MORNING KOMBAT WITH LUKE THOMAS AND BRIAN CAMPBELL - UFC Iowa: Sandhagen vs. Figueiredo Preview | Times Square Boxing Lookahead | Morning Kombat

Episode Date: May 2, 2025

The guys are back in studio to preview the upcoming Cory Sandhagen vs. Deiveson Figueiredo main event at UFC Fight Night Iowa this Saturday. Plus, the Ring Magazine Times Square extravaganza this weekend is loaded with Devin Haney, Teofimo Lopez and the return of Ryan Garcia after his failed drug test. BC and LT preview Garcia vs. Rolando Romero, Haney vs. Jose Carlos Ramirez and Lopez vs. Arnold Barboza Jr. Stay locked in with Brian Campbell, Luke Thomas and the Morning Kombat crew on a Friday!See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

I'm gonna be a man. Reveille Reveille. Look at us now. Oh Jesus. Do you want a margarita? Yes! Oh my God! It's us doing what we love. It's time to bang. Oh yeah, you feel it, you hear it, it's on ya. Hey, it's Morning Combat back at it, fired up, ready to be here. Friday, May 2nd, 2025.

And I don't know the best damn combat sports talk show. They, they really ever considered putting together the BBC with that BDE, Brian Campbell, one half of your hosting duo today, tomorrow, forever. Right. That's Luke Thomas of Washington, DC fame. Luke today is the 10 yearyear anniversary of what super fight So today is May 2nd. Yes, you might call it the biggest fight of all time you might oh Soup give me a hint

boxing Would it be Canelo Mayweather? No, that was 2013. That was when we met. That's true. That's 12. Oh, Mayweather. Pacquiao. Yeah, there you go. Mayweather Pacquiao. It's been 10 years since Mayweather Pacquiao. It's been 10 years.

Yeah. Yeah, we've only gotten older. Yeah. Welcome into today's show. It's going to be a great one for you. We're probably going to be goofballs, but we're going to get you all fired up and ready for UFC. Is it Des Moines?

I'm just calling it Iowa. UFC Iowa this week and obviously Turkey's takeover of Times Square will be a big topic as that goes down tonight on the Zone Pay-Per-View. And we'll look at the latest news. Look back at the PFL card last night from Universal Studios in Orlando. No fansubs are dead wrongs today. Apparently, they weren't good enough. There wasn't enough of them. Well, I think we have some.

We just didn't have, you know, we wanna make sure that when we hit them with the batch, we peter north them, you know what I'm saying? Like just a big ol'. Somebody's gonna have to clean that up. Yeah, that's pretty disgusting. So, morningcombatatgmail.com would be your way to get into the show.

We'll run the ones that we haven't run yet. When you send some good ones to pair with them, thank you, that goes down on Friday's show. A programming reminder, of course, we're here tonight, right now, today in studio here in Manhattan. The Metal Arch Studio will be home Monday. We'll do an episode at 11 a.m. Eastern. But next Wednesday, next Wednesday, right here at this table, May 5th, we're talking about UFC 315 pregame preview. BCLT. Let's go. The Iceman. Wednesday, Wednesday, right here at this table, May 5th,

we're talking about UFC 315 pregame preview BC LT. Let's go. The Iceman, Chuck Mindenhall and lots of Cuervo to be had. You're going to, you're going to man up. I had, I had Cuervo last night. Blanco? No, what was the real nice one?

Cristalino? Cristalino, that's the one I had. Yeah. Uh it was really good. It was really good I did it get my wife my wife made fun of me She goes your breath smells like margarita and marijuana, and I said I said sweetheart That's up. That's my favorite combination if I could just be honest yeah Right there. I didn't have a bunch. I didn't I didn't long. I don't Luke was making fun of me Yeah, he's like did you have three of them? I was like fuck you long. I don't Luke I only had one so how drunk were you off of one? No, just nothing. I mean, just enough to take the edge off today.

That's it. That's it. This man once said it would take 52 beers to get you... There was a time in my life when I was... I really doubt that. ...a completely terrible alcoholic, but... I shouldn't tell that public story. All right, we'll let that one go. Hey, the third member of our team,

the man with the horn himself, comes to us directly due to a gentleman's down under from down under. It is Luke Nocita of the Main Card Minute. What up, gang? Coming down under from a man's down under sounds a little bit nicer than ballsack, so I'll take it. All right, all right, is your dad aware of this show

by any chance? You're Australian born dad? My dad is very aware of this show. Is he aware of the ballsack joke? That is another question. Okay, but he couldn't pick us out of a police lineup, right? He might be able to pick you guys out, I'm not gonna lie. Long Island, people on my sub stack were asking me

if the way in which we talk about the subject constitutes workplace harassment. I say yeah, I mean. Okay. HR? Well considering the other side of that, him being a bad boyfriend, he's live-streaming tonight, too You are that's right, baby. I'm doing the boxing tonight. You don't see tomorrow

I'm definitely doing UFC tomorrow. I was thinking about doing the box tonight, but I'm so fucking tired Well, you got back from a commentary gig this week. Yeah, which I wasn't supposed to do that gig You know our friend Johnny Johnny on the costo. Oh, yeah, he was supposed to do it But then ahead it could he had a last minute travel change, so they rang me up, and they're like, you wanna do it? BC, let me just say this, because I know you've done it before.

