MORNING KOMBAT WITH LUKE THOMAS AND BRIAN CAMPBELL - UFC Fight Night: Cannonier Rallies | Keyshawn Davis Joins the Show | FULL EPISODE

Episode Date: February 17, 2025

MK. Monday. Lets go! This weekend on MORNING KOMBAT, Luke and BC recap the UFC Fight night event. In the main event, Jared Cannonier rallies back from hell to finish Gregory Rodrigues. What does this mean for a 40-yr old Cannonier?   Plus, in boxing Keyshawn Davis put on his star-making performance. After his 4th-round demolition of WBO lightweight champion Denis Berinchyk in what was Davis' 13th pro fight, how big of a future superstar does "The Businessman" appear to be? Davis will join the guys to discuss it all.   Also in boxing, the guys react to the WBA proposal for the return of 15-round boxing title fights.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Reveille Reveille Look at us now Tip to tip Oh Jesus Do you want a margarita? Yes! My God! Talk to us.

Doing what we love. Two, three, two, three. It's time to bang. Oh, yeah. It's Monday morning. Get fired the hell up. The best damn combat sports show they ever created. It's right in front of you, deep inside of your face hole. Hey, it's Monday morning. Get fired the hell up. The best damn combat sports show they ever created. It's right in front of you, deep inside of your face hole.

Hey, it's morning combat. My name is Brian Campbell, that BBC with that, you know, that BDE, those alpha-like qualities. Next to me is my co-host on this Monday, February 17th, 2025. Quick happy birthday shout-outs to my older sister, Jen, Michael Jordan, and my childhood neighbor, Greg McCurrier. But this time, let me introduce my co-host. He's not in the nation's capital, but we do have him here.

The connection is working. He got that McDonald's Wi-Fi. It's Luke Thomas. LT, how the heck are you? What's up, BC? Glad to see you. I'm actually in New York City. I wasn't allowed to go to the studio today to do the show, so I'm here in my hotel room going to get

it done, but hopefully this McDonald's Wi-Fi will hold. I appreciate everyone's patience. Ready for a good show today. Well, so far it sounds like someone's arsehole, but we'll take it, Luke. Are you using the backdrop of Manhattan The Big Apple to entertain One Tukes Yes, we took her to Broadway Last night, unfortunately we went to the Empire State Yesterday while it was raining and cloudy And I paid to go to the 102nd

Floor Observatory And you couldn't see a single thing, nothing It was absolutely 100% cloud So that was not great But I've never been To a Broadway show before Never first time in my whole life They're good at it They're real good

They're real good at it They're a lot better than your sound quality At the moment but then Broadway folks Including Hamilton as once reviewed On this program they are very Very good at it How bad does it sound I don't understand why it sounds so bad

It got worse since our pre-show fixing I don't know you know what we're going to do About it But you know maybe If you just mime I'll just like try to Impersonate you and try to guess what you're going to say Right you know what I mean Well now Luke if you got any ideas about what you want me to do

Just put it in the chat and we'll figure it out Alright well let's do it I got you Let's do a little bit of business that was the third member of our team Long Island Luke Noseda of the Main Card Minute Podcast You'll be hearing from him today Today's episode of Morning Combat by the way Presented by DraftKings

Yes DraftKings the crown is yours Shout out to everybody watching live on YouTube Watching on the DraftKings Network Listening to the audio Thank you for having our back If we could ask you to like the episode on YouTube Subscribe One day

One day we'll get to 200,000 YouTube subscribers Maybe today And obviously you can follow our fine YouTube spin-off channels right there To get even more content inside the MK Universe. And how about today's show? We're going to break down all things that middleweight banger at UFC Vegas over the weekend. I told y'all Cannoneer Hobo Cop was going to light up also, also at about 1145 a.m.

Eastern today on this program. The businessman Keyshawn Davis will join us fresh off of his title-winning performance Friday night at the theater at Madison Square Garden. Hey, Luke, one word to describe Keyshawn Davis right now. Electric. Electric. Yeah, electric is a way to say it. So, so much to get into on this show uh quickly long island luke thank you for rejoining us if you can uh was it a good weekend for your bets on the main card minute with one gaffney jim pierre it was a weird weekend so i went four for six on the last

six fights but the way i parlayed them it wasn't a really a winning week gaff had a great week though gaff called like the entire main card i did pretty solid on the prelims overall can't complain okay okay uh luke thomas how is the homeless level right now in manhattan um not that bad i mean you know they're always sleeping on the subway but like in terms of the street i actually expected it to be worse it was not worse it was better so as long as you don't daddy, why, why is that man's butthole showing on, on, on the one train? As long as that doesn't happen, you've had a good day. All right. I had to have it. I had to have a talk with the two-star. I was like, okay, when we go into the New York city subway, you have to treat it like I'm taking you to the bathroom. Don't touch the handrails. Don't touch the seat. Don't touch anything.

Just sit down. And then when we get home, we have to burn our clothes. Okay. Forget every damn thing that you saw. All right. We got a loaded show for you today, folks. Do I have any other reminders? Yes. One more morning combat at gmail.com would be your email address. If you'd like to reach the show, Hey, get ready for Friday. We got fan subs coming back. We've got Dead Wrong. Say hi to Mikey when you're there.

And as always, a reminder, your submission will not be read on the show if it's attached with a picture of your genitalia. That's not fair to do to an employee of this program. Thank you very much. All right, let's see how long we can keep this Wi-Fi together. We got a lot to talk about. Let's get right into the show right here, right now, Jesus Jones. Let's do it.

Topic number one, UFC Fight Night. Vegas, middleweight division, Jared Kananir rallying back from hell in round one to finish a larger and seemingly more dangerous Robocop, Gregory Rodriguez. So Luke, even though Cannoneer was forced into the fire early by an overly aggressive Robocop, at age 40, do you believe Cannoneer is actually more effective when he's willing to get dirty and push for the KO, like we saw on Saturday night, rather than counter from the outside?

Or was this merely the result of facing a dangerous, yet very inexperienced opponent at the highest level? It's a great question. I tend to think of it as maybe a little column A, column B, but mostly column B. It is clear that when a guy like Kananir is pressed, that he has certain capabilities and certain willingness to

push to do things that other guys simply don't have in this division and maybe broader in the UFC like he's got that dog in him in ways that it's just really hard to describe and the fact that you saw at the stat at the end of the fight he is only one of two fighters by the way to have a knockout

in three different weight classes along with Conor McGreg I mean, just a pretty remarkable testament to the fact that he's getting that, you know, over the age of 40, basically, right? I mean, just sort of like, this is kind of who he is. At the same time, to me, yes, the durability, the toughness plays a big role in how that can make him rally and Marshall forces that he needs to win. But BC, I would just be, I think it's disingenuous to not point out that what really is happening here was that a guy has something more than just a certain set of intangibilities. This was veteran savvy, right? So is it toughness? Of course you don't get to the next round if you don't have it, but he combined it with veteran savvy to rally himself, make necessary adjustments, begin to put the pressure on.

Again, I don't know if it's Rodriguez or Rodriguez. They were calling it Rodriguez on the broadcast. So that's what I'm going to say to begin to pressure Rodriguez. And then he basically kind of fell apart down the stretch, losing just basically a matter of seconds into that fourth round. When they came out of that, he got dropped at the end of the third. This was a guy showing what it means to have been in the fire before. This was a guy showing what it means to have been in multiple main events, who has fought the very best that this division had to offer at the time in which he was around.

He was combining all of that experience, BC, with the skills that he has, the technical skills that he has. He comes from a great team, plus that dog you kind of referenced earlier where he has to get roughed up to kind of come back. You know, that certainly puts some urgency under him. But he was able, a lot of guys, BC, when they have forced to be urgent, they can't muster that will. And they don't know how to get from point A to point B. He had the skills. He had the experience, which I think is the most important one. And of course, he has the sort of internal fortitude to get him to that next place. But that, to me, was a function of somebody just knowing what it's like to be in those kinds of spots, knowing what it's like to have to climb

a ladder out of a bad place, and then being able to then go and execute and do it it's a combination of many things to me it's the veteran experience at the top of the food chain there yeah very well said look this was an act absolutely all action banger of a main event you gotta shout out cannon near at 40 for his ability to not only come in in like world-class physical shape but to carry on and carry through showing great stamina, heart, courage, power, all that stuff. But I teed up that question for a reason, Luke, because last week when we were previewing this fight,

knowing that Kanan Nears at the back end of his run, but still can be dangerous, is in great shape enough to maybe screw around and get another run to the top, I needed him to be more offensive. This, like I said, was more a factor of a very larger opponent just taking it to him off the start that he was sort of, before he could even make the decision, he was in a firefight. I'm not necessarily asking Kananir to dumb down his style.

I just think we've seen him for a long time as that smart, technical counterpuncher with the big power, but we've also seen him in big fights kind of threaten this right hand stalk his opponent but never really take that step forward so look i'm not asking him to get lit up in future matchups but if he could realize the strength and the combination of his power, his technical finishing ability, and that will, and that chin. I wonder if he can take literally any of the elite middleweights and if he can get them into a bit of a fight, whether that's going to increase his chances moving forward for as long as he has left.

You're muted, Luke. Luke Thomas, you're muted. You're muted, Luke. Luke Thomas, you're muted. You're muted. Apologies. Who would you say that that would be true about? I mean, it's not like I don't think that what you're on to bears. What you're pointing out is relevant. And I feel like we often get into a place after a big fight like this for a main event, even at the apex, where we want to make sure that we give the winning guy the credit.

And I'm happy to do that. He really is. He was clearly the better guy, certainly down the stretch, maybe not at first. But, you know, the majority of that time, I mean, people gave the second round to Rodriguez, and I don't mind that. But to me, you could see the tide turning in that round right you could see the the life of beginning to get drained out of him and to me when you when you ask this question about like oh you know if he was put in some of these other scenarios could you get more out of them I certainly after Saturday do not want to be in a place where I say the answer to that is automatically no. On the other hand, how do we watch a fight like that and say,

yes, of course, a guy like Kenanier can rally in all of these very, very difficult circumstances. At the same time, Rodriguez was not really ready for prime time. It didn't look to me like he had the energy to go five rounds. And this was not a fight that, I mean, the first round was a grueling pace, but after that, it was not necessarily, it was a high pace, but it wasn't an insane pace. How much of this, if we're being honest, is Kananir having a lot of ability, a lot of will, and as I mentioned, that real veteran experience that I think honestly saved his chances here. At the same time, BC, when a contender like this, Rodriguez,

is going up against somebody who's over the age of 40, Rodriguez, whatever, 32, when that turnover doesn't happen between old and new, it's actually kind of bad for the division for that to be the case because new blood just doesn't come up in the way that it's supposed to. And when that kind of failure takes place, I do think we have to take inventory of it and say i don't know man he like he wasn't ready for prime time here in a way that for cannonier it was kind of i'm not gonna say old news but he was quite accustomed to it in the end yeah i agree with the original comment that it is

a little column a column b but it's certainly a lot of column B. And that's Gregory Rodriguez looking as scary as anyone we've seen as a middleweight for like the first three minutes. I mean, look, when they stood across from each other at the weigh-in, when they stood across from each other during the pre-fight instructions, you're like Robocop looks like a heavyweight against a blown up welterweight or something. I mean, it was staggering. And then you see him deliver that level of carnage inweight or something. I mean, it was staggering. And then you see him deliver that level of carnage in the opening round. It's like, holy crap. But, but we've kind of seen this before, even though Robocop came in with a five and one record in his

last six, when he puts his head above water against higher level competition, he kind of gets exposed. We're starting to get to that point. Now if you consider he's, what, 31, 32 years old, where he's going to have to figure out how to be a consistent fighter, not just a Shane Carwin-esque one-round destroyer. I mean, Long Island Luke, can we play the critical tweet we have here of Rodriguez's cardio? Knowing he's going into a five-round fight, this is MMA Joey saying, how the F did Rodriguez come into a five-round main event with one-round cardio? Luke, is that fair to say this is the biggest fight of his career

against a former title challenger, a five-rounder, and this guy looked like he had about six and a half minutes worth of offense in that? Again, it sucks, right? Because you don't want to take this from Ken Anear, dude. He showed up big time after a very inauspicious beginning, getting dropped twice in that first round. Neither of them were terrible drops, by the way. We should kind of talk about that as well. It wasn't like his head slammed back in either case, but they were pretty bad.

