really turned any significant corner in this fight. There just wasn't a whole lot to what he was able to do. And I think if Izzy can largely stay off the fence, which again, he largely did. If he can largely pick at you with leg kicks, put a little bit of other offense behind it. There were some good body kicks, actually in either direction, but Izzy had more of them. You know, that's his fight to lose at that point. In fact, if we look at the targeting, I think this will say a lot. Yeah, targeting from Izzy, 51 of them. You know, that's his fight to lose at that point. In fact, if we look at the targeting, I think this will say a lot.

Yeah, targeting from Izzy, 51% to the head. That makes sense. 22% to the body, 25% to the leg. So one of every four things he targeted, he targeted to the leg. For Kananir, it was 40% to the head, 35% to the body. That's a lot to the body, which by the way, is a decent attack.

And 24% to the leg. But's a lot to the body, which by the way is a decent attack, and 24% to the leg. But the number that I want to see is not necessarily any of those. The number that I want to see is to what extent Kananir did targeting of the leg. Round one, 11-14, that's pretty good. In fact, he landed more leg significant strikes than Adesanya, 11 to 9. So that's pretty good. But then it begins to trickle a little bit. Kenanir then drops to 4 of 5.

Then in round 3, 4 of 6. Then in round 4, 2 of 2. And then by round 5, 1 of 1. He just wasn't getting a whole lot going there. By contrast, Izzy fell off a little bit in that number, but not nearly as bad, landing nine in round one, seven in round two, four in round three. Again, that was the round that they tied, or that was the best round for Cannoneer. Four to Cannoneer's two in round four, six to Cannoneer's one in round five. But what's the common denominator in all of these? These are not terrible numbers by any stretch.

These are not even bad numbers by any stretch. Nothing about this was bad except for, if you're a fan, probably the entertainment quotient because the fight itself just kind of hummed along. It never really had a whole lot of crescendos one way or the other or peaks. It didn't have any peaks and troughs. But the fight just was kind of ho-hum. It just kind of marched along. Izzy had a gap basically on Kanonir both in terms of overall ability and the capacity

to land more numerically and that's really what it was. There wasn't much more to it than that, candidly. And you guys know I'm a big, listen, I'm a huge supporter of Izzy. I don't hide the fact that I think quite highly of his game. I don't hide the fact that I've thought very highly of what he's accomplished to this point. He has done extremely well in the middleweight division. He has been dominant in a whole lot of ways. On the other hand, Richard Mann from Fightmetric has a newsletter.

I always recommend it. And he puts it out, I don't know, usually every Wednesday of every week. And one thing he had noticed was if you look at Izzy's sort of first half of the campaign in UFC, there was a much bigger differential between the strikes he landed on his opponents versus how many he absorbed. And I think we've got BC coming in. Let me just finish this point real quick, BC. If you look at the second half of his career, it's actually the opposite, and the differential

has shrunk significantly. All right, let's bring in my guy here, BC. All right, we've got to make sure he's unmuted. Wait a second for Greg to give us the go-ahead. We good to go? All right, we've got to make sure he's unmuted. Wait a second for Greg to give us the go-ahead. We good to go? All right, put it on. Put it on me, baby. Okay, let's do it.

All right. Greg, can you hear him? He sounds good? He looks good, I'll tell you that much. How did it go on HQ? Sweaty, quick, and I got the job done. It is in this city, but how deep are you into the show? Because I'd like to drop a little analysis. Okay, we're still in the main event.

Give me your reaction. I mean, he is. You thought Cannoneer was going to win. I did. I also thought Cannoneer would take more chances, and I'm not here to damn him. You don't understand until you're in there with somebody like Izzy, and they talked about it excellently on the broadcast. The strength of him, of course, he looks skinny, he looks easy to take down, but the timing, the speed. You know, our fantastic producer and cameraman, Greg said. Dude, Greg's the man. Greg said on the way over there,

hey, you kinda look like Mayweather. Yeah, it did kinda look like Mayweather under this part of the theme. Not it's direct apples for apples, but it's hit and not get hit. It's hit and not get hit, yeah. And what Adesanya does is he makes you take the ultimate risk to try to have some success with him.

And I think he does that by tagging you early with counter shots, showing you the speed. Talk about the distance that they fought in the first three rounds. If you would have told me, Kananir was going to be able to get that close but not be able to touch him. It's not that I didn't see the lack of, you know, the skill gap between them. I just know of Kananir's danger. And in this case, he got disciplined at the end of the day. I don't think you can fault him as much as just says out of Sonia. He is who he thought he was

You know, I mean this guy's great five title defenses a Claim for the pound for pound thrown right now, although it's a heated discussion with his own, you know teammate there Yeah, we'll get along with Kamara Usman, but not surprised in the end Luke and I know there were some booze But I don't look at this as a as a knock. There were maybe other fights that he'd not take enough chances against Yoel Romero. Yeah, and that was a weird fight, too. I got no knock here because Kananir stayed dangerous until that final round when he did land a couple shots. It did nothing, though. This was a thorough performance.

How many did you give to Kananir? The clear round was round three, or clear. I want to say that was his best round, if not a clear round. You and I were talking when there was about 30 seconds left in the round, 45 seconds left, saying, look, it was pretty damn even, you know. I think Kananir did enough. He snapped Izzy's head back with that one right hand when they were close in the clinch to get the edge.

Although, if you had it 5-0 in the end, what was the final? I left before the end. 249-46 is 150-45. Either way. 50-45 is a little strong. But, you know, you look at the stats in real time where 19 to 13 strikes for a cannon. Those numbers are all wrong. They're always wrong.

Don't ever believe those. They're not correct. That cage, that octagon, not smart at all. It doesn't call it Uber for you at all. I mean, but look, what do you want me to say here? Well, here's one thing I'm bringing up. And I brought this up just as you were walking in, actually. Which is that, you know, I talk about Richard Mann and he has this fight metric newsletter.

And one thing he had pointed to was that if you look at the first half of the campaign in UFC that Izzy has had, there was nearly a plus three differential he had in terms of strikes he would land on his opponents versus what he had absorbed. That number has shrunk to less than an integer. He still has a positive differential, but it is barely a positive. It does kind of tell you, I think, a couple of things, and maybe it's all these things together, and it's, right, one is these guys are game planning better for Izzy. The tape on him, I said this before, like there's a shitload of tape on Izzy. And if you come from a good team like MMA Lab, dude, and what did we say before the fight? I even agreed with it. I was like,

dude, I don't know if Cannoneer's going to win. He trains with the MMA Lab. He is a veteran. He is going to have a good game plan. Maybe not a winning game plan, but a good game plan just the same. And I think you saw that. The other one is, I don't know if the argument is he is risk averse or whatever, but the gap that he had on the division, like in a night where he yet has another title defense, it sounds kind of crazy to say the gap is narrowing, but the level of dominance he exerted in the early part of his UFC campaign, he is not enjoying, for whatever reason you want to put that up to, he is not enjoying the same level of dominance at this point. So what do you attribute that?

Well, also, you know, some of that is people learning their lesson. You know, you start watching the tapes of the people that did come at him. You watch the tapes of the first Robert Whitaker fight when the champion, you know, walked right into a big one there, although it wasn't, you know, recklessly as he just sets it up. And if you are going to be offensive against him in an effort to not only win the fight, but to win the round, how do you typically win rounds? I mean, obviously, you know, if you land the bigger shots, but a lot of times to get there, it's output. If you're going to try to output this guy, he's going to match that. And he's going to sting you with shots. So, you know, there is a little bit of a talk in there. I mean, did, did Cannoneer, was he willing

to risk it all enough? You know, no, is the answer. It's like, how much damn can you put him on him? I want to ask you, do you believe that Cannoneer, who I think has his boxing, his defense, his head movement, I always thought was criminally underrated. I thought the last two wins heading into this fight, he really stepped it up a notch. Did that become at all a flaw rather than something that helped him? Because he tried to open up offense, but he always got back to a safe spot. He needed to be reckless to win this fight, true or false? He needed to take more risks to win this fight. Not from start to finish, right?

Not from start to finish. There had to be moments where he was going to command respect. He never got that respect for the most part. I think that's right. I think that's right. But here's the thing. It's like, I often wonder when these guys are fighting Izzy, like when their rounds four, rounds five are coming up,

and you're in a, like, again, there was not really a strong case for 2-2, but I always try to think, like, what did the judges maybe see? And we see fucked up scorecards all the time. So I was like, it's either 3-1 or 2-2. You know, what's he going to do to really press? And it always sometimes seems like these guys, it's so easy for me to say this, and I'm not in any way impugning his character, but sometimes I wonder if they realize the fight is lost and they want to just turn in a commendable performance.