Sure. We love John Anik on the show for any number of reasons. Let me just say this, any kind of commentary is hard. Like anything, any, even doing the in-ring or in-cage interviews, all of that is hard. Like anything, any, any, even doing the in-ring or in-cage interviews, all of that is hard. Play-by-play commentary, which is what I had to do, and of course that's not a natural fit for me. Sure. I had to do it this time. It is super fucking hard. It's the ultimate challenge in broadcasting, in my opinion. It is so, you don't realize every

time you have to throw to a production element right there could be something that happens on the fly You have to throw it back to the announcer. They have to throw it back to you. You have to throw. I mean, it's just constant Balancing it's a high wire act that you're always on the whole time. I love the rush. I love it Put me back in the color chair. Okay, okay, you know what I mean? I'm happy wrong shots to XSE for the opportunity was I in the end I actually had a great time, but it's tough dude. That's a tough job no doubt But the clips that I saw you sounded great you and Jessica Aguilar for XFC down there at kill cliff Yeah, young gun seven was the one and then we recorded young guns eight I'm not sure when that will air but that one young guns eight

I cannot wait for folks to see you stand with me when I say that we stand by the young guns to soundtrack as John Bon Jovi's like musical mountaintop ooh Well, please glory come on. I would agree with you, but I feel like What's the what's the song that all the white girls love? Oh, we're halfway there Yeah that one I was gonna say it's either that or Pour Some Sugar On Me by Def Leppard.

I feel like that song by Bon Jovi is like their peak song, but I agree with you as a compendium. No, in terms of coolness. Yeah, yeah, commercial peak that. Or when he sold out and went to country and did It's My Life, you know, it's not our number. It's My Life deserves to be, I mean, burn the masters, please. Yeah, yeah, thank you.

Burn the boats too, Goggins. There we go. A lot of rambling bullshit, but you can follow this show before we get into the meat of it, right? I mean, the meaty part with our social channels, our handles right there, our YouTube channels, all that good stuff. Reach out and touch one of us. Touch.

Consensually. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah, we're fired up to be here on a Friday. Rare Friday studio appearance from us. I love it, Luke, because the trains aren't as busy. This office is dead. You know, there was one person in here when I came in. Yeah, I mean, it was Ken. Nadir was sleeping and scratching his balls. I couldn't believe it.

Yes. Do you think Ken, when he goes home, is maybe like a chemist in terms of the creation of drugs? Let me just ask a question. If you had... Who in that office right there of all the production donks, this will answer your question, is most likely to own either a reptile or an arachnid? Oh wow.

Because the answer to that question... I was going to say a beaker cuz like Ken could be a secret meth like Genius level cook, and we just don't know it like like oh You hear me I got you like a Walter White exactly yeah exactly but in terms of the deer is nodding Yeah, yeah pretty much pretty much, but who do you think has the most amount of milligrams in their system right now? Oh bong island Yeah, I mean you could've got Keith Richards blood. Are you kidding me? There you go. There we go.

All right. Enough of that bullshit. Thank you for playing. Hey, your favorite show is about to hit you up. Favorite style with topic number one. And by the way, as we get into this, I want you to know that topic number one, the road to Saturday's UFC Iowa main event of Corey Sanhagen and Devinson Figueredo at Bannamweight is brought to you by Total Wireless, the official wireless provider of the UFC. Get unlimited data that won't slow

you down. Luke Thomas, this is a very good main event pairing the number four and number five Bannamweights in the world. And a decent card top to bottom for a fight night card. I love the momentum we've been having lately of the crowds last week fired up. It's been a good run right here. So as Corey Sanhagen faces off with Figueredo in this main

event and Figueredo having already been a champion of course multiple times in the division below him, Sanhagen has gotten close to that title opportunity himself a few times but but has had a biz pinging and run of every time he sticks his head up above water, he does have a big time setback. So the question here is this specific fight, this main event for Sanhagen, a do or die from the standpoint that if you're going to have at age 32, one more run at the top, is not going to happen if you don't get by Figueredo on Saturday night. Is it do or die for him?

Short of getting what Michael Bisping ultimately got to get that title, which was a UFC 199, a last minute notice to fill in to fight Luke Rockhold, short of that, this is it. This is the fight. Because you're not taking on some kind of scrub in Davis and Figueredo. You not taking on some kind of scrub in Davis and figurado you're taking on a a a very good former champion, but he is a former flyweight and he is

Frankly in terms of age relatively speaking anyway long in the 237 and Corey Sandhagen has had enough of these fights where You know losing to umar is no is, I don't think it's any kind of disreputable thing, but the accumulated weight of split decision to TJ Dillashaw, that kind of set him back. And then of course, there's the Umar fight and then, you know, getting choked out by Aljamain Sterling. It's like every time there was this chance to get across that threshold, it has not gone well or at least at a bare minimum is you know It could have gone a lot better. I think is the best way to put that at 30. What is he 33 now?