But at the same time, I mean, BC, we're talking about the cardio, but to me, it's more than just the cardio. Ken Anear had to make some adjustments about what he was doing and what kind of shot selection to go for, how to pressure, what he was looking for and what he needed to do. Once that happened, Rodriguez didn't have a second set of adjustments himself. He had like a game plan. He was sticking to it. And then as it failed and he failed along with it, he just wrote it out basically the majority of the way. There wasn't a second order of rethinking what you needed to do to take away this and then add to that.

Whereas you did get some of that with Jared Kananier. Jared Kananier is just a higher level guy. I mean, we're talking about the dog in him. And when I'm sounding like a broken record, I simply do not wish to deny that. But I feel like a focus on that when the issues are you didn't have the skills in this particular matchup. And again, not an easy guy to beat. I'm not suggesting he's like some scrub or something. But in the moment in time, dude, there just wasn't enough there to handle this. So like the cardio collapse, of course, but the cardio is going to collapse a lot

easier when you're being pushed a little bit. It's going to be, it's going to, excuse me, the cardio is going to collapse a lot quicker if you're being pushed or you're out of sorts or you're hurt or you don't really know what to do. That's when the cardio begins to drain because it becomes also a function of panic. It becomes a function of worry. You're, you're, you're reacting. You're not thinking, You're not flowing. I think you've got a lot of that, too. To me, this was Rodriguez getting a good chance to be like, not only am I going to ascend in the rankings and get a signature win, but I'm going to show you the depth of my adjustment ability. I'm going to show you the depth of my quality.

And there just wasn't enough there. And I think that's the biggest reason among all that he failed I mean he came in unranked looking to to parachute into the top 15 considering he was facing the number seven guy in Cannoneer and obviously again credit to Cannoneer not just for the heart but for the the know-how and how he put him away it was absolutely systematic technical and brutal at the same time but Cannoneer comes in ranked number seven despite this win which is a soft you almost forgot type of deal 40 years old but we all thought he was around this ability still didn't know if he was going to pass this test came in as a betting undercar underdog which kind of looks comical in hindsight but if we spin this forward cannoneer fears that this one won't do a whole hell of a lot

for his future let's listen in to jared post fight i didn't say anybody is specifically um but if you were to look at the rankings uh i will i would like a ranked opponent for sure um i think i'm definitely going to get a ranked opponent after that victory um i would like somebody ranked higher than me unfortunately all the somebody ranked higher than me. Unfortunately, all the people ranked higher than me are either in line to get a title shot or going to wait for a title shot or just beat me.

But I'm not going to count, rule anything out. Shoot, if they say, hey Jared, we need you to fight Drake next for the belt. I'm like, hell yes. I'm ready. Do you foresee rematches in your future? Sean Strickland, Izzy, something like that?

Yeah, well, three people, four people in the rankings ahead of me have beaten me. And I'm ranked seven. That means three people who I haven't, either haven't fought or haven't, or beat. So two people who I haven't fought drakenson comes out and the other four people are five people i fought so what was the question just do you foresee yourself rematching a shot straight oh absolutely yeah with that with that being said as long as i keep winning you know what i mean um yeah so luke even though he has a potential issue with those ranked ahead of him, have already fought him and beat him, a lot of those, like Strickland and Adesanya,

are coming off disappointing performances. What could this win mean to a 40-year-old Cannoneer in terms of getting back in line for another chance at the title? Not much. I don't think it means much. mean i i we just have to be realistic it was this was the ufc kind of seeing what they've got left in cannonier and the answer is still something there clearly obviously right at the same time they were trying to see what they had with robocop and it just didn't really go anywhere right i mean he showed, he showed some, clearly he's dangerous, but against a certain quality of fighter,

when that first order danger doesn't really succeed, there appears to be a bit of a collapse that is imminent over the course of time. And I think that really is the lesson they were trying to take from this one. I don't think it really necessarily has title implications. And again, I don't really want to deny Jared what he is owed. Over the age of 40, only now one of two fighters to have a KO in three different weight classes in the UFC. A remarkable achievement in its own right, even if he never held the title. But, like, there's just a lot of people ahead of him.

I know that there's a bunch of rematches that he wants in certain cases, and maybe he'll get some of them. I just find it, my personal belief is that it's very unlikely he gets another UFC title. I think it's just too far away there's too many other moving pieces it's just not going to work okay with you saying that and I understand everything you're saying I agree largely I like the idea of him rematching Strickland that first fight he won by split decision it wasn't maybe the the best of either of them now Strickland under a new coach conceivably moving forward you're going to be interested in seeing does he alter his style is he going to be more offensive to put him in against

that version of Kananir coming off that performance we may see fireworks I don't think you know Jared Kananir would be a huge underdog at all in that fight so as much as I get what you're saying given his age given the division ahead of him he is in that veteran spot where he made that joke they want me to fight ddt ddp tomorrow i'm ready where if you're looking for a quality name who's been there before last minute he fits that bit but what if he packages this win with say a second win over strickland that might change the conversation a little bit. If he beats Strickland, that's one thing, but I don't know if I'm expecting fireworks if they fought again. First of all, I am interested in that fight. I think that fight actually makes a

lot more sense than it once did, so I'm totally on board with it. Let's see what happens, especially after where they are now. However, this is my personal belief, I guess we'll see what happens. I do not believe that Strickland's going to get any more offensive or any better outside of the tutelage and the oversight of Eric Nixick. That's not to say that, again, their relationship as a corner and team ran its course and maybe you just have to go a different direction or that there's, like, no other good coaches he could find. But to me, like, what he had going on in that second fight is a much

bigger issue that I don't think a coaching switch is really going to help. That's a separate question from what it might mean for Jared Cannoneer to beat him and what that could do for him, obviously, because as we just know, Strickland was already just in a title fight. It could be kind of big, right? So that fight I'm okay'm okay with and maybe i'm short selling cannoneers title opportunities by virtue of that but just as a personal matter i don't think that fight would be fireworks unless cannoneer made it fireworks it just simply would not be that that they're i don't know i'm i'm not convinced by that i'll put it that way i'm wondering though an anir goes through this war as he did, did the veteran skills took down the monster, whether he goes, Hey,

maybe I implement a little bit more of that pressure and that urgency moving forward. I've always been a big cannon near fan, Luke. I don't know if I think I might even picked him to be Izzy at that point. I thought he could, I was disappointed at the caution that he showed in what, you know, late in his thirties, that was the mountaintop moment of his career. I just still think there's something. I mean, look, he doesn't look past it. Take withstanding that beating in the first round, not withstanding,

he doesn't look past it. So he's certainly somebody that I'm watching closely, whether it's a last minute call or whether he could just kind of linger and not lose. You string together some wins. You never know some wins you never know. Quickly on RoboCop, though, that disbarred lawyer from Atlanta, Jed Mishu, always says, you know, first team all body, looks great getting off the bus. Let's show you a pic of RoboCop when he actually did get off the bus. Should we have bet against him after this, Luke,

or is this exactly what it means to look cool in South America? Let me tell you something. I don't understand the way that young men dress at all anymore. And by that I mean, I don't know what's cool. It's not like I have any idea what's cool. But I don't understand their haircuts.

I don't understand what they're wearing. Who is the dumbass that said, hey, let's make our hair look like broccoli. Like you're a fucking idiot. What, who, who on earth would like that?

And yet they all do it. And yet they all do it. So I don't understand anything about it, but my man was rocking it with confidence. Didn't, didn't, didn't get him to dub, but you know,

he liked it. So whatever. Hopefully he can rock the treadmill. Luke was some more confidence. He's going to have to fix this star, the stamina issue. He is a dude. He's going to get killer knockouts he gets after it he's fun to watch i hope for his sake this is that turning point moment just the same very quickly there were they mentioned it a

little bit when he knocked cannon near down like he didn't even try to go for any jujitsu in that fight this is another thing to me that seemed like we should probably bring up very, very quickly, BC, which is this is what I mean. A guy like Kananir, when things go bad, leaves no stone unturned. Like, he'll do just about, I mean, he's got his core skill set or whatever, but, you know, he's going to scrape and claw and climb and do whatever he has to, obviously within the rules, to get the job done. It didn't look to

me like robocop was doing that it looked to me like he was trying to win a certain way and when that didn't happen it just kind of went away and i'm like the fact that this guy didn't use his jiu-jitsu to me seemed like a big problem something to keep in mind for the future it could be first team all donk donkerson if he doesn't fix these strategic issues luke but we'll find out all right let's go to topic number two and it's the ufc vegas undercard which look i i liked this card coming in on paper i thought it actually overachieved in the end we got a lot to talk about luke whether it's yusef zalal edmund shabazian gabriel bone theme you can add whoever else into the blank let me ask you this question which ufc undercard fighter on saturday made the biggest leap with his or her performance fill in the blank here luke which fighter is it bro i'm halfway tempted to say angela hill i'm halfway tempted because what she's doing

you know having been up and down for so long but I mean, she has, she had, I think going into the fight, a 17 to 12 record, I guess, what is it now? 18 and 12. You know, she was getting kind of close to 500 over there and over the age of 40, that's just insane. And she still guts out a win. That's very remarkable. And listen, she's 18 and 14 now, Luke, to cut you off 18 and 14, 18 wins, 14 losses. You look at certain databases. The point being is she's close to 500, but you get the idea. But, you know, as cliche of an answer as it is, BC, the answer has to be Yusuf Zawal. Now, it's not a performance that I think could have been as good as it maybe even should have been. It fell a little bit short in that regard.

But in terms of what he proved, and then when you look at the road ahead and where he's at in terms of his age and maturation, it's got to be the law. It's not just that he got a win over Calvin Cater, which is a big deal by itself, but it was kind of how he did it. Now, that third round, less than inspiring. However, this is what I wanted to point out. He didn't do a ton of amazing, crazy techniques and strategies you've never heard of. He didn't, you know, he wasn't going from esoteric submissions or something like that. Really, that had nothing to do with how he fought. Instead, what it looked like he had to me, BC, was an understanding of how important footwork and movement was and had the ability to execute.

