MORNING KOMBAT WITH LUKE THOMAS AND BRIAN CAMPBELL - UFC 289 Picks | Josh Taylor vs. Teofimo Lopez Jr. | Fight Announcements | Morning Kombat Ep. 451

Episode Date: June 9, 2023

On Episode 451 of Morning Kombat Luke Thomas and Brian Campbell kick off the show by previewing Josh Taylor vs. Teofimo Lopez Jr. Next up the guys break down some recent MMA fight announcements including Chris Weidman's return. The guys give their final thoughts on UFC 289 before making their picks for Okay, bet. As always we close out Friday's with dead Wrong. (00:08:50) - PFL 4 Recap (00:41:00) - Weekend Boxing Preview (01:15:00) - Dana White vs. MMA Media (01:31:40) - Fight Announcements (01:36:00) - Ok, Bet (01:52:40) - Dead Wrong Morning Kombat is available for free on the Audacy app as well as Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, Stitcher 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

Reveille, Reveille, dogs. Look at us now, tip to tip. This is our life. This is our passion. That's the spirit we bring to this show. I'm Luke Thomas. I'm Brian Campbell. This is Morning Combat.

Oh, yeah, when you hear the sound of the art. You know it's Fridays with MK. Welcome on in, Friday, June 9th, 2023. And you've stumbled into the award-winning best damn combat sports show. Period. Yeah, it's Morning Combat. I'm your co-hostess with the mostest, the BBC, with that BBE, Brian Campbell. Live and direct, not from CT with

the CTE, but on the grounds here at the Turning Stone Casino in Verona, New York, International Boxing Hall of Fame weekend, and tonight's show box, the new generation, more to come. But the guy you're really here for is that man next to me, the best damn combat sports fight analyst ever, among really good fight analysts who have never been in a fight it's luke thomas from washington dc look you still got that canadian smoke down there or what yeah the uh it's not as bad today so yesterday that what do they call it bc the aqi index what that's the measurement of the quality of the air i get air quality index thing is what it's called it was 250 when i got up yesterday which is like as soon as I opened my door,

it was just you could smell and see smoke. Today it's at 100, so it's a lot better today. But it was terrible yesterday. It's just wild times. But, Luke, I want people to know we've got a fantastic jacked-up show today where we will be sharing our UFC 289 picks in our okay bet segment, recapping the big surprises that came down on last night's PFL four card, including a big announcement of another boxing MMA crossover. Only maybe one you did not

see coming also set the stage, right? Big weekend of the box from show box to tail female versus Josh Taylor and a few other weird ones in between. And oh, yeah, Luke, we'll be reacting to the other biggest news going on in the combat sports game today and reading your dead wrongs. Fantastic show for you, Mikey Mormyle on the ones and twos from CBS Sports. And, you know, Luke, we couldn't get to this point without our fantastic partners. Yeah, I'm talking about CBS Sports and Showtime, the label that pays us. But Luke, when I'm on the road and it's time to travel

and I need to build that foundation, I'm going to that big green bottle, bro. I'm going to AG1. Yeah, the big AG1. Shouts to AG1. We love them. BC is living proof that it's great. Not only do you get extra

water because you're putting it in the water, you're getting that hydration going early, but 75 high quality vitamins and minerals, adaptogens, probiotics, everything your, your immune system needs, everything you need for recovery, aging, sleep, the whole nine yards, AG one's got you covered. And Luke, I use it in the morning to start my day. I want to feel amazing right from the start because I know I'll walk down that path and I'll be tempted to do gross shit. But if I can build that foundation early, I'm ready to go. I'm ready to take on my day.

I'm ready to do something good for my body because it's giving my body the nutrition it craves and that I am ill-equipped to provide it largely due to the way I was raised. Good habits, good micro, excuse me, micro habits can have good macro benefits. Just an easy way to get all the things your body needs, craves benefits from, and uses all in a simple, easy to consume way. One time a day. What's not to love. Yeah. I mean, you could ask your vase, right? You can ask Rogan, you can ask Campbell, all these people are going to come through and tell you. Because, Luke, if you want a comprehensive solution for your supplement routine,

then try AG1 and get a free one-year supply for new customers of vitamin D drops and those five free travel packs that I'm using right now of AG1 with your first purchase. Here's the website. Go to drinkag1.com slash morning combat. Of course, combat has a K. There you go. Point it out right there on the screen, somewhere down there. That's it. That's drinkag1.com slash morning combat. Check it out. Luke, would you go to an extreme level and say drink or die um on some kind of way that's true on some kind of way that's true you know if you don't put those vitamins and

minerals in your body your body's gonna suffer long term ag1 makes it real easy for you to get them yeah it's confirmed uh there it is uh luke i'm not being held hostage in this hotel room but it's been a nice stay this week. And if you're looking to get a little bit closer to me this evening, and how about that network Showtime? You can go to Showtime.com right now to get your 30-day free trial. I don't need to remind you of the big Bellator cards that are coming around the corner or the consistent flow of Showtime Championship Boxing,

but how about tonight from here, the Turning Stone in Verona? It's a triple header of Showbox, the new generation. Luke, I just want to let people know, six unbeaten heavyweights on this card and also interviews with the 2023 Hall of Fame class. We'll get to more on that later, but check it out tonight, 9 p.m. Eastern. You can check it out

for free by going to Showtime.com. Luke, anything else you want to set the stage? I've come humbly with uh, with huge condolences and love over, over your, your dog, Luke. And I just, yeah, you know, we talked about this a couple of weeks ago and I was like, she just won't die, you know, because she had, she was 16. We had to put our dog down yesterday. I will tell you, dude, that messed me up more than I thought it would, you know, and I'm not doing some, I thought I was going to, I wasn't trying

to do some tough guy act. I was just unprepared for, um, how it made me feel when it was finally done, to be honest with you, you know, it was not awesome. It was really awful. So, um, but a bunch of, but a bunch of people reached out privately over text, a bunch of people reached out on social media, you know, you hate making a big show of it, but you feel terrible. You want a place to tell people about it. So I guess I did. Um, thanks to everyone who's on a kind note really really appreciate it uh the worst is over i feel much better in certain ways i feel sad and other ones but uh dude uh it was a peaceful and humane event but not fun no not fun at all and a lot of us have been there in some form luke i just want to

shout you out and your family a lot of love and thoughts and glad tidings in your direction. This is a show about boxing MMA. This is also a show about the journeys and the growth of men. And we're fighting this battle with you, Luke. It was Lola, right? Shout out to Lola. The good news is right now Lola and Booger are having a time. Well, dude, so here's the funny part about it.

Moko died about almost two years ago to this point, right? When he died, it messed up my other dog, Barbas. He got a little weird. He's fine now, but he got a little weird at the moment. But Lola was, like, super thrilled he was dead because, you know, Moko would come through and, like, rub up against her and, like, sexually harass her, and she just couldn't take it anymore. So when he died, she was, like, see you when I see you, bitch.

So I really wonder how that reunion is going. It's probably a little awkward up there in the pearly gates. You know what I'm saying? I mean, do you think, are you trying to frame Booger as more of a Weinstein Appleton type of? No, no. Just standard asshole cat. You know, just what's yours is mine kind of a thing, you know? I live with the biggest

asshole of them all, Reginald Jackson, so I know that life. But look, let's get into our five topics. We will be making our picks a little bit later on in OK Bet, so get ready for all things UFC 289. But this became a little bit of a surprise overnight lead topic for us. It was PFL4. It went down Thursday evening in Atlanta, Georgia. We're going to get to the big upset in the main event and a big retirement of a big name. But Luke, Deontay Wilder showed up on this PFL broadcast to ultimately announce this. I don't think we saw this coming. His hope, his want, and his challenge to Francis Ngannou for a two-fight deal that would involve one MMA match and one boxing match.

But there are somewhat complicated details linked to this. Wilder said on the broadcast during the interview was, it's been a bit of a dilemma what path to take and what is available and what isn't. The fight business is difficult because it's unstructured. So people should see me back in August, no later than September, when they asked, would you literally come into the octagon and make this transition? He said, that's a good question. I've thought about this many times, even with Ngannou.

We was talking about business together. You always see MMA fighters crossing into boxing, but never boxers crossing over in that same way. I want to make it more interesting for the fans. So I said to Ngannou, how about you come to my backyard and after it, we handle business and yours and we cross over. I really meant it. I've seen myself on that side of the field. He went on to say he has trained against MMA fighters in the past and they've always been supremely surprised at the level of his strength.

And Luke, Randy Couture jumped in from his broadcast position and said, hey, if you need to work on your ground game, I have a place for you. Correct me if I'm wrong, Luke. at the level of his strength. And Luke, Randy Couture jumped in from his broadcast position and said, hey, if you need to work on your ground game, I have a place for you. Correct me if I'm wrong, Luke. Isn't that the place for Francis Ngannou who also trains his ground game? There you go with that. But Luke Thomas, there's a couple other details we'll get to, but first and foremost, I'd love to get your reaction.

Wilder in MMA with PFL, I'm going to assume, and a two-fight deal with Francis Ngannou. Is this realistic? Yes. Yeah, it's realistic. I mean, here's the thing that makes all of this kind of work is that Deontay is a better salesman for his own efforts than I think sometimes he gets credit for. Like, a lot of people talk about the promotional genius of Tyson Fury with good reason, but you should never lose sight of the fact that Deontay Wilder actually has a little bit of that kind of spirit and carnival barkerness to him as well, because a lot of it is just BS in the reality that a lot of this remains uncertain. And even on the broadcast itself, when you watch it and you hear like Sean O'Connell and everyone else talking to Deontay, they kind of set it up like he's got a lot of options. Here is potentially one of them.

But this is just the reality. We've talked about this before, but it really is worth reiterating. Of all the possible crossover matches between a high-level MMA heavyweight and a high- level boxing heavyweight, Francis and Deontay to me is the one that can go the both directions the furthest, right? I mean, in other words, Francis versus Tyson Fury in boxing is probably the biggest of all the different permutations you could make. But Francis versus Tyson in MMA just doesn't feel quite the same because Tyson, obviously, with four-ounce gloves would be a big power puncher, but he doesn't have

like the nuclear option in the way that we know for a fact Deontay. Deontay has the nuclear option with gloves three times the size. So, I mean, with a four-ounce glove, my lord, he was going to be a frightening thing to deal with. But certainly, I would say that Deontay versus Francis in boxing wouldn't be as big as Tyson Fury, but it would be very big. And more to the point, yes, if Francis wanted to take Deontay down pretty early, he could do that as well. But you could see how those matchups would at least give you a little bit of room to breathe for Deontay saying,

yeah, the chances would be stacked against him in MMA, but it's the most compelling boxing crossover I can think of for a high level MMA fighter due to how crippling his power is, which would only be magnified by the four ounce gloves. Because none of these guys are going to have good wrestling. None of these guys are going to have good jujitsu. It's not possible for as unrefined as you might find other heavyweights to be like in ganu it's just going to be miles ahead of everyone else but the power quotient and what that could mean in a sort of a puncher chancery kind of way is still pretty intriguing you add

to the fact we see you got this sort of sales component going on with deontay who's trying to sort of see what's out there and read the market. Again, this is all somewhat speculative. I would say the chances of you getting two of those fights seems unlikely, but the reason why people are intrigued is this one goes in that crossover direction in either way, to me, a little bit more interestingly than all the possible alternatives. Yeah, we're going to get to that four-ounce glove thing in a second. There's a video of him trying it on. But, Luke, here's what confuses me.

Deontay said on the broadcast, and to your point, Sean O'Connell and the PFL team are really trying to play up like, hey, man, if you're going to do this, might as well do it in the smart cage. And I get from a business plan why they would want to aggressively push this and have Deontay on the broadcast. And Deontay has been making sort of a world tour listening to offers. He told them on the broadcast he wants to come back in August, no later than September. But a lot of us know that there has been talks in Saudi Arabia for a monster event in December that would be a doubleheader,

Usyk versus Fury in the main event, and Wilder versus Joshua in the co-main. Obviously, we would have a lot of reason to believe or debate in how likely that fight that night actually could go off. That would need a lot of reason to believe or debate in how likely that fight that night actually could go off. That would need a lot of money. There is a lot of money over there. But what does that have to do with these dates? Backstage, after he was on camera, Wilder talked to MMA Fighting, and he said he is 99% on the way to securing his next fight against Anthony Joshua toward the end of the year, but he acknowledged the definite chance that it might fall through, which would free him up for a potential fight with Nganou.