I believe okay 33 32 33. Let's double check that double check that for me if you can't look We're not completely in a place where it's impossible as I mentioned if serendipity finds its way But in terms of proving that you deserve to be in 33, to be in, I mean, this is it, BC. This is it. This is the window. And I know we have some sound to this effect. He has even kind of talked about, I'm sick of being that guy who almost wins. Always a bridesmaid. Always a bridesmaid. He is so talented. And, you know, we understand the greater context, which is that Banson Wadeweight is a very very difficult and

tough division. It was historically deep about two years ago. Let's be honest here. It's been deep for, well it's still deep. I mean it's still tough. Still deep as shit. So the point I'm trying to make is the one you did you had raised which is sometimes we like to be like well there's always a way to come back from a loss and in general there is truth to that and it might even be true here to an extent but it also feels like we've seen the stumbles. Yes. If it's gonna get right it has to get right now. It's his time. It's his time to shake off the label of the idea that he can't win the big one or he can't beat fighters that that you know odds makers think are better than him and I don't think

this is a case where people think I mean what do we know the odds in this one coming in? I'll pull them up here. I got a minus 550 Sandhagen plus 410. Okay, that's way wider than I would have expected. Do you think those odds are nuts? They're a little nuts. I got Corey back when he was like minus 400. I thought that was a little expensive.

Two things, Corey's the better fighter of the moment, and I think he has better stock of the moment. Yes, they're both coming off a defeat, but I think he has more left in the tank. I think he's the better stock at the moment and I think he has better stock of the moment. Yes, they're both coming off of defeat, but I think he has more left in the tank. I think he's the better stock at the moment. I'm shocked at nearly 6-1, nearly 6-1 favorite odds in that case. That's jumping out. What are we missing here outside of the size difference?

I mean, how much are you going to hold where Figueredo moves up in this weight class and we don't know what we're going to get from him. We don't know how long he's going to be good. He gets three consecutive wins and suddenly looks like maybe a Dark Horse title challenger. How much do you take away from the loss he had to Peyotr Yan in terms of his shine right now to be this much of an underdog? Yeah, I mean, again, losing to Yan is not disreputable, but if we're asking like what does it mean for title implications,

it is a fairly bad loss in part because it ended up being a little bit, a little bit one- sided in the end. And you know, some of the things you thought he might be able to leverage, which were forms of grappling control, really didn't play a significant role at all. But that's the thing that's interesting about this fight, which is that Corey Sandhagen, as at times has shown to be vulnerable into certain kinds of grappling positions. And when you got a fantastic back attacker like Figueredo, I want to be clear, I favor Sanhagen to win here. But at the same time,

there are certain elements of Figueredo's game that are uniquely suited to take advantage of what we at least think BC are Sanhagen's known weaknesses. Well, we all agree, I'm going to speak for all of us and say we think San Hagen has title-winning ability. We've always felt that sometimes it's luck. Sometimes it's timing. Sometimes it's the right improvement at the right time. Is it his time?

Is it now at age 33? It's going to have to be based on the way we're setting up this narrative. But here is Corey San Hagen talking about the confidence that he has in his skills and in what this win could do for him. And like I said, man, I'm better than ever right now. I've never felt like I have the actual skills to be a champion more than I do right now.

And Saturday night, I'm super pumped to put on the best performance of my life, win this fight, win it impressively, ask for my title shot, and then hopefully land in a little bit of luck where there will be no one else that they have, and be the guy that fights for the belt next. I mean, you could argue that he could be fighting for the belt right now if he was coming off a win. It was bad timing for him at a point where the division opened up, the seas parted, but he had that tough loss to Umar.

Or maybe it's always going to be O'Malley with the marketing upside in that regard. But obviously, I think we can say it. But if he had blasted out Umar, it's a very different conversation at that point. Is it as simple as win and get a title shot here for him? Well, that's a little bit more complicated because of some of the factors that you raise.

I would say that a solid win here, yes, the answer is he definitely will get a title shot. If you look at the top five, O'Malley's sitting at one, Yan's sitting at two, but Yan, who has the win of a figure eight-o, has already been a champion and is not... Listen. Well, Yan need another win, or can he just sit on... So here's, this is the thing that people are like, why didn't Yan get the fight against marav for ufc 316 and the answer is probably a couple of things that they're still wanting to push omali on an individual basis But if you're trying to sell pay-per-views to a North American audience in a particular American audience Having two people in there who don't have what I would call is

Characteristically American names and certainly in the case of marav He speaks fluent English, but it is a second language These are not like homegrown stars in that traditional way and I'm not saying that fans can't appreciate people who aren't from here of course we know there's a decorated history of them doing exactly that but it takes time it's hard to do that an American is in terms of preference for slots on main events on pay-per-view cards, whether we like this fact or not, they are going to get some preference in there. So for that reason, if if Sanhagen wins, I think it there's a good chance he could. The thing you have to ask yourself is,

