MORNING KOMBAT WITH LUKE THOMAS AND BRIAN CAMPBELL - UFC 293 Results: Israel Adesanya vs. Sean Strickland | UFC 293 Reaction & Post-Fight Show | MK

Episode Date: September 10, 2023

At UFC 293, Israel Adesanya faces Sean Strickland for the UFC middleweight title. In the co-main event, heavyweights Alexander Volkov and Tai Tuivasa battle. Elsewhere on the ESPN+ pay-per-view main fight card, Manel Kape faces Felipe dos Santos, Justin Tafa will rematch Austen Lane and Tyson Pedro locks horns with Anton Turkalj. This event takes place from Sydney, Australia. This is the UFC 293 Reaction and Post-Fight Show. Morning Kombat is available for free on the Audacy app as well as Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts and wherever else you listen to podcasts.     For more Combat Sports coverage subscribe here: youtube.com/MorningKombat   Follow our hosts on Twitter: @BCampbellCBS, @lthomasnews, @MorningKombat    For Morning Kombat gear visit:morning kombat.store   Follow our hosts on Instagram: @BrianCampbell, @lukethomasnews, @MorningKombat Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Introducing the new McSpicy from McDonald's. It looks like a regular chicken sandwich, but it's actually a spicy chicken sandwich. McSpicy. Consider yourself warned. Limited time only at participating McDonald's in Canada. Oh, buddy. Ha ha. Oh, buddy. What a show. What a show I have today. post-fight show, instant reaction, whatever you'd like to call it. So UFC 293 is in the books.

Surprisingly pretty good card in terms of fun fights, at least the main card. Prelim card, a little less so, but the main card certainly delivered in terms of good action and the main event just ended and woof, there's a lot to get to there.

A lot to get to. Okay, so if you're watching, first of all, thank you so much. I really appreciate it number two give the video a thumbs up if you'd be so kind that'd be awesome and then on top of it what else can we say here hit that subscribe button right it's free doesn't cost you a thing would help us out a lot here alright so all the results all the analysis all the spoilers I have a tweet up right now where you can leave questions we'll get to it well obviously we'll start with the main, all the analysis, all the spoilers. I have a tweet up right now where you can leave questions.

We'll get to it. Well, obviously, we'll start with the main event and then work everything there backwards. But we got a lot to get to. So without further ado, let's get this party started, shall we? Let's go. Let's see here. Oh, for crying out loud. Here we go.

Oh. for crying out loud. Here we go. All right. So let's get to it. Um, where do we go with this one? So let's just read the results and then we will go from there. Um, pretty amazing night, pretty amazing night. You know, I love to read the result, and we'll get to it here. Okay, so in the main event, Sean Strickland defeats Israel Adesanya, Adesanya, whatever, over the course of five rounds. He did it on all three judges' scorecards, 49-46. I had it 48-47 for for Strickland but I thought he was the winner ladies and gentlemen you know listen um a couple things I got to put cards on the table right away you know I've been a long time supporter of the career and the fighting ability of Izzy

and that's one and number two I thought he was going to win and and then three you know when asked like what could Strickland do to win I didn't really I I didn't have a good answer I in fact I couldn't come up with one I didn't think that a guy with the style that he has, which we'll get into in a minute, could win. And it's like, dude, none of that. This was the best Sean Strickland I'd ever seen. By far. By far. Okay. But we got to say something about Sean Strickland. Number one, this was the performance of his lifetime. Not in terms of overwhelming force, although he did rock and drop Izzy and nearly closed the show in the first round. But that's not it.

To me, when Ronda got beat up by Holly, she got overwhelmed and she got finished and was this amazing thing. When Rockhold overcommitted, Bisping caught him and it was this amazing thing. Although, obviously, Rockhold had already fought him before. So there are some meaningful differences. But I have to tell you man this was you know not that there was any like flukiness about the win over with Ronda and Holly but I just want to make this point this was 25 minutes went the full distance right the judges didn't turn in any bullshit

scoring cards like is a 4-1 card for Sean Strickland justified? Yep, sure is. Very justified. Easy to see that one. You may have it slightly different or whatever, but that's not an unfair scorecard. Again, all three of them had it. So the judges didn't mess it up. Okay, so it went the full distance. Judges didn't mess it up. There was no, you know, crazy reffing that either it was a bad stoppage or otherwise intervened and changed the course of everything. Nope. Didn't get any of that, right? So no reffing. And he stood with him the entire 25 minutes. Not one single, I haven't looked at the fight metric data, but from what I know, not a single takedown attempt. Ladies and gentlemen, whatever your preferences as a fan watching, and we've all got them in one direction or the other,

the only thing I think my true North Star in the fight game is just one thing. It's like the right guy should win on fight night. The sport is too dangerous. A lot of these guys are underpaid. Circumst circumstances of getting a title fight or any kind of like opportunity are hard to come by you just want the right guy to win ladies and gentlemen there can just be no debate about it the right guy won the right guy won period no question and he did it with like maximum time on the, not scoreboard, but the clock.

Didn't get some like, oh, it was a short turnaround, three-round fight. Like, you know, there was nothing. There was no fluky circumstance. Took the fight on relatively short notice anyway. Like, this was by far to me, not just because he beat Izzy, but more than that, just actually what he showed was super impressive from Sean Strickland. And he earned this one fair and square. No two ways about it. You have to credit him.

You have to give it up for him as a competitor and what he turned in tonight. And I certainly have every intention of doing that. Dude, he earned it. He earned it. That's all you could ever ask is, did the guy who really deserved to win? And by the way, Izzy wasn't the hometown guy in the sense that he's Kiwi and this was in Australia. But could the judges have had some hometown cooking or be influenced by this, that, and the other? Nope, none of that.

The right guy won. You have to give him his credit. Whatever you think about him as a person, and as a person, you know, I get that a lot of the fans love him. He's not for me. You know, but as a fighter, what did he turn in tonight? He turned in a championship-winning performance over the, at worst, the second-best middleweight of all time and did it in that guy's best domain. I mean, you can't say shit about that. You can't say shit about that. He earned that one

completely. And like I said, dropping him in the first round, dude, I wasn't sure that fight was going to make it out of the first. I was watching that one like, what? What are we? MMA, dude, this is what I'm trying to tell you, man. Certain things will shock me time to time. This was certainly a surprise. I wouldn't call it shocking, although sort of on that, maybe on that one. It's close.

Not quite shocking, but very surprising. Maybe slightly below shocking, but surprising. But, dude, this is MMA. Crazy shit happens all the time. And for guys like Izzy, I tell you what this, I think this win symbolizes for me a little bit. The idea that Izzy has been like completely figured out, I don't think is true. But I do think that Eric Nixick has had some trial and error at this and got this one right. Now, of course, Sean deserves 99.9% of the credit, but I'm saying those two have been together for a long time

and really worked it out. Man, man, there's a lot to say. All right, let me get a swig of this water here because that was crazy. What was different about Sean this time? What was different? A couple of things. One, one of the big takeaways for me from this fight was the cage cutting. If you watch the Pereira fight, he follows him. So wherever

Pereira's going, Shawn's just kind of circling and following him in whatever direction that is. That's not the same as cage cutting, where I'm trying to keep your back pinned or close to the cage, and you can't kind of get out in the exit, get back to the center, get back into the open. He was cage cutting this time. Man, that made a big difference. But the real thing was the pressure game. Izzy usually is able to command more distance between himself and his opponent as a way to, you know, with the feints, with shot selection, whatever.