I think that's an important part. Wilder would go on to say, all things are possible. Me and Francis have had discussions and meetings lately with both of our teams. This is a real conversation that has been taking place. This is something that can truly happen. Luke, we're going to throw to this video of him trying on the gloves very shortly, but I do have questions with that. Is this whole Francis thing just a stunt for PFL to be the first topic on our show and make headlines when the reality is Wilder's more likely to fight Joshua

for stupid money in Saudi Arabia later this year? Do you feel like this is him establishing a public backup plan? For sure. I mean, there's just no denying that part of this is inherent. Let me just throw shit at the wall and see what sticks. It's what this feels like. To your point, he's got other options. The one against Andy Ruiz fell apart because I don't know what's happened with Andy Ruiz's life. So there is at least something to be said for one of the hurdles that I thought would have gotten in

the way has been removed, but there are still some other substantial ones in place. Of course, though, we see you and I have talked about this privately. Now you're hearing some discussions about whether or not Anthony Joshua's next fight is going to be against Dillian White. So there's something that could be going in that direction as well. There's just to the point that Deontay did say something honest on the broadcast, which is basically like, look, guys, not going to lie. I've got some options. I'm still fielding what's out there. But what he was trying to do was introduce this possibility with Francis, either for one or two fights as one of his top priorities that he has among some other ones to the point you raised, maybe the one in Saudi

Arabia against Joshua, if the money really is there will be simply too much for him to pass up and i suspect that that is true still like if that falls i mean the question you have to ask yourself is if that falls through now what is next for dionte and i will say that if that does fall through bc there probably is some heavyweight name i'm not thinking of that could squeeze in and just make it all happen for one reason or the other but i will say that if the Joshua sweepstakes go in another direction if they go in the Dillion White direction now you have to ask yourself okay in that world how likely is it that he fights in Ghanu at that point I would say it's actually greater than 50-50 in the event of at least getting a boxing fight out of it they could both make good money for it's a chance worth taking for

Deontay you think just given how many structural advantages he has and it's a sellable fight because of Francis's crippling power that he could you would at least think taking to boxing again I want to be clear I think he loses but could he make a lot of money could it be a sellable line yeah a lot of that stuff can work oh especially if look I don't love the idea of Deontay Wilder going to MMA with literally no training or experience and facing maybe the best heavyweight of all time and probably the scariest fighter ever. I love that idea, Luke. I don't want to see him get kicked in the leg and, you know, sacrifice whatever left of his boxing movement or just be overwhelmed. But if they do the boxing one first, there's going to be a lot of eyeballs on that for a reason for everything you said. And that could be a spectacular fight, even if

Wilder does handle him like a lot of people would probably pick because of that unknown of Ngannou's power. And you know, what if that's a super fun fight? Does it, would that build toward momentum of, okay, let's see them in MMA. It's interesting. I am shocked that Deontay is in this spot. I'm not shocked that he isn't, that he's entertaining the idea of what like stupid life-changing payday mixed with a fun, cool challenge and a lot of buzz. Would he be interested in that? Yeah. He's a real fighter. Like he talks a lot about, you know, uh, scoring, uh, catching a body in the ring and is, you know, willing to say, if you throw in the towel, like in the Fury rematch, I'll fire you from the team because I want to win or lose, live and die in that ring, whatever happens, happens. So would he be willing to cross over

to MMA? Yeah, I guess he would. Should he might be the follow-up question. And Luke, do you feel like this is only happening because PFL does realize they have a small window next year with Jake Paul and Francis Ngannou set to debut just as they launch this pay-per-view division. They have a small window to really, really splash the pot of global MMA and try to go make an all-in power move that they might be like backing up the truck to Deontay. And that's why he's willing to entertain this. Do you think it's more of extreme money and that's why he's willing to entertain this do you think it's more of extreme money and that's why we're here or hey Deontay's wired that way he'll be willing to f around James Tony style

uh again I do think Wilder is at least somewhat sincere and willing to cross the Rubicon so to speak and go into the MMA territory. I mean, the thing you have to ask yourself is like, why would Deontay potentially take a deal with PFL when Fury would not likely take a deal with UFC? There are obviously some big differences fighting John Jones. If you're Tyson Fury is not, you know, not a great option for you. Like that's probably going to go real bad.

You're probably going to get beat up a little bit. Um, and you're not going to make that much money, but you, you know, you're going to make a, you'd still make a decent beat up a little bit um and you're not going to make that much money but you you know you're going to make a you still make a decent wage like they would pay Tyson Fury something decent right he would get what 10 million 15 million potentially for something like that um so there's that to consider but I think with on the PFL side they're probably just going to be like dude we're not the UFC like you're a big star Francis is a big star you know we'll take a cut but you guys get to keep the biggest share of this.

And so I think that they can just offer them an economic model. They don't have any of the horsepower promotionally that UFC does. Not a drop, but those two guys are already pretty big names. Together, it makes it a pretty big name. Whether the fight should take place is a completely separate matter to me yeah whether or not it could be whether or not that could be the most economically attractive one in real terms to me is not so silly well if you're pfl and you've already majorly gone in with the signings of francis and jake like i mentioned you might as well go all all all the way because as much as like i think it is a a separate discussion of did Francis make the right move?

Then did PFL make the right move in signing him for that much money and giving him that much control, right? We all want this to work out for Francis, but it is a lot different buzz factor. If Francis debuts in the PFL in 2024 against Junior Dos Santos or somebody in that category or Deontay Wilder in some permutation of a two-fight deal in two sports but that's opening up the door to a major question though Luke to close out this topic who's going to produce and broadcast the boxing side of that

two-fight deal does PFL get a cut of that are they part part of that? Does it, is it an ESPN top rank code deal? Even the, or is Jake Paul who has his own promotion? Some, you know, going to get into that. And suddenly we could see that on the zone pay-per-view. Like,

how does that work? Does that matter to you? I think that's something that could hold this idea up. It could, because you would want them to take place on the same spot. You know what I mean? Like, however you get a Wilder versus Ngannou boxing pay-per-view, you would want the MMA one to be in a roughly similar,

or if not identically similar, platform. I don't know how that would work, actually. Also, like, isn't Wilder a PBC guy? Yes, but he has been really exploring all of his options and i like basically some guys get to a point luke where they go okay i want to go elsewhere but i'm going to keep al hayman as my manager as my advisor right like danny jacobs left the pbc bubble to sign with eddie hern and fight his last big fights on the zone still an al hayman fighter just not a pbc fighter there is there have been at times that separation so it's a good question would pbc go with wilder into this venture i don't know but

i don't if i if you're pfl i don't think you you don't go to the mat for that one yeah you don't go to the mat for that one you know i'm saying if you're pfl you need to find a way to make the boxing fight as part of your world that's my opinion yes like you even if you what if you're pfl you need to find a way to make the boxing fight as part of your world that's my opinion yes like you even if you what if you put them in the smart cage with four ounce gloves and that was instead of two fights how about one hybrid fight isn't that the move right now luke instead of two fights at separate disciplines do the hybrid fight four ounce gloves no takedowns or kicks just punches but in the smart, Luke, isn't that the move right now? I mean, I'm not sure what the smart cage really adds to it. If I can be honest, nothing

is really money, right? Unless we're doing this in Saudi Arabia, PFL is putting up the money. Um, on the boxing side, I don't know that they're doing that. I mean, on the MMA side, obviously that's my question. Yeah. That's my question is, is would this two fight deal be synced there's a couple different promoters at play right like it's it's a it's a messy scenario but luke if you have visions of what it would look like of dionte wilder and that crippling frightening power with four ounce gloves we've got the video from the pfl broadcast for you to see right now okay i i have four ounce gloves right here sir can we put some of these on let me see i put these on in the back and and to to to to put my hands in them and to feel the lightweight

of it and i mean i can only imagine how much velocity i would get out of a punch and then i go by i don't punch to you. I punch through you. So these right here, it's a full definition of going straight through. It's like a 50-caliber Desert Eagle right here. See, we can make that happen for you, Deontay Wilder. And I'm just going to say this. I'm going to put this out there.

The PFL just signed the baddest heavyweight mixed martial artist on planet Earth. His name is Francis Ngannou. He's a lot closer to your size than either of us are. He's a big-time puncher, and he has expressed interest in boxing. So maybe one in your world, maybe one in our world. I'm just saying that's what the fans want. Hey, Francis, you listening? We discussed this before.

And, hey, we got many space and opportunity to discuss it once more. You know, hey, I'm looking for a two-fight crossing over. Interesting, Luke. That seemed to sum up what O'Connell said, that it was, you know, do boxing in your world and then come back to us for the second half. We'll see if that's even possible. A lot has to happen, but do you think to, this is really the final statement. Does what is while there's power so sublime that it's possible to have a Ray Mercer, Tim Sylvia moment with him in an actual MMA fight,

whether it's in Ghana or somebody else, like is that the type of power that when you do put on the forearms gloves, it doesn't matter because if you can't get that takedown, that guy's going to take your soul. Yes. Dude, he has historic power. The argument I've made about Wilder in boxing, and I think the

tape would back this up, is his right hand. We don't necessarily know what to be the most powerful in every scenario that a right hand can be thrown an uppercut, you know, or whatever, but his right straight, like his cross or his, or his straight punch, either way, his backhand is what they would say in boxing. His backhand is one of the most powerful backhands of all time, of all time, of all time. He's right up there with shavers. He's right up there with foreman for that particular punch straight down

with his power hand. He is on the short list of the heaviest punchers of all time. If you take a glove and make it one-third the size of what it was before, and especially he's going to have, at least by MMA striking standards, good timing, decent accuracy, that still would make me pick Ngannou in an MMA fight, but would you be a little nervous? Yeah, I'd be a little nervous.

A guy with some of the best power we've ever seen in boxing. That's what I mean. It goes in both directions in a way that not a lot of the other permutations do because on the boxing side, Deontay is not super technical relative to other guys. On the MMA side, obviously, he'd have a huge advantage, Francis, but the power of Wilder would just be extraordinary so you'd still favor Deontay you'd still favor Francis but

you'd be a little bit nervous at first I can't believe we're having this conversation as like matter of fact like it could happen like what a wild development last year here's the only part about last night I don't get and understand something like making these things work is a lot

harder than folks realize. So I understand if the PFL probably tried to do it or who knows like Deontay can be a little, Deontay is very friendly but he can be a little bit sensitive at times so who knows if he played a role but if there was an opportunity to get a face off

with Francis on TV, man, I feel like that should have been explored yesterday. And again, I want to be clear. I haven't talked to anyone from PFL yet. Maybe there was, and it all fell apart. I just want to say it did seem like a missed opportunity because that would have been – I mean, it's cool to see, for example, Deontay try on the gloves.

But to see him right there with francis because deontay is very tall too he's like six foot seven obviously you could see relative to even even randy couture who was a heavyweight and a light heavyweight just how big deontay is in terms of his frame man that would have been big what a sales angle that would have been right it could have been a moment like mike perry and conor mcgregor right luke it could have been a moment like Mike Perry and Conor McGregor right Luke it could have been a moment but I get your point hey in that main event of PFL4 in Atlanta we saw wild things take place featherweight champion Brendan Loughnan was set to take on Jesus Pinedo Luke the playoff scenarios entering this fight was that if Loughnan clinched a play a win of any kind would give Brendan Loughnan a spot in the playoffs to defend his title. A Pinedo win would clinch a playoff spot, but only if it happened in the first round

within the first four minutes and 14 seconds. And if Pinedo won after the fact, Loughnan would be in and also Chris Wade would be in. That sounds confusing, but basically if you're Pinedo, you had four minutes and 14 seconds to pull a big upset. Look, he only needed a minute and 34. Let's go to the videotape of this wild upset. Let's go. Oh!

Oh, my goodness! Locken is down and Pinedo's out. Luke, not only did he get the win, advance to the playoffs, Pinedo knocked Locknan out of the postseason, which, look, let's be really honest. With all the drug test failures that took names off, with not having an overabundance of, like, faded UFC names to put in the main event,

like an Anthony Pettis, Lachnan was kind of becoming the face. Kayla Harrison's not fighting right now. Lachnan was becoming one of those guys that you tune in to see for PFL. Now he's out of the postseason. What a wild turn of events. I mean, two things.