Jan, as I said before, it was like Jan was clearly better than Figaro. If Corey skates through, I think it's a, I don't know. I don't know how that one goes. It probably, I mean it, a I don't know I don't know how that one goes it probably I mean it It depends on a few things, but I don't think Cory hasn't fought either of the guys that are fighting next for the title So that also helps him helps him well he fought umar who already lost right but in terms of the rematch of marab versus O'Malley that's right, so it would be a fresh match So look getting the win is obviously we've already seen marab versus yawn marab just ran over him

Yeah, let's hear from Cory one more time talking about that whole bridesmaid label and you know, look it's gotta be tough to what that does to your psyche and your confidence when you're constantly having to rebuild when you get as close as you can. Here's Sanhagen talking about dealing with all that. As you go into this next push, a fight like this, maybe a title fight after, where is kind of the mindset and like what you've done and what's limited you so far? Yeah, I mean, in the past, I'm just losing by inches. You know, I'm not really losing by miles against any of these guys.

So I just gotta, you know, I just gotta go out there and touch up some things. You know, I'm sick of being the guy that's really good at almost winning and I'm done being that dude. It's hard, you know, it's hard to beat really good at almost winning and and I'm done being that dude. It's it's hard. You know, it's hard to beat really good fighter. So, I'm freaking trying my best but you know, I think that I've learned a lot from my experience. I'm a super experienced guy. I know everything that's you know, not everything that's gonna happen cuz fighting is crazy but but

yeah, I mean, after this one, I really think that I'll land in one of those spots where there's gonna be no one else to fight for the belt. Umar is out for a while. I don't know what Jan's doing for his fights, but he's kind of coming off of a skid or a previous skid. He's on the two fight win streak now, but he's also lost to both of those guys so I don't know how interesting of a fight that'll be if if they do a title fight for for Jan but also the entire world wants to watch me and O'Malley fight the UFC fans have been calling for that fight for a really long time and then against Marav I'm the only guy that hasn't fought him and and lost so uh so yeah man I think that I have I could land myself in in a little pot of luck after this one,

but I got to go out there and make this luck happen by just going out and looking like the most impressive Corey Sandhagen that the world's ever seen on Saturday against Davidson Figuereta. You know, there's no net this time. The back is kind of against the wall from the standpoint of the super elite opportunities. Maybe this brings out somebody who's not gonna be too patient. Somebody who's going to have a little bit more onus in this fight. It's not that Sanhagen has lacked that consistently, but it's sort of you gotta find the right confidence, momentum. You gotta find that right moment.

And so far it has felt like the right moment for him, but the results have been wrong. In terms of if he can get this done against what Figueredo brings at age 37, is it as simple to call it a strikler-grapper, strikler versus grappler matchup, or does it have the potential to entail a lot more than that? Strikler.

Strikler, strikler, yeah, strikler. Thank you. I think he can crack. He can crack, but Sanhagen has historically shown a very good chin and should probably have a pretty decisive advantage. And you would just imagine if you're Figureto, do you really believe that your best chance to win is keeping it on the feet? Probably not.

That seems unlikely. It seems unlikely that that's your best way to do it. So I think you're going to see something like what you saw with the yawn fight. Figurado is going to test the ground or at least what opportunities exist there. And if it gets shut down, which it basically did for the most part, it's yawn.

Yeah. So then what happened there? Yawn just began to basically style over the course of time. I think that's a similar kind of fight, similar. I mean, there's going to be meaningful differences, but similar kind of fight for what Sanhagen, there's going to be meaningful differences, but similar kind of fight for what Sanhagen's going to want to look for here. Yeah. I mean, is it a problem that at band and weight, figure eight

does more of a of a single punch at a time counterpuncher. He's shown good power at this weight division. Yes, his power has been sometimes a saving grace in close fights, but I don't think he throws enough. So are you setting up in your mind that if Sanhagen has this the same takedown defense success that Jan had? We could be looking at a repeat here. Yeah, I mean look at the figure eight those numbers He lands two point nine one strikes per minute. That's a little below average, but he absorbs three point five five

So he gets hit a lot and a lot of that comes from the Moreno fights and whatnot But you know in general he's hittable. I think is the way I would put that. Contrast that with Sagan, 5.02 strikes landed per minute, it's very high. Sagan? Yeah, here we go. Sandhagen, excuse me. And then he absorbs 3.46, which is also high, but at least has a positive differential. But the point I'm trying to make is volume. He'll rain on you if you let him do it.