And so guys are much more hesitant to kind of walk into him. Shawn wasn't. And it was, I can't claim that I saw this coming. I certainly did not. But like having now reviewed the fight, I'm trying to see what he did differently. The cage cutting made a big difference because when you follow, it's much easier to walk into stuff. When you cage cut, they have to be much more defensively aware

of their footwork and where they are and again the first round end of the first round notwithstanding is he had um i mean you know he got hit more in this fight than he did in other ones but i wouldn't call what he had poor defense i mean there was a lot of movement but the point being was he could never get anything going right it's sort like, how do you fight a kicker like Edson Barboza? This is not quite the same, but the point being is you kind of just pressure into him. Now, cage cutting is a little bit different, but you really kind of pressure into him so he can't set. And if he can't set, he can't throw the way that he wants. You got a lot

of that as well. So one, the cage cutting really made Izzy much more defensively back-footed. Like he just had to spend more time doing it. You know, changing directions, changing stances, throwing and then getting out. The other thing that was kind of amazing was Sean's style of like throwing up, like he throws up like a crossing guard at times. Not like this kind of crossing guard, but more like an X. And then kind of catching and rolling away from it. Izzy really had no answer for. There's a lot of the kind of stuff that Izzy does where he'll, even from Southpaw or Orthodox, he'll throw a left hand and then try and come

over with the right. And Sean read it all the time, or was able to roll and get out of the way, but then not so far out of the way where Izzy was off the hook. He could then get right back on him and then pressure him. So he was able to connect with some of the way where Izzy was off the hook. He could then get right back on him and then pressure him. So he was able to connect with some of the leg kicks. I think the second round was maybe Izzy's best round. The rhythm disruption leg kicks where he's kind of adding up. He backs a guy up with something else. And as soon as they move into him, he tags him with a leg kick.

You saw a lot of that. But dude, I will tell you what. Izzy was throwing a lot of looping shots, man. A lot of looping shots. He. A lot of looping shots. He wasn't throwing stuff down the middle. You know who was throwing stuff down the middle? Sean Strickland. Sean Strickland was happy to throw stuff, linear shots, right down the middle.

And dude, that was connecting. His jab was one of his best punches. Dude, the two best punches, this is true. Now that right hand, okay, the right hand at the end of the first was good for Sean Strickland. But I'm talking over the full 25 minutes. What were the two best punches, the two type of punches that were the best for Sean Strickland? His jab, let me move this, his jab and his left hook, right? And the left hook is able to land in part because Izzy wasn't moving out of the way,

but also because there's this linear punch coming around, and now Izzy's kind of confused about what look he's getting from this shoulder about what Shawn's doing. So, dude, it's like, it was incredible to watch that this guy was using much more of a basic style of striking, but patient, cornering this guy. Now, he was giving away, earlier in the fight anyway, he was giving away longer stretches of the fight, which is why Nixick was kind of on him with that 90 second, like, let's go, let's do something with this. But at the same time, he was hurrying Izzy. Izzy couldn't set, Izzy couldn't get anything going. And I will tell you what, man,

it looked to me like he just was out of ideas. He couldn't find Sean. Sean also, how about this about Sean Strickland, dude? So Sean Strickland was the one landing the linear shots up the middle and then the left hook when Izzy wouldn't move his head and all kinds of stuff like that at the end. But the other part too was how good was Sean at kind of rolling and catching and kind of blocking shots and then Izzy couldn't really find him. That was the other part. It wasn't like it was a back and forth battle. Where both guys were landing heavy shots. And it was this war of attrition.

I mean they were throwing a lot. And a lot of it by the way that Sean threw didn't land on Izzy either. But as the fight wore on. I thought he had taken. By the third round on he had kind of taken it. Maybe you could say Izzy took the fourth, depending on your scorecard. Again, the judges didn't see it that way. But the point I'm trying to make is, dude, his ability to roll, catch, not so much slip, but kind of just absorb out of the

way, catching, blocking, moving out of the way. And Izzy had absolutely no answer for it whatsoever. And then he would throw the looping shots and you would see Sean kind of get out of the way, and Izzy had absolutely no answer for it whatsoever. And then he would throw the looping shots, and you would see Sean kind of get out of the way and catch it and roll with it. Dude, he was just better. He was just matter-of-factly better. And you had Izzy going in as what? What did they say on the broadcast? A minus 675 favorite?

A minus 675 favorite? I mean, just bonkers. You know? So, I mean, he was better basically everywhere. I mean, he didn't wrestle, so he didn't get the full sense of the game, but you know, whatever. Irrelevant. On the

feet, Izzy has this kind of thing where he backs people up, he hits them with the leg kick. You know, he gets them one thing that Izzy got that Sean just usually gets got that Sean just, or usually gets, that Sean just would not give him is Izzy gets guys to be deferential to him, right? Ooh, I don't want to get too close. I don't want to make a mistake, blah, blah, blah. I'm going to stay out here and I might eat a leg kick or not. Kind of like what Yoel Romero would do. You know, Rob Whitaker,

not so much because Rob comes charging in a little bit on that jab but um yeah he gets some deferential sean was just not deferential and wouldn't he would kind of bite on the feints a little bit but then izzy was fainting more than he was throwing um and so by the time he was throwing he was predictable and. And then Sean could see it coming, block and get out of the way. They're looping shots. They're not straight to the target. Dude, he gave it to him. He beat him. I mean, he beat him fair and absolutely

square. Make no mistake about it. Not a damn thing fluky about it. Izzy was out of ideas. He was out of space. And by the time the fight was over, he was out of time. was out of space and by the time the fight was over he was out of time and and honestly if that fight had I mean you see Sean at the end of the fight he was like going bananas cuz he knew he knew

he had him beat and in between rounds standing not sitting look at the look at the energy in the corner of of Izzy Eugene Berman. It was kind of like, you know, a little bit more, blah, blah, blah. And in the corner of Nixick and Shawn, it was like, let's go. You can do this, blah, blah, blah. There was just this complete difference between them. I'm not going to say, maybe you believe it is. It's hard to ever, ever know who wanted it more. But Shawn wanted it badly, badly.

And, dude, he even admitted walking into the cage, or I'm sorry, he even said after the fight that, you know, all fight week, he kind of walked into the ground, he was kind of doubting himself. Look at the face-offs. They weren't, he wouldn't even make eye contact with Izzy. Barely, barely. And then kind of like deflecting with jokes. He admitted he was a little bit shook, you know? But then that first round cracks him with a right hand. And what was Izzy doing when he got hit with the right hand? Coming with a wide shot. Right?

Coming with a wide shot. Trying to come around. And Sean was just like, nope, bop, bop. One, two. Hit him right down the middle. Crushed him. Crushed him. Absolutely crushed him with it.

I will say, remarkable, you got to give him credit for where the credit is due, remarkable resilience by Izzy to stand up and then even tell Mark Goddard, you can go back and hear it, that he was fine, and then, you know, to make it out of the round, because Shawn was unloading on him in that moment. I want to get some of these fight metric numbers up, because, man, people are asking, like, you know, where does that rank among upsets? That's a huge fucking upset. Huge fucking upset. But like I said, if you're a Sean Strickland fan or whoever, there's just no denying, dude, he, I mean, like, you know, I mean, he was better.