Like, I didn't get my ass beat by that guy. I don't want to end up on a highlight reel because they know if they start charging, yes, there's a high risk, high reward quotient there available. But also that the risk is that you could end up getting completely fucked up and you get slept. And they're like, I went four rounds with this guy and I looked pretty good the whole time. Do I want to give all of that away? I think that's sort of the thing that I wonder. Because what would explain not doing... I mean, it's all part of the same family, though.

It is all part of I had an idea to that if they, because what would explain not doing. I mean, it's all part of the same family, though. It is all part of I had an idea to come in and do something. Yeah. That road got closed, and I quickly realized by getting caught with a few shots, by getting leg kicked that, you know, if I disobey, I'm going to get stopped. So you don't lose heart and give up and start circling backwards if you're elite and tough. And Jared Kennedy has proven that he's both. But when he can't even find the first crumbs of success outside of that round three, if you're elite and tough, and Jared Kananier has proven that he's both. But when he can't even find the first crumbs of success outside of that round three,

unless he was willing to take the risk of looking up at the lights, which I didn't necessarily see in him, he was confident enough to keep trying to find that opening. The only major thing I had a problem with was the lack of full-on urgency in four and five when it was clear, right? That's fair. urgency in four and five when it was clear, right? That's fair.

Second half of round four where it was clear he wasn't winning a back-to-back round. And also round three was his best round. That was the time to pick it up right there. By the way, Mikey, we good on the stream? Everything good? Yeah. Okay. All right.

Because you guys are looking real concerned back there and we don't know. Well, if we do, it does look like a hostage video right now. It does look like a hostage. Yeah. Should we tell our families we love them? I mean, should we just stop the analysis and you can apologize for yesterday, Luke? I'm sorry, bro.

You know I love you. You're still wearing your badge. I don't give a shit. Who cares? Okay. What about the fans walking out before... I saw on Twitter folks were walking out sort of near the end of round three. Yeah I didn't get that in this case

because Kananir's more dangerous than the average Joe. If Vittori's down four rounds to zero maybe that's a little more justifiable although Vittori's still a big time striker and has the wrestling capability. I don't see that in this matchup. I'm not mad at them. They pay their ticket. They can do what they want. The booing

to me. Like I don't think this is a booable performance. Adesanya also was offensive in key moments, also was backing Kananir up. This is not a guy you can F with. Part of me leaning toward that prediction was the idea of, I thought Adesanya was in a point where he kind of wanted to make a big statement. I was starting to buy into that belief. And against Kananir, you can be lulled, I think, at times into thinking you're closer to a knockout when that guy was willing to take big-time damage

he's willing to just be patient and sit through that in ways that sometimes they're inhumane to land that big shot um Dada Sonia knew of the danger in there I thought he was offensive enough I really don't have a problem with that no I don't have much of a problem with it either all right again it's not like this is I'm not sure how to couch or explain this criticism exactly. The answer's in the vape stick, if you're looking for it. It always is in the vape stick.

But I'm being dead serious, which is to say it's like, what can we say critically about Izzy's performance? He is... It's extremely difficult to pick the lock, to find a clear opening on him, to consistently land on him. On the other hand, these guys have kind of figured out just enough to stay close to him without ever turning a corner.

And it makes for less than desirable action, I think, for the fans. I think that is a thing that we're seeing. It reminds me a little bit of Jon Jones toward the end of his light heavyweight run. And those fights were a lot different, and they would kind of open up in different ways, but there was so much tape on Jon, there were so many things he could do, but guys would game plan around it, and he would kind of just be reserved by virtue of the things they were showing him, but he was still just enough better than them that they couldn't overcome that.

It feels a little bit like that. Is that a fair assessment, or am I out of my mind? That's a decently fair assessment. But look, would you agree? Kananair did show really good defense and head movement. He sure did. To not be in a situation where it looked like he was on the verge of getting dropped and taken out.

He didn't get dropped. I didn't see him wince. I mean, his right eye got a little bit messed up. There was an eye poke. There was an eye poke. But I don't say that for us to give him praise. Because again, if you felt like he didn't take enough risks

given that at 38 is he getting back to this title shot, you'd say unlikely. You never know, but you'd say unlikely. That's the thing. That's the difference

with Vittori. Vittori's still in his 20s. So if he can't get there, well, partly he's not fully developed. The other part is he's got time left. Dude, time is up

for Kananir. So I think because he wasn't getting pieced up. I mean, when you're getting pieced up and you start to feel like I could go, that triggers a lot of fight or flight in people and they just go for it. Kananir, again, I think his defense and his head movement and some of the counter strikes

once in a while that he was hitting, it gave him a false sense of confidence or security that he was closer than he was to crossing that line. And he really wasn't in the end. Because if you're going to say, I don't know how you put it exactly into words how great Izzy is, but he's now showing him he can go close to that flame and not get burned. He was not afraid to be fighting at a distance that you would think in theory you don't want to be there with Jared Cannon.

I would say this fight, relative to some of the previous ones, a little bit more successful boxing from Izzy. For example, against Romero, you hardly saw any of that. And the leg kicking, although you saw much more of the leg kicking. Again, but guys are learning from this. They're kind of taking things away from it. But still, he is, to have this much tape on him, to have guys this much game plan for him, and for him to still have that edge in the division, it is remarkable.

It is very difficult to do. However crowd-pleasing it might be, fine. Certainly, I'm not here to tell you you have to like things you don't like. But how difficult it is to pull off what he does is extremely, extremely difficult. Of the rare people that have had success against him, Gastelum took chances,

and I think he was a little bit more explosive than Izzy thought. There was an earlier... Version of Izzy, too. And look, and they went to... Sorry, no, I'm not farting. I thought you were lifting the... I mean, that would went to... Sorry, no, I'm not farting. I thought you were lifting. I mean, that would have been...

Yesterday was my feral day. Classless. Today is not my feral day. Wow, Ron Burgundy. All right. I had to move my foot. But, you know, and it became a war, and it was what it was, but Gastelum also had to take back heavy damage and be willing to do that.

Also, Gastelum had a strong force. I'm in the midst of this point, though. Also, though, we did see Izzy become safe and defensive against Joel Romero when he got hit in the first round, but he never really repeated that, so it's hard to look at that as a trend. And then, look, when Jan was able to land the big jab and the leg kicks, you saw Izzy slow down. Jared Kananier never put Izzy in a spot where he was going to slow down

his offense out of fear. And that's really the biggest thing I think negatively you can say against Kananir. Because at least Gastelum and certainly Jan, they were more offensive. Kananir, I think, wasted two rounds trying to figure Izzy out and trying to get close with counter shots. At some points, you do have to let things go offensively, not just from a counter standpoint, not from a defensive standpoint.

You need to take the fight to him. Kananir never tried to take the fight to him until it was too late. Interesting. I'm looking at the numbers here. In terms of targeting, Adesanya, Adesanya, whatever, targeted Vittori and Whitaker to the leg much more than he did against Kananir. 36% and 42% respectively. Kananir, just 25%.

Sort of tells you the boxing took the pressure off of Izzy, I think, to rely on the leg kicks as much, or to focus on them as much as he did. So his offense was a little bit more varied, but still 25% is really high. I don't know what the UFC standard would be. This is not GSP trying to just wrestle from top position and neutralize you and control you. I'm so glad you brought that up. Because when Adesanya predicted, you know, I'm going to F this guy up and said all that, it didn't mean in the end he was going to be reckless.

But again, he stood so close to Kananir and was comfortable with that distance that he's basically saying, bring your offense to me and I'm going to end you by countering. He's so comfortable in the storm that that's why I think you hold back any criticism and instead you say, okay, somebody's going to have to take a chance. You're going to have to take a chance if you're looking up at the lights. You have to do that. I think that's right. But I am glad you brought up GSP.

It does seem to be the case that when champions, and everyone's going to have a different number for it. Obviously, St. Pierre had a significant amount of title defenses, and Anderson lost his, you know, this terrible Chris Weidman knockout, right? And when I say terrible, I mean, you know, it's like a bad thing for him. But there are these champions that kind of hold on for a pretty long time, Jones, now him, to GSP, when they kind of get into that settled-in, multi-title defense stage of their career. And again, Jones is very different in many ways, him, to GSP, when they kind of get into that settled in multi-title defense

stage of their career. And again, Jones is very different in many ways and so is GSP. But they kind of get to a point where they still have the lead on the division. The guys can do things to make it interesting, but they can't quite cross over the hump unless the guys stick around the division too long, or in this case, like Demetrius Johnson lost or whatever. But you see this kind of evening out of, they have this dramatic rise, then they kind of hold that title, and then they have these performances that are obviously too difficult for their contemporaries to deal with, but they're not these remarkable flashes that you saw earlier in their career.