And I just don't feel like Figueredo has a defensive umbrella to go with the metaphor, if I may. So, yeah, that's got it. I think these are the fault lines that you're kind of looking for here. Yeah, there's no question about that. In terms of a betting angle, Long Island Luke, these two, you'd probably guess they would go the distance,

but is there value here on the under? There's not a lot of value on this fight. I gotta be real. Like, I'm going Sandhagen. Again, I got him at minus 400. He's even heftier now. You're right It probably goes the distance even Sandhagen by decision is minus money So is this the fight though that Sandhagen not only makes a statement, but makes a large one with a finish I'd like to see the threat more of high kicks from him, but also he could submit in

This in this pairing Sandhagen. Yeah Making that back to I know it's a threat on the rainforest. I think that's less likely but he does have a big height advantage. This is 5'5 versus 5'11 so it's always harder to jab up and then he has a two-inch reach advantage so there are some physical to the extent that Sanhagen can manage range that's gonna be a big problem for Figurado. Something to pay attention to. Also, if I may just say one thing,

when you watch Sandhagen's early UFC fights, he did get himself into a few problems by being too confident, but there's a certain kind of swag that he had that has been replaced with a little bit more cold, calculated, functional game. And you get that, you know, sometimes you get injured in a fight or it's just you got to win in advance. But I would say is when

he's flowing and he's in that state, it's just a much more dynamic game. If he can find a way to avoid those mistakes, but get to that flow state, he will be tough to beat. Yeah. Big moment here. Big close up for Corey Sanhagen. Do you think that he gets it done, and do you think he gets it done over the distance? I think he gets it done over the distance. Yeah, I'd be surprised if he scores a stoppage, but you know, one never knows. But yeah, give me Sanhagen by decision, I think. I'm sort of in the middle. I think those odds are strikingly large. I do think he's going to win, so give me about half of those odds, and I'm more comfortable at it. Yeah, I mean, if it was like a minus three, high twos, I'd be like, yeah, that makes sense.

High fives is surprising. I mean, to close the shop on talking about Figueredo, there's as much pressure on him in terms of staying relevant in the top seven here with the win. I mean, how far does he fall with the second consecutive loss? Yeah, Figueredo's sitting at five,

Sanhagen sitting at four. I don't know how much further he would fall because you got Song Yedong, Vera and Rob Font He's beaten two of those guys already So it's a little hard to say but certainly what is figure out like 37 years old You know you lose to Sanhagen you lose to Yon it kind of tells us that like you you We now know what you are at Bantamweight. Warning track power. Yeah, exactly He's got big power, but and he's got great ju jujitsu but he's maximized what is possible basically so again both

guys kind of in a position here where it's like all right what do we got fellas like who's gonna show us something here big stakes for combat fans that want to juggle this weekend and we're gonna get into it shortly of the Times Square triple header that's going on which I think it's a 6 p.m. Eastern paper view star you know what time this UFC fight night card starts, and will we be clashing I can tell you in just 7 p.m. Prelim 10 p.m.. Man, okay, so we're going much later So there won't be that same competition by the time San Hagan a figure which as a fan I'm happy with because this is a a very good main event that I need you to see it is a very good main event

What time is the Canelo fight? I believe that card starts at 8 p.m. Eastern the for fight pay-per-view main card From Riyadh. Yes They're starting at an 8 p.m Eastern because they wanted to guarantee for the Mexican and Mexican American fan base that won't get to see him in person live Right at least they'll get to see it or you could just put fights where the Mexican fans are you can yeah We're doing that in the six thousand seat arena R Riyadh. Did you see the the grand arrival that there's like eight people there I mean it's any any there's a bunch of Mexican media because I follow some and they Clearly all got flown in because all the questions are like how much is your watch and you know?

Yeah, how excited are you to be in Saudi Arabia? Like still a fun fun weekend of combat ahead of us and that includes PFL last night, which we'll get to. I enjoyed that card. He thought it was pretty good, actually, yeah. There we go. Let's go to the co-main event, though, of Saturday's UFC Iowa fight night card. Really good ground match up here. The grappling of Bo Nicol, this great submission and jiu-jitsu skills of Renear DeRitter, a

middleweight clash with two guys that are really looking to make a big statement but in different ways. For RDR, he's looking for a third straight win since debuting in the UFC just what, in November. He's fought twice already, two big submission victories. And you've got a Bo Nicol who certainly has the glossy record. But man has it been a little bit of a reality TV journey if you're following the court of public opinion

about exactly where Bo Nicol is at. Two fights ago he gets the big showcase opportunity fight against Cody Brundage. People thought he got hit more than he should and then last fight out against Paul Gregg. Luke, we saw Bo Nicol not even shoot to the ground once when a striking decision, but kind of took a chance in how close and weird the fight was to practice out his skills at that level. Is the backlash against Bo Nicol that has a lot of people questioning if he really is that phenom we thought he was coming out of having to win twice in the Dana White Contenders Series and then watching him mop up and submit

and take down a bunch of guys in a row. Where do you think the stock's at right now for Bo in real life? And do you think people have been too harsh in terms of critiquing him as he enters a very tough matchup here? I... Oh, man, it's such a difficult question for me to answer. I don't share the fans' hatred of him. I don't necessarily have as much of...

I mean, hatred's strong, but there's a side turned... No, it's real. A side turned aggressively. Long Island, would you call that there is palpable hatred for Bo Nickel from the fan base? Again, hatred is a strong word. Dislike, sure, but... Fear that he's not the real.

Fear that we've been... Because we've had to wait around. It's not like he's fighting every three months. I mean, so there's basically a couple of problems that have really fucked him up. One is the inconsistency in terms of how often he's out there. It's, you know, when a guy is hot, you got to get him out there. And when he was doing that in the Contender series, like where he was one and then back again, he's blowing the doors off people. You're like, oh shit, this is amazing.