But more than that, his command of range, both offensively and defensively looked to me very natural. He naturally was able to look with very minimal effort to find exactly where the range was, where he could score the circumstances where he could score, and then how to be on your bike in a very strategic way. The rest of that time, mind you, they're in that little ass cage in the apex. It's not a big cage to move around in. And he was still very, very capable of avoiding, again, for the vast majority of that fight, really anything Cater wanted to do, giving him two significant, single-digit significant strikes in round one and two, and then popping him with that jab,

being on the go, feinting him backwards, landing the leg kick when he needed to, and it became effortless. These are not complex weapons by themselves, but the ability to manage range in the way that he did, the effortlessness that went into that. And he's only, what, I think 28 years old? That, to me, is the thing that I look at and I'm like, dude, you can build on that. You can do something very special with that. To me, while there are questions and some issues, Yusuf Zalaw showing that against Calvin Cater makes for me, he's the biggest standout, not named Jared Cannoneer on this card. I mean, look, the Moroccan Devil, seven wins in a row after a 2-2-1 start

to kick off his UFC career. I'm certainly much more positive, even with him running, running in the wrong direction around three as Calvin Cater tried to recreate this Zabit fight and tried to really rally with some big offense. Did I love that from Yousef there? No, but the totality of the seven wins,

he's got a quirky personality, a quirky style. He's not going to be easy to deal with. But the other half of MMA Twitter, Luke, not necessarily the half that would love a pre-meth fishing trip, but they didn't really seem to love this. Let's show a meme that might sum it up. This was supposedly Yousef zalal training for the fight luke running backwards on the treadmill uh is that gonna fly at the next level because

you win seven in a row in this crowded division you're ready for the next level that's not enough to win a title in this weight class and i'm not even sure it's enough to get a title fight. After this, it starts to get real tough. First of all, that meme is just fucking ludicrous. I'm just going to say it out loud. If you didn't enjoy what Zolal did, that's a personal matter. I can't argue against it. People like what they're going to like.

Most people like, obviously, action. That's not a crazy thing, but his footwork and his defensive movement, which by the way, bled into his offensive skill. This is very good work that he did. If you can't appreciate that, I would, I would ask that you do some reflecting on why that is again, not to say you had to love the, especially that third round. You didn't have to love that,

but saying this guy's a track star and he's just running the whole time, when he's pulling Cater into his punches, getting away from him, Cater can't do shit to him while he's being landed on in nearly a two-to-one clip. I mean, get the fuck out of here. That's completely ludicrous.

However, if you're going to fight guys like Yair Rodriguez, if you're going to fight guys like Josh Emmett, if you're going to fight guys like yair rodriguez if you're going to fight guys like josh emmett if you're going to fight guys like even brian ortega and especially now max has moved up so there's a little bit less of a threat there who knows how much longer volk's gonna i mean you think you can do that with volk and win you get the i mean that's just i mean that by no you can't sir it's absurd and and definitely i know they already fought ilia Teporia when they were both at a much more junior stage of their career. You try that against him, you're going to wake up looking at the lights. So it was, to me, people want to make it all or nothing, BC. Oh, the third round sucked. He was on his bike for the majority of the time.

Therefore, I felt less impressed. And that's just not the reality. Third round, yes, he took his foot off the gas. Full criticism warranted. But for the vast majority of that fight, his foot off the gas full criticism warranted but for the vast majority of that fight his footwork was excellent it was good defensively it was good offensively the two blended into each other and the come the natural command of range there are guys who've been fighting for 20 years who can't do that he has at age 28 almost effortlessly that is a very very important mark of skill i I love his unique style. I love when people have styles that are just different,

that are really hard to figure out and get the advantage of. I'm all for it, except for what we saw in that third round. But, Luke, you do remember that fight. I think it was GSP BJ Part 2 when GSP covered himself in KY Jelly and Canola Oil in the locker room beforehand. Here is Yousef Zalal talking about a somewhat slippery Calvin Cater.

So what was the game plan for him going in there tonight? Bro, this is the crazy part is we were taking a lot of grappling. I shit you not, I felt like there's Vaseline all over his legs. I swear to God, he was the most slipperiest guy I've ever seen in my life. And I felt like I'm not trying to be that guy. They'll be like, oh, this, this, this, and this, and that. But, man, that was suspicious, bro. I'm like, all right, bro.

Much more so than just normal sweat? A hundred percent. Nobody slides like that that quick. No way. I fought a lot of good guys, Jack Shore and all those guys, and I felt when you're dry and all that stuff, there's no way. And it is what it is. You can cheat the sport.

You can do whatever you want, and the end of the day is I'm doing me, and that's what's going to get me to the top. Now, Luke, if we just get some TSA agents To the Harley Davidson prep point We won't have these issues at all Because they've put their hand inside my Picard before I'm not kidding Male and female Did that joke offend you or are you

Frozen Can you see me Oh I see you now go ahead Luke you're back on Luke you call her you're on the air Uh oh There we go can you see me? Oh, I see you now. Go ahead, Luke. You're back on. Luke, call her. You're on the air. Uh-oh. There we go. Can you see me?

I can see you just fine. I'm here. Yes, there you are. There you are. Okay, very good. Got that McDonald's. I don't know what that was. Got the McDonald's Wi-Fi.

I'm doing my best. It would be surprising to me if cater was greasing, but at the same time, it's like, I don't think anybody's really above cheating in MMA. I mean, I want to be clear. I'm not accusing him of that. I don't know what, who the hell knows, who the hell knows. I remember, you know, Nate Mark Wharton, who's the more pal Horace had a whole thing about, you know, greasing. And this has been a constant thing that people bring up

time to time. I don't really know. But in the end, even if it was true, it didn't necessarily matter. Right. And so, you know, I don't know what to say to these guys. These guys like accused each other of the most heinous crimes in MMA without necessarily providing full evidence. I mean, he's giving a testimonial about it, and maybe he's telling the truth. But, like, Calvin Cater seems like a guy who's, like, done everything by the book up to this point. So unless you feel strongly about it, I don't really know what to make of that. No, I don't feel strongly about it.

Zalal did have positives to say about Cater, who I think deserves... Look, he makes fights fun. I know he's lost more than he's won of late. He tried like hell in the third round. He's always got a great chin. Here's the law putting some flowers on him. You know, how was his power out there?

Hey, that fucker, bro. What they fucking drinking Boston, bro? God damn. He got that nose like the eyes kept hitting. And I was like, coach is not moving, bro. No, she's not moving, bro. But. Yeah, those Methune massachusetts people are just

different there but shout out to new england's own calvin cater luke i got a mea culpa here on edmund shabazzian i basically called them a uh a self-implosion problem leading into this episode now look i want to acknowledge that he's not fighting elite guys there's a comeback fight coming off the loss he took on dylan buka, who has now lost three in a row since winning on Dana White's contender series. But Shabazian looks different. He sounds different. I know he's always going to be an explosive first-round striker.

So that right cross, that beautiful knockout, it is what it is. But I'm seeing a bigger frame. You heard him in the post-fight interview talk about being a father, how much that's maturing him, and now you add in the Eric-Nick-Sick relationship in the corner. Is it me, Luke, or did Shabazian show us on Saturday that there's still time for him to turn a corner and maybe build up more defense and more of a chin and more resolve,

I guess what I'm trying to say, to not be so implosive. In the right hands, a damaged fighter can still be rescued. I think the team at Jackson's, for example, with Aaron Pico, did exactly that. How far he goes still remains to be seen. And what he could have been without all of that damage up front remains also a big question mark. In this particular case, I think it's kind of similar, not exactly the same, but kind of similar, where Shabazzian, I think, absolutely can be more than what he showed.

And I don't mean, like, the flashes of, like, oh, he beat Brad Tavares quickly. I don't mean that. I mean, like, again, what Jared Cannoneer showed, rescuing himself, not, you know, things get tough, and then you fight back and win. There's a lot of corners that could be turned in that regard. But at the same time, you just do have to have managed expectations because some of that stuff, a lot of that stuff can be beaten out.

A lot of it can be beaten out. I don't think all of it can. You have to kind of just reconcile with that. Well, ever since he left taverdian and uh ronda luke things have gotten worse and now they're getting better so good to see but speaking of armenian on armenian love did you see the whole arm and saruki and post fight get up on him check this out. Luke, that had to make you feel something deep inside, right? You know,

listen, I've never been to Armenia. Just my mom is always Armenian, so I don't know what to say, except I don't know what to say. I don't know what to say. But it's good to see some camaraderie.

How about that? Good to see some camaraderie. Okay, we're going to need to see more from Edmund Shabazzian, but this was a very strong step in the right direction. I'm cheering for him. He's fun to watch. He's offensively skilled. Let's see if he can put it together.

Yeah, but hold on. One thing, if I may, very quickly, BC. Did he do anything this time? He hasn't done before. No, that that's why I said, look, you got to understand the opponent level. And you have to understand that he could deliver a knockout, whether he's broken or not. But dude, the frame looked different. The mentality looked different.

I can feel that there's positive changes there. I don't know if it fixes him, though. I don't know if he's fixed. I don't know if this is just a one night reprieve, but. I don't know if it fixes him, though. I don't know if he's fixed. I don't know if this is just a one-night reprieve, but I don't know. It just felt – I felt better for him watching that. I don't know. I don't know if your Wi-Fi is even there, Luke. This is turning into a Brian Campbell live ramble, but, you know,

I can deliver here. Anybody need any life advice? What the hell is going on, Luke? Are you still there? Luke Thomas. Oh, he's back. It's going to come back. Yes.

I'm sorry, guys. I'm on the fastest Wi-Fi that I have. I don't know what to say. You're good, Luke. It's just going through hiccups. It's good now. You're good. You're good.

Luke, let's move the show along. I got to shout out a welterweight gabrielle bone theme who easily could have been the answer to this question in my opinion uh it was certainly before his brother ishmael would lose on the main card due to doctor stoppage in the first round but luke when we saw gabrielle bone theme on the undercard and saw him in there against a red-hot Chaos Williams. The athleticism jumps off the charts. The technique on the ground. He choked out Chaos Williams, who was 5-1 in his last six.

Unconscious in round two via Bravo choke. 27 years old, 4-1 in the UFC. Should we take him seriously in the welterweight rankings? Because he looked like he fixed the glitch in this fight? This was restorative. I mean, I think there's still a lot left to go. It's one of these things where these guys, when they get back, they end up getting back by doing things that you kind of thought they could have done before anyway. Similar to like Shabazzian in his fight.

And this, to me, was kind of like that. Maybe a little bit tougher, actually. I'm not going to say it's exactly the same thing. A little bit tougher. So it was great. It was very good for him he performed ably the finish was nasty i mean dude like i don't know if we have it but the face that uh that chaos williams was making after he got put to sleep was like honestly kind of concerning it looked like he was having almost like a seizure or something so this was all very very clinical for the most part devastating certainly in the end he a great job, but at the same time, it's like, that's not the, that's not the threshold

that we thought you would have trouble with before. You've got to prove something about that. And that part hasn't been done. So very good performance, but let's escalate and see where we are then. Then we'll get a better answer and i mentioned in on the main card there the lightweight ismail bonfim came up empty against nazim sadikov but he was in that fight it looked like he had more fight in him it was kind of suddenly just stopped and that was it there may have been a language barrier issue on the communication there as well but look i hope both bonfim brothers are going to bounce back here because they make fun fights. They're aggressive as shit. We've seen videos of them sparring each other at full speed. Also, you mentioned Angela Hill at age 40, who went on there on the undercard against Ketlin Souza, picks up a split decision. Luke, between 2020 and 2022, Angela Hill lost five of six fights. Since then, she has won five of her last seven.