Obviously, they were fighting lesser opposition at those times, but I'm just saying, do you not notice similar patterns in that way? I think Izzy's in the midst of that a little bit. What does experience give you at that level? It gives you an ability to know how to win close rounds. Jon Jones was great at knowing how to... Some of that, some of knowing how to win close rounds is not taking big offense in return and having great defense amid the fire. And obviously, Jon Jones was somebody who could also fight in the fire and still come forward uh I think he's Izzy is Izzy wasn't even breathing through his mouth though by round five even by round five he was breathing through his nose and I think some fans are going to look at that and say look dude you didn't take hardly any damage I mean obviously you know some

of those leg kicks were hard and yes Kennedy is a threat of course but you're not tired you didn't get beat up why was there not more on your end? Now, of course, if you're Izzy, you're going to be like, well, listen, I'm the champ, he's the challenger, he's got to take the vote for me. Also, the challenger's dangerous as shit. He's dangerous as shit. Can we put that out there? But I think what's left is that, like, in either way, you want to look at it, could

more have been done, at least in theory, yes. But dude, I've often said this too, Izzy doesn't make stupid fucking decisions. He never makes stupid fucking decisions. And as a consequence, that doesn't lead to a high entertainment quotient all the time, at least in this later stage of his career or whatever, but it leads to Ws all the time. If you're going to try to survive in advance, this is the opponent to do it to. But back to something I was trying to touch on,

but it was a puppy that lost his way, is that industry, right? Technology, that whole bit. The whole point is this. When I mentioned how Gastelum and Blachowicz had success, they used offense to set up the success. They used entry-type points, kicks, jabs. Like, it just wasn't there.

Kananir was just trying to settle for one shot that would turn the tide. You're not going to do that against Izzy. You have to make Izzy trade with you. You have to make Izzy's output go down by the danger you bring there's a lot of things you have to do none of it is easy Gastelum was willing to lean on his chin and take big chances and it worked for him for a lot but you you've never seen Izzy in a fight like that again I think there's a reason he proved you know I mean that was by the way I do I do think one thing about Izzy he doesn't get

the respect for the opening of round five against Gastlam when he's, you know, like... Unprepared to die. Unprepared. Like, that was this turning point, like, oh, shit, I'm also a warrior at this level. Yeah. So if anyone wants to take me to that point, this is what's going to happen. He's nasty. He's great.

And I think that fight plays a significant role in Izzy's decision-making because, I've said it before, obviously he lost to Blachowicz. And, you know, you've seen some big punches landing from Whitaker and stuff. But that was the last time you saw Izzy's decision making because I've said it before, obviously he lost to Blachowicz and you know you've seen some big punches landing from Whitaker and stuff but that was the last time you saw Izzy hurt. You haven't seen him hurt since the Gastelum fight and I don't think he wants to come

he went to that place and that fifth round that he had against Gastelum, you were there in Atlanta, dude that was fucking epic. I don't think he wants to do that shit again if he doesn't have to. He's basically telling people take me to that place. That's what he did by standing that close

to Kananir. Take me there. It's not going to be easy for you. You're probably not going to get there. Kananir didn't take that bait. He took his swing. It was better than

Lorne Murphy against Shevchenko though, I'll tell you that much in terms of game planning and execution strategy. Well, you know, they can't all be winners, can they? It's like our Friday show.

They can't all be winners. Both represent Alaska though. Oh, that's right. All't all be winners, can they? It's like our Friday show. They can't all be winners. Both represent Alaska, though. Oh, that's right. All right. So, dude, that fight didn't really blow up the fans' attention, but we

got to talk about that, Comane. So let's read the decision officially. Alexander Volkanovsky retains his title, defeating Max Holloway. Dude, 50-45, 50-45,

50-45. And here's what I'll say about this, and there's a lot to say BC by far the least competitive battle of the trilogy Volkanovski

has a claim in my judgment as you can say whatever the fuck you want about pound for pound that's your best fighter in the sport everyone else can eat shit

that's the very best fighter in the sport damn I just said the same thing on HQ without any of the did you really you know they said look you know we got to close strong

Geico 15 seconds give us what you your biggest takeaway from there and I was like look I love me some Usman I love me Adesanya

nobody fucking does that to Max Holloway and he was already in 10 tense close rounds with Holloway and he just beat the this is not a disrespectful thing

and I can't believe I'm saying it he beat the piss out of Max Holloway Dude he dummied him and I can't believe I said this to him I said this we were watching and you can tell the audience the truth I don't believe I'm saying it. He beat the piss out of Max Holloway. Dude, he dummied him. And I can't believe I... I said this to you. I said this.

We were watching. You can tell the audience the truth. I don't care who wins or loses. But the way Max lost kind of broke my heart a little bit. I don't care that he lost. The better man won tonight. Of course. Just no argument.

He didn't knock Max down. And he didn't stop him, obviously. But he beat Max in so thoroughly, I don't even know what else to say about it. Max was definitely flat, though. We don't have to just address that. He came out flat. There was no Christmas. The speed difference was massive.

Yeah, a little bit. I'm going to say 80% Volkanovski, of course, in the end. 90. I mean, look, I hate to, there's certain superlatives I hate to use because you've got to leave something up there in the Justin Kidd. Like, this was virtuoso. I mean, it was fucking Jimi Hendrix.rix i mean it was just like yeah holy shit so i want to go back to something i tried to say in the live show yesterday but you were like yo bc fuck you remember that hey listen some people had a good time okay um they did the people there

had people there their audience at home hated it uh but here's the thing i said look don't discount how he fought volkanovski against Korean Zombie the way everybody is. Max, everybody's saying, look, great performance, but we expect that it's a different level against TKZ. And it is. But the intention, dude, the intention. This was a Volkanovski who needed something to fire himself up. So he took the fact that Max was talking trash. He took the fact that, you know, you're in Max's territory, Ninth Island.

They're going to be cheering for the U.S. guy against, you know, the foreign pirate here. But, Luke, he kept that shit on his shoulder. You know what I'm saying? He loved it on his shoulder. He came out even talking to the camera on the walk about how good Australia is and boo me all you want. And then he came out there and fought against Max with the same intention of, like, I'm going to piss on you like he did against Korean Zombie.

Now, it blew us away that he had that success, but he was crisper, faster, more powerful by far than the guy he was against Max, who used brilliant footwork combinations, leg strikes, and darting in and out to, you know, do his wizard chest dance moves, and it was amazing. He's a totally different, evolved guy,

where when we both look into the camera and say, yeah, I love me some Usman but you know he was he was life or death against Colby and then was you know won a close fight against Colby and like Alex is widening the gap

on everyone but it's best illustrated by what he did tonight because like Max wasn't even in this fight for a second Luke and when Max showed a little bit of life that one round that was around

three or four? Maybe. It was one of the takedowns in round five. Alex just shut the door, closed strong, and then came out in round five, opened the cut again, and just butchered him. And you haven't seen. It's not like Alex was never not offensive. Watch the Jose Aldo fight, right?

Watch the Mendes fight. Like, he's always been offensive. But I just haven't seen this intention to sit down on his shots and load up. And, dude, it wasn't one thing. It wasn't just the power, just the speed. I mean, it was everything tonight. There's one thing that people aren't really picking up on.

Again, I'd have to rewatch it maybe 48 more times. But in all seriousness, he wasn't fainting all that much, Volkanovsky. Now, there was some was some obviously plenty of stance switching don't get me wrong but dude relative to the first fight or even the second fight he was kind of again relatively speaking stop sitting on your aeroplan points and get big savings so you can be somewhere you actually want to be like on a beach right now you can save up to 25 in aero plan points when you book a trip to one of 180 plus air canada destinations worldwide so stop sitting on your next trip and start saving on one don't miss out your chance to save in points ends february 23rd book at air canada.com flat-footed and he beat the shit out of max dude that was punishing to watch the right hand that

split him open max's face was fucked up the other there was a cut over one eye i think it was the left eye the right eye was swollen shut they didn't even interview max afterwards dude that was as thorough a closing of the book on that rivalry as, again, not you could possibly, a knockout would have been the most thorough thing, but like, you know. You could have stopped it. You could have stopped it. In the first two fights, it was like, well how was the scoring, and blah, blah, blah. Dude, this fight was over, it was just arithmetic.

I mean, it was, there was not a single close round. There wasn't really a single close moment. A couple of decent strikes Max had, a few different ways. I will say, I didn't understand Max's strategy all that much. What was the first thing I said when they started up? I was like, dude, he's so squared up. He's presenting a bigger target to Volkanovski and he's hunkered down a little bit, although his feet are closer. It almost looked like he was trying to bring in some of the strategy from the first and second fight and get the best of both worlds. And Volkanovski just sold all of that shit.