He's upping the ante every time and he's staying visible. But that hasn't really happened. That's the first problem. The second problem is the skillset development. Like yes, there were some elements of what, some elements of what he said after the Paul Craig fight, which was, you know, I didn't go for a take down. I lasted three rounds on the feet, blah, blah, blah.

That's good experience for him. And it does show something. It just didn't show nearly what he thought it meant. And to think that that was an especially interesting accomplishment. Like, do you think he sounded delusional, or do you think he sounded just very sober? Like, look, I got a chance to work out my-

All fighters are delusional. When people are like, oh, he sounds delusional, I'm like, dude, he fist fights in a cage for money. They're all delusional. Like when people are like, Oh, he sounds delusional. I'm like, dude, he fist fights in a cage for money. They're all delusional. You can't do that job if you're not delusional, but you can be delusional about certain things. There still has to be some part of it that's grounded. And to me, it's the overrating of things. It's not to go in and be like, listen, I'm happy to get the three rounds. I'm happy that I didn't need my wrestling, but I also understand that, you know, hey, he was just throwing overhands. It wasn't like there was this other array of skills that complimented it. And it was that it was ignoring that plus the lack of

frequency in terms of octagon appearances. And then to your point, being very, very delusional, like all fighters are, but being very delusional, that combination has turned quite toxic for the fan base. They really, really, really, really don't like that. But this fight to me, BC, is an interesting opportunity. RDR is many things, but a wallflower is not one of them. No Jacob Dillon in that guy. Not one headlight? No. No. No. Zippy. Not one or two or even three Marlinas in this case. All right. The point I'm trying to make is he's going to bring the fight to you. And sometimes he'll do it recklessly and sometimes he'll do it excitingly and

it's everything in between. But he's not going to just lay back and have a fight like Paul Craig had with him. Right. Like, do we expect Paul Craig 2.0 or I should say another version of the Paul Craig fight? I do not. I do not expect that. I think if it goes that way for a little while already ours gonna clinch up So the point I'm trying to make is you're asking about Bo nickel. I actually feel like there's a lot of opportunity here opportunity being the word To recapture maybe a little bit of what is lost sure one fight is not going to do it You guys are wrong about this. I think it's more than dislike. I think there's people like

Aggressively angry at him, but I think you can kind of tamp that down a little bit, provided he turns in something BC. So if you believe that it's another thing we haven't discussed, which is the UFC pushed Sean O'Malley really hard. And for a while that actually worked. For folks who don't remember Sean O'Malley in the Contenders series, and then that little magical moment right after that in the UFC, fans were red hot about him. But it cooled off eventually for a variety of reasons. Two years suspension of drugs also. That's one, and the Cheeto Verif, the first one was weird and the whole bit. But you notice that they began to get resistant

about what the industry was pushing. You hear this term, industry plant, that gets debated about. The industry is pushing right-wing politics at the moment. That's right, I mean, it's just laundering fascism is what it's doing. Okay.

But the point I'm trying to make is, in the case of Bo Nicol, he got pushed in that similar kind of way and then it fell short and that turns up the toxicity to the nth degree. So what I'm trying to say is he doesn't even necessarily have to win BC, but if he goes in there and just gives it his all in some kind of way, he has to win over the fans. That's right. More importantly than he has to win. But I made this point yesterday in my live chat. Does he think that he has to win over the fans? Because if he doesn't think that,

he's not going to fight that way. At least, I should say, the chance of him fighting that way is significantly reduced. Does he think he's better than he is? And because of that, it's slowing his well-rounded growth. We're going to get a great answer to that. I love the matchmaking, to be very fair. It's a great point. I love the matchmaking to be very fair. It's fantastic match.

Great matchup. They really did a good job with this. So Bo'nickel 7 and 0 just still 29 years old. So he's still on the light side of 30, but we haven't seen that consistent commitment in him beating the legitimate names. Well, maybe here's the first one. Long Island Luke, I'm very curious to see the odds.

I really don't know where they're going, but I would guess you would go RDR at least minus 250. I'm assuming you mean plus 250. Really? RDR is plus 280, Bo Nicol minus 350. Okay, then here's the question. What am I missing when I see- Athletic differences.

I get the one dimensional, for the most part, status of what RDR really is at this level, let's be honest, I get the one-dimensional, for the most part, status of what RDR really is at this level, let's be honest. I get that. But is Nickel either not one-dimensional himself, or is his one-dimension so much more dangerous than RDR's one-dimension? What are we doing here? That's, I'm shocked by these odds.

I think, I think, if I had to guess what the oddsmakers are looking at, they're looking at the athletic difference. There's simply no question Bo Nickel is a much better athlete. I'm sorry, three-time national champion at the athletic difference. There's simply no question Bo Nicol is a much better athlete. I'm sorry, three time national champion at Penn State, he's a better athlete, fact. Kind of gets, at certain times, gets to the fight in a hurry. Whereas RDR just kind of stands real tall, you know.