She's 40 years old. She's 18 and 14. And even Jared Cannoneer had to shout her out after the fight. Angela Hill was in here earlier and she mentioned her support for you. And with both of your victories, 40 old fighters went 2-0 tonight. She posted that on her social media. So how's it like holding it for you guys? Oh, we holding it down.

You know what they say, black don't crack. She said the exact same thing to me. Hey, it's a universal saying. So I guess we show it and prove it, right? We show it and prove it. Anyway, we're proof. But, yes, shout out to Angela. Angela is awesome, man.

She's hilarious. I think she definitely should be a UFC Hall of Famer for all of her accolades within the company. You know, her social media, her analysis and the amazing fights that she's put on. And thank you again for those

kind words and acknowledgement, Angela. Congratulations on your fight, too. Luke, you heard it right there. Black don't crack. I called her the Jim Miller of women's MMA. I don't know if you want to go as far as Kananir putting her in the hall of fame, but shout out to Hill for being always a positive personality, someone that adds a lot to the game, but she's not done yet. And I got to give her a lot of credit, Luke, because I've counted her out a few times. And longevity does matter.

The ability to reinvent yourself does matter. This is fun to see in the women's side. There's simply no question. I kind of counted her out as well. But she just keeps training, keeps getting better, keeps learning, keeps improving, stays in good shape, keeps applying herself. And you're right, the Jim Miller thing is probably the better way to look at it. Like, you know, she's beating relevant

fighters or whatever. I don't know if she's going to get to the title anytime soon or maybe ever, but you know, she's not fighting bullshit people. She's fighting good fighters that they are putting in front of her. And as I mentioned, like I can, she's a martial artist. That's what she is. BC, a martial artist, a continuous level of self-improvement, self-education, and look at the result as a consequence. You get wins like that. Very, very, very impressive what she has put together. The Hall of Fame part is a little strong. Sure.

I like Angela a lot. That's a little strong. However, however, commendation certainly in order on this Monday morning. Another commendation I'd like to shout out to you, Luke, is from the good people at Cuervo. In fact, now is a very good time to remember where tequila's story truly began. It was 1795 when Cuervo invented tequila. And since then, Cuervo has stayed true to its roots, the same family, the same land, and that same passion. later we'll stir we are still here in every pour in every margarita in every celebration so enjoy the tequila that started it all that of course is cuervo the tequila that invented tequila proximo cuervo.com please drink responsibly and i've got

the fantastic cuervo Cristalino. It is the official fuel of pregame preview on Morning Combat. I had some of that on Thursday. Shout out to the fine folks. I told you. I saw Morning Combat superfan W. Kamau Bell. And I had some of that. A friend of mine came over to the house we had.

We pregamed with that. And we went to go see W. Kamau Bell. It is muy delicioso no yes it's a nice little it's a nice little late night sipper too luke if you get down with that i totally agree i don't know if you're like kane velasquez you're more of a shooter but that you know i can put that joke anywhere all right let's go to topic number three hey it's the weekend boxing recap and heck yeah friday night top rank on ESPN. It took place in the theater at Madison square garden and a Valentine's day treat as 25 year old Keyshawn Davis already looked at as a rising star in

this sport. Well, he climbed his first mountain. If you've followed the show in the past six months, you knew how good we thought Keyshawn Davis was, but after his fourth round demolition of WBO lightweight champion Dennis Barinchik on Friday night, Luke, we're going to talk to Keyshawn soon, but this was only his 13th pro fight and he dominated a decorated battle

tested champion. How big of a future does the businessman have? Dude, he didn't just beat Baranchuk. He tooled him. He tooled him. It was a demolition. Dude, Keyshawn Davis is the next big star in American boxing. That's what he is.

He's the next big star in American boxing. And there'll be some other ones too, of course. You know, right on his heels, Abdullah Mason. We'll see what happens with, what's his name, Richie Torres, the heavyweight they got out of their top-ranked BC. Yeah, I mean, there's a few of these guys on the way. Keyshawn Davis is leading the pack. He is the next big American star in boxing.

And if he doesn't become one, somebody messed up. Because he's got everything you could possibly want to get there. He is obviously extremely skilled. You can see a thumbs-up there. He's extremely skilled. He is very athletic. No question about that. BC, he's mean and he's precise. And here's what I really want to point out. Obviously, he got dropped, Brinchik did, in the third round to the body, which by itself was tremendous. He came in, Brinchik ducked down thinking it was going to be a hook to the head and he just ate him up to the liver with inside foot position. But BC, it's the final sequence that really stands out to me. And why do I say that? Not only does he hit him, not just

with the left hand to the liver, he hits him with the right, then the left hand or right to the body, left hand to the liver. But he is right on top of these. These guys are right on top of each other in that sequence. And Barinczyk can't lay a glove on him. Can't do anything. Meanwhile, you see right there in the eye of the hurricane, Davis, block, block, roll, and then stab that shot to the body. Finish him off inside round four. Dude, he had his eyes open.

You could see him looking everywhere he needed to go he was a step ahead he was quicker he was absolutely brutal in his application of it and to be in the mouth of the lion and never have any teeth marks on you like that against a guy who you mentioned brinchick you know maybe something of a limited fighter but certainly battle tested and very very tough and has fought very good guys to just get chewed up like that so quickly. Keyshawn Davis is the next big star in American boxing. And if it doesn't happen, I'll eat my hat. That guy is destined for pay-per-view stardom. And look, we were a little late to picking up his momentum. And I certainly thought when he

sold out that arena in Norfolk against Gustavo Lemos and handled him like that, that it's like, okay, we got to really wake up. Dude, this was such a further leap from that. The poise he showed. I think, look, he's got almost genius IQ level in there. You can see the way he diagnoses his opponents. Look not just at the way he finished Brinček to the body,

but that left hook injic to the body but that left hook in round three to the body where he like lunged to his left and ducked down low basically just weaving in and out like water there to drop brinjic he's a brilliant fighter he truly is and he's just 25 and you want to talk about iron sharpening iron he's trained by brian beaumac mcintyre he's got terence crawford as a mentor he's got shakur stevenson the fellow lightweight titleist as a mentor uh you can see how much is rubbing off you can see the natural talent there i didn't fully realize that he was this ready this early this close to being a truly breakout star but i don't see how you can say anything but that

after friday night's performance. I mean, one thing I noticed, Luke, did you see, he seemed to be a lot bigger physically than even the last time we saw him in terms of muscle mass. I didn't really realize until I saw him kind of flexed in and celebrating. You see the, you see the back muscles, you see everything there, dude, he's going to one day be a big welterweight who can punch. And that's the thing. It's like, you look at him, you think about him, you're like, oh, he's a slick fighter who's maybe got a little bit of pop. No, he's a complete fighter, and he's going to destroy some people down the road.

I don't know, dude. This is like as important, as impressive a breakthrough win as I've seen in a while. I would agree with just about all of that. I think I mean, you asked me all about the MMA card who I thought stood out, but like nobody did exactly this. Now granted a different sport, different setup, different, you know, it's not apples to apples, but the biggest guy, the guy who took the biggest leap over the weekend was Keyshawn Davis. And BC, I'm with you. I was a little bit slow to the upkeep on this one too. I began to really notice it more recently. Certainly that Norfolk homecoming he had was a big deal that

kind of changed things. But that was more about like, oh, what's he going to do as a, you know, can this guy sell tickets? Are people going to show up to see him? What kind of star potential does he have? And that was pretty good right there building up in his home market. But this to me, like this was child's play for him. Child's play. He looked completely at ease. Dude, it looked like a magician doing tricks. You know what I mean? Like he wasn't having to battle through and then find openings.

He was just, you know, that there's that scene in the matrix where Neo finally understands who he is and Smith comes running down the hall at him and he just uses the one arm, you know what I'm talking about? He uses the one arm to block all of his punches. It felt like that. It felt like that. It felt like this guy was, like, miles ahead. And he's only, as you mentioned, 25 years old. And I'm so glad you brought up the physicality part, too,

because I wasn't sure about his physicality either. But, you see, he hasn't even grown into his full body yet. He still probably has a couple more years of training to really fill out maybe three more even depending on how you see how he was throwing barinchik anytime there'd be a clinch he was throwing back i mean he was like physic he he was fighting almost in a bud crawford way where every time there's contact you can see who the stronger guy is instantly when when bud fought Bud fought Errol Spence, Errol was again, prior to that fight anyway, obviously since then, who knows what he is, but prior to that fight, he was a bulldozer. He would just ram through everybody who stood in his way.

And then when Bud went up against him, he would lean his shoulder into him and you would watch Errol go flying off of his balance. You were like, how was that possible? Dude, like the fact that Terrence Crawford is in this guy's corner and as a mentor and they've trained together, obviously you can see it rub off on him. Again, it's the meanness, but these guys like these Terrence Crawford guys and Shakur is not quite like this because he doesn't have the same kind of pop or meanness, but like, like Terrence, it's a mastery of the science of boxing with just this, you know, absolutely kill or be killed mentality. And, you know, when you combine science with psychopath athletic, you know, mindset,

you get these kinds of results where these guys are just absolutely murdering their opponents, but physically dominating over them and then doing it in the stylish, almost breezy kind of way. Man, I cannot wait to see the next few years of Keyshawn Davis's career because it appears to be extremely bright. Yeah, he'll be with us in just a few minutes. But I do want to play one quick soundbite that he had after the fight because he brought so much joy to the table. And to hear the pre-fight interviews that Top Rank played on the broadcast and to hear

everything he's been through mentally, family issues growing up, all of that. It's remarkable to see him when he climbs the mountain be this joyful to be a advocate publicly for mental health. I couldn't be more into it. Actually, I believe we have him right now, so we can go right to Keyshawn Davis, the businessman who certainly handled his business on Friday night. Keyshawn, we are talking you up over here like the next big thing in the sport. And you earned every bit of it. I talked about the joy that you showed in the ring Friday night. What did this moment mean to you? It meant a lot, honestly, man.

I'm a world champion. You know, like a lot of people, a lot of fighters can't say that. A lot of people, you know, work hard to get here and still can't accomplish it. So I definitely gotta be grateful that God gave me this victory in an amazing fashion, honestly.

Look, there was that sort of negative during fight week when the box full of racism was dropped outside your door and then that's not even a story anymore but I'm interested, did that do anything to you mentally? Because I predicted that it would only fuel you. There's the rare fighter that can take that stuff

and use it as fuel. How were you doing dealing with that heading into the fight? Well, I know the great ones perform under any circumstances and i always tell y'all each fight i'm gonna show y'all how great i am god don't know i know that's one of the ways that i showed y'all how great i am kishan we were just talking about this 25 years of age and to look you're really starting to like fill out and becomes like you're pushing Barinczyk around a little bit.

How much weight have you put on or I should say how much muscle have you put on the last couple of years? And honestly, when you think about the next two or three years, have you thought about how much bigger you're going to get and what weight classes that might mean for you? I don't really know like the number of how much muscle I put on. I just know I put on muscle. I'm 25. Your bones are starting to be different and stuff like that.

So, of course, I'm going to start hitting my peak or my prime in terms of physicality. But I still got a lot more to go to learn inside the ring. So I'm going to continue getting better and better. But 135 is still easy for me to make you know wednesday um i was 134.2 and i drunk me some coconut water before i want to scale you know what i'm saying so um i take that in consideration like dang i'm still making this making this weight like fairly easy yeah i don't see my face i don't look trained i don't look not energized when he pushed me when he pushed me the stage, I was trying to get on his ass.