He was just matter-of-factly better. All right, let's take a look at some of these numbers, because this is, to me, what's going to tell the story here a little bit. All right. I mean, dude, listen, look at this shit. Look at this. I can't throw it to you. Listen to this scoring line.

This is crazy. If I told you that one fighter was going to have a knockdown in this fight before it was over, would you have said it was going to be only Sean Strickland? Sean Strickland, credited with a knockdown. Izzy, not. Izzy landed 94 significant strikes. Sean Strickland, 137. Dude, let's look at the other five-round fights this guy has been in.

Okay? Izzy, in five-round fights. Okay. Izzy in five round fights. Izzy in five round fights. Okay. So he landed 94 significant strikes after 25 minutes. Okay. Against Pareda, which did not go the full five. He was at 86.

But of course, Pareda was at 91. But for ones that went the distance. So Kananir went the distance. Izzy was at 116. Whitaker went the distance. Only 79. Whitaker was was at 91. But for ones that went the distance. So, Cannoneer went the distance. Izzy was at 116. Whitaker went the distance. Only 79. Whitaker was just at 59. Jesus, that was not a lot.

Marvin Vittori, 96. Yeah, I mean, but I've never seen numbers like this. I've never seen someone have 137 and Izzy at 94. Matter of factly, qualitatively outstruck, numerically outstruck. Okay, let's look at some of the other numbers. Sean Strickland's significant strikes of his total strike percentage, 52 for Izzy, just 34. Holy shit. Holy shit. And then total strikes attempted, actually Izzy attempted more, 271 to Sean's 259, But look at how totally inefficient he was. Let's look at the targeting percentage.

This one makes a lot more sense. This one's not super surprising. Head strikes. And this is going to be a big reason why he won. Izzy, he targeted the head 23% of the time. Sean Strickland, 62. 62, more than double. Body was not too different.

40% for Izzy, 32 for Sean Strickland, and then 36 to the leg, 5%. Let's talk about the leg kicks. The leg kicks are often, for Izzy, the difference maker. It was the difference maker, for example, in the Yoel Romero fight. Even if you can't quite get the hands going, usually the kicks do a lot.

They land, so they add up, so whatever total offense is in the round, a lot of times he's usually landing with impunity or very frequently, so they add up for a lot. They land so they add up. So like whatever total offense is in the round, a lot of times he's usually landing with impunity or very frequently. So they add up for a lot and then they usually deter guys or they make them switch things up or whatever. Dude, they didn't do shit to Sean Strickland. They didn't do shit. Did he ever slow down once with his cage cutting? Did he ever slow down with his cornering footwork? There were times he might have been backed up. You know, again, it's a fist fight. Guys are going to, you know, each side is going to give and take.

Even if it's semi, in this particular case, kind of one-sided. I mean, every round was close, but kind of one-sided. Except for the first round. First round could have been a 10-8 too, by the way. First round could have been a 10-8. Yeah, in fact, was it 49-46 on all three? Or was it 49-46 on all three? Or was it 49-47?

Let me go back to my... Because then it was a 10-8. Hold on. Let me see here. 49-46. So no, there was no 10-8s. I apologize. Anyway, the point I'm trying to make is those leg kicks are huge for Izzy. Huge.

But here, against Sean, Sean kind of lifting, kind of walking, but not walking too far, right? When you're going against Pareda and you're just pushing into him, pushing into him, pushing into him, he's jabbing to the body, jabbing to the body, he's leg kicking, turning and you're following. You're just walking into shit.

He didn't walk into shit this time. He walked right up to it and then no further. And then when Izzy's doing all of his stuff and then coming wide, time he walked right up to it and then no further and then when Izzy's doing all of his stuff and then coming wide he's going right up the middle dude he just walked him down patient with range didn't rush anything waited for the guy to throw you know typically there was a couple times he was you know he was biting and moving or whatever but not not not in not enough for the champ champ, anyway, to land. And so then he comes around and pops him.

He just was on. He just was on. Beat his ass. I mean, it is what it is. You can like these facts or you can hate these facts, but they're facts. They're facts. Mmm. I just didn't see it coming I just didn't see it coming.

Just didn't see it coming. Can't sit here and pretend that I did. Can't sit here and pretend for two seconds that I thought over the course of five, maybe for a round or two or something like that, that I thought he could do it. But not for five. Not for five rounds. He was basically better except for the second round. It was a good rally round for Izzy. And then that's about it.

Let me take a look at those second round numbers. Yeah. Dude, listen to these. A fourth? No, Izzy didn't win the fourth. What am I even saying? Fourth round. Listen to these numbers.

38 for Strickland. Just 20 for Izzy. Most of those being leg kicks anyway, right? How many leg kicks did he land in the fourth? Yeah, he attempted six. Fifth round, 36 to 21. And then the first round, 27 to 12. Bare minimum, bare minimum, the lowest scorecard you could come up with is 48-47. That's the lowest for Sean Strickland. There is no case for Izzy. There is no, well, what about 48-47?

What about that? No, it doesn't exist. There's no, there is, you cannot find three rounds for him. You can find one round and you could maybe squint and find two. That's it. You cannot find one round and you could maybe squint and find two. That's it. You cannot find three. And again, you could also argue, it would be hard to argue a 10-8 round one, but you get my point. The dominance was just basically all in one direction, dude. Sean Strickland had the performance of a lifetime. And I got a little bit of pushback, I think on,

what was it, Friday's show when I said that Eric Nixick is one of the greatest coaches in MMA history, I don't know why that's controversial to some people. You're like, oh, well, it's premature. Well, let's see what he did. Now he's got two champions that have come through his tutelage. One guy, Sean Strickland,

he's been with for a long time, Francis, left MMA Factory, came to him and became a UFC champion as well. I seriously doubt this is the last champion that he ever has. And for folks who don't realize what happened before Nixick got there, Extreme Couture was in dire straits. It had a big roar of popularity when Randy first established it and blah, blah, blah. But then the gym kind of fell on hard times.

A lot of fighters left. They weren't really known for having anybody big. And under, it's not just Nixickick of course but uh under his leadership and his time and effort that gym has come fucking roaring roaring back roaring back and is he you know to the point of what uh strickland himself said has beaten a few of his friends and you know was kind of in his head but look at what they were able to turn in tonight. Dude, that's a chance. This is a team that, like, they don't win championships by accident. They don't luck their way into belts. You know what I mean?

They don't get gifted this shit. It doesn't just fall in their lap. They go out there and grind their way into getting it, and they have a consistent level of excellence throughout it. Again, I know there's other coaches, and there's lots of other guys there. It's not just him. And on some level, anyone who works with them, they all deserve credit. But the number of coaches in MMA that ever even get to a UFC title fight, you can count very few. And however many it has champions, however many have multiple champions. Now, I know there was a time when AKA had three

champions at once. I mean, that's going to be tough to beat, but okay. No one's taking away Javier Mendez's place. You know, if you can take a program that was like failing basically as a gym program, turn it into one of the best gyms in the world and create two UFC champions and, and several other highly ranked fighters, some of which are homegrown, some of which are recruited, but nevertheless, a consistent level of excellence. Dude, you're doing something that a handful of coaches in MMA history have ever done. Put some fucking respect on Eric Nixick's name if that statement to you was in any way controversial, because it shouldn't be. It shouldn't be. He's a fantastic coach.