Yeah, but you just said RDR sometimes will come at you and put the pressure like he did to Kevin Allen. And he'll clinch up and then make it a ground affair and you know, he can ground it out that way too. But I think all of these Force Bo nickel to act whereas Paul Craig The thing that was frustrating about the Paul Craig fight was Paul Craig felt like a sitting duck Yeah, and that Bo nickel just couldn't do anything about

RDR is just going to force contact like you're going to have to do something I think for that reason they're they're high on him, but you know well I would I would have favored RDR by by like to really there. I think for that reason, they're high on him. But you know. Wow, I would have favored RDR by like two and a half. Really? I would have. No, I would have. Again, I think the odds here are a little high in both the main and co-main,

but I would have, I favor Nickel to win. All right, well we've got Nickel talking about why he believes he's gonna win, and certainly that would support the odds if you believe that too. And it's built upon the idea that RDR does make a lot of mistakes. Certainly not a perfect fighter.

Let's hear from Bo. Yeah, you know, when we look at Dorritter, I think that we can obviously talk about the Jiu-Jitsu. You know, he's many, many submission finishes and, you know, different submissions. He's got very creative on the ground. And so that's something that I look at as high level skills. And, you know, he's also got a judo black belt. So he's a guy that uses that to his advantage in the clinch and being able to throw people.

And then when I look at his striking, I think that he's got a really good jab. Straight left hand is pretty solid. But I think that at the same time, he makes a lot of mistakes in all areas, on the ground, in the clinch, on the feet. And so that's something that I'll look to exploit. And I feel, you know, with the game plan

that my team and I have set, that I'll be able to do that. So looking forward to just competing from bell to bell and pumped up about it. Let me ask a question. Did he sound a little nasal either? Are you trying to put out Boogar Shugar rumors around this? No. Is he sick? Oh wow. Like if he's sick. Has he been dancing with the staff? If he's sick, he has some kind of respiratory illness and he turns in another shitty performance even if and especially if he wins,

all of his problems are only going to be exacerbated as a consequence. I agree, but what do you get with what he said here? RDR's certainly not perfect, certainly not well-rounded, but is RDR error-prone or is it the opposite that he's just so unorthodox that that's his strength? I think he's a little error-prone, because he'll take risks and get himself into bad positions.

Right, but against good strikers, that's where that becomes an issue. Yes, on the ground too. Although, GM3 hit him with some big shots too. Yes, exactly. So there's that. And I would say that for me, it's like, what makes him magical is that he's got,

you know, that inverted triangle he hit on Vitaly Big Dash. Yes. You know those kinds of things where he can just, I wouldn't even necessarily call it Hail Mary. Or the ease of how he dominated Kevin Holland. I mean it was what he just took him down. Kevin Holland is not at all the force that Bo Nicol's going to be in the play. Okay, but Bo Nicol hasn't beaten anybody on Kevin Holland's level, has he? Who would you favor if he fought Kevin Holland? Who, wait, who would- Bo Nicol. If Bo Nicol fought Kevin Holland? Yeah, Bo he? Who would you favor if he fought Kevin Hollins? Who would?

Bo Nicol. If Bo Nicol fought Kevin Hollins? Yeah, Bo Nicol would run him over. You don't think so? No, I see the reason why you said yes. I guess what I'm really trying to say is, is there an argument, no, maybe, we followed RDR's career going back to one,

we've had him on the show a bunch of times, I've seen what he can do in multiple weight classes, I believe he's faced better competition, has better experience. Oh, that's true, yes. So since Bo showed us something against Paul Craig that felt like there was a disconnect, like with the game plan and understanding the whole situation, even though RDR takes chances it can be a wild card, I just see a guy that's fought much better competition and has swam for the most,

I mean, look, he got sent to hell by Malekin twice. Like, there's no, but that's a heavy weight. Well, Malekin, yeah, exactly. That's a frickin' heavy, that's a steamroller. In retrospect, it's kind of an insane fight to make. And I'm just saying, like, the ease in which, yeah, maybe Bo Nicol handles Holland in that same exact way, so that part's a moot point.

But Bo Nicol has more questions than he has things to impress us each time he steps up, right, and I want him to succeed. I like the bone nickel story that was one of the rare college wrestlers that I did follow his story throughout it and you know he has a cool name and he seems like a decent dude but is striking in it but this is also a weird match up in which

both guys can strike so how does that what is that going to produce as an actual fight in your eyes is going to be one of these things where they're not going to look to push their ground advantages and it's a really gross sparring striking match like Damien Maya versus a versus no versus a Ben. Askren Askren. Oh, ask you shall receive. Yeah. Or as Colby Covington called him, ask her. Yeah. Him and ask cream had the grossest hand fighting match ever.

Yeah, it was terrible. Is this a replay of that or does one person have the ability to hold an advantage on the ground with their specific skillset? I would imagine that in terms of MMA, which is what this is, Bo Nicol has sizable advantages on the ground because he can, he is much more nimble, he can reverse position I think underneath in terms of like wrestling get ups, he can control from the back, but he's not the same kind of submission threat that I think a guy like RDR is.