It's not like I had no energy to do all that extra stuff, too. You know? So I'm very comfortable at 135, surprisingly how big I am. So I'm going to be here for some time, honestly. I hate to bring it up, but we just kind of have to close the book on this. Was it ever determined for a fact that teofimo lopez was the one who sent the what do you want to call it the racist gift box right um it's no facts it's no can't i ain't go back and look at the cameras or i ain't honestly man i believe in god i believe

in a higher power man whoever did that they did it and it is what it is either it was berentic of them team or it was Tio. I honestly don't think it was Barretta getting them team. I literally just dapped his team up right now. They're respectful people, you know what I'm saying? So I really think it was Tio Fimo. I don't know how he got my room number and stuff like that. I just know how to go about things moving forward so that won't happen again.

Yeah, very fair point to sum that up. I want to talk about this fight because we have a lot of respect for Navarrete. I think one of the more unheralded fighters in this game. And Barinczyk handled him. Breakthrough victory. I think some people were at least expecting this would have been more of a competitive test

that you would have been tested in certain categories. You literally bodied him up and made it look easy. We could see the machine in your brain going as you're picking apart angles. Are you surprised at all at how easy against this star amateur with the reputation from that Ukrainian team that he has

that he had nothing for you on Friday? Honestly, no. I wasn't surprised at all. I wasn't surprised at all. I wasn't surprised at all. All week I was saying, I'm going to touch your body. All week I was saying. In a press conference I was pointing at him, I was saying, I'm going to F you up. I knew

what I was going to do to him. What people don't give me credit for is my defense. I really have great defense. I know that about myself. I'm knowing if a guy can't hit you, then how is he going to win? Then I'm naturally aggressive. I like to

fight. Honestly, just not to toot my own horn, bro, but it took work for me to work on my defense. It took time for me to actually get my defense to this point. I just feel like I got the whole package, man. I got defense. I got offense. I got power. I got speed. I got the will to man. I got defense. I got offense. I got power. I got speed.

I got the will to win. I got heart. I'm smart in there. I can see a punch before you even throw a punch. You know what I'm saying? So I just feel like I'm the full package, and y'all just going to continue to see how great I really am. Well, it looked like you were going for that knockout maybe as early as the

second round, and Bomek was like, just be patient. He's almost got to hold you back a little bit. I mean, were you thinking that was the moment to go for it? I forgot what round it was, but once I see his nose started leaking, because his nose started leaking, I think, like, in the second round. So you might be right. Once I see his nose started leaking, I'm like, okay, it's any time now. My punches are affecting him, you know?

So Bomak, me and Bomak got such of a chemistry, man. Like he know when to hold me back and he know when to let me go. So anything that he say, I'm a, I'm a, I'm a definitely listen to, you know, but sometimes he could be wrong. So, um, we'll be, we'll be going back and forth on definitely like listen to Bomek. Let me add one more. Can we talk, if I may be still quickly, uh, can we talk – if I may, BC, real quickly. Can we talk about the body shots?

And you mentioned your defense. We were just talking about this on the show. If you look at the final sequence in round four, right, you're right up on him and you're catching all of these shots and then digging to the body right after that. Did you know the body was going to be there or was that a read in real time i knew the body was going to be there but specifically in that moment um that was just a reaction and you know you work on things in camp to make them natural reactions and my natural reaction was to block and go straight to the body you know because that's what we was working on for camp you know and thank god to the bnbt that we had a perfect game plan all the time. The game plan definitely showed that night.

And if you can, what did BOMAC say about the victory when it was all over? All he keeps saying is, dude, I'm so proud of you, dude. Everything came from all the things you've been through, for you to make it here, I'm just so proud of you, dude. Keep going. Keep going. Those words right there, those exact words. Love to hear that stuff. Keyshawn, as we look at this division right now,

we got a full screen here of the champions at the moment. I mean, you want to talk about boxing royalty wba tank davis wbc shaker stevenson the ibf is the legend vasily lomachenko and now you with that wbo strap in your opinion where do you fit in right now among these champions in this division well we all fit in together. We are champions. So it's not like where I fit in. We all fit in right now. If you look at that list right there, you got, first of all, Keyshawn Davis.

You got Shakur Stevenson. You got Lomachenko. You got Javante Davis. It's like, damn, pick your poison. Who you want to fight for the strap? Each fight is going to be 12 round hell. Or if you fight me, you're getting knocked out.

So you better choose wisely. You know what I'm saying? You can say the same thing about that other Davis. You know what I'm saying? So man, pick your poison right now. The one 35 division is a hot division. It's hot. And honestly,

if you, if you really want to ask my opinion outside of Shakur Stevenson, I want to fight one of those two champions. Well, Keyshawn, let me say it like this. When we looked ahead to the start of the new year and ranked the fights we most wanted to see, my number one

was Tank Davis versus a guy you know well, Shakur Stevenson. I'm not sure now, no disrespect to Shakur, if I want to sub you in. You versus Tank is the hot topic on Twitter at the moment after this victory. How realistic is that fight for this calendar year in your eyes? Man, you got to ask him that. You got to ask him that.

It take two to tango. Everybody heard the knock, knock. Everybody heard that call out. I've been calling this guy out on Twitter, social. I called him out on ESPN. It takes two to tango, man. And I'm not a person that likes to chase after nothing. If it's meant for me, then God willing, he's going to give it to me.

So I don't want to keep calling this guy out. At the end of the day, I'm my own champion. And at the end of the day, it's a hot topic on Twitter because Keyshawn Davis is a hot topic because Keyshawn Davis created his own lane for Keyshawn Davis. So I don't need a Javante Davis to make me become nothing. All I got to do is keep doing what I'm doing. Now, if he decides to get in the ring and fight me,

then, oh, pay-per-view. It's going to be an electrifying fight. But it takes two to tango. So I need y'all to ask him that question. Fair enough. By the way, kind of interesting. You're from Norfolk. You've got Gervonta from Baltimore. and you've got Shakur from Newark,

all basically East Coast guys, all killing the 135-pound division. Kind of interesting in that way. So let me get your opinion on this if we can, Keyshawn. Tell me how Davis versus Lamont Roach goes in about two weeks. Well, you've got to think about it like this, man. When Navarrete moved up in Fort Beranchik, Navarrete moved up from 130 to fight a real 135 pounder for antique dusting them off easy so on a higher level you got lamont roach moving up fighting a real 135 pounder it typically typically should be the same

you know outcome um shout out to Lamont Roach, though. I know Lamont Roach. I know him. I know Tank, but I know Lamont Roach as well. So I'm not going to just count him out because maybe I'm a little biased. But, you know, just knowing the sport of boxing, man, the natural 135-pounder should typically win that fight. And then one more for me, if I may, Sean, which is, okay, this was February.

You already got a world title. Congratulations on that. I mean, amazing, amazing accomplishment, but you got the rest of the year. So talk to me, are we going to be active this year? Are you looking for only big fights? Like, how are you thinking about the rest of the year ahead? Well, first of all, I'm fighting at least two more times this year, at least. I'm 25 and I've been stopping, guys. I haven't been going my four rounds.

I don't got no cuts on my face. My hand's not bruised up. I can go on a 10-mile run right now, hit the back. I'm young. I'm ready to fight again. I only did three, four rounds this past week. I'm ready to fight. Like, bring me back out there.

I can go three more times this year, for real. But at least I want to go two more times. And I definitely want a big name coming into my next fight, honestly. I really, really want a big name. I've seen premier boxing champions, you know, PBC, you know, made like a little tweet the night that I fought. So I don't know if that was pertaining to Davis or Cruz, but either one of those fights, I would love next. Wow. Pitbull Cruz, that would be something. I want to close with this Keyshawn because you give so much love to your city and also your family.

Your two brothers, Kelvin and Keyon, fought on the same card as you. We saw Keyon on the undercard on Friday in New York. And like you told us in the past, he's going to be a problem in the future. This is what? We call it a DB3, Davis Brothers 3. I think that's the acronym you guys got going. Is this going to be a thing where we're going to see two or three of you fight on the same card as much as possible in the future because there's so much talent running through that family

right now oh for sure bro like for sure man like just like you said bro davis brothers db3 is three of us you know i'm the middle brother my little brother y'all got to watch this past week, 6-4 at 147. Kelvin Davis, he fight in March 8th, you know, 6-1 at 140. And we all share the same mentality. We all like to fight. We all come from the same city, the same mother, the same father, the same background, you know. Y'all see after the fight how we hugging each other like this is real. It's not nothing fake when it come to us, man.

And, again, Keyon Davis, he just – the boxing world know Keyon now because I've been preaching his name. I actually get to see him. Y'all like, yo, this kid, nah, he's good. He's pretty good, you know. And then my big brother, he fight for an intern, you know, this year and stuff like that. It's not three brothers in the sport of boxing that's competing

on these high levels right now in today's day. It's never been three brothers right now. I honestly feel like the boxing world needs to get behind us because we're doing something that nobody never seen before. And we're living up to past expectations.

The future is incredibly bright for Keyshawn Davis and company Keyshawn, thank you for the time Congratulations again on Friday's big win Cannot wait for the future with you Yes sir, thank y'all Thank y'all for having me

Thank you Keyshawn The businessman joining us Hell of a victory Now Luke, he mentioned it there And we knew the friendship between him and Shakur Stevenson, a title holder in this division, they won't fight each other. You got a, you know, an Aljo and Murab type thing going on there.

But dude, is there a fight you would like to see more for Keyshawn in the future than Tank Davis? I mean, I didn't hate the Pitbull-Cruz offering, by the way, but when you look ahead, what's the matchup that would get you excited down the road for this kid? I mean, honestly, the Shakur one too, but I mean, they're stable

mates, so it's not going to happen probably anytime soon. So it's got to be, I mean, Tank seems to have limited time left in the sport. We got to get it against people who can thump with him. And it seems like Keyshawn is plenty game. I mean, there's other ones you can go to, obviously obviously but that is a great opportunity and if they can make that before Tank closes the show I would be delighted I'll put it oh my god that would be such an incredible fight 25

years old Tank what is he right about 30 right now right at the absolute mountaintop of what he has but we got to see from Tank against Roach we got to see not only him get the win but see the absolute mountaintop of what he has. But we got to see from take against Roach. We got to see not only him get the win, but see where his head's at after, because he has been vocal about a very serious thing on his mind, which is he wants to step away for a bit to get his head right, to remove the trauma of the past that's been following him.

And we certainly all support that. Also, though, the guy's one of the biggest stars in the sport, and you want to see him so a lot to juggle there but kishan broke through and shout out to 20 20 year old excuse me abdullah mason luke we love him as a prospect you've shouted them out his last fight he got dropped twice in the first round but rallied back to get a huge ko that was long island luke's fight of the year by the way he improved to 17 and 0 on Saturday, and he took out Manuel Jaimes, who had just gone 10 rounds with Roley Romero on that pay-per-view.

And Luke, he put it on him. And as dynamic a young prospect performance jumping through the screen as you would want to see, dude, this kid is going to be right behind Keyshawn in terms of getting us to notice him sooner rather than later. Keyshawn's a little bit ahead. This is a world title fight.