And whatever my, like, you know, I'm not part of the Sean Strickland fan club, but whatever my reservations there, I've always heaped praise on Eric Nixick. Dude, I know Eric Nixick well. I talk to him all the time. I've been able to pick his brain. You're just dealing with a different level of operator there. You're dealing with a very different level of operator there. What was the record tonight for CKB? Was it like two and four? Or three and three? I think it was like 2-4. For who won tonight. Let's see. Let's go through this here very quickly.

Kevin Jussette won. So that's 1. Shane Young lost. That's 1-1. Blood Diamond lost. 1-2. Let's see. Jack Jenkins lost. So that'd be 1-3. Olberg won. So that'd be 2-3. Or no, I don't think

Jack Jenkins is, but then Tyson Pedro? No, Tyson Pedro? Is he? I think he is. So maybe they're, yeah, so wait. So, or is Kevin Jusset, is he with City Kibbe? I know he's, like, adopted Kiwi. Oh yeah, he's City Kickboxing, yeah. So maybe 3-3? I'm not sure. Nevertheless,

you know, tough night. Tough night at the office for them, especially with their biggest star losing there in that way. Everyone's end comes, and sometimes it's by the... The only part I got right was the only part, which is this small. The only part I got right was the general disclaimer that in title fights, the guy I couldn't think of, I did a live chat last week. I couldn't remember his name. It was Tim Elliott. Now, Tim Elliott did not beat Demetrius Johnson,

and it was a bit of a weight bully issue there. Nevertheless, you're like, oh, what's Tim Elliott going to do to Demetrius Johnson? Dude, he gave him a tough fight. He gave him a very tough fight. People always think that there's this destined contender who's going to rise up and wins. And sometimes that's true, right? I remember when St. Pierre made his, um, fought Matt Hughes and lost the first time. And then, you know, but he had already beaten Caro and I think he beat after that, or even around that time he beat Jay Huron and like Dave Strasser and all this shit. And he's rising. Yeah. And then when he beat Frank Trigg, you're like, ooh, Matt Hughes might be in trouble now. You could see that coming.

But a lot of times, that's not the way it goes. It's the same kind of situation with Shevchenko. Dude, there's a lot of tape on Izzy at this point, and a lot of his feinting game, it hasn't, not that it hasn't changed, obviously it slightly alters over time, but guys have picked up on a lot of the different stuff that he does to get you off, to change angles,

the shot selection that comes with it, the question mark kicks and all this stuff. The setups for this, a lot of it is much more readable than it once was. And Nixick having a couple goes at this got much better at reading it. Sean Strickland, much better at prepping for it and practicing for it. And it worked.

It worked. It worked beautifully. It all worked. So this idea like, well, could Izzy get a rematch? We'll talk about that in a second. Could he go to 205? One issue I think he's facing is that the unpredictability of what his striking game used to represent has plummeted.

It's not what it once was. And, you know, when guys go after him like Pineda or Brunson or Gastelum, they're more hittable. Or Costa, like they're more hittable. But when you're reserved and you're backing a guy up and you're not throwing and you're putting pressure on him and you're making him move and he can't settle and he can't throw and then some of his reads and some of his options are much more diagnosable. Brand new ballgame.

Brand new ballgame. And Sean cleaning up the stuff that got him into trouble previously. Remember, there's kind of two guys he can be. He can kind of be the backwards guy. He's not very offensively potent. And he can be the come forward guy. He was able to be the come forward guy and more offensively potent. But he threaded a needle by not making some of those previous mistakes of not cage cutting.

Of walking into range at times. Like bullying guys in that way. A couple more aspects about this. The Submission Radio boys asked me if there were any advantages that Sean had had. And one thing that they had said that Eugene Behrman had pointed out was like, you know, this guy fought recently. That Abus Magomedov fight, and I did say this on the MK293 pregame special. Dude, that was a tune-up fight.

That was a tune-up fight. Spence Crawford, Tank Garcia. In both cases, the guys who won, respectively, Spence and Tank, the one difference, there's many, but one of the big differences between them and their opponents was you had the Avedisian fight as a tune-up fight for Crawford and then you had the Hector Garcia fight that he had here in DC before taking on Ryan Garcia they got tune-up fights and they were much fresher and they were much more ready dude look at what he got everyone was clowning that fight because he got all should

this be a UFC main event no it shouldn't be a UFC main event. You know, and Shawn fighting in the apex forever. Like, okay, all that stuff. But that's not what we're talking about in this context. What purpose did that fight serve for Shawn? He was able to take a UFC fight, had to weather an early storm against that guy, got to walk him down. And it was a guy that was was relative to Shawn's skill level, very beatable.

Dude, that's a tune-up fight. He got a tune-up fight. I mean, that's not what they called it. That's not what it was designed to be. You don't really get tune-up fights in the UFC by matchmaking design, but he got one. Look what good it did. It made this guy so much readier than maybe he would have otherwise been. Certainly, he looked very ready to me.

So, you know, people can laugh like, oh, what was the value of that win? That guy shouldn't have been in the main event. Not that anyone was like clowning Sean for it, but like, oh, the win didn't mean anything. Bullshit. That win was super valuable. Super valuable. All the sparring that goes with it, then getting ready, getting to get a little bit of the test, but it's very beatable. And you get to work it all out. Now, Magomedov doesn't fight like Izzy, so you have to make some of those changes there. But staying fresh, staying ready, making the walk the whole nine yards, and getting a relatively beatable guy. Dude, you just don't get opportunities like that.

You don't get opportunities like that. You really don't. So, pretty impressive. Pretty goddamn impressive. Now, the folks had asked me on my live chat, is there going to be a rematch? I don't know. I will tell you candidly, even as someone like me who's been an Izzy fan of his game for a long time, I don't think he's entitled to one. I don't. He got beat fair and square. And this is what, two losses in the last three fights? No, I don't think he's entitled to one. That, of course, does not mean he won't get one. That in no way means that. They absolutely might do that because Izzy versus Drickus is going to be, you know, a lot bigger

than Sean Strickland versus Drickus. It just is, you know, I mean, I don't think I have to tell you all that, you know, that win that Izzy had over Pareda, the redemptive one, I was like, oh, that sent him into a new atmosphere. And, you know, the Drickus one was going to be the one you thought was going to like make all the sense. It just wouldn't be as big, you know, the Drickus one was going to be the one you thought was going to make all the sense. It just wouldn't be as big, you know, Sean Strickland. So, I have a feeling that they're going to maybe run this one back. I don't know. Unless Izzy goes to 205 right away or something. I don't know.

I don't know how that's going to go. But the rematch or no rematch will be interesting here. Also, it will be, I think the UFC might, I think there's going to be Sean Strickland fans who are very happy, obviously. But then there's a question of should they have done the Drickus fight? Like, should they have, like, if you were going to have Izzy lose, did you want to lose in a bigger fight that you could have made this all-African storyline or whatever? Your mileage may vary on that one, but this is certainly one of the biggest upsets in UFC history. So no matter one's other preference, it feels like the Dracus-Izzy fight, you could still do it, but it probably went up in smoke. Because I suspect, even though I do not,

I think if you lose two title fights in three goes, you're not entitled to a rematch. That's just my personal opinion. But I think they probably are going to run this one back unless he's going to 205 or unless he's got other designs. But, man, man, man. What a win for Sean Strickland tonight. God damn.