He had no answer at any point for what he was doing. I do think Max has certainly evolved much better than the two of them since their first and second fight. And I do agree with what I said earlier that he's now being more dangerous with his offense. I mean, he's just getting completely well-rounded. But the gap in speed was wide this time around. So let me, I'm not saying that. It's like, I want to give Hulk all

the praise that he deserves, and I also just said, I think he was the one that got better. Max, even though he had the amazing performance against Cater, the mileage is such a difference. Alex is three years older, but the mileage difference is huge in that regard. I'm wondering now, in hindsight, if that great fight against Yair,

coming out of it, we're like, did Max do great because he won it or not so great because he was getting lit up early? Was that the last stand? Not forever. I'm not saying retire tomorrow. I'm saying, like, that guy, that guy, was that the last stand against Yair? And I don't want to say he got old overnight, but he ain't young, Luke. You know what I'm saying? What do you make of that? He got second chapter. He got second

half of the career right now. Let me read some of these numbers. So actually, we should compare this. So Volkanovski landed 190. Again, quantitative, not qualitative, although qualitative certainly is there as well. Volkanovski landed 199 to Max's 127. Now, if we go to the other fights that he had, excuse me, I'm going to look them up here real quickly. You didn't tell me these stats are bullshit though. No, no, these are the final ones. These are the final ones. So these ones matter. So again, remember these numbers, 199 to 127. In the second fight, it was 137 to 102, much closer. And in the first fight, it was 157 to 134, still much closer. This was the biggest gap, at least numerically, that he had.

On top of that, BC, real quickly, Max, of course, 0 for 3 on takedown attempts. I didn't think he was ever really going to get them, but I thought maybe he could go for the, like, you know, Jared was trying to go for the single leg, not really getting the takedown, but then pressing Izzy into the fence. He didn't do anything with it, but that's not a bad strategy on him itself. He loved it. Jesus Christ, he had 16 seconds of control time. That is it. Holy fuck, man.

You can't control Jesus at all. And then if you look at the targeting, 76% to the head, 14% to the leg, and just 9% to the body. Dude, he was max. I think it was through three rounds. I was like, dude, Max can't even find him. He can't find him. Here's what I want to ask you. Because there's a couple of potential options, okay? One is that Volkanovski just made a leap and a half in the last couple of fights. And that could be it. Two is that the damage caught up with Max.

And even though he won against Yair, he got old overnight. And now we're seeing it here. Three, do we find out like Max was injured or had a horrible weight cut or do we find out something after the fact that you go, oh, that makes sense? So let me ask you this. When I sat down with him, he did look thin, but like, I didn't think,

people were like, oh, he looks terrible. He didn't look as terrible in person for whatever that is worth. You know who told me at the live show, Melissa Loves Nachos said that Max in the face looked, you know, sucked out all week. You think he had a bad weight cut? You wonder. He's 30. That weight cut is hard to make. Is that why

he's saying let's go for the knockout thinking in his mind my best chance then is to shorten the front edge? The other one is too, I asked him about damage and he even brought up in the press conference, we talk about damage when we try to do the Allen Iverson thing. Dude, I don't know man. He looked like the damage caught up with him today. He just looked a beat off. It's like the answer may be all of the above in a way

It may be all the above. There's no denying Volkanovski leveled up. Dude the fact that he wasn't he didn't he do I can't go back I can't say this enough. There's no stat on this So there's no way for me to definitively prove this Go back and look at how much he was fainting in the third round of the second fight That was the round where the fight began to turn in Volkanovski's direction and how much effort he was putting into foot feints and shoulder feints. Dude, he was just waiting on Max and then beating the shit out of him as he entered, escaping at an angle and then popping him on the retreat. How many free shots did he get when Max was pulling back or even rolling, whether it was a kick or a punch? He found wherever... Dude, it

was like he had a fucking GPS tracker on the guy and was just pow pow pow I used to take my gun right up to the screen and just fucking beat the shit out of the game everybody did yeah I just couldn't believe

I couldn't believe dude he just it looked effortless the whole time Max looked like god Max Max was almost

unrecognizable I think Alex felt bad. Even though he did close round five with him. Strongly, yeah. There was points in round five where I'm like, oh, is he just trying to be a nice guy here? You know, which we've seen at times. Because you could have stopped it.

I mean, that cut was so bad, you could have stopped it. You could have stopped it. Again, in New York City, they probably would have stopped it. Like, remember, we had the Diaz and the Masvidal fight. Oh, Punch Strunk P, you know him very well. He tweeted at me and said it's the same cut that was opened up in the Poirier rematch. Right, but here's the thing.

Max took a beating in the Poirier fight, but he gave Poirier a fucking beating too. He rocked and had Poirier kind of trying to cover up and hold on for his dear life in a couple of those moments. He couldn't do shit to Max. You know what Max needed between rounds? Volkanovski. Chef Cass to show up, take those weird

blinking cup things, put it right on the Johns and just revive him. I mean, just, you know. He needed one of the seven margaritas I had yesterday. All right,

so here are the striking totals per round. Again, quantitative, not qualitative. I didn't pop anybody with that joke. These guys are dead behind the camera.

I know. Well, first of all, I mean, could he have, he's eaten all the edibles in Las Vegas. Don't say his name. Do not say his name. I'm not I mean, could he have... He's eaten all the edibles in Las Vegas. Don't say his name. Do not say his name. I'm not going to say his name.

But he's eaten all the edibles in Las Vegas. If you go to the stores, they're like, sir, we don't have any left. Okay. I'm glad you're working on the show. Okay. It's so hot in here. This is what... Somebody tore up the bathroom.

You can't use the studio room bathroom. Who tore up that bathroom? I walked in and smelled like shiite. I didn't go. I didn't go. Mike, was that you? Mike, did you take a dump in the bathroom? I've been in front of you guys

the whole time. No, you walked out. I saw you walk out. Alright, hold on. Dude, this is what yesterday's show was supposed to be and I ruined it. Yeah, you did. I had too many Yo, that was like that Sully Salinger joke. Dude, that was like trying to land the plane in the hot seat. Dude, we'll talk about this.

Yes, I mean, I accept my responsibility for yesterday. I really do. But BC, be honest. It wasn't 100% my fault because we had ridiculous technology issues. When do you want to have

this talk with the viewers? Later. We'll have it. Okay. So, striking totals. Quantitative. Round one, Volkanovski,

28 to Maxis, 24. Pretty close. Round two, 37 to 27. Round three, Volkanovski, 28 to Maxis, 24. Pretty close. Round two, 37 to 27. Round three, 40 to 26. Round four, there was a little bit of an effort there from Max. 44 to 31, but how about this? Round five, 50 to 19. Now, I don't know this offhand, BC,

but I'm going to guess if I looked at any of the other rounds in any direction, no one had that much of a striking differential. So that's 30-plus strikes and a difference. Let me actually double-check that. Have you ever seen Richard Mann in person? Have I seen him in person? I'm not calling him a dick man at all. That's disrespectful.

You literally just did. He's a great numbers guy. Like, you're a numbers guy? He's a great numbers guy, you know? Yeah, so I'm looking at these striking totals here per round. Yeah, this is the second fight, right? No, this is the first one. So 19-19 round one, 22-21 round two, 25-15, 34-24, then 37-23.

Those are just numbers to me. It was an ass-kicking. That's all I needed to see. I'm just pointing out. Three to nothing is the final score. Excuse me, that was the second fight. What am I saying? You and I are huge.

I mean, you love Alex, too, but you and I are just such huge of Max's character, of his legacy, of his legend, all that. Yes, I looked at the numbers. That's the most dominant round of all three fights. He's still only 30, but I want to ask you honestly, I mean, he has recreated himself at times where we weren't sure exactly where he is physically or mentally. There's a ton of money fights he can make

by moving up and fight the other aging, you know, I mean, him against, I'm sure McGregor's still his super super fight him against any of the, I mean, it's Chandler. Does McGregor want to fight Holloway after a performance like this, though? I get what you're saying. So that plays into it as well. I want to ask you, what do you think should be next for Team Max? This is a night of retirement, right? Donald Cerrone, Jessica Ai.