So I watched that fight again this morning. I missed it last night, obviously, because yesterday was not the most fun day of my life. So I watched most of that stuff this morning up early. And what really occurred to me was, BC, I don't know if you watched the whole fight, but Lachman just seemed really, how do I say this exactly? Like just wasn't throwing very much. I don't have the stats in front of me. know if you watched the whole fight but lockton just seemed really how do i say this exactly like

just wasn't throwing very much i don't have the stats in front of me by the way shouts to the pfl team for changing the graphics and not billboarding the entire screen with numbers no one gives a fuck about they dialed that back a little bit i noticed that it looks a lot better so shots never made that change but on top of that bc lock in just wasn't really active he was waiting around a lot panetto has a kind of a herky-jerky movement but he was active he was going for it he was trying and it did just really really work that's the first thing i would say the second thing is bc back before bellator was taken over by scott coker and it began to change as an organization what kind of matchmaking they were doing and what they were prioritizing at that time in 2014. So to like Bellator 2013 and back had this real reputation as a place where the underdogs

go to live because no one was getting super favorable matchups for the most part. Everyone was just having to work through their tournament structure and it built stars like Chandler and some other ones, but it also, you know, it made guys who were on their way to being stars or standouts in Bellator take tough fights and lose all the time. Boy, that is exactly what we just saw right here. This is why matchmaking is both a delicate art and something of a science as well. You've got to get it right for the right guys. People might be saying, oh, isn't this proof of concept of what the PFL preaches?

Well, in a way, that's true, but it also hamstrings them a little bit promotionally because, BC, as you well know, Lockton's story wasn't just triumphant. It took time to build to it. He had to go through several fights. He had to go through a season. He had to go through this really arduous process, and that takes a lot of time. All for it to not exactly go up in smoke, but to get upended like that.

Yeah, PFL can say, hey, no one gets the favorable matchups here, but it also means all that time you invested in this one guy's story, you can't continue to build on it in the same kind of way as you were before, and that's why promoters have eschewed, in many cases, these tournament formats because they really get to you in a way that more clever, open-handed matchmaking just gives you a lot more flexibility around timing and who you want to put in that space. Did you just say Jed Meshu? Eschu means to reject.

I thought that was Eschud. I thought that was the correct pronunciation. It might be. I haven't. Yeah, it might be. It might be. Is it Boyd or Boyd? I can't.

I won't fight you. It might be right. I've said Eschu, but it might be Eschu. You might be right. I mean, I'm not but it might be S2. You might be right. I mean, I'm not pedantic, Luke, so you can go any direction you want with that. But shout out to Jesus Pinedo, who, like I said, had a time block. And I do like that element of the season format with PFL

where there are these scenarios where it's like, you see that in soccer sometimes. You need to win, but you need to win by a certain amount of goals to advance. He advanced. He got it done. Brendan Locknane's 2023 story is behind him. Luke, the story of Marlon Marais, though, is now behind him completely. Marais was in the featured preliminary bout on Thursday night

taking on Gabriel Braga, and he suffered, unfortunately, what a lot of us would have predicted, which was a pretty devastating first round TKO defeat. But then he took off his gloves, Luke, and the 35-year-old who finishes his career with a record of 23-13-1 suffered his seventh straight TKO defeat and ended his career with eight losses and nine fights all by knockout. Yet, when they put him on the microphone you're about to hear it you felt good in some regard that Marais got to go out on his own terms back in the promotion that he first made it big let's listen to Marlon very confident since we first saw him in the challenger series

and and you see Marlon Marais now on one knee he has his gloves off he's talking to his coaches there may very well be a sign that he is done with his mixed martial arts career and sean o'connell is in the cage about to talk to the legend Marlon Marais. Marlon, we're gonna talk to Gabriel Braga in just a moment. The gloves are off. I see the tears. Is this the last time we will see you in professional mixed martial arts? Yes, man. i start here with the worst tears of fighting you know and when i announced my retirement i wasn't ufc i wasn't home now i'm home uh i wish i had better performances here, you know, but guys, I gave him all my heart. I trained hard.

I can look myself in the mirror every day and be proud of myself. And I've been kickboxing since I was nine. I'm 35, 26 years. I gave all my life for this. And I thank Anderson, my coach. I thank Ali Abdelaziz, my manager. I thank Ray my life for this and I thank Anderson my coach I think Ali Abdelaziz my manager I think Ray Seifert for the opportunity and I thank all the fans right here you know and I wish PSL is gonna be number one in the world and this guy we just fought you know I wish him the best I wish everyone the best

he's a great fighter. I gave my heart for the sport. Thank you, God. God gave me all I have. I can't be sad today. I'm happy. I have a beautiful wife, two kids. Marlon, it's been an honor to announce your final fights.

Congratulations on a legendary career. Ladies and gentlemen, Marlon, it's been an honor to announce your final fights. Congratulations on a legendary career. Ladies and gentlemen, Marlon Marais. Luke, I know that was long, but I'm glad we ran that in full because for as rough an ending as he had and as much we all rightfully sort of joined arms and was like, why is he still fighting? Why are we doing this? Why these extra BFL fights? That's about as like real, honest and joyful. Somebody walking off on their own terms. I mean, I say my own, his own terms, they weren't going to put him back out there, but it felt like a

graduation moment to see how much he puts into it, how much this run meant to him in his career the full circle moment of having been the world series of fighting champion before coming to the UFC and coming back home as he said there's something was a real I caught feels from that there was something real pure there and I and I and I was happy to see some elements of how this all went down, Luke. I agree mostly. But I just want to point out something that I think is true, which is if he had done this three fights ago, I still think we would have had the exact same feelings of gratitude, not merely for the opportunity to watch his career,

but to watch the career of somebody who was a high achiever, who did really, really well in large part. The ending here has not been great but most of what he has done has been very very very high level very highly accomplished and deserving of praise and admiration i take my hat off to him he had a great career in large part you know but i don't think he had to wait to get to this point to get his flowers in the way that he got them last night the first thing i'd say and unless the other thing is too it's easy to go after a guy like,

oh, well, where was his manager? Where was her friends? Where was his camp? You know, these guys are going to make their own decisions. And I am certain that this was not the first time that those people were trying to tell him to call it off. And ultimately he has to see it by himself. So he sounded pretty good on the mic, BC.

I am, but I will just tell you how I feel about it. I feel gratitude for having watched his career. I mean that sincerely. But also, I feel a little bit of relief. Like, I feel a little relief that it kind of came to a close in the way that it did because it went on way too long. And whoever's fault that is, no matter, again, I want to be clear, I don't know if his people did or didn't try.

I'm guessing that they did try. And he just didn't, you know, he's got his own view of things. And that's the way this cookie crumbles. But this didn't need to go on as long as it did. I'm happy it's over, but, like, fuck, man. That was a long road to get past that. It was. So he's 35 now.

He was 31 when that losing streak began, and it all seemed to fall apart in his highest point in the UFC in 2019, right? Facing Henry Cejudo for the vacant Bantamweight title. Win a fight, of course, that we know he was winning until he wasn't. But that changed him and changed the streak. But this is a delicate spot to be in when somebody is 31, 32, 33. The losses are piling up against elite fighters. It just so happens that it's ending in knockout every single time.

Yet, Luke, he's always in tremendous shape. I'm sure when he goes into camp, he still feels like he can do it all short of the punch resistance, which is obviously a major part of this. It's different when somebody's 37, 38 and it's Chuck Liddell. And we're just like, Chuck, we just don't want to see you. We know your game, but we just don't want to see you keep getting hurt when you're Maraish or somebody like Penn and Burrow, who was in that situation still, not even 30 when he started falling apart, it's hard for us to tell them, okay, now at 32,

go sell insurance or go coach or go do something, when they probably feel like they're just one win away from turning that around. So at the very least, he got to get it all out of his system at a point where he still looks good physically, the way he speaks and stuff. But man, he did have, like, when they call him a legend, when you hear him say, the legend Marlon Marais, you're like, all right, a World Series of Fighting legend.

But then you look at the fine print, let's actually give him his flowers. He's the inaugural World Series of Fighting Bantamweight champion, won that title in 2014, made five defenses, then comes to the UFC and Luke here are the notable names he defeated in the octagon John Dodson Aljamain Sterling Jimmy Rivera Rafael Asensio and Jose Aldo um not bad Marlon not bad at all not bad at all respect on the way out you know what I'm saying like respect by the way he didn't just beat Aljamain Sterling he sent him to the land of wind and ghosts like that I mean honestly that loss probably is the thing that turned Aljo into the fighter he became

because he'd really work on the part of his games that were lacking Marlon Marais gave him a lesson that night so again shouts to Aljo for accomplishing what he did, but it took running into a buzzsaw in Marlin to get to that next spot, and that was because Marlin is incredible. He was, certainly. PFL also announced their playoff schedule for this year, Luke. The first playoff card will take place August 4th in San Antonio. That's featherweights and light heavyweights, and the last two playoff cards will take place August 18th and 23rd

at the Hulu Theater there at Madison Square Garden or whatever they call that theater these days. By the way, isn't that where, I mean, hold on, aren't Taylor and Tao fighting in the Hulu Theater? Yes, both fighters not happy. Tao and his dad really not happy. But that's a good transition, Luke, because it's time for topic two in our boxing preview. We did not, because of the technical difficulties, have a chance to sort of hit the storylines about this card. But of the many boxing cards this weekend, do not sleep on Saturday night's offering on ESPN and ESPN+.

10 p.m. Eastern is the main card from the theater at MSG. Josh Taylor will defend. Now, I keep calling him the undisputed champion, Luke. He achieved that in 2021 when he beat Jose Ramirez to unify all four belts. He has been stripped or has vacated three of them in the last year for refusing to fight mandatories. At one point, he was going to move up to 147, then he decided to stay. But here we go, Luke. The WBO unbeaten champion is Josh Taylor at 19-0, and he will welcome former unified slash undisputed based on the title bullshit debate.

It's Teofimo Lopez, the former lightweight king who has won two straight fights at 140 pounds. But look, this fight is really interesting in a lot of ways. One, because it's a great fight between two exciting and highly, highly skilled combatants. One loss between them, 37 wins between them, but they are both coming off of performances in disputed wins. That does bring up a certain amount of questions for Josh Taylor. We have to go all the way back to February of 2022. When he fought Jack Catterall, he got knocked down in the eighth round. He held on for a split decision that was very controversial and disputed, but it was his sixth straight victory over unbeaten opponents during

an incredible run. So you have to ask yourself, what's his stock coming in? Teofimo, on the other hand, we're talking about the December fight of last year against late replacement Sandor Martin, who is better than a late replacement, to be a difficult softball but Tao would take a split decision win over 10 rounds he was knocked down in round one and of course Luke we remember him saying to the camera do I still have it do I still got it to which he would go on later and say that was a trap to try to entice the big names at 140 trap or not he got the biggest name arguably at 140 Luke I laid out the questions and concerns the other question is teo's mental state we'll get to that but on paper these two great fighters

how much should we focus on the questionable victories in their last outings to handicap who might win on saturday night i think a fair amount i think a fair amount and the reason why is because teofimo lopez's last opponent was a guy by the name of sandor martin or martin sandor martin is uh a southpaw fighter so it's an open stance fight right um and the thing we saw with ryan garcia and tank davis obviously they're very different fighters than these two but it's that open stance thing where it's with the, the fighters do not have the same stance. They have an open stance Southpaw versus Orthodox, uh, and Sandor Martine, because of that was able to create a lot of different problems for someone like Teofimo Lopez Lopez.

The difference between them is I would actually argue BC. Um, Lopez is much younger. I think what, 25, 26, whatever he is, and Taylor's 32. So the way I line this up as you got a guy in Lopez who is very skilled, but those skills come a little bit short overall as a boxer to me relative to the Tartan Tornado. And more to that point, they become particularly accentuated in that circumstance. Sandor Martin was able to do certain things because of that position that just gave all kinds of problems to Lopez.

I want to remind folks, Sandor Martin dropped Lopez. Lopez only won via split decision, and even that is somewhat contested about whether or not he really fully deserved it. You just have to think, I mean, as bad as Taylor looked against Jack Catterall and then he looked fucking bad, that was a really bad decision that went in Taylor's favor. Nevertheless, just the overall amount of boxing experience and IQ relative to someone like Lopez, in my judgment,

relies a lot more on athleticism to complement his skill than Taylor. Dude, I see this as a very tough matchup for a guy like Lopez. Not to say he couldn't win because he is dynamic, he is powerful, he is athletic, and certainly it's boxing. Like, you know, you're going to get hit.

But skill for skill, especially in this position, whew, I have to tell you, uphill climb for me on the Lopez side, big time. Well, look, I think the betting oddsmen don't really know what to do with this. You got Taylor on a 16-month layoff coming off that flat performance we talked about. Like, if we're going to debate the disputed wins, I think Lopez had a much better argument of having beaten Sandro Martin legitimately than Taylor did against Catterall, even though Taylor did persevere in the second half, step on the gas, try to make it a fight and succeeded according to the judges. But as we stand right now, the odds makers have Josh Taylor minus 200, Teofimo Lopez plus 155. To clarify on the ages, it's actually 33 for Taylor and just 25 for Lopez, which is wild.