Took away the leg kicks, caught, rolled, blocked the vast majority of what he threw, dropped him in the first, nearly finished him, and outstruck him in the final three. Fucking A. Fucking A, dude. What are you going to say? What are you going to say? He did it Absolutely Fairly

Squarely Deserving to hoist the belt tonight No doubt about it How old is Sean Strickland I think he's older than Izzy If I'm not mistaken He's much younger What am I saying

32 So yeah He had losses last year to Jared Cannoneer So he's, no, much younger. What am I saying? 32. So, yeah. Man, he had losses last year to Jared Cannoneer. He got knocked out by Pineda. And, you know, he's got a stoppage. These are the losses that he's got. He's got a loss to Santiago Ponzinibbio. Sean Strickland does.

He's got a loss to Kamaru Usman. I was there for that one, right? I think I was there for that. No, not for that one. Right? I think I was there for that. No, not for that one. Elizu Zaleski Dos Santos stopped him. And then he beat Jack Hermanson via split. Pareda knocked him out. And then Kananir beat him.

It's like, you know, I guess Pareda has the win over Izzy. But then Izzy knocked him out. And the rest of those guys are all welterweights. You know? Sometimes it's the one you see coming and sometimes it isn't, man. It's just that MMA, these guys at 32, I think I misunderstood. I thought Sean was much older than that.

At 32, that's when you're really becoming and moving into your own that way. Everything's beginning to gel. And for a guy who spars a lot of rounds, for a guy who, you know, tries to stay reasonably active, everything worked for him, just about everything worked for him tonight.

Let me look at his defensive performance. I want to see some of that for Sean Strickland. Oh, man. Yeah, dude, is he, couldn't land shit on him, man. Unbelievable. Sean Strickland, 11 of 14 strikes in the clinch. Just 7 of 11 leg kicks. 34 for Izzy. 34 total leg kicks. But listen to this difference. 22 punches or strikes landed to the head. Most of those are going to be punches for Izzy. 85 for Sean Strickland. 85. 85. I just thought Izzy looked like he was out of ideas. All of the tricks he uses, all of the shoulder feints and hip feints

and everything, most of those, not most of those, many of those he couldn't really get going because he was under pressure to move. So that was part of it. And like I said, man, he's been around a long time. Look how many times I've broken down his game. Look how many times other people have broken down his game. You don't think those guys over Extreme Couture haven't done that? They've done that. And there's a lot of tape on him and that shit doesn't work like it used to, man. And that is the nature of the fight game. There's nothing ignoble about that. It happens for everyone. If Sean ends up winning and defending this title, he didn't win it, but I'm saying he ends up defending the title many times, that day will come for him too. And it will come for the one who replaces him and replaces him and replaces him and replaces him.

This is the inevitable cycle of the fight game. The question is only when will it catch up to someone? Will it catch up to them at what year and what fight and blah, blah, blah? That's the only really part that you have a difficulty kind of deciphering. But it happened here tonight in Australia. It happened to Izzy. He didn't look to me like he wasn't ready. He didn't look to me like he wasn't focused. Maybe he's got some injury that we don't know about or something. I don't know.

I don't know. But you've got to give Sean his flowers as a competitor. You don't have to give him his flowers as a person if you don't want to, or you know, whatever your choice. I'm not making any commentary about that because I feel like it'd be a distraction. I'm not making that, but I am, I'm just trying to say as a fighter, as a fighter, as a competitor, you simply have to give him his flowers tonight. You have to, he has, there can just be, it's not ambiguous. There's nothing like, how do we feel about all of this? Like there's no, he did it. He did it in dramatic and important and frankly, historic fashion. Boy, what is it about Australia

forcing huge UFC upsets, Ronda and, um, and Holly. and now this one. Different kinds of upsets, but upsets dramatic just the same. Australia, the land where the golden children go to die, right? I mean, if you are a UFC star and you want to defend your title in Australia, boy, you do so at your own peril. I think the Rousey fight was in Melbourne, maybe? I don't think it was Sydney. Was it in Sydney? It might have been Sydney. Now I need to look. Hold on. Let's see. Just to double check. I'm sure you guys know that off the top of your head very quickly. And then we'll move on to some other details here. Yeah, that loss to Holly Holm, UFC 193 was in the Etihad Stadium in Melbourne.

Yeah, Melbourne. It doesn't matter where you are in Australia. It's where the golden children get slaughtered. They get slaughtered there. Pretty remarkable. People have asked, is it the biggest upset in UFC history? By the odds, it would not be, certainly. That one would be bigger. This other one. There's been some other ones that I think that might be bigger as well. But this is... I mean, to go into a fight where you're a plus 400

underdog, your competitors nearly minus 700, you traveled all the way across the earth on short notice against a guy your own coach had failed against any previous time that one of his fighters had gone up against him. And you even admitted that you were doubting yourself and your chances about this to then go and then outperform that guy against all those circumstances without shooting a single takedown.

We went over this 25 minutes, blah, blah, blah. That's just one of the most impressive exchanging of the titles that I've ever seen. Not in terms of like, oh my God, he went in there and just beat the shit out of him and showed how superior he was and it was his passing of the torch. But given all of that uphill climbing he had to do, including right here, including right here in his head, for the people who will listen to this on the audio podcast platform later, through all of that, and he still was better in four or five rounds. You just, if you watch MMA long enough, dude, you see so much competitive injustice, right? People not getting opportunities or they get opportunities and someone else fucks them or, you know, whatever. How many times, how much fuckery is there in the fight game where things are just,

they don't go someone's way and they're not destined for greatness and they're never this, that, and the other. And then to competitively win all of this the way that he did up against it, even though, yes, I know that the Aussies had kind of treated him like the hometown favorite. I understand that.

So the wind was at his back in certain ways. But for all the other parts of this, the competitive task that he and his team had was extraordinary. And they passed it A-plus or at the worst, A-minus, you know. He earned it. Sean Strickland is your UFC middleweight champion and one of the most historic upsets in UFC history and there's not a damn thing fluky about it. And that's just the reality. Pretty amazing. Now I've asked for questions on Twitter. So we'll get to those here in just a minute. Let me do this very quickly. All right, so then let's switch here just a second. Let's do, if we can, nope, not that one.

Sorry, boys and girls. Let's do this one. Quickly, let's talk about the co-main, because I want to get to your questions. But let's get to these results here, if we can, at UFC 293. Your co-main event, Alexander Volkov defeating Taito Iwasa.

He does so at 437 of round two, via Ezekiel choke. Alright. So here is the difference, as far as i could tell volkov's again linear punches volkov's jab was dynamite his flurrying at uh as the round wore on was even better his lead leg is so crafty where he's able to like inside cut kick then go high inside outside leg kick go to the body like he's just you know constant disruption constant landing keeping you at range keeping you defensively transferring like all kinds of stuff very very gifted with that and he was we I knew he was going to be technically superior to Ty but the question was could Ty keep up long enough to to have superior speed and power and explosivity to maybe close

that gap a little bit? And the answer was pretty clearly no. Now, I was pretty impressed with Tai's leg kicks. Those were damaging. And you could see that Volkov was wearing it for a little while. But I will tell you that the big thing to me is look how much Tai Tuivasa got his timing split. Right? So you're moving. You guys know I do this all the time. You're moving like this. You're constantly doing this. And then someone catches you in between.

So you would see Tui Vasa try and set this up and then come leaping in. And then you'd see Volkov just hit him. Hit him with a shot coming in. And it would stop it or impact it or just nullify it or whatever, and then sometimes it would drop him. In fact, I think the final time he did get dropped was from that. It's because he was predictable. He could be read.