You know, listen, here's what I would say do I think that Max Holloway can continue to beat elite fighters potentially in two divisions I 100% believe that yes of course

I believe that but but I know for a fact he makes an absolute shit ton of money I won't say how much from his gaming

does he have an OnlyFans or is this just like Twitch type thing like live gaming I think it's Facebook gaming I won't say how much, from his gaming. Does he have an OnlyFans or is this just like Twitch type thing, like live gaming? I think it's Facebook gaming. I don't know shit about gaming so you'll have to ask somebody else. But, you know,

he's a smart dude. He's got a great team around him. Beautiful family. Beautiful family. Like, I'm not saying he has to hang it up, but he's taken a lot of damage. Tonight was another night

where he took a lot of fucking damage. Not like an abusive amount, but not a great amount either. It might be time to at least, because he's so young, it might be time to at least just take a year off. Yeah, take a fucking break, man. Take a year, a year and a half off, and look, even if

he does that and comes back and all he does is take fun old guy fights, he's allowed that. He can still make a lot of money, he can still win those. I mean you would love to see him against Tony Ferguson, against name the aging fun guy that he can make great fights with, but I would like a break in between. I don't want to see him rush back and try to fight another top contender. I don't want to see any of that. But let's not act like McGregor isn't damaged physically himself. So I would love

that. Yes. Listen. Okay, let me ask you this. Dead serious. If they made it 155, who do you favor? And I know it was a bad performance tonight for Max, but Max or McGregor? Because before I would have said Max, no problem. Yeah, I think still Max. Probably still Max. Closer. And Max would have to answer questions. It's like McGregor doesn't have to answer questions from layoff and injury for sure.

And I do know that... Do you believe, by the way, speaking quickly of McGregor, that the talks of this Mayweather thing is as serious as some of these weird online reports are saying? That Mayweather offered him $160 million for the rematch? Do you believe any of that? I dismissed the first fight as nonsensical bullshit for people who didn't know combat sports, and then it was one of the biggest fights in combat combat sports history so i'll just shut the fuck up this time it seems implausible because it would require them to work in all likelihood with the showtime

again which you know i don't think daniel really wants to do um but you know money talks so whatever that money is that big and they did it like the middle east and dana can get half of it yeah i want to say something about max's run we went over this on the resume review I'm really glad we did the resume review I guess it was a bit of a curse unfortunately this time again fuck that kind of sucks but um I will say this we did one on Jessica we just haven't published it yet so I guess that evened it out right but dude that run he had from 2014 against Will Chope all the way to I won't say the Dustin Poirier fight because he rebounded against Edgar but that night December December 14th, 2019, that Max Holloway run is so special,

but he met his match. He met his fucking match, and the win against Cater was remarkable. The win against Rodriguez was fucking blood and guts, but he's not the top dog at featherweight. There's just no controversy about it anymore. How similar do you feel about Max right now to how you felt about Jose Aldo

watching him getting violently knocked out a second time by Max? Okay, I will say this. I felt pretty similar. However, look how wrong I was given that Jose went to bantamweight and didn't exactly change his fortunes, but really kept the flame alive.

We'll see what he can do against Marab Duval. Team Max are not excuse makers. There is a chance he got old overnight against Yair, and this is what it's going to be like moving forward. But I really feel like something was off. It mixed with Volkanovski virtuoso. Maybe there was not going to be a scenario where he was going to win this fight.

But I feel like we're going to find out something down the road. I don't know. We'll see. We'll see. We might just find out that Volkanovski had his fucking number, dude. That's what we might find out. And had it. Because, you know, I'm glad also that we did... By the way,

we pumped out a shitload of content. Well, they haven't even seen some of the longer things that we did yet. I mean, but I'm glad we did the re-watch, the watch party.

Yes, I am glad we did it. Because re-watching that first one, that third judge who did 5-0 Volkanovski, I'm much more looking back, 4-1-5.

You know, I think I ended up with 3-2 the second time, but I could see easily where you can go 5-0 there. So in reality, Luke, it's like Volkanovski was closer to dominating the first fight than he was in a pick-em. It wasn't dominant, but you get what I'm saying. Like, it was closer to that. The second one, yes, Max had great first round and great second round and dropped him twice, you know, once

in each, but that comeback over the final three rounds, Volkanovski was amazing, and now five shutout dominant rounds. For a rivalry between two greats, it really wasn't, you know what I mean? It was more unclose than it was, you know, nip and tuck debate who won that round. You know what I'm saying, Luke? I mean, he was more unclose than it was, you know, nip and tuck debate who won that round. You know what I'm saying, Luke? Yeah. I mean, he was the better man, like, across the board almost. He really was.

From round three on of the second fight, he never looked back. And doesn't he have excuses that he could have leaned on in the second one? Which I know he still won by disputed decision. But didn't he have, like, with the travel, with COVID? Like, there was, like, legitimate hurdles. Well, I think Australia's, again, I have to go back and check. He didn't have the time with his coaches that he normally gets that yeah i mean australia's covid restrictions were pretty significant um so i think that definitely impacted training but you know that max was fucked up in that fight too like he couldn't

they were all on zoom and shit like the whole thing was a mess but um tonight dude you can say whatever the fuck you want to let's talk about volkanovski for a second so i don't do pound for pound rankings but you do yeah what is the is the, I saw people being like, well, Kamaru's like actual resume still necessitates him being put in pound for pound and I can understand that.

I would like you to speak about it but dude, just like talent, Volkanovski is the best fighter in the sport. He's my number one.

Yeah. He is so good. Usman 2, Adesanya 3, Jones is off the list because of inactivity, but Jon Jones is in the discussion, obviously. And, you know, there's a couple other guys that deserve to be wherever you have them, four, five, six, seven right there.

But no, dude, it is Volkanovski because he is having an Usman-like run when Usman kind of was like, oh, shit, now he's adding, you know, striking and now he's knocking Masvidal out. And, you know, but again, he also had very close fights with Colby Covington twice. and Licka Volkanovski, except for the rematch with Max, he's not having these very close fights, and, yeah, he had a scare against Ortega,

but that is going to go down as, like, such a huge... A legendary moment. A huge, um, it's more of a... What he proved. What he proved, yeah, exactly. You know, to see him bend like that, but not break, and then be the dominant guy overall in that fight. He's never lost in there, Luke.

He has a win that's so dominant over a version of Aldo that still has it that, again, I still believe Aldo kind of was just like, no mas, fuck it. Looking back, that was the canary in the coal mine for me. He knocked out Chad Mendes and put him into retirement. Darren Elkins he whooped up on. You know, I mean mean I get it. Maybe I'm jumping the gun on okay now he's got three wins over Max and a win overall though he in four title defenses he's the greatest

featherweight of all time. I mean look Jose is fucking Jose. You're right. But he doesn't have to do much more if he's not already the greatest featherweight of all time Luke. Fucking A. And it feels too soon in a way but he's also 12-0 in the octagon and now he's got is it it what, five title defenses now? Or did I just make that up?

No, four. Four. Four, because Max has three. Damn. So Luke, I like what he did afterwards. He said, it wasn't just, I'm done here. Let me move up and fight Charles Oliveira, which I want to get your thoughts in a second. But it was, I want to be active enough.

And what's the smart thing to do when you hit your absolute best you'll ever be right now? This is his prime prime, the peak of the absolute prime. He says he wants to defend both. He wants to fight Oliveira, but he wants to be active in both divisions. Is that possible on this level? You can say Amanda Nunes has done it, but the divisions aren't as loaded or competitive, Luke.

Is it possible to do that before you get into the Oliveira side of it? I think he has... Because there's a few guys knocking on featherweight. Josh Yam at one of them. Dude. I'm not saying that he's going to look better. I'm just saying...

I mean, Yair's interesting in the sense that he's so unorthodox and quick that you could see him catching Volkanovski with something. That's not crazy. Again, Ortega dropped him. Mendes dropped him. Max dropped him. Dude, if I can learn Russian quick,

I could talk Zabit back into the game. I don't think you could. He ain't dropping Volkanovski. But the point I'm trying to make is he has shown some, very limited, but some vulnerability in that sense. So maybe you think Yair would have a chance there. But I wouldn't pick Yair over Volkanovski.

No. It would be a great fight, though. It would be a sick fight. So dude, here's the thing. He wants to go up to 155. Now this would be a fucking nightmare because in the sense of this way, Oliveira be a fucking nightmare because, in this way, Oliveira got stripped of the title, which was bullshit, but whatever.

Because, you know, DC just rams, yo, I cheated like a motherfucker in Buffalo. Everyone's like, hee-haw. And I'm like, well, then we're going to give the title back to, okay. But either way. Chuck, yeah. Yeah. So the point is, you have Oliveira waiting.

They don't even know who the opponent's supposed to be. It should be Makachev, but they don't want to make it in Abu Dhabi, so whatever the fuck they're going to do with that. Mahachev, I think. Whatever. I don't know. I'm trying. Now you have Oliveira saying he wants to fight Conor,

and there's all this stuff. Volkanovski coming up. Like, what would they do? Would they do Volkanovski-Olives? There would be some Poirier-Chandler kind of move up and down there. I saw that, too. But would they do Volkanovski-Islam for the title? Here's the thing. Do I want to see Volkanovski go for the title? Here's the thing.