And Luke, I want to play this face-off video before we continue to talk about some of the storylines that lead us here. It got a little bit contentious. It's been contentious the whole build. This is the press conference yesterday and the end of it. Let's take a look. Did you lose a bet? Sir, sir, sir, sir, sir.

Well, you win. Stand right there. It's okay. It's okay. It's okay. Listen. Hey, I'm only talking to him. I'm only talking to him.

All right, all right, all right. I'm only talking to him. I know. I'm only talking to him. I'm only talking to him. I know, but close proximity is not smart. I can't wait till he f***ing brings up. I understand, I understand. I'm gonna f*** you up. Why can't we do a face off? Why can't we do a face off?

I don't understand this. I'm going to see this guy. Hey, I'm going to f*** you up. With that? See this guy. Hey, hey, hey. Do all that. Do all that. Do all that. Go, go. Scared, bro. Scared.

Oh, f***ing mug it. I got you. I got you. Yeah, that's cool. Right here? Right here. Luke, did it look like he was in Taylor's head or is Taylor just pissed off because Taylor walked off that that that interview series thing that top rank set up where they were talking trash over

satellite and Taylor just got up and left in the middle of it he was sick of Taylor of Tao's shit dude you you need to tell the audience the truth tell them about the column you wrote and the shit Lopez well yeah all right let's transition to that tell them the truth so here's the deal if you ask yourself why is lopez the underdog here why are there more questions about him lopez at 135 right his last fight at lightweight was when he was upset by george cambosis jr in 2021 which had a big fallout of course because teo they found out after had the torn esophagus suffered in training camp the doctor said he almost died remember that fight was on DAZN not ESPN because of the purse bid there was a lot of crazy fallout of Tao you know saying that DAZN paid off the the judges like I mean there was craziness after there but Tao's still with top rank even though he said at one point in the build of this fight that this

is his last fight on the deal now he's correcting that and saying it isn't his deal goes to 2024 then Bob Arum says no we got him for three more years he's crazy Luke and saying it isn't. His deal goes to 2024. Then Bob Arum says, no, we got him for three more years. He's crazy. Luke, the thing is, he might be crazy. But first from a boxing angle, here's why Tao is the underdog. He was dynamic as shit at 135, right? Could do Roy Jones shit. I had Roy Jones on my old boxing podcast.

He said, the only fighter I've ever seen that reminds me of Roy Jones is Tao female. The quick twitch fiber of being able to leap in with those left hooks, but also having a savviness in boxing. He wouldn't have beaten Lomachenko if he didn't have that same savviness, right? But he's only 25 and has accomplished so much. Yet we have a lot of people questioning if he's done at the elite level. And the fear in this is a combination of his mental state mixed with those two performances at 140 pounds both victories but they only showed flashes of the old Tao which is you it's we have to ask yourselves how much did Tao lose from that Cambosis fight from everything

that happened losing invincibility the physical toll everything happened don't forget it was also a war is Is it that? Or did he also not necessarily carry that power up with him? You mentioned that sometimes he was a little bit too obsessive or focused on the athleticism side of it. I think that's true. I don't think his power is as explosive at 140. He's fighting a guy in Taylor who is as big of a junior welterweight

as you can find and is also a southpaw who can also box just as well as he can brawl if he has to go watch the Regis Progre fight if you need more proof but Luke what I have seen from Teo at 140 as a boxer is there's not enough boxing he's sort of following his opponents around trying to land one of those big shots I thought he did a better job against Sandor Martin putting on pressure but not leading looking for Martin to put the jab out in trying to counter big with explosive shots the problem is it's one shot at a time he doesn't use his jab anymore Roy Jones didn't use his jab but that was considered the great anomaly why because Roy Jones was faster with better reflexes and timing than arguably any boxer who has ever lived on this planet okay Okay. Tails, not Roy Jones. This is reminiscent

to some degree of the path Adrian Broner went. Could you compare the two outside the ring? I hope not. But inside the ring, Broner at 135 was a weight bully with big power who would stand in front of you, duck your shots and just use his power to get you out of there in a methodical, predictable type of way. When he moved up in weight, even though he won world titles in those weight classes, he was never able to carry his power, but he never truly went into the boxing mode. He had a boxing background. He was a high level amateur, all that. He's always relied too much on not throwing enough punches and trying to rely on power that didn't carry up with him. It was frustrating to watch him at times in big fights when Broner would fight elites,

and he just couldn't pull out a game plan that would give him the best chance to win. I think we fear that for Teofimo up front. Then you add in the mental factor, Luke. I've got legitimate concerns about where Teofimo is right now as a man, not necessarily a fighter. I wrote a column about it on CBS Sports. You can look at it at length.

Even though Teofimo said this week at the press conference that this is the best version of me that I have yet to see in myself, it's hard to have that full confidence. He's going through a divorce right now, which cannot be easy. He's talked at length that his wife is trying to get half of his money and is kind of keeping his son away from him. He has always had family drama with his dad and trainer, Jose – I'm sorry, Teofimo Sr., who they called Junior,

by the way. That drama has led to crazy moments. But Luke, do you remember the Teofimo of old, the guy before the Cambosis fight, who was only 20, 21, 22 years old? Even with the craziness around him of his dad getting him into fights against Loma that we didn't know if he was ready for, or remember the Nakatani fight where he came out flat in that night and was lucky to hang on to a win he told me on my podcast after that his mother and his sister were fighting with his fiancee backstage up until the second that he made the ring walk but he's always been able to put it back on the tracks what did he do after Nakatani knocked out he beat Lomachenko he doesn't have though that same poise and that same safe look in the

interviews that I used to see the rare guy who's young but has poised beyond his years and can sort of block out that stuff and just focus I question if that guy's still there because Luke there's been a lot of controversy the past couple months he hasn't done a lot of traditional media but Teo's been on this um punch drunk boxing podcast a lot. He said, what I like about boxing is, is best is I could kill a guy and get away with it. Then he doubled down and said, I'm going to kill Taylor in this fight. My plan is to kill Taylor. Luke, that drew a lot of controversy and headlines. So Lopez caught up with Marcos Villegas this week on Fight Hub TV. And this is what he said about the controversy. He says, look, this is what I mean. Boxing is soft.

I was going to pass away against Cambosis because of the injuries. Literally. I thank God I'm still here. But if I had gone, they would do the 10 bell count and people would miss me for a little bit and then be forgotten. I'm not apologizing for my comments. If he dies, he dies. People have died in the ring. This is what the sport's all about. I'm not someone who apologizes. I know people want to punish me for these words, but what the fuck are you going to punish me for? Because I'm speaking truth that people die in there. Sorry if my words are too strong. Sorry that you're too sensitive for this.

If you don't like it, don't sign up for boxing. If you don't like it, don't watch boxing, go watch MMA. Those guys die less. And whoa, they asked him on Punch Drug Podcast if he's crazy. He said, people will call me crazy because you can't be outspoken, but the most intelligent ones are crazy. I'm sorry to say. The ones very awoke are really crazy. When I see death, I chase it.

Luke, I'm going to package those quotes with him accusing top rank of favoring black fighters and not giving him a push him in this feud out of nowhere with the announcers tim bradley and andre ward that doesn't make a ton of sense boxers have always lived on the edge from mike tyson to hector camacho to so many of them arturo gatti i have known taylor a long time because i interviewed him back before he was anybody and he's such a great quote i've such such great respect for who he is or maybe who he was, but who he is now scares the shit out of me for his own future. Am I right? Did you see his eyes, his face in these interviews? He broke out the Bible with Marcos Vegas and was reading the book of Job and comparing himself to Job and

then comparing, I guess, top rankranking ESPN to Satan. It was bizarre, Luke. Everything lately has been bizarre. Yeah, I mean, it seems to me that he's had long-standing issues, and I think the way you discussed it was right, that he's basically been able to cover for them. I mean, for the folks who missed the rise of Lopez into the Lomachenko fight, the only way I can explain it for an MMA audience would be he had a little bit of BC. Maybe you might disagree with this, but probably not. That run through the Lomachenko fight, right?

Stop at the Lomachenko fight. He had a little bit of that Conor McGregor magic where he was a young guy coming through, calling his shots, doing the impossible. I mean, he was hitting people as he brought his arm behind his back in a boxing fight. Like, they would go this way. He would bring his arm behind his back and then hit them here. He was knocking out Comey.

When did he knock out Comey? First or second round? Second round. Second round. I mean, just – and Comey is a very good boxer and just blowing through guys, right? He had this incredible push. But what seems to me is a very good boxer and just blowing through guys, right? He had this incredible push. But what seems to me is a couple of things have happened. One, I don't know that he's invested in the technical side of his sport as much as he should have.

He was able to do a lot of interesting things through the Lomachenko fight, but I don't know that I've seen enough progress since then. And then more to that point, whatever other distractions he has in life and how he manages his personal affairs, it clearly has derailed his focusailed his focus in my judgment right it has made him paranoid in certain ways it has made him withdrawn in other ways it has made him weird to talk to i mean we didn't show it but during the press conference that these guys had there's a moment where like they're going back and forth and taylor is just saying things about what's going to happen and I'm going to be surviving retirement and all this weird stuff until the point where Taylor gets talked into just silence because he doesn't even know what to say to the guy anymore. It was but awkward.

It was super awkward. So it's really just kind of weird. It's really just kind of weird, the whole thing. And I don't know that like you definitely see guys who can be really weird and then use that to fuel them to greatness but on the other hand you can see guys who can kind of get around it as like it's a tax that doesn't ordinarily cause them to lose and instead now what i think you have is just that you have a situation where the tax of all of that is becoming a little bit too high the paranoia about who's out to get him the the finger pointing about all of the dark forces in the sport who's out to get him the the finger pointing about all of the dark forces

in the sport that are out to get him rather than the sort of like triumphant positive takeover tone that he once used to have there's a subtle shift between them between me against the world and the world is against me there's like a little bit of a difference there between them even though it sort of sounds the same. To me, he's kind of tipped over into the other versus being in the former previously. Yeah, I'm nervous because I like him a lot. I've always enjoyed interviewing him. I've always enjoyed just

what we talked about, his ability to sort of keep that poison focus despite the craziness. And the talk used to be, well, you know, he should probably just cut ties with his dad. And not that that's an easy move, but the talk was, you know, he should probably just cut ties with his dad. And not that that's an easy move, but the talk was, you know, is his dad technical enough or as good enough of a trainer? They have done consulting at different times, Luke,

and there has been some talk. His dad had done interviews and said they did visit with Team Canelo and Eddie Reynoso and get – but at the end of the day, the dad always says, you know, but I'm the mastermind. I'm the head coach. Let it be known. We used to just debate if that relationship was going to derail his upper bound limits of his boxing career. Now I'm,

I'm talking scarier because there's a lot of talk about life or death. He's done a given a lot of long quotes this week about the glory and honor of being able to die in the ring, which I don't love when people do that at all. And then the business side is weird. You know, Bob Arum, like I said, yesterday did an interview where he said tayo can say all this craziness about hating espn he's with us for three years and he's with espn if he's with us so tayo had told marcos vegas that um look guys um i have a contract but you know essentially contracts are made to be broken what tayo's plan was he said i'm a and i need to be paid for it. He wants to start takeover promotions now moving forward and do one-off

fights and not sign with any networks or promoters. Like that works if you're Canelo or Miguel Cotto at the end of his career or Floyd Mayweather, when you just get to a certain level where you're the draw, people will play on your terms. Teo's not there yet. He's done great things before the age of 25, like almost Hall of Fame things. I don't really mean he's beaten enough guys where he's a Hall of Famer, but he jumped into the pound-for-pound rankings at such a young age and beat the number one pound-for-pound guy in Lomachenko astoundingly. To the McGregor magic, your point, it is comparable in how that sort of just all happened and took place.

But sometimes when it goes, and when I say it, sometimes we're talking about chin, sometimes we're talking about speed. In this case, I'm fearful, Luke, that it's the, that, that poise that focus and that reality. He's been incredibly conspiratorial after the Cambosis fight in many different weird areas. I think him and his dad are severely overvaluing themselves at the moment. They're talking about how this fight is the most important of his career because this will give them the freedom to do what they want. Not if you're under contract to top rank in ESPN still, like that's

just how the game works. So Luke, in terms of this matchup, Taylor's the rightful favorite. If Taylor's not going to box, this may be a really, really, really tough night for him. Yeah, it really comes down to that. Again, I think Lopez is the better athlete of the two. Certainly the more springy, explosive athlete. You mentioned the fast twitch fibers.