And Volkov just was like waiting, waiting, waiting, go. Right? So to me, it was like the devil was in the details on the setups. The distance closing of Tuivasa was way too readable. And then even with it, he just wasn't employing defense. If you're going to leg kick, you've got to really get off and get your head off the center line. He wasn't really doing a lot of that. So he was kind of eating punishment even when he was delivering.

Don't get me wrong. Tuivasa was delivering with those leg kicks some good punishment, especially at the early parts of round two. You could tell Volkov was hurting a little bit. He was kind of trying to shake it out and ollie shuffle a little bit. So there was those moments. But the technical details of distance closing, of finding that range, which is not easy against a 6'7 guy with a long reach. I'm not making it to be like some simple task. But what we were looking for out of this fight, what we were looking for was an opportunity to see if Tuivasa could progress.

Now, the good news was, I did think that this was much more like the Gon fight for him than it was the Pavlovich fight. Now, the Pavlovich fight didn't last very long, obviously. But you could see Tai had a game plan. He was trying to stick to it. He was trying to maintain composure. He was trying to do what they had set up to do. The issue is, as aforementioned, he's just technically overmatched by a guy like Volkov. Volkov has slow feet. He doesn't move a lot and move very quickly, but he's very technical. He has good reads. He has good timing, timing beats speed,

and it was too much for Tuivasa. Nearly got finished at the end of the first, and he got dropped at the second, and Volkov got on first, did a very good job to maintain mount. There was a couple times where you saw Tuivasa kind of rolling side to side, and nearly got out on his left hip, and then Volkov kind of slid his knee over. I mean, you know, for a dude that big to be on top of you it's got to be a fucking nightmare to get them off of you it can be the case depending on who they are that they if they have long legs that if they go wide they can leave space between the thigh and the floor but he had a nice sort of like constrained knee forward mount which kept him uh and he could grapevine the legs and because he's

so big he can grapevine and then still get some distance down. Typically, if you're going to grapevine someone, you're going to attach your hips to them and flatten them. It kind of flattens your ability to create distance to pop. But he's so big, he was kind of actually able to do it a little bit, which was very impressive. So people are like, oh, well, Volkov can't wrestle. Well, he might have defensive wrestling issues. That could be true. But his offensive

grappling against Tai Tuivasa, once he moves into a dominant position, it's going to be very tough to get a guy like that out and off of you. So I thought that Tai did, you know, not, I don't really fault him too much, but again, technically overmatched. And then he finished him with the Ezekiel choke. The Ezekiel choke is much easier to do in the gi. I should have had a long-sleeved shirt. But the basic idea is, let me see myself here so I can do this a little bit more correctly. The basic idea would be as follows.

You go like this. So this is the person's neck, the stem of this microphone holder, you come around the back of it. And then with a gi, you would grab the inside of your sleeve and then you roll this over the top. And then you kind of like exit out a little bit, right? And so that's the way you do it. With noogi, they end up making like a fist into one side, and then they kind of catch the top of the arm on the other, kind of like this. That's sort of the way they do it. But it takes practice.

Now, shouts to Joe Gilpin over at Flow Grappling. He had pointed out, if you actually look at it, partly it was the Ezekiel choke. Partly he was kind of covering Tuivasa's mouth. So it was almost like a suffocation mixedzekiel choke. Partly he was kind of covering Tuivasa's mouth. So it was almost like a suffocation mixed with a choke scenario, which is, you know, devastating, fucking devastating, hard to deal with. It's just, if you've got a big, strong guy like that on top of you and you're, and you're that technically outmatched, like, dude, once someone gets to mount, it's like,

DC is like, you got to push on the hips and stuff. Dude, that guy's, you know, what did he weigh in at? Probably close to 265. He's got good balance. He's got a heavy base. Yes, of course, you can put your hands on their hips, and you could, you know, everyone knows the basic shrimp escapes to get it back. You're going to just get fucking pounded doing that.

You could see one thing that Tuivasa was trying to do was step over with his outside leg to collect the ankle of Volkov, then bring that in, and then come out the other side. He was trying that, but he couldn't even get that going. That's when Volkov would grapevine

and kind of hold him there. So Volkov's jab was on point. Lead leg attacks were on point. Timing was great. Ground-to-pound was good. Top control was good. Maintaining mount was good. Taito Iwasa was simply technically overwhelmed.

He was technically overwhelmed. And, of course, that led to him being physically overwhelmed. I still think that at 28, or however old I think Ty is, I think he's right around that old, just to be very sure. 30. I'm not so young anymore. Still, 30 at heavyweight is young. I still think that there's a lot of room for improvement, but they have to dial back the level of competition.

They need to dial that back. It's pretty clear it's time to okay he's got some ability he's got some ability but um we can't be giving him this guy top five guys right now it's just not he's not really ready for top five guys so let's not throw the baby out with the bath water and declare that the tai tui vasa experiment has failed far from it but the tai tui vasa fighting top five guys, and even like top seven, I'm not sure where Volkov is ranked,

but he needs someone, I would say, outside the top ten. That's really who he needs. You're like, oh, that's kind of a waste of time. I don't think it is. First, it'd be a get-right win, which he kind of needs at this point. And then on top of it, it would be another opportunity to work out his game, develop it.

So that's pretty important. As for Volkov, I'm not really sure what it does. Let me pull up the rankings, which I do not contribute to. The heavyweight rankings have, let's see, they've got Volkov at seven. Yeah, he should be fighting, Ty should be fighting the Marcin Tybura's and Rosenstruck's, or Strook's of the world. Not the Aspinall and Blades's, you know.

But you've got Volkov sitting at seven, Ty was sitting at six, I don't think that's fair anymore. I'm not sure which direction they're gonna go, but five is Curtis Blades, four is Aspinall, and then obviously it's Miocic, Pavlovich, and gone from there. I don't really know what this will do for him,

because you've got gone, and Pavlovich, and Aspin from there. I don't really know what this will do for him because you've got Gahn and Pavlovich and Aspinall kind of waiting in the wings to see what happens. Could they run another one back with Curtis Blades? He's got the Jelton-Almeida fight coming up. I guess the winner of that maybe you could do. If Almeida wins, you could do Almeida versus Volkov. I don't know. It's a little hard to say, but it's a good win for him.

It's a solid win. I think it puts him probably not inside the top five, but just outside of it. And he has 47 fights in, dude. He's still getting better. Remarkable. That's not easy to do. A lot of guys kind of get stuck in their ways and they have sort of a live by the sword, die by the sword mentality. He's had a much better one the whole way through. You know? Okay. Manel Kopp defeats Felipe Dos Santos. Three rounds, 15 minutes.

The scores were... Let me see here. The scores were... Oh, for fuck's sake. Do I have them here? Let me pull them up. I think it was 29-28. I mean, there was maybe one 30-27, something like that. I'll get them here in just a second.

I apologize. The service I'm using didn't have the scorecards listed. Okay, yeah, so he wins this one at UFC 293. 30-27, that's right, and then two 29-28s. Dude, Felipe Dos Santos. Taking this fight. Basically on short notice. After Kaikar France fell out.

I thought he performed super ably. He could not deal with some of the counter striking. He could not deal with the speed. He could not deal again with the linear punches. Another Nixick trained fighter. In Manel Cop. He could not really deal with that very well, but his mental composure was phenomenal. He was landing, in sometimes those back and forth exchanges, he was landing great work.