Do I want to see Volkanovski go to 155? Not a doubt. I would love to see it against Olivera, against Makhachev. But you're saying we've got things to figure out first at Lightweight. But dude, Lightweight's a bit of a fucking disaster right now, and all this would do would clog it up. So what I'm hoping is they can get that other 155 fight made so we can get some clarity,

and then see where Volkanovski can fit into the picture. How interested or legit interested are you and like in a way that is you think he's competitive to go to 155 I mean I wouldn't not be interested I'm gonna be a sick fight right and but I want to ask you about that and it almost doesn't matter the opponent here now I know Max is big for featherweight in terms of length and height and he always has been but Max had a five inch height and reach advantage Volkanovski was small like i mean he always he's always looked small against max but he looked small um i get that he came down from a higher weight playing rugby and maybe that speaks to now he's fallen in love with his power and figuring it out but just straight up size wise the same fears you had

of henry sahudo coming back and fighting volkanovski and trying to become a three division champion do you have any of those fears of the size difference, dude? Yeah, first of all, this idea that Suhudo's going to fight Volkanovski and win, get the fuck out of here. I've been telling you all that was a stupid idea. I've been telling you that's a stupid idea. By the way, Suhudo and Aljo had a stare-down in Vegas. That's a much better fight. Love that fight. That'd be great.

Dude, there ain't a bantamweight on earth who's going to give fucking Volkanovski problems. Get the fuck out of here with all that. So, I forget the rest of your question. I had a point to make. Do you have a fear about his size and potentially moving up against Charlie Olive? Sure, sure. I think he's obviously very strong. I think he could hold his own.

But there's a question, like, how far does that actually extend against somebody like Michael Chandler, who is not the overall complete package that Volkanovski is, but he is. Dude, Chandler in the offseason gets close to 200 pounds. That's a big kid, dude. That's a real big kid. Well, big, he's a 34 year old, 35 year old man, but you know what I'm saying? He's a big dude. So I do, I do wonder about that. I think it's a very legitimate question. That's why it's so intriguing when it's why in combat sports, what's the most exciting thing? A few things. The guys on their rise up is super exciting. The other one is the guys who can move through weight classes. That is so special.

It's so special in boxing. It's less true in MMA, but it would still be very fucking awesome. Where would you put fighters starting OnlyFans pages? On that list of what's great about fighting. Okay. Are they like near the BKFC stage of their career? Because that says a lot about what they're going to show. I'm just saying bullshit.

I don't even know what I'm saying anymore. Let's talk about some of the other fights. That is so true, though. I know, right? That is the life cycle. It's like, how much will they show? Well, how close are they to the end of their run? I mean...

Oh, yeah. By the way, would you like... I know that Chandler versus Poirier is something that's sexy as shit, but would you like Max against Chandler? Well, you mean after Max gets time off? I like your other one, Max versus Tony. I like that one a little bit more.

That's a little more. You know what? Conor versus Tony I think would also be great. Conor versus Tony. There's a lot of good fights you could make. Yeah, those are some good ones. The Chandler one, wouldn't hate it. Wouldn't hate it.

I don't know if it's my first choice, but wouldn't hate it. Would you think Max is more likely to just come back against a big dangerous name and then take the year off or two years off? Like we're sort of jamming? He is a fighter, Luke. It may be hard to talk a guy like that when you're 30. He needs to take a break, dude. He does, but when you're 30?

Dude, all the more reason. His 30 is close to like a real 34. And it's funny because Rory McDonald lost while it was on TV. Doesn't even look like the same fighter anymore. And I'm sure we'll get to that this week on Morning Combat from the PFL this weekend. But one thing I had said afterwards to Bronstetter, how rude was that YouTube commenter saying he looks like a teacup chihuahua? I mean, that's so rude.

Not rude enough for you to not laugh at it. Yeah, it's ridiculous. But wow, okay. You know, I'm sure I had a... cup jaw I mean it's so rude not rude enough for you to not laugh at it it's ridiculous but uh wow okay um you know I'm sure I had a I'm sure which fighter was I talking about it doesn't matter oh no no I said um what if you know because we said like the warning sign for Rory was the fitch fight and the talk about God telling him not to hurt people you know in that moment what if he had taken a year and a half off we've taken 18 months off and just figured it out? Dude, sometimes the damage is done.

It doesn't matter how much time off you take. Now, I'm not saying that's the case with Max. We'll have to see. But there can be times where you take time off and you ain't getting recharged. There's nothing left to recharge. Yeah. Speaking of which, in terms of just getting your lights put out, how about Alex Pereira? I don't know why I keep saying Pereira.

I don't speak Portuguese, but my understanding is if it starts with an R or has two R's in the middle, that's when you say an H. He doesn't have either of those, but okay. He sends Sean Strickland to the land of wind and motherfucking ghosts. 236 of round number one. KO, a left hook from hell. Almost identical to the punch that City Kickboxing's Carlos Olberg used on Tafan and Chukwi, which I talked about on the extra credit like extensively this past week Holy shit. Yeah, I mean we do this was possible and there were times I looked at that betting line

I'm like, can we talk about Sean Strickland strategy? No, no, no because you asked me to talk about My reaction and then you're like sorry. Sorry. Sorry. Sorry. It was like when you're like, can we do a Jake chant? Dude, somebody fuck Jay. Sorry. I tweeted this morning and someone called me Luke Moss Margarita's Thomas. Yeah. And I was like, that's a good zing. That's a good zing. What did you think? I mean, obviously I was impressed.

There were times this week when you look at that line and you're like, what if he really is that good? And now we're getting plus money on him against a guy without big power who's going to potentially follow him around and walk into it. No one thought that strategy. We can get to that in a second. But God, I'm glad he did this because him versus Izzy is such a great storyline matchup and I think has potential to be very interesting if Pajeda is the type of striker that came there wasn't in that fight to try to discipline and slow down Izzy's output.

I mean, that could be a chess match with big explosive moments. And I love the storyline. But to prove that you're that good by knocking him out that brutally. So there's no doubt here, Luke. I mean, you know, I can't take credit for this because I predicted trickling to win just like you. But this fight was so close on paper

and it got us so excited. We knew it could go either way. And one thing I said was, you know, could it look like Hendo Bisping won? It kind of looked exactly like Hendo Bisping won except for one big ridiculous follow-through punch, you know, could it look like Hendo Bizping won? It kind of looked exactly like Hendo Bizping won, except for one big ridiculous follow-through punch, you know? If you had told me that Strickland was going to fight like that, I would have never have picked him.

Now, the one thing I will defend Strickland on, the one thing, putting Pereira on his heels was, at least in theory, not a bad idea. But in order for that to work, so many other pieces. He was so flat-footed and just kind of marching into him. And it wasn't like he was putting him on his heels, but it didn't feel like very strategic pressure. It more just felt like consistent. And dude, what the fuck?

I mean, it's easy to say it now in hindsight, because you're right. He had a strategy that was bent upon, you know, with pressure and, you know, and movement and trying to get bent upon You know with pressure and you know in movement try to get Pereira to make a mistake and all that and you know given their lack their gear experience gap obviously Pereira has the extreme History and glory and having beaten Izzy twice, but it's a slow trends, you know, it's a slow transition sometimes to this game He could have exposed no takedowns, but that's my It's easy to say in hindsight because he got demolished what he should have exposed it. No takedowns. But that's my point. No shooting. It's easy to say in hindsight because he got demolished what he should have done,

but he probably should have shot early and put in the threat of that, which would have helped the pressure he was trying to put on by come forward. And he was trying to swim with his head a lot, Luke. Strickland? Yeah. Dude, he looked straight up and down. He was trying to just kind of swim in and move in. Even then he wasn't doing that that much.

But he was keeping the movement to such a tight area that he was still in range. Dude, he was flat-footed. He wasn't bouncing. He wasn't taking angles. He wasn't hardly fainting at all. He was just reacting and walking forward again. Like, could I do any better? No, he would have beat my ass in fucking 10 seconds.

It would have been nothing. But this is what I mean. Do I think that Alex Pereira is obviously insanely talented and just a devastating threat and somebody who I think is going to make Izzy fight. Yes. No doubt about it. But Sean Strickland is a good fighter, a very good fighter. He should not lose this quickly unless something desperately went wrong. Just didn't love his approach to this fight.