He's obviously doing tremendous things, but as you indicated, top ranks got a few things cooking with some of these guys. Abdullah Mason probably is going to be behind Keyshawn, another American star. There are some bright spots in american boxing right now bc it's just we got to get these guys on in big fights and in big in front of big audiences and you know on home soil as much as humanly possible to really leverage all this because the talent is there the talent is there well how often do I talk about this new generation of young American boxers just want the smoke?

Mason is 20 years old. Let's hear from him quickly on what might be in his future. I saw one, you know, you got the title, you got one. I think I'm up there at one. You want a title shot next, then that's what you're looking for. Oh, for sure. I mean, you know, whatever comes my way next, you know, we still got to work our way up there and be realistic. But if that comes our way, then I'll be ready for it.

Now, this is my way, then. Luke, he wants a title shot next. We still got to work our way up there and be realistic, but if that comes our way then I'll be ready for it. Luke, he wants a title shot next. He's in the same division where the champions are Tank, Loma, Shakur, and Keyshawn. This is not bad, right? Not bad. It's insane. It's insane. I hope he can do it

because he seems like he's got a lot of ability. Yes. Also, on that undercard, Jared Big Baby Anderson finally came back from that knockout loss to Martin Bacoli, but went the distance, looked kind of flat and uninterested. It was kind of tough to see. I was happy that Zayn was – He looks like – BC, he looks like food. He looks like food to, like, anybody who's really good in that division,

all these other heavyweights right now are going to eat them alive. You know, something's got to change for him probably mentally in terms of his, his want to, to put in the training and to be in there. Uh, Xander Zayas, the unbeaten junior middleweight dude,

he looked good again. He fought, uh, Slava Spomer, the guy trained by Roy Jones jr. And he brutalized him to the body and scored a late stoppage. There are some haters on there that believe he gets hit too much, Luke, but I'm really watching him closely out of Puerto Rico.

He's a fun and exciting fighter. But you know what was a big story over the weekend on DAZN? Arnold Barbosa Jr., the Mexican-American, scoring a split decision over 12 rounds against Jack Catterall in Manchester, England England to pick up the WBO interim strap, which essentially makes him the number one contender for Teo Fimo Lopez at 140. Teo has 180 days to make the fight or be stripped. Barboza has already said publicly he's willing to unify against Richardson Hitchens if that's the case.

But let's hear quickly from Barboza first celebrating the win backstage. That's right, man. God is good, dog. God is good. God is amazing, bro. This time, bro, it's free. That's right, bro. We're going up. Congratulations, bro. Now, Luke, there's too many titles in boxing, and that's just a vacant interim strap,

but that felt good. That guy's a hard-nosed, unbeaten boxer who went in there on enemy soil and did not get robbed which was great to see a very very surprising result i wasn't following in real time but then when i caught everything else after the fact and why it was important i was blown away actually so to your point you know not the most prestigious title i'm not sure which one is in boxing but a hard road to get to even these spots. And congratulations to him. Well, Teofimo responded to that video of him crying with this tweet that says,

hey, it's an interim belt. Relax, buddy. Not classified as a world title. I don't care what any of you make it seem. You know who the real champion is. Well, Teofimo's got 180 days to make the fight with Barboza. Here's Barboza sending a message yeah tilfino's in against back against corner um you know now people know why that he's been ducking me man for the past four

years you know so so now it's time for him to put up or shut up and vacate man so let's see what he does ring magazine potentially doing a show alcatraz with um tfmo lopez uh how good does that sound for yourself man i think if you put me into Teofimo in Alcatraz, man, that's going to be an amazing war. That one, I'm coming to war. So my manager's getting on it. Trust me, he's going to Saudi. He's probably going straight to Saudi after this.

So he's going to talk to Turkey, man, and see what we can do. So Luke, Teo's either going to drop the belt, move up to 147 and maybe wait for the winner of Butsenis against Staniosis, or he can fight in May or June on Alcatraz Island for Riyad Sizzan against Barbosa. This is a situation I believe, and I want to know your opinion. If the Teo from the Josh Taylor and the Loma fight shows up, he's going to defend that title.

But if they make this fight and he's that in-between Teo, Barbosa could be an issue. I mean, if he's distracted from, again, I don't know if he sent the racist gift box, but if that's where his head is at, that he actually did that, you know, we've seen him underperform. We've seen, like, dude, Teo is capable of incredible overperformance as well as shocking underperformance. Sometimes he shows up and you can't believe how good he is, but BC, you know this too. There are times he shows up and you're like, dude,

what the fuck is going on here? Like, you don't understand any part of it. So which one you're going to get makes the whole thing kind of exciting in that way. Yeah. I'm happy for Barbosa. He really fought a smart fight, knew when to press on the gas, knew when not to. Catterall fought well too, by the way, but I didn't think he was offensive enough. Let's go to topic number four, which still stays in boxing, and critics are heavily panning this WBA proposal, which was started, by the way, by Teofimo Lopez, and the idea of the return to 15 round boxing fights may be in titles only or in undisputed titles only.

So first, let's show the video of Teofimo being interviewed under a Ring Magazine podcast with Steve Kim. Listen to this. I want to know something. Can we bring some fights to 15 rounds? Can we? I don't know. That might we bring some fights to 15 rounds? Can we? I don't know.

That might be a question. Just some of us. I feel that when you're fighting for the undisputed. How about we do undisputed 15 rounds? Add three rounds to it. Then we'll find out who the true champions are. I think you're one of those true champions. Yo. You got two of these in two divisions.

Let's get you a third one. And let's do that then. I think in honor of the representation of what it really stands for, that sanctioning fee of 3% that you guys don't charge, right? There's no sanctioning fee. Why not three rounds?

Extra. 15 rounds. All right, Taya. For Undisputed. Thank you. Thank you for joining us, man. And that was obviously not Steve Kim. Sorry, that was Dougie Fisher of Ring Magazine there.

So, Luke, Teo makes that suggestion. And the next day, and by the way, don't miss there how Dougie Fisher was like, okay, Teo, let's wrap that up. You're sounding crazy again. But after Teo did this, WBA President Gilberto Mendoza said publicly he's willing to consider the change for high caliber fights only. The comment was vehemently and publicly maligned by just about everybody from Turkey Al-Ashiq to the remaining three sanctioning body heads in the

BC, the BAO and the IBF and also our own Luke Thomas. So LT, while this feels like a no-brainer, can you explain why going back to 15-round title fights in boxing is potentially a horrific idea? The number of rounds that need to be there in order to keep fighters safe. Hold on. I'm here. I'm here. Can you hear me?

You can hear me, yeah? We got you. I'm back. Hi, everyone. Sorry. The answer is as follows. Three rounds you could have to minimize all fighter safety, or to minimize fighter danger, I should say. The reality is boxing is dangerous,

and people die in one-round bouts, and they die in 12-round bouts. You might be asking, what is the difference between that and 15? Chael Sonnen brought up a point on the MMA side when they went from three- to five-round bouts in MMA where you're adding now, granted, a significantly greater chunk, you're adding two five-minute rounds

of 10 minutes extra to the bout. But the level of damage that happens in those bouts goes up exponentially. They're much more damaging, much more consequential. And that by itself is kind of bad enough. But we let it go because it's important for the division and it's important for the fights themselves and it's important for the titles. 15 rounds is something that boxing used to do

until a series of events happened. But most importantly, a guy by the name of Kim Duk-Ku fought Ray Mancini on national TV and was basically beaten to death on air and died shortly after the bout itself. But you can watch him get torn to pieces in these contests, in this contest, and you can see him... ...against Luke.

Really, really, really, really, really fucking bad. It was after that that basically people... Can you hear me? Am I okay? We got you back all right okay we got you back a little we got you back okay we're trying our best here sorry the point i'm trying to make here is i'm doing my best in this hotel room the point I'm trying to make here is we did do 15 rounds and people fucking died doing it in a very visible and unnecessary way. Anyone in any of boxing's regulatory apparatus, whether that's the officiating side or the sanctioning side, who is seriously considering doing 15 rounds in a boxing contest deserves to be removed from office, removed from

their position. You are not capable of making sound judgment, a ludicrous idea that can only endanger people. And it's just one fighter imagining something that sounds cool in theory, BC, that has no real relationship to the dangers you then secure, or at least certainly raise the level of, by doing it in the real world. We saw a guy get beaten to death doing this. Revisiting this idea is a non-fucking starter. It's moronic, it's dangerous, it's bad. And BC, it's not even necessary.

You don't even need to add basically 10 more minutes to a boxing fight. What the fuck are we even talking about here? Yeah, I mean, that fight with Dooku Kim was obviously infamous, and he fought like there was no tomorrow with an unbelievable amount of pride and passion. And obviously, it went the way it went. Not only did he die, his mother committed suicide. And then the referee, Richard Green, shortly after committed suicide. And then Ray Mancini was deeply depressed and it really, you know, he would go on to

make the hall of fame, but that was obviously a major turning point in his career. So Luke talked about it. So did Turkey Al-Ashiq with this tweet. And we know he seems to have the most control of anybody in the boxing right now. And he says, no, I don't support this idea in any way this is bad for a fighter's health and i would never be in favor of fights going back to 15 rounds in my opinion even a 12 round fight could be too much for a fighter's health but 15 is out of the question uh it would never be allowed to happen luke he may be running boxing shortly so it's good to see him say that. And also, promoter Lou DiBella, who's long been very public about his internal struggles that we all go through with this sport and the corruption and, you know, the physical price people can pay.

He came out in a response to your tweet and said, shame on the suggestion. Let's get more barbaric again when we can't even standardize health and safety protections in this effing sport. Let's just kill some more people and scramble more brains. I guess I'm happy, Luke, that Turkey came out and said that because, like I said, he's got the most control. I hope that wherever this Turkey and TKO takeover happens, that we get a UFC commitment to health standards in this so that we can at least clean up that in boxing. You know what I mean? We're Going to have all this organization Hopefully it's for the long-term good

And not a monopolistic nightmare but Hopefully first and foremost they get The safety right so we don't have to Even have these type of discussions you Know yeah there's just no this this is a Terrible idea where I know we're living In an era where people just want to rip Out the the the, the,

the copper wiring in their house to see what's behind it. And then like all of a sudden problems emerge and now we're going to have to solve them. This is, this is something we don't have to do. There is no need for this. It doesn't change anything for the positive. Fuck no to all of this. And to anyone who says it, remember their name, they're out of their mind. There you go. Let's go to topic number five to close it out. Look, this Saturday, February 22nd, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. Dizon and Turkey Al-Ashiq are presenting what has only been marketed and called as the fight card of the century.

A super card with seven intriguing title bouts on the main portion. So, Luke Thomas, kind of a two-part question in one here. This card's depth is so ridiculous. I don't know if it was you who told me, but Boxing Scene has rated four of the seven fights on this card five-star bouts, which is its top rating. The other remaining fights are all four-star bouts. Does the quality of this event live up to its

ambitious title and which storyline are you most excited about so what i'm really asking you luke is is it acceptable to call this the fight card of the century and what are you most focused in on i mean there's ppc there's people who are rightly concerned about like saudi sports washing and like what the role of that is going to be going forward. And not even just that, just monopolistic control. There's plenty of things to be concerned about. But if you're just judging the fights on the card and you're trying to understand how significant it is, BC, again, maybe you disagree. Any single one of these could be a main event.