He rattled Copp in the second round. He bloodied him. I think he swolloped him with his eyes. He performed, given the circumstances, very ably. Very ably. Manel Copp, showing you what makes him special as a fighter. Hand speed, angles, combination punching, accuracy, fantastic. His timing was good.

The chin on Dos Santos, I mean, he was getting lit up by Cop. Cop dropping him in the first round. He's knocked down at flyweight. He's knocked down his last four opponents. I was shocked that one went to a decision. I couldn't believe that that one had gone all the way to a decision. I thought for sure he was going to get stopped, but no. And he even took a round in the process as well.

Doesn't really change the flyweight landscape. It's a big, even through a loss, it's a big boost for Dos Santos. For Cop, I think that the rivalry now between him and Kaikara France has reached a fever pitch. People really want to see it. Kopp, on the night that Sean Strickland wins, of course, he and, who was the other gentleman who did this? Charlie Radke. The fight being over and then dropping the old anti-gay slur, the old six-letter F word. I'm not going to go on about it because I know this community thinks that, you know, that it's 1993 and that's totally cool.

You know, it's like only the most unenlightened people think that that's okay. But, all right, neither here nor there. So, you know, not a great look in that sense. But great look as a fighter. He looked tremendous as a talent. And I don't see any other way that they go to any other place other than Kopp versus Kaikar France. Which, by the way, that rivalry building up and Kaikar France was in attendance tonight and they were still like, FU, FU. And Kaikar France doing the thing. I mean, they've done a good... Even Kaikara France not even having a microphone,

just being in attendance with everything and then going crazy about it. They've done a good job building up that fight. They've done a good job building up that fight. I can't wait to see that one. Tremendous flyweight action. Tremendous flyweight contest. Marred by the very stupid post-fight comments.

But other than that, you know, a lot of good work. Justin Taffa fucking demolishing. In the words of Laura Sanko, bodying Austin Lane at 122 of round number one. I mean, holy fuck, dude. Dropped him with a left. I think he hit him with a right hand. Again, splitting his timing.

Moving himself to center line, then catching him. But then coming a little bit low, hitting him up high, dropping him, and then hitting him with vicious, almost looked like it was personal, ground and pound thereafter. Taffa getting poked in the eye one more time. Luckily, it didn't have much of an impact this time. But I'm like, fuck, dude, are you shitting me? Another eye poke?

Really? Word? But okay, he wins. Amazing, amazing performance by him. Some of the best tattoos I've seen in the UFC were some of these Samoan guys, right? So that's a great job he did. And then Tyson Pedro sent the Pleasure Man packing, defeating Anton Cercali via KO at 2-12 of round number one. I think it was his right hand that couldn't miss a series of right hands.

And then finally he went left hand right hook. So left straight right hook. And that dropped him. And then he hit him with one of these fucking coffin nail hammer fists that closed the show. Dramatic, dramatic finish. Phenomenal win for Tyson Pedro. Phenomenal win. So there was your main card.

Quickly, about Laura Sanko. I've been saying she's the best color commentator that they've got, and I don't know how you could disagree listening tonight. I mean, everyone's going to have their, their you know I like this person I like that person fine but like just as an example like during the fight she was talking about how Sean Strickland kind of uses so Sean Strickland's right-handed so he'll keep this hand up here he'll kind of put let me see so I can see myself he'll keep this hand up and I should have changed the lower third. God damn it. Hold on.

She'll put her, excuse me, Sean Strickland will put his hand up here and then we'll kind of have this hand here a little bit. And what she was talking about was he'll kind of shoulder roll a little bit, kind of Philly shell it. But if you're Philly shell, in the words of Laura Sanko, you're typically bladed, right? So you're presenting, what's the difference between being square and being bladed? If you're bladed, it's a much smaller target. So when Floyd uses this guard right here, you know, you're catching stuff off the shoulder, right behind the shoulder, right? And you're presenting a much smaller target.

What makes Sean a little bit weird is he kind of rolls with it, yeah, like this. He kind of rolls with it, but he's almost much smaller target. What makes Sean a little bit weird is he kind of rolls with it. Yeah, like this. He kind of rolls with it, but he's almost much more square. Guys, guys, you can say whatever you want. Oh, that's not that big of a deal. She's the only one who's going to point something like that out, a trenchant, helpful observation

to the audience like that. You know, Joe Rogan's a legend. I think we all know that. He doesn't deliver analysis like that. I'm sorry, he just doesn't. He doesn't. It's not an insult. He brings other things to the broadcast.

Many people like him for any of the reasons. This is not an argument about whether or not you should like Joe Rogan as a commentator or not. That's not my argument. My argument is the level of detail and precision and thoughtfulness that Sanko puts into the broadcast is, in my judgment, a level above all the rest of them. All the rest of them. And again, I know that there are just some absolute mouth-breathing cavemen who are like, no, she ain't that good.

You're in denial. You're in denial. She is that good. She's probably going to be here for a long time doing this, so you might as well just get comfortable with it. She's better than the other men on that panel, and in certain cases, by a considerable distance. So I thought her debut went swimmingly, to be quite honest with you. Yeah. All right, let's see here. Let's take some of your questions.

God damn! All right, let's take some of those questions, finally. All right, here we go. How is the UFC PR machine going to correct for Sean Strickland's new age masculinity? I don't know. I don't know. They've got their hands full. And yeah, you know, this is the world they've created.

Like, you know, they don't want to do anything. I mean, they're independent contractors, so there's a debate about whether they can meaningfully, you know, in the workplace, direct forms of speech. But they choose not to. So, welcome to the world you've created. Can you remember a time when you've seen the basics use this effectively? Shit, dude. That's a great question. Not like this.

To travel this far, be the guy that good, win a world title? No, not like this. Mm-mm. What's next for Izzy? Probably time off. Again, I think he's probably going to get a rematch. I don't think he deserves one, candidly. I don't say that as a hater.

I'm just saying you lose two title fights out of three. No. It's time to not get one, but he probably will. This person writes, Izzy's behavior was so weird. Didn't take a step forward for five rounds. Raised Sean's hand and said how great he was. Ran out of the cage to dab people in the crowd up and left. Something feels off.

Maybe. First title defense for Strickland. Probably going to be Izzy. Okay, I mean, just another idiot here. Alright. Da-da-da. What kind of PR push do you anticipate the UFC putting behind Strickland, he writes. There's definitely a market that they should try to exploit, but it's going

to be tricky. It's not as if they can put him on Kimmel or Fallon. There's a whole independent podcast circuit that he can and probably will do, probably along political lines, but not necessarily just that, that I suspect will boost his profile. Not so much the Colby Covington route, per se, but something like that.

This person's asking, how do you think Laura did tonight? I thought she did like, didn't miss a beat. Didn't miss a beat. With that win, did Sean Strickland just have one of the biggest babyface turns in MMA history? He was already having one during the week. Right? It wasn't even just the win.

Like, even if he had lost tonight, I thought he had had one. So the win always sends that one into overdrive. Does this feel like turnover for the division? With both Izzy and Rob losing dominantly it gives the feeling things are moving in a new direction. Yup. Their time is, you can tell, kind of passing them by.

The lack of body punching was horrific game planning and a really bad sign for Izzy's ability to make reads. He was doing a little bit of it, but yeah. In the last 15 months we've seen two fighters beat Shawn through the body jab so for him and his team to not pick it up is bad. He was doing some of it. He just couldn't quite get it going.