Really, really, really didn't understand it, really didn't like it. And he paid for it. Strickland talked a big game this week so maybe there was that pressure in this moment to, if I'm going to beat this guy I'm going to have to kind of try to dominate him. And that might not be dominating with power. It might be dominating with pressure and always hold the control of the fight. And he was fighting Luke to get that control

and he never got that control. And he got sent. Some of the Fight Metro guys are making fun of where we're shooting this thing. Yeah, we should probably just end it now. No, no, no, we've got to figure out, we just have to finish the main card here a little bit. Do you agree with my assessment that Pereira is going to be a good match for Izzy to get more out of him?

Yeah, I said that a couple minutes ago, and I think there may be slow moments, maybe tense moments, but this is going to have to be a different Izzy because it's a different type of challenge than Cannon Air, and it's going to be fun to see a guy who um you know it's not like we expect izzy to take him down although that could end up being in play for all we know is he's adding things to his game constantly and he's great but if this is a slow tense chess match that speeds up beautifully it's going to be a dangerous ass fight because we don't actually know how good...

We don't know the potato ceiling in general on the MMA side. So that's what makes this extra scary. So when you fast-track somebody, he had three challenges. He passed them all three by stoppage. He found a way to look spectacular coming into a title fight on a fast track, but also not having all the questions answered, Luke. That's right. Which is going to make this it's gonna make the

betting line interesting it's gonna make the anticipation of it because you're gonna pump the the the preview system with the highlights of him knocking Izzy down you know knocking Izzy out right of course you're gonna say that was in bigger gloves now we got at four ounce gloves that is going to sell itself Luke. If you didn't see it tonight, and maybe it was on Instagram, too. I don't know. I just saw it on Twitter. The Glory Kickboxing, the official Glory Kickboxing Twitter account.

Boy, they had some memes ready for old Sean Strickland. They took the clip of him saying, like, oh, I could beat the shit out of any Glory Kickboxer and blah, blah, blah. And then they sort of superimposed it over some kickboxing highlights and shit. And they had it the second he was knocked out, ready to go. Your former employer. Yeah, it was fun working for them. I learned a lot, actually.

All right, how about Brian Barberena defeating Robbie Lawler, TKO, round two, 447. At distance, Lawler looked pretty good. Barberena just ate a fuck ton of damage and then just got busy with all of the strikes. I think he threw over 190 strikes in one of the rounds, which is a welterweight record for a single round. Now, look, he had to come back from it, like you mentioned, and he had to dig deep into hell, which, again, he's good at. And by the way, there's a three-fight winning streak now for him, which is, you know, this

is big. But this was supposed to be a feel-good story because Robbie Lawler came out and he looked younger and friskier in the head movement. And yeah, he was getting into the pocket and exchanging, and had the the you know the exchanges that that were sexy that we liked we expected this to be an all-action affair and it was but it was really looking like Robbie you know bought a couple more fights it looked like he kind of just figured some things out for a while but you know the reason why we picked Barbarina or I did coming in was if it turned into a full-on war you're gonna like the younger guy who's been a little bit more battle-tested.

Yeah, he almost retired, though. He's been not battle-tested, but a little bit more durable of late. You know, he did almost retire, but I wanted this for Robbie, though. I wanted this win, but damn. You asked about retirement. We already had two of them, but... I would go if I was Robbie. He's been fighting a lot.

We don't talk about it. He's taken a fuck ton of damage. Yeah. Well, we don't talk about it because it's difficult to. And while we should talk about it in responsible ways, and I think you asking Max

and maybe some other fighters we talked to, it has to be a discussion. But damn, that's not an easy discussion because it's tough. It's hard of what you accept in these type of combat sports. And it's hard that we have to come sometimes put it into our analysis of has

this guy take it too much will that show up in this fight you know what's max going to be look like next time was that just virtuoso volkanovsky or did we see clear signs and um i don't know much more robbie can gain i mean you know this looked like a triumphant maybe last victory effort it didn't happen now i mean he walked into last of the the Mohicans theme song to these what is he lost four or five? I mean easy lot. It's a question. Let me verify that before you move on I think it's six of eight and four or five and he's 40 years old and dude Jesus. Yeah He hasn't won two in a row. I lost five 50 2016. Yes, that's five of six. They've been to you know, Colby RDA Look look look

He had the Rory McDonald fight and then the Carlos Conda fight. Two insane wars and his career was never the same after that. He's what, seven and two since then? Did he beat Cerrone by decision? No, two and seven. Yeah, two and seven, excuse me. And then of course he stopped Nick Diaz, which doesn't get him. And then two wins were Cerrone who was kind of getting towards the end of his run and

then Diaz. Alright, real quickly here. The Sean O'Malley and Pedro Munoz fight. Notice how I just said the two wins were Diaz and Cerrone, and then you were like, yeah, but BC, the two wins were Diaz and Cerrone, and I was just like... Give me a margarita and shut your mouth. Yeah, yeah.

Okay, in all seriousness, Pedro Munoz, Sean O'Malley, no contest. Dude, this one sucked because Munoz looked like he had a good strategy of leg kicking and then constantly mirroring the stance switch and staying out of punching range in large part, and it kind of muted a lot of the offense of what O'Malley had. Joe Musso asked me on HQ if Pedro Munoz acted to try to get out. So do you think he was looking for a way out? No, dude he was, this was a Pedro Munoz fight. He was kind of frustrated, I don't want to say he was frustrating O'Malley but he was

making it the type of fight he was trying to. Lower the output because if you get into an output fight with O'Malley he he's so dynamic and quick and creative, he's going to find that opening. Munoz was landing the leg kicks, which was a smart strategy that Vera did, and that changed that fight in a big way. Why would he look to get out? You saw the replay, Luke. It was a full hand coming into the eye, and he got him twice with the same finger in both eyes, Luke.

All right. He fingered him. Okay, so should they do a rematch? Third base. Yeah, third base. Pop goes the weasel. Should they do a second fight?

Should they do a rematch? I mean, in reality, they probably should, but I don't want to say, like, sorry, Pedro Munoz, you lose. By the way, two of the judges

gave Munoz round one, so he won technically. Yeah, you have to. You have to, because we didn't learn anything from it, and Munoz at least showed, or no, we learned something. Munoz at least. So he won technically Yeah, you have to. You have to. Because we didn't learn anything from it and Munoz at least showed, or no, we

learned something. Munoz at least showed he could succeed in that, bringing down the offense and the output to raise his possibility of landing a big shot that could

change him. We didn't see enough exchanges to see what this was going to look like. All right, let's answer some questions. I know there's a bunch

more that happened. We're going to save some of that for extra credit, so let's answer some of the questions from the fans here at BC. Anthony Smith said,

Izzy is a lot like Mayweather, to your point. Stunts on his opponents defensively. He doesn't always take wild chances for wild results. Of course, we already talked about that. How about this for you? Will Pereira's length be the biggest issue for Adesanya? Adesanya, whatever. Pereira, whatever.

Yeah, I mean, what's the length difference here? Because, look, Adesanya is used to, like, six, eight-inch like six eight in treats advantages like he had over like Vittoria and Costa this was smaller against cannonier and I think you saw some of that danger in there but what's the I guess we have to click on it Luke I thought you were gonna help me out he has a this is potato has a 79 inch reach according to Wikipedia and then is he is what 84 80 80 okay so it's basically 79-inch reach, according to Wikipedia. And Izzy? Is that, what, 84? 80. 80.

Okay, so it's basically virtually identical. Virtually identical. I mean, that's going to be a part of it. Is that the one reason? No. How about this? The main reason is he's got sick power in both hands, but that main reason Luke gets some more gold coins thrown on top

because he beat him twice, including once by knockout. And I know Izzy says, re-watch the fights. Okay, great. I'll re-watch it. If you have big success, that's great. But he lost them both. And you can't fake that kind of confidence, Luke. If I kicked your ass in the street twice and now you want to fight me in the MMA cage, Luke,

I'm going to kick your ass a third time. I don't know. Daniel Fever has something to say about that. The problem with this person writes, the problem with Izzy is that he's too good on his feet. There isn't another champ that shuts down other fighters by having such a gap in talent. See, here's the difference. Khabib did, actually. But Khabib found the finish, or at least brutalizing rounds, much more often.