Any single one of these could be a main event any any any single one of these could be a main event depending on how they want to do it and more to the point the card is so good bc the card is so good it's actually drowning out the rematch between better be even bivouac yeah there is so much happening on this card that there actually isn't that much buzz i mean there is but there's not you know what I mean? You would have thought that the main event would be like, this thing would be like dissecting. And we did, of course, after it happened.

But I mean, in the lead up to it, we'd be talking about this and that and like all the different things that we learned and what could be happening this time. And some of that is happening, but you have to divert your attention to Big Bang being on this, to the return of Shakur Stevenson being on this, to, by the way, Madrimov and Virgil Ortiz on this to the return of Shakur Stevenson being on this too by the way Madrimov and Virgil Ortiz on this fucking card like and I'm just I haven't even mentioned I haven't gone through half of it

it is so outrageously stacked that it's honestly hard to process under normal boxing and frankly maybe even MMA card terms this is maybe the first boxing card that I've seen that is like, you know, even really good boxing cards, BC, they'll have two, maybe three good fights, right? You know what I mean? That's saying a lot. Dude, this one's got, what, seven of these motherfuckers? They're all studs. I mean, the first one is

Joshua Boazzi against Callum Smith. It's like, holy crap, that fight rules too. Let's show this commercial that DAZN put together. It illustrates what we're looking at here. The fight card of the century. Live on DAZN Worldwide. February 22nd. With belts on the line all night.

Featuring an epic rematch. Betabier versus Bivol 2. For the Undisputed Light Heavyweight Championship. Dubois versus Parker. Defend or dethrone for the World Heavyweight Crown. Stevenson vs. Schofield, superstars battle for lightweight world championship glory. Adames vs. Silas, heavy hitters meet for the middleweight championship of the world.

Ortiz Jr. vs. Medrimov, knockout Kings collide for the world's super lightweight throne. Zhang versus Caballel. Titans clash for world heavyweight domination. Buatze versus Smith. Battle of Britain eliminator for a shot at the world title. The fight card of the century. February 22nd. With belts on a line all night.

Buy now at DAZN.com slash boxing. Luke, they deserve us playing that commercial on this show. They're not all full title fights, but they're all either a title fight or one that leads directly to a big one. The idea of trying to pick which storyline you like best, I think the best storyline here is that

this card is out of control. It is indeed completely out of control. And to the point where I'm like, you're asking what the coolest storyline is. I don't even know which way to go with this one. Just the main event alone. Just the main event alone. Look at that card. That card, BC, it's insane.

Just the main event alone is worthy of the opening bout between Smith and Blatzy is like for every casual fan. But after that, dude, it's, this is, this is a, I don't know. I don't know if they're going to make a card like this again. You know, I'm being serious. Yeah. I'm with you on that. This is so huge. And maybe, I don't know Turkey's plans, but we've always said in, in boxing, at least we'd like to get an annual Superbowl card. The idea was always, you know, all the promoters come together for one card per year.

Well, with Turkey, you can do that. Maybe this is I mean, I know this is just another big tentpole event, which on a year which is going to be filled with them. But we can say what we want about the other side of dealing with with Turkey and the threats of the takeover with TKO. And, you know, we've written about it. We've talked about it. There's more positives than negatives. And this is a major positive on Saturday, the winner of that co-main event, by the way, between Dubois and Joseph Parker for that IBF belt.

Usyk's ready to, you know, to face the winner. So there's so much at stake. I can't wait to see this. Luke Thomas, are you using the restroom? You want to use the restroom? And I'll just, like, sit for a while. Yeah, let me go real quickly to the bathroom and i'll be right back okay all right while luke heads off to the bathroom we are going to start our next segment as we put the five top luke we've got an echo issue i'm muted and we're good thank you very much long island luke uh thank

you all for dealing with our audio issues we're're doing our best, but we're getting there. We're getting there. So yeah, this card top to bottom, absolutely ridiculous. I'm really, really, really looking at, obviously the main event is the best fight on there, but that Madrimov-Ortiz fight, not for supremacy at 154, but certainly for a pole position here in a lot of ways

with Ortiz coming off that fight a year win over Boa Chuck and the run that he's been on and Madrimov in that loss to Terrence, Bud Crawford really put himself on the map in a major elite way. So damn, damn, damn. I think the one I'm most intrigued by, by the way, is that Shakur Stevenson Floyd Schofield, which is probably the opposite for a lot of people. We expect Schofield to get humbled and lose in a spot where it's probably too much too soon, but he is aggressive. He is sometimes raw and fearless.

Buckle up. This is going to be fun. We're going to find it out. Let's go to our next topic. We give you the chance every Sunday evening on the social channels of at Morning Combat on X and Instagram to send your questions in. Now a warning, you may get heckled if you've got a weird username and you better come original. This one's called

DMs from the donks. All righty. Let's hear the first one as Luke finishes naked gun style, urinating into the microphone. This is great. Yeah. The first one's coming to us in very small print from at 420 history bird shout out to that guy right there. We love that guy is Keyshawn Davis's career more impressive than Shakur

Stevens currently Shakur Stevenson's currently. So here's the deal, South Oregon bird, um, four 20 history guy. No, he has not accomplished more than Shakur who gets heavily more maligned for getting booed out of his hometown arena in a wide, you know, win, then, then is necessary. Shakur is a three division champion already. And, uh, Keyshawn at 25 just climbed his first major Hill there. But I think the, where the conversation shifting is you heard me in that Keyshawn interview say the fight I wanted to see more than any of this calendar year was tank versus Shakur. And now I think I'm actually ready to sub out Shakur and put Keyshawn in.

So that doesn't mean that Keyshawn has reached a higher level of accomplishment, but I'm starting to readjust my, you know, five princes, four Kings, six kids, whatever we're going to call this, these young American breakout boxing stars. I thought Shakur was the boss at the end of this video game. And now I'm readjusting that every time I see Keyshawn Davis. And I think that's as great of an endorsement as you can give a young fighter, because I think even through some of his public warts that Shakur Steven is

still the Stevenson is the absolute goods in this game. But Luke, would you agree that that Keyshawn's kind of taking some thunder right there? You know what I mean? Like in this division. But Luke, would you agree that, that Keyshawn's kind of taking some thunder right there? You know what I mean? Like in this division at the moment, he's grabbing the hype of the division at the moment. He's got some of Stevenson's slickster abilities. I mean,

they're not the same, but he's got some of his slickster abilities, but he can also punch. And he's, as we talked about it, he's mean. It changes the equation a lot, actually.

Indeed. It does. Let's go. It changes the equation a lot, actually. Indeed, it does. Let's go to question number two here. From at Kieran underscore Delaney. I mean, one day we'll figure out how to pronounce that. It's probably like Shiraz or something. I have no idea. Why do you think the heavyweight division talent pool has regressed significantly over the last number of years? In case I get picked by name

it's oh here we go he put it in there it's pronounced kieron luke it's not sharon kieron delaney this guy drugs delaney is definitely sharon it's definitely definitely sure yeah sharon is karen thanks for sharing luke i assume assume he's talking about MMA where the heavyweight scene is pathetic at the moment outside of the very elite who can't fight each other or won't fight each other, meaning Nganou, Espinel, and Jones. What do you think about his question? There just hasn't so like these guys like lesnar and kane and carwin they don't do this anymore and then the you know which we've lost in some

of the other divisions but then the dagastanis kind of make up for it but there just hasn't been that heavyweight kind of dagastani thing going on on the uh to help out as like a counterbalancing force so there's just been really poor recruitment of elite heavyweight talent in a way that just didn't used to be this bad dude heavyweight used to be a lot dude even go back and look at the strike force heavyweight grand prix and that wasn't even what the UFC could do that that was just force it's crazy it's crazy yeah it's weird you would think there would be such an evolution of heavyweights ability

and the talent pool being deeper because guys are actually growing up, seeing a path to it. You know, I can get into amateur wrestling and take my martial arts on the side and, you know, go to college or the Olympics. Like there's a, there's a route to get here. And we're seeing this heavyweight division get worse and worse. It's not like they're all in boxing. Luke, I don't know where they are.

Where are these people? The NFL, the NBA. Okay, so you're saying Richie Incognito could have been something at 265? Probably, yeah, probably. Thank you, Kieron Delaney, for your question from somewhere over there in the Scotland, Ireland, Wales area. This next one's from Burner239.

Is UFC struggling to find top contenders? Recently, we are seeing a lot of champions defending titles and veterans like Cannoneer schooling the up-and-comers like Rodriguez. Let me restart that is it the ufc calendar has them going through contenders too quickly luke why are we according to this man not i mean we i don't know if that's true first of all is the if you want to say the stars there's not enough stars at the moment. They're reloading that, yes. But there's contenders up the wazoo, is there not? Well, I mean, it depends on the division, right?

So, like, heavyweight, there really aren't any. 205, there really aren't many. Women's bantamweight, there's nothing going on, Luke. There's just absolutely fuck all. But some of the other ones are obviously stacked. It just really depends on what the division is. And then also, like, even at lightweight, there's not a – I mean, there's always going to be contenders, but there's not, like, a great matchup because there hasn't been that turnover, which we talked about.

Like, again, Rodriguez should have beaten Kananier. That's how a division, a healthy division, normally functions. So there are some issues like that. But to the point you raised, I would just submit these are specific issues. And also, like, you know, it's basically not entirely, but it's basically the big dudes. That seems to me to be the real problem here. Yeah, we got a problem with big dudes at the moment. Number four comes from Fahey.Liam. we got another liam luke unbelievable that's like the most popular

he says what is a fight or fighter that changed your perspective on how just how tough mentally and physically a person can be luke i want to jump in quick and say Glover Teixeira versus Yuri Prohotska and Jamal Hill. In both of those fights, I had multiple readjustment periods where I'm like, how the frick is this cyborg taking this damage and just coming back with a smile? Yeah, that's a good one. I'm going to go Diego Sanchez versus Martin Kampmann. I've talked about this fight even recently, I think, on the show. Dude, Diego Sanchez's face was falling off.

Yeah. It was falling off. And there's a video. I don't know if it's still somewhere on Fight Pass or anywhere else we see, but there was a video at the time of Lorenzo and Dana visiting Diego backstage, getting his face sewn back on. And Diego is just talking about cortisazon like his heart the whole time. It's crazy. Like, dude, that was one of those fights

where I couldn't believe how tough he was. But sure enough, he was. What was that fight with Anthony Smith and somebody was pounding his teeth out? That was a pretty gnarly moment. Glover knocked his teeth out. He handed the teeth to the referee. Yeah, that's just...

Yeah. I mean, I could easily also say rounds four and five of Hunt Silva one still lives in my brain as this is inhumane. Yes. The final one comes from Spice of Kalinin. What is both of your go-to orders at a Mexican restaurant? At this point in my life, it's usually straight up Jalisco fajitas every time. And if not, I go with the quesaburria tacos as a second option. I'm sorry, what word is that, Vici?

Quesaburria. Quesaburria. Oh, yeah, yeah. Que sabía. Oh yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Que sabía. Thank you very much. Yes.