That's definitely true. That definitely plays a role. And that could always do wonders for you. But, you know, leaving your feet like that against a skilled operator in the way that Taylor is, is also just super risky. And one more time, I'm going to go back to it. I really don't know how the open stance. I just don't see Lopez's best work coming from that position

candidly I don't think he really is all that great about it and Taylor has a good jab Taylor Taylor and Frank Martin have great pull two counters by the way right so I feel like a guy who lunges against a guy who has a known good pull two counter just is a recipe for disaster you know for him as well. I want to be clear. Is Lopez out of this fight? Far from it. The odds are pretty close, especially for a boxing main event.

I think Miner's for plus 200 with Taylor being the favorite, as you indicated. But BC, it's a 12-round fight. Skills win fights in both boxing and MMA. And the more skilled guy is definitely Taylor the only question is if was the cataract fight just like a really bad matchup on a bad night for a guy who by the way hasn't been very active neither guy's been super active in that way like one fight per year since basically 2019 for Taylor uh was it that's a bad night or you know just sort of just just didn't couldn't quite get it done against the opponent at that time. Or is it a sign of, of really bad decline? If he's fallen off a cliff,

all bets are off, but I don't think he's quite fallen off a cliff yet. I haven't seen that. Well, there is a scenario where Taylor with the 16 month layoff, the bad performance last time and the age of 33, will it all catch up to make him more human than he was? And let's say Tao, who is in tremendous shape, Luke, let's say he comes in, dials it up to the top level. Could this be an even and competitive fight? Absolutely. I think the odds makers were a little nervous of where exactly is Taylor at, but styles make

fights in the styles we've seen. If Tao had that much trouble with Sandor Martin in terms of a softball, who's big with a good jab and a left cross and can control distance. Taylor can do that, but he's got way more pop and can sting him. So, look, I mean, you know, Tao can jump in and land shots you don't see coming and drop you and change the tone of the fight. I just don't know if that Tao is in there anymore, dude, because, look, everything needs to be in synergy for the most part to win an elite fight against another all-time great. You know what I mean?

Like Josh Taylor is putting together a great run and resume here. This is not going to be easy under any circumstances. Uh, if Tao is able to take that chaos, like he used to and funnel it for good, this, this would be a huge return for him. I mean, think about it. He was arguably the undisputed champion at lightweight and beat the number one guy in the sport to do it. When he beat Loma, if he now moves up in this weight class which he did and on Saturday beats the guy who's still number one even though he doesn't have all four belts that would be another major feather in the cap of Teofimo who by the way is still only 25 I hope for him Luke he's got another gear and another you know great chapter in his career I'm cheering for him

personally in that regard, but the oddsmakers got this right. There's a lot of reasons style-wise, style for style that this could be a bad night for Tael. Can't wait to find out, Luke. Also this weekend, briefly here, there's a very sad pay-per-view tonight. It's in Miami, Florida at the Casino Miami

Highline. You can go to FightTV or Don's.com. Is that the official branding? Tonight in Miami, I think it's Hialeah, right? No, Hialeah is a suburb of Miami. You mean the sport? It's at the Miami High Lie. Like, it's at the front on. I wonder if the ring's going to be, like, on the High Lie surface.

I'm not sure, Luke. We're going to find out. You mean the sport with, like, the big hooks? Oh, yeah. The pelota? Yeah, the pelota. Luke, I've got a huge pelota. You know what I'm saying? I just...

Wow, are we this early? Wow, okay. I used to do the pelotas joke, but what they don't tell you is pelotas is more like... The slang for balls is more huevos than it is which is eggs than it is balls. What's the name of that basket in Highline, Luke? It's not a Pelota.

What is it called? I should know because I grew up going to Highline. Pelota just means ball. I'm not sure about in Highline. I've actually seen Highline live. It's a Sesta. It's a Sesta. So real quick, growing up in Connecticut,

the only frontons left, Luke, in this world, I think, is there's one in South Florida and there's like a couple in Europe. The last state before Florida that had them still was Connecticut. So growing up in the 90s, we had three. By the time I became old enough to go, which is 18, we only had one Milford Highline. Luke, that was the place to go when you weren't 21, but you wanted to sneak in beer and you wanted to gamble and smoke cigarettes. I had a great time. They'd have dollar hotdog night, Luke.

I mean, I've done very disreputable, disreputable things that at a highlight front time. And so will Adrian Boner on Friday night, Luke, it's called a SESTA, the, the basket that they throw,

by the way, I people, the people, anyone who has ever tried to tell me that highlight isn't rigged. Like, come on, bro. All right. It's like, it's like a pro wrestling't rigged, like, come on, bro. All right?

It's like a pro wrestling kind of sport, right? It's pro wrestling, yeah, for the most part. Like, it's great competition back and forth, but somebody who was climbing up the walls two seconds ago inevitably drops an easy one at the end of the point, and then all the serious bettors by the cage go nuts because they just lost their, all right. You see, I don't know what a fronton is,

but Connecticut's own Apathy once said, my flow's cold cold make you sleep inside of a tauntaun you know what i'm saying front on is a highlight place luke adrian broner's back we have not seen him uh since 2021 when he had a very disputed decision went over giovanni santiago he was supposed to come back last summer against omar figueroa on showtime pulled out at the 11th hour with mental health issues. He's 33 years old. Does he have nine lives? He'll be taking on Bill Hutchinson, a full-time lawyer who has 22 losses and four draws as a pro with nine KOs. And this is a $25 pay-per-view.

Don King at 91, Luke, has been doing media this week, and he said, Broner facing a full-time lawyer is great because dealing with lawyers is Broner's forte. Boba dot Bob. Let's go to the videotape of Broner at the press conference. Billy Hutchinson, you know, and everybody out there know, you know, it's public record. You know, after I f*** you up, I need you know after I f*** you up I need you I'm gonna hire you because I need an attorney anyway because I'm about to fire my own attorney and you know now that I know that you're a fighter you know I know that you'll fight for me in in the courtroom so you know and then after you beat that case I got a couple n****s you know they got murders and s*** so

we need you. Dude, Broner is awesome. Oh, wow. Yeah, so that's going on tonight in Miami. Hopefully Mikey goes. I hope, right? Mikey, are you going to go to this? Mikey, you should buy all the Delta 8s in South Florida and go there.

Mikey, if you don't go to this Broner fight, I want you to know it's only because you're racist against black people. Yeah, finally, there it is. Luke, Saturday night on DAZN, Ontario, California. Finally, Jaime Munguia is going to face somebody with a pulse at middleweight. That person is 37-year-old Sergey Derevyanchenko, 14-4 record. But, Luke, we remember him as a three-time middleweight title challenger. And those four defeats have all come against the elite.

And to be fair, they've all come in either very close fights or disputed decisions against Daniel Jacobs, Gennady Golovkin, Jamal Charlo on pay-per-view, and Carlos Adamas. Luke, Munguia is somehow still just 26, but he's 41-0, and he has had seven straight fights against second- and third-rate competition. What are your thoughts on this one? Because you've always been a Munguia guy.

Like, is it, yay, about time, or is it like, I don't know? Well, okay, so i'll say this it's a it's like way way way past time in terms of like the number of fights he has munguia has what 41 professional contests this will be 42 he should have been fighting dudes like dervyanchenko 20 fights ago you know what i mean like it's way overdue on the other, Munguia is only 26. He's only 26 years old, and it's not like he's getting roughed up in there. I mean, listen to how long these fights are going with his opponents.

In the last fight, three rounds. The one before that, five. Before that, three. Now, he did have a 12-round fight against Gabe Rosado, which he won pretty straightforwardly, but then six rounds, six rounds, one on 11, but then four rounds before that. And there's a couple 12s mixed in there against Dennis Hogan but he was overmatched in that one and Liam Smith you know

Hogan arguably beat him Luke Hogan arguably beat him in that one yeah because okay but he got roughed up a little bit Hogan did he just outworked Munguia for long stretches of it but Munguia was the blending the heavier shots for sure right you would agree with that sure um but you know even as early as 2018 he's fighting saddam ali like like jesus christ man like that wasn't that long ago he's 21 years old he's fighting saddam ali so like what i'm trying to make is it's not like he's been getting like super oh you know who i'm thinking of gary o'sullivan gary o'sullivan that went to the that went to the 11th round but he fucked up gary o'sullivan you're right the Hogan fight a little bit different still my point being is he's not getting roughed up in there it's like he's had fights where he's underperformed or kind of like wasn't that great

but here's the thing about Munguia he is young he's a big puncher right he's got he's got a solid ability to thump and Derevyanchenko is spirited in ways that previous mungi opponents have not been but is definitely old and has definitely been fucked up against big punchers already even though he was you know obviously over over performed against triple g or something like that he took bombs from triple g and kept coming he did he just trucked through but but he has faced so many at this point that there's no way they didn't have an effect Munguia is younger he's a bigger puncher I'm glad to see it's finally happening it's way overdue it's just you know you you got to be you got to be like yay

okay this is better it's just a I can't even trust where Munguia is at anymore uh and b he should win but like would you be all that shocked if he didn't i don't know well he's co-promoted by golden boy and xanfer and here's oscar's quote we want all the big names for jaime but we want that fight against jamal charlo first after our commercial success of making ryan versus tank we have the framework to work with pbc and showtime but if that can't happen munguia will fight anyone. Gennady or even David Benavidez are great options. Hey,

Oscar, chances are you're not going to do a DAZN and Showtime co-pay-per-view involving Jaime Munguia. Just a heads up. And the other thing is, I don't think DAZN is going to keep letting you take your best fighters to Showtime either. Just so you know.

There you go. Worth watching. Yeah. Still possible. By the way, you know there you go yeah uh worth watching yeah still possible you see you see oscar threatening uh eddie hearn on twitter yeah yeah he was like stand down mother effer or something like for that level right i mean it's just like watch yourself you know watch your back um all right luke also sunday is this sad too sunrise florida there's going to be an exhibition pay-per-view when 46-year-old Floyd Mayweather, in the second of a hopeful five exhibitions he wants to pull off in nine months this year,

will take on 29-year-old John Gotti III, the grandson of the gangsta. And Luke, Gotti is 5-1 in MMA, but he hasn't fought since 2020 when he lost to 7-6 Nick Alley under the CES banner. I know you don't care, but here is Gotti's quote. I'm bringing bad intentions to that man. I don't care if it's an exhibition or not. You signed up to fight me. There's no quarter. It's kill or be killed.

Yeah. All right. You have plans on Sunday, Luke? Hopefully you and the kooks will be checking that one out. Also, I hope tonight you'll be checking out the Turning Stone Casino once again. It is Showbox, the new generation. So, Luke, it's me, Raul Marquez, Barry Tompkins, Steve Farahood, and Al Bernstein is joining our broadcast tonight.

Why? Because it's Hall of Fame weekend. This class of 2023 is Carl Frotch, Tim Bradley, Rafael Marquez, Joe Goosen, among many others. But, Luke, I do want to tell you, tripleheader tonight, all light heavyweights, all unbeaten. Watch out for this name, Ali Ismailov. He is a 30-year-old Russian who didn't get into boxing seriously until age 17, but he had 200 amateur fights. He's 10-0 as a pro with seven knockouts. His trainer,

John David Jackson said his power is on the level of better be. I've had heavyweights that won't spar him. He needs to make his opponents engaged because once he hits them, it will change the tone of the fight. Luke, I'm being told that this guy, he's number ranked number five in the IBF that a win here. If he can get it against unbeaten Charles Foster, could lift him right into that title picture where he's not mincing words. He wants B-ball.

He wants better beef. Hell, he'd take Canelo too. Watch out for this guy, Luke. Grew up right near the Georgia and Dagestan borders in Russia. And I asked him in the fighter meetings about that upbringing because they mentioned he grew up in a place just like Khabib. So I was like, what is it about that place? He said, our people are born to fight. There's no after school activity that isn't boxing, wrestling or fighting.

It's always one on one combat after school. I've been doing this as a kid. It's the only thing I want to do. Luke, he had a Hamza beard, dark sunglasses and spoke in a barely audible monotone robot voice. Get ready for fireworks tonight if you happen to tune in, okay? How's that for a sell? I will be watching. Have you asked Al Bernstein about any bathrooms he's destroyed?