Also, this Shawn was different. The body jab that Pereira had to use was a guy who was marching into him constantly. Even as he circled away, that guy would circle. So it's much more direct, like, stumbling into shit. This was much more strategic pressure. Has Izzy's extensive fight history caught up with him? Yes.

Do you think Sean's first... Will you be doing a breakdown of what Sean did to disarm Izzy? 100%. 100%. For as important as the overhand right is in MMA, why doesn't Izzy ever try to throw it?

He did. He couldn't find it. He didn't throw it a lot, but even then he couldn't get it going. Shocking upset of all time? No. Could it be that we simply didn't see how favorable stylistic matchup this could have been and was for Strickland?

Well, we definitely, I certainly missed a shit ton. I can say that. Stand-up fighter Izzy more than willing to be backed up and not much explosive punching power to discourage him from playing his game. Yeah, it's more than that, though. This was the right pressure game. As I mentioned, taking the leg kicks away, like kind of walking in and lifting, not letting

Izzy settle, making his offense limited, and therefore by being limited, more readable and more hasty and kind of like forced. He just took off off you know he put him on a shot clock is really what he did he put izzy on a shot clock and a fast one too not 35 seconds or whatever um or 30 seconds but whatever the fucking shot clock is these days but uh he had him on an mma shot clock and he it hurried up the game and he had a hard time with it uh let's see is he's demeanor notification skipping on the press he skipped the presser him on an MMA shot clock and he it hurried up the game and he had a hard time with it uh let's see is he's demeanor in the cage and skipping on the press he skipped the presser oh that's interesting do you think there's something going on with him that spurred this

dead of a fight from him maybe again i don't i haven't talked to him i haven't talked to him since the first MMA Pareda fight so i don't know for a team who so good at game planning, it looked like they had nothing for Strickland. Yeah, they had nothing for him. That's very true. What do you make of both corners during the fight? Knicks X-Corner is very understandable. The Bearman corner and the Izzy corner, I'd have to go back and listen more closely. I'd be kind of making up that I heard it very clearly.

I really didn't. But clearly, not enough. Who do you think of Strickland's MMA version of the Philly Shell working on one of the scariest? What do you think? Shocking. Is it a testament to the Philly Shell or boxing? Not necessarily. It's the right guy Is it a testament to the Philly shell or boxing? Not necessarily. It's the right guy using it.

It's the right thing, you know? Where does this put Eric Nixick among all active coaches in the game today? If not at the top, right near it. Do you feel like there's value in the corners, honesty early in the match? Seems like a lot of perspective was left out in Izzy's corner

that Sean's corner didn't hold back. Yes, but also like closely dissecting a corner like that when you don't know their interpersonal relationship in that way, it can be, you can get in front of your skis

in that one, over out in front of your skis. How do you think this impacts Izzy in the middleweight goat conversation? He is, guys, you know how much I like Izzy's game. You know he can't, he doesn't.

It's still Anderson Silva. It's still Anderson Silva. Is Sean Strickland the best boxer ever made? No. Didn't you say that Sean couldn't win tonight? Couldn't win, no. Highly unlikely that he wouldn't win, yes. Anybody can win.

Let's see. Did Sean just break the Izzy code? Didn't bite on a single faint hardly. He did bite, but he didn't bite a bit at a safe distance. And it really felt like without those, Izzy was neutered. Yes. Yes. It seems like his strike, but it's not just that. It's that you got to pressure him so that everything becomes more readable, becomes hastier, becomes less set up, becomes less confident, less powerful, all that stuff. It's all working together there. Is he still in the GOAT conversation? No. I mean, dude, he's still second best. I mean, he's second best with a bullet. The distance between Izzy and the other middleweights vying for number two is pretty far. But do I put him above what Anderson Silva did?

I watched Anderson Silva's reign. No, it's not the same. Is the six-letter F word back? It is on UFC broadcasts, apparently. At 34, are we witnessing Izzy on the decline? Maybe. Maybe. Not so much physically, but maybe the competitive advantage that he enjoyed early in his UFC run,

the difference is clear now that the rest of the... I guess it has been for some time. You know, Kananir got kind of close and other guys got kind of close. The competitive distance between himself and his peers, that distance has collapsed dramatically. Why didn't Izzy push more in the final round? I don't know. Was Izzy overconfident coming in?

Probably a little bit. A little bit. A little bit. Not much. I still think he had focus. But he was like, you know, I'm going to go kill your king and stuff like that on social media. But I mean, like, you know, a fighter being confident that they're going to win is like they're kind of supposed to be like psychotically confident. But okay. Does this put the whole MMA science in question? Means analysis still have a lot to discover?

Yes, of course. But also, analysts are always working with incomplete information. We are working with what they have showed, not what they can show the next time. And as a result, there's going to be a gap between that. And this was a big one. Is that the best defensive performance you can remember? That's a pretty goddamn good one. It's a pretty goddamn good one. It's a pretty goddamn good one.

Will 2023 be known as the year of the Shons? Hey, man. The Shons and MMA are having a great year. Wow. Is this bigger than Sarah beating GSP? I don't think by odds it is. I don't think it is. Let's see.

Do you think Sean won every round but the second? Probably. Probably. Would you say that Izzy's striking has not evolved enough at this level or is it just the competition catching up? Definitely competition catching up. Definitely. 100%.

100%. Someone wrote, obligatory question, did Strickland win or did Izzy lose? As Izzy's number one media cheerleader, Sean Strickland won. Sean Strickland won. Sean Strickland won.

Izzy didn't lose in the way you're framing it. Sean Strickland won. You have to acknowledge it. You have to. You have to. You cannot take that away from him. He fucking earned that thing,

fair and square. No two ways about it. No two ways about it. Okay Most of these Most of these are The same kind of questions Does Johnny Eblen have a serious claim To be the best middleweight in the world? Yes

I know people are not going to want to say that Because he fights for Bellator but yes Yes he does The same kind of questions. Does Johnny Eblen have a serious claim to be the best middleweight in the world? Yes. I know people are not going to want to say that because he fights for Bellator, but yes. Yes, he does. Did Drake lose to... Oh, Drake! Drake put it on him. 220,000. All right, here we go. Dun-dun-dun-dun. Alright, here we go Do I think Izzy properly prepared? Yes Alright, that's it

Hey, I'm going to do extra credit here in just a minute So, that's that Was it a weird performance from Izzy in the sense that All week there was a weird media environment and everything? I don't know. I don't know what to make of him leaving. I don't know what to make of any of that stuff. I guess we're going to have to wait and see what the information will be.

But tonight belongs to Sean Strickland. No doubt about it. Tonight belongs to Sean Strickland. Belongs to a lesser degree, but also to Eric Nixick and Extreme Couture. And guys who flew all the way to fucking Australia and got the goddamn job done in the most, if not the most, one of the most improbable circumstances that any of us have ever seen. But the night belongs to Sean Strickland and there are simply no two ways about it. So I want to thank you folks for watching here tonight. I really appreciate it. Thumbs up on the video. Hit subscribe.

And boy, we got a lot to talk about on Monday's Morning Combat, do we not? So join us on Monday. Monday, Monday, Monday. Live at 11 a.m. me and BC. Sean Strickland wins a fucking one-sided affair basically over Izzy and is the new UFC middleweight champion. Welcome to the Sean Strickland era. Didn't think I'd be saying that tonight, but you got to call balls and strikes. And that was, that was the, that was the pitching performance of a lifetime.

Congratulations to him. I'm out of here, y'all. Peace. Thank you so much for watching.