Yes. Uh, what's your, what's your go-to order BC? Um, it's definitely a, um, a,

uh, torta sandwich. Uh, the pork is tremendous Luke, uh, but I'll try to go with the beef uh that's but that's you know not every restaurant will have that so if not i will go with uh the carne asada burrito does that make me a you know a gringo probably well the way you described the torta sounded like

you had a plan for banging fat chick yeah i I mean, I want to leave it ambiguous, like where you got to question my motives, you know what I mean? Yeah. Dude, I'll tell you what, there's this Mexican restaurant I go to, now it's got some Salvadorian cooks, so they kind of remix the menu a little bit, but I have a favorite dish because it's close to where we take

Tuki for some of her after school activities. Yes. And they make this dish called the la carreta which is a skirt steak okay rice beans you know guac uh sour cream the whole bit and then they also just throw in a free bean and cheese pupusa which is like a look like a like a pancake now pupusa sounds like sounds like a uh a uh torta if you know what i mean great dude pupusas are like the salvadori in number one food and in dc they're super super good because obviously there's a million salvadorians here uh that that dish is my go-to it's the it's the skirt steak with the with the

pupusa and then the beef of the bean and the, buddy, that is a home run winner. Okay, but if it's breakfast, it's only one thing. Huevos rancheros, Luke. Okay, it's keto, bitch, right? Yeah. All right, there we go. A little more skin to do. You're terrible. That's our five questions from the DMers of the week.

Thank you. This final segment, though, is where I do everything in my power using the internet and your Submissions to my Instagram Dms to make Luke Thomas uncomfortable And or laughing This one's called have you seen this shit all right Wow

Who Luke big weekend for Conor McGregor. BKFC had a press conference in Italy where Conor says he's ready to knuckle up. For sure. If you think I'm up here giving these speeches and leading these men into battle, and I won't step in there myself, think again. For sure, Conorcgregor will fight in bare knuckle fighting championship mark my words luke mark his words yen yen on that or what

couldn't couldn't be less in if there was a contest yeah okay all right well connor in his professional role as co-owner of bkfc seemed to tease a big signing coming up for that bare knuckle federation stay tuned we might have something announcement with fedor emilienko hey fedor we're waiting some news might be coming with fedor emilienko bareinoko Fighting Championship is signing and acquiring the best fighters of all time. Luke, what in the GFL is going on here? I mean, come on. Fedor is nearly 50 and geriatric at this point. I mean, a legend in the game.

Need I say more? But what the fuck are we doing here? No, thank you. I mean, just put him in there against Verdum. Give him that rematch, Luke, that we've all been waiting for okay i mean somebody's yeah i'm good on that yeah i'm good on that uh finally uh what do you get when you combine conor mcgregor cocaine and firearms luke you get this video yeah i like these babies yeah yeah i want to move out of it every single one of them cleaned the head. Look at the far one.

Did you see me on the neck? See the far one down at the neck? Two shots to the neck down the back. See that? Look at this fucking thing. Imagine getting a bang of that. Oh yeah. That's a beautiful gun that is, man.

Oh, that was great. Look at this fucking thing. This way. Oh, you're proud of me. See you in hell baby! Ha ha ha! Ha ha ha! I can't play the Tommy gun. Tommy gun is like that.

Can I shoot this? So what? Prepare for the bounce back? Nice! Back! So Steve's the... Steve's the... Oh it's a powerful one!

Whoa! Wow! God bless America! God bless America baby God bless America. Look, that video was brought to you by Freedom, and it's needless to say that Conor definitely would have taken the Polar Express with Osborne without question had he enlisted alongside you, right? Oh, my God, right? I'm just glad there was a range safety officer there.

Let's just put it that way. Okay. Hey, let's keep it going. It's time for MMA Fighters in the Wild. And this is not a joke. This is a real thing. Jon Jones, Instagram Live over the weekend. Let's watch it.

On the trip. You get pissed off. Disappointed. Another day. You just want to kill. And you hear. Another day, you's going to kill. You know, and it's really to try to, it's morbid to try to figure that out. But it's, it's damn, dude.

Damn, right? Yeah, he needs help. Sounds like he needs help. I'm not even doing a bit. Separate from this, separate from this video, why doesn't the UFC just strip him? I mean, the answer is because they want to make Jones versus Aspinall. But if he doesn't want the fight or he can't physically accept the fight, like, are we at that point yet to strip him?

I mean, you know, GDR got stripped when she's like, I don't want to fight Cyborg because she's on roids. You know, they're like, okay, you're not our champion. The interesting answer will be if he decides not to fight aspinall for whatever reason does the ufc claim that they stripped him or does he claim that he gave the title back if we get to that point that could be interesting uh more fighters in the wild colby covington showed up at the ufc apex and posed with mel gibson luke as we take one step closer to the armageddon that is coming in our lives lu Luke, wow, look at these common bedfellows.

And also, Colby was on a live stream when Kamaru Usman refused to talk to him. What is it? What's up, buddy? How you doing, man? Good to see you. It's a live stream. It's a live stream. How you doing? Doing good? All right, for sure. Did you get that?

Yes, that was Usman, guys. He just said, hey, man, we're going to talk in a little bit. I don't think he wanted to talk on the stream because he didn't want the chat to hear what he had to say. But, yeah, we'll definitely chop it up a little bit. Maybe we'll get a picture. Or maybe we'll just fight. You never know. When chaos is in the building, it's unpredictable.

He gave me a knuckle. You know, I wasn't going to shake his hand more about the knuckles. You know, that's a sign of respect. So, no hard feelings. You know, I said my truth. We duked it out. Maybe we'll duke it out again. Whatever the fans want.

We're going to give the fans what the fans want. Look, I don't think the fans want him around anymore, if we're being honest. Right? I mean, come on. Here's what the fans want. Turn that stream off're being honest right I mean yeah here's what the figures what the fans want turn that stream off that's what they want I remember that time Nina drama cost our months are you can a title shot when that when they wrestled and it got weird on that video well it got even weirder on Saturday watch this This is a great night of fights and I think everyone had a great night. I'm sorry, I didn't mean to.

This is because of you. I hurt my back because of you. Tell him I didn't hurt your back. No, you didn't hurt my back. It was my fault. That seemed nice Alright Remember that time we covered that press conference with jake paul and in hollywood and we were like what the hell's going on there let's listen in on dimitri biebel what was your first impression of this country of america yes uh when came there, first of all, what I saw, it was Hollywood, you know. And I thought, wow, it's so dirty. Than I expected. Well, Vine and Santa Monica, you're right.

They can clean it up a little. Luke, Hollywood's the dirtiest place on earth. Let's be very honest. Yeah, he's telling the truth I've said this before I couldn't believe how young the homeless looked I know Barefoot and zombie like

It was gross to say the least Let's go to Times Square Where you can watch the Super Bowl on a big screen Unless you get itchy And want to start kicking field goals. Okay, local authorities are still... That's not real, is it? It looks pretty real to me, Luke, okay? You know what I'm saying?

They should put a sign out there saying no doing that, but let's keep going here. Guess I'm not parking on any city streets, if you know what I mean. All right. Luke, you ever fearful that Tukes is going to grab the car keys one day and just get behind the wheel? Yeah. Oh, my God. yes oh my god yeah brother run them people over let them know who yeah

that was a kid bringing the hurt here's some kids getting hurt though Good stuff right there Our KO of the week Brings us to the backyard Luke sent this one to us Holy crap Yo look at this They got my man posted up on the elbow like he's at the beach.

Bah! Lord, that's a finish. Anything can happen in regional. Regional or backyard MMA, anything can happen. Watch this baseline cameraman in this next clip. Oh boy. Oh boy, sir.

But it gets worse. Watch this. this for the win right in the jewels yes unbelievable hey that was great dude it's time to get fecal on bc's feces y'all remember that time justine kish shared her pants in the octagon and became a meme for life lukeall remember that time Justine Kish Shared her pants in the octagon And became a meme for life Luke you remember that right Unfortunately Hey let's welcome If shitting your pants is cool Luke You can call me Jimmy Butler

I mean what the hell is going on here Jimmy Body Jim That looks like a Saragusa-style drop right there. Wow. Is that what we thought it was? Bro, that looks like my dung...

Shit? I think he shit his pants mid-layup, which is pretty tremendous. Oh, wow. That is... You know what, Luke? Yeah. I've said it before. I'll say it again. Never trust a fart.

Never. Never. Dude wipes. Keep them on hand. Dude wipes. Okay. Luke, I challenge you to a game of battle shits. Do you accept?

All right. Poop down at high noon. There we go. Let's go over to you never know what you'll find at the Goodwill on the coffee mug aisle. My lead

is this medieval 9-11 humor, Luke? That's unbelievable. Wow. Okay. there we go. And we all know Luke's favorite character in this segment, the weird cake lady. Let's see what she's up to. Okay, she eats the lipstick. All right. This lady.

Okay. Listen, I try to be progressive, but this woman is a whore. I mean, what can I say? Oh, my God. Wow. Luke, look at the high progressive, but this woman is a whore. I mean, what can I say? Oh, my God. Wow. Luke, look at the high heel, too. Yeah. Keep eating your shoe, you disgusting freak.

Send her to the gulag immediately. All right. Time for your accident of the week. Let's watch this. Woo-hoo! Mommy Express! Oh, yeah, that's his teammate. Oh, good lord. Wow. Were we jousting?

No! Damn. Let's go to your... I think we played played this before but it's worth the second time you can't turn the black cock black we can't turn the clock back i know it's after a minute we can't turn the clock back and turn it back into the mid-80s look have you ever turned the black cock back i mean it's an honest question not not yet but you know the night is young okay all right uh let's head over to what's new in fast food uh try the new anus pounder i don't know what look they call that the mcdiddy you know what i mean all right okay there we go yeah all rightda-ba-ba-ba. Yeah.

Alright. Luke, I got a great idea for Tookie's next birthday party. I have two red balls and nothing in my ass. I take this first ball, place it in my hand. This second ball goes in my ass.

Give a little tap. Wa-pa-te'll pop teleportation. Luke, are you progressive enough to hire that gentleman or what? I mean, what's going on here? I'm going to have Tukey in that golf cart run him over. You know what I'm saying?

Thank you very much. And one more. You know how much I love art and painting. Let's see this easy 12-step process to paint this. It's a masterpiece. It's a master something. Wow, that is unbelievable.

That's where Luke's career is at. Thank you for playing. That's all the's career is at. Thank you for playing. That's all the ish we have. I cannot believe you included that one. I cannot believe you included that. You went for it. You went for it, goddammit. Yeah, you know, which is art in itself to go for it like that.

Luke, thank you for trying your best with the tin can and the string in terms of being able to hear us. But, you know, we made it we made it okay i'm sorry i had i have everything but it's just with the with the hotel it's tough i don't know i'm sorry no problem uh thank you to shakur stevenson for joining us long island luke of the main card minute and mk fame are you there sir yeah you just said shakur stevenson though it was uh keshawn davis who joined my god brain fart kishon davis uh not shakur stevenson who i also uh will be chatting with this week i believe uh thank you

kishon thank you long island luke you have anything else to say no cita this is your chance all right this is your moment i'll have a bet breakdown later today another one tomorrow tune in main card minute thank you very much get on that the mcm there we go luke thomas any final words from the nation's best and brightest city uh nothing yet oh here we go there we go nothing yet i appreciate everyone who tuned in today and we'll have a lot of coverage on friday for the big boxing card should be a lot of fun morning combat at gmail.com allows you to re to reach the show merch to come. Take care of yourselves.

Thank you for joining us this week. And you can follow us below. If you could like the video and even go as far as subscribing, that would help us out a lot. Thank you for playing for LT. This is BC. Take care of your head. Take care of your loved ones.

Don't freeze to death. Winter's almost over, and we're out of here. Thank you.