He still, like, Khabib didn't really win, but like, I'm just going to stand the whole time. I mean, a little bit with Ike went to, but even then there was a bunch of takedowns on that one, too. Well, he kind of gassed himself out with the takedowns when he couldn't finish up. Fine. And it was a light-nosed thing, but whatever. But, like, Izzy has that same kind of one too. Well he kind of gassed himself out with the takedowns when he finished up. Fine. It was a late notice thing but whatever. But like Izzy has that same kind of I'm so much better than. Who's the best striker at middleweight? Again we'll see about Pereira but for now it's Izzy. But he doesn't

turn it necessarily of late into these like you know dramatic finishes and brutalizing affairs. So he's going to bring sick confidence in there. No I agree with you. I can't wait to see it. Remember during the card when you were like, since Alex... Oh, you're not going to

listen to me talk to you? Oh, sorry. There's a good joke here. Okay. It's weird that you're actually reading the fans' questions. Normally you're like,

that question fucking sucks. I asked him for questions. Go ahead. We asked him yesterday too. I was going to say, yeah, I forgot what I was going to say, but I did get

the nice little, you know, pitchfork. Since Alex beats Strickland, I guess that means he doesn't jack off to cartoons. I had to get that one in there. Yeah, thank you. By the way, to all those people being like,

yo, he 10-7'd him at the press conference, how many fucking times do you need to see something at a press conference that has fuck all to do with what happens in a fight? Again, McGregor just sunned Mayweather for four stops on the tour and then got tuned up in front of everyone. It doesn't mean shit. I keep trying to tell you, Donks, it doesn't mean shit. Okay.

I don't think they're... No, no, no, no. I had people tweeting me being like, yo, yo, yo, that's gonna play a factor later. Okay. Izzy is going to encounter the perception issue that he can't surpass Anderson as middleweight GOAT because of his fight style.

True or false? I mean, that's not helping him in this discussion be closer than maybe he could be, but it's going to be the totality of it, Luke. And I think also, you know, after Pereira, who else does Izzy has reason to stay around for at middleweight? I think it's going to be time to make the full-time move, which means changing your body if that's necessary for him. I mean, look, he got humbled against Jan, but he didn't get dominated.

Like, there was almost an argument to make that Izzy could have won 3-2. Not a huge argument, not a powerful one, but my point is, like, he was at moments when he was in that fight, he's got to be able to believe with a different focus and working on his wrestling that that move feels closer than not, Luke. Who else is climbing the middleweight rankings? I agree. I think if he beats Pereira, yeah, move to 205.

Unless Strickland bounces back with a huge win and Izzy wants like a payday or wants some, you know. Yeah, something like that. Someone says, similar to Shevchenko's assassin KO artist descriptions, I think saying Izzy is a, quote, KO artist is inaccurate. He's very smart and safe and Costas' only recent KO exciting fight. Fair on fair. Well, if he can get into a downhill position against you, he's going to probably knock you out, right? Oh yeah. But, you know, lately the competition, I don't think it's like, is the competition catching up?

Well, no, the competition is great. And when you continuously, that's why I picked Cannoneer in this one, because it's hard to be as great as Izzy has been, right? I thought he laid it against Romero and took a chance that was a little maybe unnecessary and got away with it, but he hasn't done that again. And yeah, if you're not on his level at all, he's going to turn the tables, go downhill, walk you down, and get you out of there.

He was offensive against Kananir. Like, this isn't the argument to make right now, Luke. Anyone competing with Anderson Silva for some type of thing that Izzy is, there's part of us that just loves the folk hero side of Anderson Silva because in his mid to late 30s, he did video game shit. I mean, he had the front kick to knock out Belfort, the dancing around Forrest, the comeback with the broken rib against Chael.

That built the folklore of this Michael Jackson character who was like the Jordan of MMA for that stretch. Izzy's got his own thing, Luke, and the totality of the wins are going to speak to it, as would if he moves up and gets a championship in a second division, which I'm not saying, like, do it, you'll be the favorite, you know? But he also, Luke, he can compete right now for the 205 title against any of those guys. He can. He can, man. Maybe so. Pro now for the 205 title against any of those guys. He can. He can, man.

Maybe so. Prochka was there in attendance as well. Can I say something? I want to give a shout-out to Dean Thomas. I think Dean Thomas is the smartest guy they have on that broadcast. Nobody quite knows wrestling like Daniel Cormier. I know some people don't like Cormier as a commentator. Some do.

I get it. But when it comes to the wrestling, he is quite good. Obviously Rogan has been there forever and sort of has tenure. Do you think he felt upset about me saying that he normally dresses like a busboy? So today Rogan- Is that why he called you the other dude? He wore like a classic 1950s black and white suit. It looked good, he didn't button the top button. I don't get that.

If you're gonna wear a suit, you gotta button the top button, right? Well he has a thick neck though. I mean he does work at the court. They can find, dude I have an 18 inch neck. I can find shirts. But it didn't button the top button. I don't get that. If you're going to wear a suit, you've got to button the top button. Well, he has a thick neck, though. I mean, he does work at court. They can find. Dude, I have an 18-inch neck. I can find shirts. But it didn't look like a rental. It kind of looked like not him. It didn't look like a rental.

Yeah. So maybe he threw up on his regular clothes or something. No, the UFC outfits him. And I wonder if they tried to get him one. Oh, they outfit him? I was going to say, maybe his normal outfit was being used at like Gonzalez E. Gonzalez. So I thought Joe reserved it

for that night. No, no. Did Joe also have explosive diarrhea from eating at said establishment? I will say this.

Dean Thomas is a fucking legend, dude. He adds with those little bits of information more detail than virtually anyone

else on the broadcast. And I get his job is easy. He gets to come in. Yeah, like Trevor Whitman's great, but he's feathery. That's right. And Dean gets to parachute in. Yeah, like Trevor Whitman's great, but he's feathery.

That's right. And Dean gets to parachute in with an insight and he can get the hell out. It's harder to do that for much longer stretches of time, and I get that. But I want to say, Dean is the fucking man.

And I will also say, there are times when I ask Dean questions, like on WhatsApp, I'll message him, and he gets back to me. He'll shoot videos to explain things to me. Dean is the fucking man. He is a treasure.

And they put him on the analyst desk for ABC. I want to see him more. Dean Thomas shouts to you, dude. You the fucking man. He is a treasure. And they put him on the analyst desk for ABC. I want to see him more. Dean Thomas, shouts to you, dude. You are fucking awesome. Of all the people in the inner circle of Dana White friendship right now, he used to be like Nick the Tooth. Nick the Tooth. And it's like Matt Serra and all those guys.

But I actually feel like I would want to hang out with Dean Thomas. Yeah, Dean seems like good people. Yeah, sorry, Dean. I burped right after. And then someone else asks, if you're going to pay 75 bucks for a pay-per-view, can we not have to watch commercials? I agree with you.

I agree with you. Yeah, DAZN does that too, by the way. You mean DAZN pay-per-view? Yeah, yeah. Which is like, what the fuck? We'll have a bunch more to say in the coming week. I know that Monday is a big holiday here in Los Estados Unidos.

So we will still have content for you that day. Be on the lookout for it. Don't you have an MK bonus weekend show tomorrow? We should talk about that. I have an idea. But yes, the answer is yes. There's going to be content coming your way. Plus, we're going to talk about the Cerrone retirement.

We're going to talk about, yes, the Jessica Ai retirement. By the way, two futures won today. Ian Gary and Macy Barber. And then there was two retirements. Yo, there's a changing of the guard happening you want to save until Wednesday's show where we'll talk

about the live show yeah yeah yeah we'll talk about it on Wednesday you know and there's a lot to say mostly I love you and I'm sorry

don't say sorry to me say sorry to the people no the people on attendance had a good time that's it we'll save it until Wednesday but everyone at home

hated it I know I know I'm sorry folks well I do appreciate you guys watching now and by the way let's just say one more thing. Thank you to all the CBS producers who showed up. Dude, Mikey.

All the Showtime producers who showed up. All the Malka people. Less of the Malka people. Our CBS Sports editorial team was here. Yes. Brooke House, Shaq, Brandon Wise. It was great to see those guys. I mean, everyone chipped in this week.

Whether or not you love the Friday Live show, and a lot of people, by the way, thought it was fucking awesome anyway. I did. I got some haters, but I got some lovers too. I will say, you're going to love when you see all the content we shot this week. And I think, you know, we covered this top to bottom

and all the bonus stuff that we normally do. Shout out to Chuck, you know, and all those guys who joined our live show. But Chuck, who helped us build some of those things ahead of time. But the stamina this week that we had to show, that our team had to show man

that is inspiring but I also I'm like I can't do this again for a long time no I don't and lastly obviously thanks to everyone

who showed up yesterday thanks to MGM for helping us stage it I know a lot of folks didn't like it but in general for the week that we had thank you to all of the

MK fans out there who paid attention who did like the Max Holloway interview who did like some of the stuff that we did. What if I roofied your drink to try to get you fired so it could be BCNL wanting to move it forward? That's a good doc story line.

More to come on that. I wouldn't put it past you. I wouldn't put it past you. All right. I want to thank, again, you guys all one more time. Thank you for watching. Thumbs up, hit subscribe. For all of us in the room, I'm going to go take a dump in that toilet and just leave it.

That's Brian Campbell. I'm Luke Thomas. We appreciate you guys watching. And until next time, get some sleep.