Any commodes? You think Al is a target for commode destroyation? I think you are a target for, you are the guy who finds targets to ask that question. Yeah. I'm not going to ask Al Bernstein on the show box level. If he's torn up a commode, I don't understand this direction that you're going. Oh,

you really don't understand how I would be wondering if you had asked him questions like that. You only did that on camera to several people. Yeah. But you know, Luke it's there's a time and place for that, right? Yes. Is the time and place showbox tonight on air? No, morning combat is the time and place for debauchery. Showbox, we get down real style,

Luke. Okay, so get ready for that. All right. Luke, do you want to continue time-wise here on the flow we were expecting? Can we have a mid-show meeting right now about this? Hey, your show, you're hosting it. You call the shots. All right, then let's bang, Michael. Here we go. Topic number three, Dana White against the MMA media again. Here's the setting for this, Luke. Robbie Fox of Barstool, we know him. He got flown in to cover Power Slap pay-per-view number two. There was a lot of kickback on the media about that so robbie caught up with dana again and they talked about it let's listen in

when i came out in vegas i don't know if you saw this but they were a number of mma media sites that wrote articles about how unprofessional it was for me to come out to the event being that you flew me out i just just want to clear the air here that, and you can confirm this, hopefully, that you didn't fly me out because of a media member, but because of my status as a world famous celebrity. 100%. As an influencer. Yeah. You know what? Tell the rest of the media who think they're professional to kiss your fucking ass. Every one of those fucking scumbags are a bunch of unprofessional fucking douchebags.

Fuck every one of them. They're all, I would love to see which professionals were calling you unprofessional. They're a bunch of fucking bloggers. They're all fully. I'm a blogger. Whoa. Watch your mouth.

Watch your mouth on the bloggers. There are a bunch of bloggers. I'm a blogger. They're not media. They're bloggers. Well, that's my point. I bloggers. I'm a blogger. They're not media. They're bloggers. Well, that's my point. I'm like, I'm a blogger. I ain't a journalist, and I never claimed to be.

A hundred fucking percent. Exactly. Listen, let me tell you how fucking powerful and influential the media is. If it was up to the media, the UFC would have never fucking made it, okay? If it was up to the media the UFC would have never fucking made it okay if it was up to the media we would have never gone through COVID if it was up to the media that any type of influence or power if they mattered whatsoever power slap would not be doing what it's doing right now so let them fucking talk. I honestly love these outbursts. Look, that guy's triggered, right?

I mean, what the hell is going on here? Yeah, I mean, people, I've said it before, people push back, but it's like, dude, I mean, what are you supposed to read from that other than just straight up MMA media antipathy, right? Well, yeah, if you criticize anything... What else is there? The modern-day role of a combat sports media member, according to Dana, appears to be

that if you criticize anything, you are trying to tear it down, you hate it, and you are a scumbag piece of shit yeah i mean we are scumbag pieces of shit just not for the reasons he thinks we are no no probably for the amount of only fan subscriptions that most ever made media journalists have luca we got a larger discussion about the role of the media but to get there let's go to the mmar with ariel hawani remember when we played that aaron bronster clip with mike mizzouli the head of the mohegan sun commission regarding the

the role a commission should have in being trans transparent about the fallout of issues with judging refereeing and all that and the whole idea of should they speak at press conferences well mizzouli texted ariel Ariel. Let's listen to this. By the way, just got a text message from Mike Mazzulli of the ABC. And so I might as well read it because I think he wants me to read it. I heard some of your podcast. I know you want to understand the scoring criteria and what the judges are looking at. Come to Vegas and attend the class.

It is free to all fighters and press. Please state that on your next podcast. Thanks. I feel like please state that on your next podcast is a very interesting way. I am stating it right now. And again, I will reiterate what I think both he and other people in

these commission circles are missing is the fact that I know what it is. I've read, I've talked, I've done what it is. What I want to know is what this guy is thinking on Saturday night when the rest of the world sees one thing and there's like five people on the planet that see another thing. That's what I want.

That's what I want. I want to talk to the people. Again, what they're trying to spin here is I don't want to be a judge. I don't want to be a Twitter judge. I don't want to be – I want to talk to the judges. I want to talk to the commission. Mizzou likes to say I need to protect the judges. Why? That's their job. Luke Thomas, what? Let's be straight up and honest here in 2023. What the hell is the role of the MMA media? What should it be? What is it? What do promoters and officials

expect it to be? Because shit has gotten very murky from the idea of these like character journalists who are playing roles and parts and are, you know, doing lip service. We've got a lot of that, right? You could become famous from being, I mean, hello, Luke, we're pretty damn famous in this circle from being public assholes, but you get my point. What is the state of MMA media right now? It's terrible. It's really terrible. I mean, I always say this. What's really funny about Dana White's outbursts about the MMA media

is that you've got a relative to NBA media or NFL media, you've got one of the most obsequious, you know, stenographer type media groups of any sport that exists. That's just the reality. And like the response, I mean, it has changed. Like when you first got into it, like if you were the guy on the road, who was the road person for whatever major site, that was a really prestigious gig. And again, there is still some value to it, but it has become much more diminished, partly due to the nature of the pandemic and the way in which there's interaction between athlete and fighter,

excuse me, athlete and media. But you know, the reality is MMA media jobs have been honestly like what we do has been really usurped in many ways by fighters doing it, fighters doing podcasts, fighters interviewing each other, like all the same stuff that we do,

building on the previous celebrity that they had amassed from their careers fighting but then also just not really doing a very rigorous job questioning other fighters because they're all either still in the UFC payroll or um you know there's just they don't have that same sort of sensibility and so the job has been utterly decimated the role has been completely damaged and uh changed in many ways not for the better. So when White lashes out, it's like, my God, dude. If you can't even take what we say on this level,

I mean, you're just utterly unfit for major sports. You just couldn't. Can you imagine being like what the Mets have to deal with in the New York media market? It's ridiculous. I mean, it's just like you can't. It's like you can't. It's just he'd be unable, physically unable to process, I think, some of that. But you're asking what the role is, and this is what they always seem to not understand. I actually have no problem

with what Robbie Fox did. It's not that I agree with that kind of coverage or that I want to do that. He told the audience everything they needed to know to make a decision about his coverage. Guys, I am literally here because the promoter of this paid me to be here. Dude, he's telling you what the game is about. That's all you can really do. That is what you actually want from either influencer types or journalist types. You actually want them to disclose these ties. You want them to disclose these relationships and then let the audience make a determination about what they want. But I think, you know, what is the role of anyone who takes this kind of thing seriously in any halfway? And again, you know, half of what we do is, hey, what kind

of pornography are you watching this week? I get that. We aren't Seymour Hersh coming to the rescue. But the job of what I think what Brian and I try to do is beyond the levity of what you see sometimes in the show is, it's like, guys, this industry cannot be trusted to run by the people who run it without someone looking around the corner and making sure what they say is true is actually true. You just cannot. We're not allowed to ask follow-ups. You know what I'm saying? Let's just state it outright. Like promoters are not to be trusted on their own.

Let me finish. Regulators are not to be trusted on their own let me finish regulators are not to be trusted on their own fighters making statements to the media without double checking it anyone powerful without double checking it are not to be trusted on their own because everyone is trying to manipulate the information space for their own ends or otherwise are just bad fucking actors there are people who you cannot trust, who have ties to awful people from every nook and cranny from across the earth. So what is our role? Yeah, to have a little fun, to get you ready for the fights, but to be in a position to be like, guys, this is obviously not fucking true. What they're saying is not true and it has consequences

for people beyond themselves. How effective we've been in that? By all means, people can grade us. But that's the job. Yeah, we're the ombudsman of the scenario right now. Our job is to be a critic, to be critical, to ask critical questions. And so it's like, look, Dana's increasingly spoiled right now, not just through the success of the UFC, but through the the way the deal with espn is structured they have editorial control over their own broadcast

right they're not coming on there and debating fighter pay or debating you know matchmaking or whatever it's a commercial the broadcast is an infomercial it's a really good one by the way but i think by association luke and the size of that deal and how important ufc is to espn plus they've also been able to skirt you know any kind of outside the lines of that deal and how important UFC is to ESPN plus they've also been able to skirt, you know, any kind of outside the lines investigations that used to be part of that. Once UFC in the end of the two thousands became so prominent that they would appear on sports center. Right. I mean, do you remember Luke, the sit down interview with Brock Lesnar,

where they straight up asked him many times about steroids and he stormed off. Like you're not seeing that anymore because UFC isn't desperate for that coverage but I do you know it is interesting when Dana is going to these extremes it's like how much do you want to shit on the media because they do play a role of promotion for you at the end of the day in trying to cover you so a constant framing of everyone being a fucking idiot and just like that. It's like, don't forget that when you needed coverage 20 years ago, you were calling and knocking on the doors of the major newspapers and then almost, you know, begging these people to come check it out. I mean, that's how the relationship between like Dana and the Kevin Aioli begins back in the

day. You know, it's like, don't forget that. We have to be extra critical and snarky because they are lacking the transparency on a level that I've never seen before. They don't have to tell the truth anymore. They're not pressured into it. And if you push back at all, you have a fear of losing your credential or dinner just rips you and goes on to the next question. There isn't an adequate way to get your questions answered on that regard. And you are constantly labeled as just that a scumbag piece of shit. Who's only here because we allow you to, and only here to tear us down and show the,

you know, behind the curtain and the man who's actually running this, how the sausage is made, all that bullshit. What does he think it is? Luke 1950s, major league baseball, where, because Mickey Mantle lets you sit at his table at the Copa Cabana, Sausages made all that bullshit. What does he think it is, Luke? 1950s Major League Baseball, where because Mickey Mantle lets you sit at his table at the Copacabana Club that you're not going to print all the chicks he banged, you know, outside of marriage. I mean, we're not there.

It's not that's not happening anymore. You know, like you say, try being in these other sports. Try being in New York media. They are so spoiled right now at because of the way they structure it at the amount of media that are only there to promote and benefit from it. And it's not that we don't benefit from it, Luke. If the UFC shut down tomorrow, that's a big hit to what we do professionally and how we pay our mortgages and feed our children. I'm never trying to look past that or abuse that

or think that we're better than this. Let us do our fucking job though just the same okay give us legitimate lip service to questions that matter anytime you hit dana with a hard question what do you get back an insult or a ask jeff novitsky i'm happy i don't deal with that shit it's your job to deal with that shit bro okay that's what it is everyone wants to lash out at dana for the way mma media is treated but like the mma media has to have a bit of a look in the mirror on this one like the one thing that i think that they are right about that just the public really cannot appreciate is i've seen people be like oh you know don't cover him but like if you're the individual

journalist you know or or whatever your title is in media you know what what you just don't have a lot of say over that like if you go up there and start to have a Seymour Hersh moment, and then they tell you, you can't come back, like you're out of a job. So like, really, I want folks to know that like the MMA media deserves blame, but not like the individual journalist level in the way that folks understand it's the corporations who own these companies, not empowering people to do this. Like, now I want to be clear one more time, BC and I, I think, are in a bit of a different position. We are well taken care of at CBS. We are well taken care of at Showtime.

And we have a lot of options. But it took us a long time to get to this level. And, you know, BC obviously is still heavily involved in boxing. He's not as reliant upon, you know, UFC favoritism in any kind of way, which, you know, other folks might not be so, so not as leveraged, but like, I just want to be clear here. Like as long as the corporations in place don't back their media to cover the UFC in the most or any promoter in that any promoter in an accurate way.

Cause by the way, it's not really not exclusive to the UFC. Like you see it more because that's just the dominant brand, but it's really true of any promoter where they don't double check what promoters say, where they don't double-check what promoters say, where they don't double-check things, where John Nash is the only one really looking into fighter pay, Paul Gift as well. But just basically two, three guys in the whole industry looking into it. As long as really that's the way they go about their business, where they accept being bullied

without any other consideration for their coverage, they're just going to get more of this. They're just going to get more. Dana does what he does in this particular circumstance because he has been empowered to do that. He has been empowered to do that. At times in which he has pushed back on media entities for coverage he didn't like, guess who folded? It was the media entities, behind the scenes,

the corporate media entities. They just folded. They just folded. And so when you're operating in that environment, it's very easy to look at Dana and be like, oh, he is saying all these negative things. You all have a choice. And when I say you, I mean the corporate overlords here. You have a choice about how you want to cover these entities.

As long as you keep putting your guys in a position to just accept it, that's all they're going to keep doing. The job, by the way, is to provide good and bad coverage the job is to provide critical and honest coverage Dana unfortunately no longer tells the truth enough on a consistent basis that he ends up creating more issues for himself and then leans on that defensive oh you're just trying to come after us and take us down and the same same thing happened on COVID, even though it didn't really happen that way, Dana. And now to see a guy like Mazzulli, again, with power, what was he, a former head of the Association of Boxing Commissions

or current one still? Very high influence in both combat sports. To see him give, again, a very Dana response that we talked about the other day, it's a troubling direction, I'd have to say, on the idea of journal. Not that we that we always like you said paint ourselves as complete and normal no our our show is a super fan show that's that's a part of the hook it's entertainment if you love the show you want people you identify with or or are entertained by talking about the fights that you also are going to watch but let's not not shut it down completely on the idea of being open.

Just tell the truth, and we would analyze it and move on. But it's the constant BS that creates this, to be very fair with you, Luke. It really is. Again, all promoters have a job, which is to promote their product, and that sometimes means telling the truth, and sometimes it means not. And that's just not exclusive to UFC in any capacity. Every promoter is basically like that. But if you guys want – you just have to have some self-respect.

I mean, if he's going to berate you, if you can't get honest answers from him, if you can't really, like, can I rely upon what he is telling me at this press conference to be true without double-checking? No, you cannot. No, you cannot. You have to double-check it. It's just where we are. And I think unless people make that mental shift to that space, you're just going to get what you want to get but i i like robbie fox personally

i know him on a personal level he's a wonderful kid and again i don't want to do coverage like he does coverage that to me seems like something i'm not interested in doing and i think you know i would i don't want to consume power slap coverage but like dude he fucking tells you the score up front that is different than people who are like i'm a capital j journalist and then dana's like hey fuck all your moms and uh all of you are lying and then not pushing back on that or just repeating statements without double checking it it's like dude you know robbie's doing this the right way i'm sorry the rest of you are not also if you want your sport to be at this level this level comes with higher scrutiny

that's what it is you're on espn bro it's a 21 billion dollar corporation combined with wwe like that that backup that that 21 billion and we don't have questions about that like it's 21 billion dollars bro like this this demands scrutiny you know all right topic number four lightning round of fight announcements luke i'm gonna tell them to you and I want your honest reaction. August 19th is UFC 292. The return of Chris Weidman is very real. Brad Tavares across from him. Do you like that for the former middleweight king?

I know we are short on time, so I'll say this. I am kind of glad to see him back. I think like everybody else I'm happy that he has been able to find what appears to be some real physical recovery from a devastating injury he's had a lot of devastating injuries of late and he wasn't like exactly in peak form before all of that but I think a lot of us feel like there is something still a little unresolved to the Chris Weidman story about where it could go Brad Tavares is a good good opponent. Also, you know, not a guy necessarily in his prime either, but still very dangerous.

I actually like this fight. I like this matchup. I think either guy could conceivably win it. And may the best man win. I got fears for Weidman, man. Like, I don't want to get in the way of him doing something that means so much to him making the full comeback and proving to himself that he can do that.

And I don't think he necessarily has, like, illusions of being number one pound-for-pound or a champion. This might be more about climbing that hill, which is very difficult and many guys have just left the sport after that devastating injury. But I do have a little bit of fear, Luke. It's hard to see our heroes age and be in these spots.

Dude, if there's a lesson you got reminded of yesterday with my dog, dude, getting old sucks. It sucks. It's awful. Luke, Yana santos ne kunitskaya is back july 1st macy chaise on for the ufc fight night card you moved by that or just be i like that a lot yeah i mean again i wouldn't make it the crown jewel of the card but it's a nice supplementary one yeah sure okay let's go to that right rising bellator super rising to joint card in japan july 29th we already know about the the headliners in that one and they're they're very good how about this danny stabatello versus

mago med mago medoff at phantom sick fight and former welterweight champion andre korishkov against lorenz larkin yay bellator that's what i'm talking about right yeah two great fights and by the way a bit of a note on that so I this got I think a little bit lost somewhere in the sauce now there are two parts to that overall event there's like a Bellator versus Risen part and then there's just a Risen part just the Risen part Showtime will not be airing but the Bellator versus Risen part they will that will start at 11 p.m in the east that particular day I have to get the timing on this one just right because I think it differs from Japan on what they list on the poster. But in other words, I'm just trying to point out

the Bellator versus Ryzen component of that card will air live on Showtime. To the individual fights that you mentioned there, Sabatello versus Megamedov, two thumbs up, part of that Bellator division and bantamweight that they've really begun to cook things up on. And BC, i'm sorry the second one you just mentioned here my brain's not working right you're talking about uh koreshkov

koreshkov and larkin larkin having a bit of a quiet comeback yes a quiet resurgence happening in bellator koreshkov breaking chance to rencounter's fucking ribs out there he's scary on his so dude that fight is that's a. Good, good fights that Bellator is putting together. I like these. By the way, that's the same day as Crawford versus Spence on Showtime pay-per-view and the BMF rematch of Poirier versus Gaethje on the UFC pay-per-view. So, wow, what a day in combat sports. August 5th, UFC Nashville, we get Billy Q back against Damon Jackson.

OSP against Kute Laba. And Baja Mondays will let the rhythm take him over against Ludvoit Klein. There's a mixed bag there, but, you know, Billy Q's going to bang, Luke. You know that. By the way, Baja Mondays is not the same as Bailamos. Which is what you're thinking of. Yeah, it's close. August 12th, UFC giving us Khalil roundtree and chris dawkus

rescheduled so we'll see if chris dawkus's light heavyweight dreams can come true there okay i like august one week later august 19th ufc 292 getting robocop against dennis ty uh talulan and gerald mearshart versus andre petki. Are you moved by any of those? I like Robocop. His return is interesting. The individual matchups, I don't love them so much. But I do like Robocop, so I'm happy to see him back. All right.

It's time for that segment every week where we put our money where our mouth is. Luke, what has been in your mouth lately, right? Wow. Okay, bet. Yeah. right wow okay bet yeah luke we go head to head with five picks in five categories last week you went three and two not bad i dipped to two and three as i continue yeah okay overall you're you're going to the metal concert i hope you're not you're going not yet not yet overall you're 39 and 34 with one draw 30 and 44 for me so i'm only nine games ish back maybe nine and a half by the way i meant to tell you i am gonna see uh i'm gonna see pantera in september pantera in september wow that's so who is who is Pantera these days well I mean half them

fuckers are dead is Phil still fronting it? Phil is the front man and they've got Zach Wild Ozzy's old guitarist and the guy from Black Label Society taking over for for Dimebag and then I forget who's on drums

but then they still have Rex on bass. I saw Ozzy in 02, Luke, at the Hartford Civic Center, and Zach Wild's solos were insane, and he was teasing Jimi Hendrix licks in the middle of them and just doing amazing shit right there. Okay, bet, Luke. Main event, the biggest one you can certainly argue here is UFC 289 in Vancouver this weekend.

Amanda Nunes, Bantamweight title and the red hot in terms of the country of Mexico but also in terms of two straight wins Irene Aldana this fight rules Luke are you going first or second uh I'll go first if that's okay okay all right so for our main event pick I'm not even sure if I fully believe it, BC, but for fun. I think there is a real case to build for her. I'm not fully convinced by it, but I'm going to go Aldana for this one. I'm going to take a risk. Again, I'm not sure.

I'm picking Aldana, and if she wins, I'll claim all the credit, and if she loses, I'll be like, oh, I didn't, you know, hey, guys, I said Nunez. Hey, don't toe the line. Stop straddling the fence. Here's what I'll say. Here's what I'll say. Here's what I'll say. I saw that you had picked Nunez before I put my picks in, and I was like, you know what? I've been toying with the idea that Aldana can get it done, so I will put my cards on the table and say I don't think it's a super overwhelming case, but I like it enough to pick it. And it relies on Nunes having declined a little bit, which I just can't be sure about, BC.

That's the part that I just can't quite know. But listen, upsets happen all the time. Aldana's got reasons why we think some of her boxing could be interesting. Maybe the pace she puts on. Hell, she won her last fight with the most weird-ass liver kick thing you'll ever see in your life so fuck it i'm gonna take a chance on the mexican here to run the table bring four titles to mexico in a single year let's go aldona mexico minus 320 amanda nunes is your favorite plus 250 erin a aldona luke i will take amanda nunes um you know i've been looking for clues this week

i like the intensity she brought to the press conference uh there wasn't much redeemable factors from that press conference luke did you have a lot of like who the fuck is that guy moments looking at the fighters they trotted out or am i just being really white belt rude right now i gotta say normally i do try to watch the pressers i skipped skipped this one. I just skipped it. You're not moved for Canada's Mike Malott against Adam Fuggett, Luke? I mean, Marc-Andre Berial was allowed to sit at the press conference. Shout out to him, Luke.

These are fine fighters, but they're not like... I'm going to take Amanda here. I do see the troubles that Aldana could give her, certainly with the clean punching, with the great technique. I mean, her left hook is very sneaky. Ketlin Vieta found that out. But, Luke, I think there's one more big one left in Amanda here.

I think she has motivation. I think she understands that this is an upgraded opponent. It's interesting to see if she can take the fight to the ground, if that can lead to some success for her. But she got here for a reason. People think I'm simping Luke to try to keep her, this is the legend of her around and that I'm, I'm giving her too much credit for how she lost the pain. You fight the first time and turned it around and fixed it. But, um,

these eyes saw what they saw. So, uh, yeah. Um, there we go. Okay. So for my favorite,

it's not, I'm going to pull up my odds here. Boy, it's not really super overwhelmed, super overwhelming by any stretch of the imagination. But in fact, I'm not sure exactly where they sit at the present moment, BC. Perhaps you can help me. But I'm going to go Benil Dariush. I'm going to go Benil Dariush for my favorite. I feel like, again, it's a tough fight to pick. The main really, really... The main event is a little bit further apart,

but this one, I think most folks agree they're excited about it for a lot of reasons, and the biggest one is you got two very, very, very, very skilled operators, and in the case of Oliveira, makes a lot of mistakes. In the case of Darius, you're wondering, is he really of that level? Is he of the...

Oliveira, we've seen it. He's put the belt around his waist. Darius, you know, never quite being there, but maybe this is that moment, right? Maybe this is the one he transcends. So I understand a pick in either direction. I feel like Dariush is in a different place now. Oliveira's saying he feels like he didn't learn any lesson

because he didn't go back and watch the fight against Makachev. Just gives me the wrong... I didn't like what he was saying. For that reason, give me Dariush. All right, Luke, I'm going to go to my favorite, and I'm going to go over to top-ranked rank boxing here and this must see uh sorry not lightweight 140 pound title bout Josh Taylor is a minus 210 favorite against Teofimo Lopez Luke we laid out the reasons earlier but uh I think this is Josh Taylor's fight this is a tough style matchup for Teo

there's a lot of questions mentally and I think even physically to some degree I don't when I say the power potentially not carrying up it's only five pounds more I think he can hurt you and get people out of here at 140 I just don't think some of these surprise shots have the same ridiculously explosive thudding impact as they did at 135 um it look if things go bad for Teo is he going to be willing to fight his way through it like you did against Cambosis for Tao, is he going to be willing to fight his way through it? Like you did against Cambosis. Yeah.

I think he's going to be willing to go out and sort if he has to, but you are seeing a lot of people starting to go, look, I love this fight, but if this fight, the heat turns up, this could be a Josh Taylor stoppage late. I'm going to take Taylor to win here as the favorite. Um, but I do think this could, we could really be surprised either way with both coming off some questionable performances in that 16-month layoff. But the safer bet really is Josh Taylor here. I'm looking forward to it.

Luke, let's hear about your underdog. All right. For my underdog pick on this one, BC, you went to a different place. I actually like your pick a lot. But for me, it's a slight underdog. I think our friends at Caesars currently, let's's see they've got him as a plus 135 his opponent at one minus 160 i'm gonna say chris curtis i'm gonna go my underdog chris curtis i mentioned very slight underdog at plus 135 not a substantial one um chris curtis as we know slow

starter does a lot of body work and i really wonder whether or not that's going to be enough to get the job done however uh extreme couture fighters have some experience against Imavov. Chris Curtis is an accurate puncher. Imavov is very, very good and athletic, but I think can sometimes get a little undisciplined as the fight goes on. So it's a close one and you can just see a scenario where Curtis builds right up to a little too late. You know, you can get to that point or gets out in front of his skis too early and then just doesn't get the calibration right. There is a bit of a Goldilocks problem

that he is typically trying to solve. Nevertheless, for these odds and for this exercise, I think there's reason to think he could get it done. Give me Chris Curtis. Okay, that's a very good fight. Middleweight tilt. That is the preliminary card featured about on ESPN and ESPN Plus.

One of the better highlights on a very weak card. Let's go to my underdog. And look, I'm staying in that co-main event. You pick Benil Darius, who is a minus 150 favorite at UFC 289. I'm going to go with Charles Oliveira here at plus 125. I hear what you're saying about the whole idea of I'm not going to rewatch that fight because that was one bad night at the office. Look, sometimes they do have to talk themselves into it as fighters

to reinvent sort of this, you know, puff back up the balloon of invincibility. If that's what Charles Oliveira needs to do to forget that and get back to the ways that he was, is that going to be enough? Here's the thing, though, Luke. Darius is not Islam Mahachev. There are some similarities in some key categories, especially intangibly but charles oliveira is that dude and i have seen an intense level of motivation and focus and desire in almost a make or break fight type of thing for him not that a loss here would retire him or take him out of you know getting big fights but just the idea of he really does feel that that was an aberration so he is motivated as shit to hold his place in the title picture

and potentially secure a title rematch if it goes that way here. I'm going to give Charles Oliveira that chance. He's got three rounds to do it as opposed to five, which means he can take chances and ramp it up. But he has the ability to create finishes out of nowhere, to hit you with the kind of shots you don't see coming out of nowhere and has no problem being in the fire. So even if their use is able to use some kind of clean counter shots to gain some edge early and use that physicality to keep the fight from going to the ground i still

like what oliveira can do here luke i just wonder if this fight does go to the ground and what that looks like because darius has used this week to tell everybody, I think I'm a better grappler than Dobroks. Luke, I'm picking Oliveira to win, but what do you think about that ground side of it in the comments from Darius? I think, I mean, dude, in pure jiu-jitsu, he went a lot further. Like, this is, you get back to one of these situations where it's like Verdum versus Noguera, when Noguera kind of made a name for himself

as like a submission oriented guy in MMA before Verdum really had in part because Verdum was still competing in pro jiu-jitsu and then also um he just you know hadn't really earned that reputation in a similar way and then they locked horns and then you saw what happened now I don't think the difference between Verdum and Noguera is as pronounced as the one between Darius and Oliveira far from it but we just saw what happened in Oliveira dude let me ask you what happened in his last fight what happened to Oliveira in his last fight he got submitted now he got knocked down from a punch and then he got hit on the ground that forced him to go this way so he ended up giving it to him but we're talking about someone

like a Sambist in this particular case Islam Makachev able to use some of those things to score a victory on the ground he's been submitted in other ways. Charles Oliveira has very good jiu-jitsu and very offensive jiu-jitsu, but he has a very offensive spirit that just gets him into problems. And a dude like Darius who has very, I want to say this, very technically sound jiu-jitsu, right, certainly at this point. I know he's also been submitted with the whole, my brain is not working.

The Darce. No. He's had submission troubles himself in the UFC as well. I'm going to pull up these names, and it's going to absolutely annoy me that I didn't get them right. But I'm going to say record for record, and in these sort of transition moments and precise like you'll just see Oliveira is like so exciting because he is very technical but he just dude he has a high wire act that he plays

Oliveira doesn't play that high wire act and I think that could get them into trouble yeah I mean this is gonna be a fun fight I think and I just this is Oliveira's like you know don't forget me now type of moment. You know what I mean? I'm not going full Roy Jones on you, but you get my point there. The whole idea of like, remind you who he is. I don't know, Luke, at the end of the day, who do you think stock for stock is the better fighter between the two?

The odds makers like Darius's chances style wise, but I still think Oliveira has ways to dial it up, Luke, and create spectacular moments that even with the stubbornness of Darius, I think he's motivated to do that here. And I still, I mean, I've been doubting him so long, Luke, it's about time I stand by him once, all right? Yeah, listen, I think Oliveira has more offensive ways to win. I think the more complete fighter is Darius.

Yeah, it's going to be interesting. I've loved Benny's story. I love the close-up his wife and children have gotten this week, Luke. I mean, I just see on the embedded when Dobronks came in and was like, you know, being nice to his daughter. There's a lot of Bushido here, Luke, but that's going to turn into violence come Saturday night. What's your over-under, Luke? All right, so over-under, I'll make it very fast. I think this fight will go the distance, the one between Miranda Maverick and Jasmine Jesus-Divisius.

I like that one to go. Luke, you can't pick that unless you're trumping me because that's the exact pick that I gave when I presented to you at like 8.30am this morning to make sure that you didn't double up on me a second or fifth or 77th time my god dude I am absolutely

brain damaged you're going through a rough time right now but if you want to I don't think you should be allowed to take that because I was even questioned while taking that. This feels like a layup. Obviously, there could be a stoppage. Anything could happen in MMA.

But I feel like I should be allowed to pick this because I'm well behind you. You see, I honestly have a brain damage problem because I actually went – golly, dude, I'm so sorry as your broadcast partner to do this two weeks in a row like this. You tell me what you want me to do, dude, because I have messed this up. Golly, golly, golly. I'm'm gonna try to take advantage of you here luke you're gonna have to pick another fight in the moment so why don't you do your pick on this one first and then i'll pick mine how about this feels like a layup i'm taking the over that this goes the three round distance i like this fight i like

miranda maverick's chances better here i think she's more skilled than jasmine jazz davisius this part of the segment we're just telling you if the fight goes the distance or not. Statistically, fights like this go the distance a lot. I think Miranda Maverick gets the win. I think it's competitive. But we're going to go the three rounds. And, Luke, I need this point. I need this point in OK Bet.

And you know that. You know that at the end of the day. OK. I've got my pick now. I apologize to you dude that really is just pathetic it's fine luke you know i want to do better for myself i apologize to you i apologize to the audience bc okay but i can pivot here pretty quickly so we're gonna do over under i'll take the under on dan e gay and nate land where i just don't think it goes the distance

i will assume that that one closes the judges can probably take that night off. They will anyway, because that's who they are. But you know, you get the idea. Well, if Ige ends up getting the win in that Luke, you will get this, not only get the point for picking the over under on that fight, you would get the point in general because my KO or sub, I'm going to jump ahead here, does focus on that fight. Before I give you my answer though, i did catch up with nate the train and the ufc you can listen to that interview in full morning combat excuse me youtube.com

slash morning combat i really enjoyed chatting with him luke he wasn't goofy it was serious as shit but let's listen to a one bit of sound before i give you my pick here i know you know yeah i got catchphrases man the train is train is just, you know, it all comes from, you know, I just run through motherfuckers. I got one gear, that's forward. If I go back, I turn around and steer forward. You know what I mean? It's all forward motion. And, you know, it's crazy because it's like, you know how many times I've heard, we're

going to derail the train. We're going to derail the train. I'm like, come up with something fresh, man. I done heard this shit a thousand times. And I always tell people, you know what happens when a train gets derailed? Everybody dies. So go ahead and derail this train, motherfucker. Luke, I've really liked the close-up Nate's got this week, right?

He's on the countdown and embedded. You see him at the press conference. Nate the Train at the damn press conference. I'm enjoying this shit. He's also coming intense with raising that intensity a lot. This fight's going to be close. It's going to be wild. You have picked that.

It goes the under, but I am picking a submission and land where versus EGA. And if it's land, where Lou, that would also give me the point. I guess that would make it a push, though, right? So you would get the point if Ige gets the finish. You would get the point clean and clear. We'll find out what

happens. What's your KO or sub? So for KO or sub, I'm going to say it ends in KO between Marc-Andre Berrio and ya boy, Eric Anders. I feel like both those guys just kind of fight balls out a little bit. And you know, they are heavy hitters

they're good athletes and that just is not a recipe typically typically for the distance so give me the uh ko for those two now there's really sort of a submission heavy guy for the most part all right i'd like to make a run and dip you know chip away into your lead luke so hopefully this is the week okay thank you very much you much. You're going to go see Vomitorium with me. That's what that's going to be. Hell no. We close with a little bit of accountability, Luke. Every Friday we offer you that email address,

morningcombat at gmail.com to send in, you know, if we said some shit wrong factually, or maybe we just shouldn't have said what we said at all. It's your chance to dunk on us and we got to take the L if it's true. It's called dead wrong. Yeah, hee-haw and shit, yeah.

Oh, oh, God. Luke, dead wrong number one comes to us from Daz. He lives in Hawaii. He says, Aloha, Donks, in episode 450 at about 12 minutes and 23 seconds. BC mentions Dana's previous irritation at Amanda Nunes for pulling out of her fight with Valentina at UFC 213 due to a weight miss. However, BC's recollection of a weight miss was incorrect. Amanda actually pulled out due to a chronic sinus infection. That made Dana even

more irritated because Amanda pulled out after being medically cleared to fight. Looking forward to more great in-studio shows and RSDs, both 1 and 2.0. Mahalo. It's Daz. Luke, I will take that L. I don't remember it being a sinus infection. I did say she missed weight. What I was referring to was the weight debacle, meaning I thought, and I'm wrong here apparently, I thought she was having trouble making weight and was hospitalized. It was sinusitis. But apparently I'm wrong. It didn't have anything to do with the weight, right?

It was sinusitis, remember? Mikey and I were talking about it because I actually got it last week. Dude, it was awful. It sucked. I had discharge coming out of my nose that was like not mucus, bro. It was something else, and it was terrible. It was newer train aids, Luke, unfortunately, but there you go. Daz, I will take that L.

I did misremember it. Dana said she would never be in a main event again, and here we are. All right, let's go over to Gary. He says on Monday's episode, BC with the BDE and CTE might have been on some CDB when he said that Jim Miller's opponent, Jesse Butler, was, quote, hung and youngry instead of young and hungry has he seen jesse butler's only pipes or maybe bc was just hunkering for a big old gas station hot dog either way love you guys listening to you helps me get through those four hour long picketing shifts thanks from gary a striking writer luca

hollywood striking writer wrote in. He did. Unless he writes for like, you know, somewhere else, Luke. Give me the top five list of males who are hung and younger. I mean, that's the thing, Luke. Was I actually wrong, right? Or did I mean to say? No, that was an accident.

It's a hilarious accident. You're like Patrick Ewing. Rockers of Freddy. Did you see that video about patrick they said he used to tape it down luke yeah apparently he had a hog so enormous he had to tape it to his leg during games which is that's just hall of fame hog right there that's that's first ballot okay speaking of hall of fame hogs stop me if you've heard this before have i told you the cliff robinson story. In the locker room? Yes. Yes.

All right. It was a good story. Should I tell it again, Luke? I don't know. Probably not. I don't know if you should be telling stories about wanton sexual harassment in the workplace. Especially of the, don't speak ill of the dead, Luke. RIP Cliff Robinson, former Survivor contestant, just the same Luke, was voted off the island

of Survivor. But finally from Colton, on Friday's show, BC said that, I did, I got this wrong big time and I apologize. He said, I said that Clarissa Shields' previous opponent was Franchon Cruz that had tested positive for PEDs and had dropped out of their fight, forcing Maricela Cornejo a week ago to fill in last minute. Luke, it was actually Hannah Gabriels and I effed that up

and I knew better, and I apologize. But we didn't cover the post-fight, but Clarissa defeated Cornejo, dominated her, Luke, like dominant. Didn't get the stoppage, so I lost an okay bet, but snapped her head back like 54 times, the pound-for-pound queen. You know, she is, right, Luke, with the loss to Katie Taylor? Would you say the pound-for-pound queen is Clarissa Shields again? I guess it is. I guess it is, right? Luke, with the loss to Katie Taylor, would you say the pound-for-pound queen is Clarissa Shields again? I guess it is.

I guess it is, yeah. I saw some report from someone said Eddie Hearn said that Katie Taylor could be next in a Serrano rematch and then rematch Cameron after that. Would you be better off with that or you don't really care either way? I think they should make the Serrano fight next. I think it's time. And did you see the close here, Luke,

that Samson Lukowicz, the promoter of David Benavidez, gave an interview here at the Hall of Fame to somebody today and said that we could be seeing Benavidez against David Morel this fall because Canelo isn't interested? Dude, would you pop big for that? Yeah. I mean, I'd rather see the Canelo fight, you know, but if Canelo, and he said Canelo and Eddie Reynoso don't't want it so it's like if they don't want it i mean the problem is on that one i mean

david morel jr versus david benavidez is or the battle of davids yeah would be a fantastic fight but i think you were talking about this before the show it's a little unclear about where you put that because benavidez coming off that plant fire, he's a pay-per-view guy now, but Morella's not. But he is an elite talent, and maybe you package that with another fight. We'll see what happens this fall.

Boxing coming your way. Don't miss Showbox tonight, 9 p.m. Eastern on Showtime. You can get 30 days free right now at Showtime.com. Check out your boy, BC. We got interviews with the Hall of Famers. Al Bernstein will be handling that. Can't wait to hear from Tim Bradley, Carl Frotch and all the others. Luke, that's

about it. Mikey, one mile behind the scenes. Thank you very much. You got anything to say, Luke? We wish you and your family peace and happiness this weekend. Thank you very much. I appreciate that. Don't forget, there is a UFC pay-per-view tomorrow night, which means I have got you covered for post-UFC 289 show. Right after the show is over, join me right here,

youtube.com slash morningcombat. We'll have results, analysis, your questions answered, the whole nine yards. Be there. Indeed. Thank you to the fans, viewers, listeners, whatever you are, for standing by us and staying with us. We love you all.

Thank you. Don't steal Luke's organs one day. Great fan subs on wednesday what a time to be alive um you know anything else luke you know anything i'm just hung and youngry that's really just all it is right now just just the youngriest yeah we're out we're out that's it