RDR is significantly more dangerous in that particular respect, but you know, you have to get to a position, I see you, I see you smirking. I think he's gonna tap that ass. I think RDR is gonna come to his- Say it, say it, say it with your own chest. I mean, put your name on it as Herm Edwards used to say, yeah, RDR by submission win and upset win, and this will catapult him into a very big fight. Long Island Luke, tell me there's value on this, please. I mean, there's value. I would just take RDR as a dog at that point, though. Why even throw him a submission? Okay, but then, then tell me the other side of it

Do you believe in Bo nickel in this fight? What is he gonna do 100% unlike what you guys were saying before? I actually think this is exactly like the Paul Craig fight And it might be another boring Bo nickel decision where he doesn't even shoot, but I'm cool with that I'm taking Bo nickel by decision. I'm not even sure Bo nickel striking is better than our dear That's what I'm trying to say I might agree with that But you but he's a better athlete and he can control in the wrestling and thrash him about. That's what I think. So he'll win a gross fight. I don't know what he wants to. This is what I mean. It's like what does he there was okay. So there is one interpretation like once someone pisses off

the fans you can't tell them anything that doesn't go with a prevailing narrative. Yes. But one thing that is at least on my mind and and I cannot declare that I think it is true, because I don't know if it's true, but there's a part of me that thinks that he fought, how do I say this? It's tautological to say he fought that way intentionally, but what I'm saying is there was a, he held something back against Paul Craig intentionally, not just the wrestling, but even in the striking. To get the experience?

To get just the experience, because he just wanted to almost carry the guy. Is that like Larry Bird playing left handed in Portland that time? That's right. That's exactly right, that's exactly right. And so I kind of wonder about that. I don't know, I don't know if that's the

likeliest explanation, but I've seen it with other fighters before, and then they come out the next time and you're like, where the fuck was that guy the last time explanation, but I've seen it with other fighters before, and then they come out the next time, and you're like, where the fuck was that guy the last time? Yeah. Let's just see what we get. Interesting shit right there. Two aging bangers in the welterweight division,

it'll keep me in the chair, but do you care at all about Santiago Pazinibio versus D. Rod Daniel Rodriguez? No, not really. I mean, it's a fine fight, it'll be fun. But no one's going anywhere. Yeah, I mean, two guys a little bit older, long in the tooth, but they're experienced, and they're dangerous fight. It'll be fun. But no one's going anywhere. Yeah, I mean, two guys a little bit older, long in the tooth,

but they're experienced and they're dangerous, and that should be fun. All right, what about Montell Jackson at Bannonweight? He only fights once a year, but he is on a fairly impressive run, even though his inactivity actually includes a JP Bays win during this current win streak. I was going to say, I'm actually a little higher

on Danielle Marcos. He might be the bigger feature and the bigger focus right here, but how much do you like this fight? Because in terms of what they're both trying to accomplish and what's ahead of them, this is an interesting tilt. Yeah, quiet little banger this one. As you indicated everything about Montell Jackson, I echo, but then you go to the Marcos side has that one over Castaneda and Yanez, which was very surprising, hard nosed, devastating

leg kicker. He's interesting, undefeated. I kind of like that fight a lot actually. that one is definitely one to keep your eye on Should I keep my eye at all in this six fight main card on the other band and wait till between Cameron Smotherman and sir He side II. I don't neither have wiki pages. Look come on long I like give long yellows account and smotherman in his UFC debut was plus 440 against Jake Hadley. Gaff cashed it. I'm taking Cam Smytherman this week. He's a dog again. Interesting, interesting.

Well, Luke, there seems to be a little bit of care level over BKFC star Jeremy Stevens making a UFC comeback. It's into his home base, right, of Iowa, where he comes from there. Isn't he a Bettendorf guy? I don't know if he's Bettendorf or not, but he's definitely Iowa. OK, what do you think about this matchup against Mason Jones? Iowa, worst Mexican food in the country. Do you remember when you had COVID that one time or ever where you couldn't taste anything?

You know, just for a little while? That's what all the Mexican food in Iowa tastes like. Tastes like you got COVID. It's like having pizza everywhere else in the country. Yes. Okay. I saw an interesting stat from Dan Thom. I'm not sure if he said I'm a junkie still or not

But when Jeremy Stevens made his UFC debut Chuck Liddell was the light heavyweight champion. Holy shit balls What an Ironman this guy has turned out to be Mason Jones was a guy who previously was in the UFC Had a lot of hype. He is well-rounded, but couldn't quite put it all together. Gonna get another crack at it here. I don't know what to make of this one, to be honest. Mason Jones is more well-rounded, but Jeremy Stevens is a devastating puncher.

He's certainly gonna have the wind at his back in terms of the home field advantage. Like this is a big moment for him, because if you actually look at his MMA record and his last 10 fights he's one win eight losses and one no contest. Yeah. And that one win is a split decision over Miles Jury. But then you know but then but then he had the Jose Aldo boxing match. Well this is the point then he goes out of the UFC kind of rebuilds his name to the point where he's headlining for BKFC and kind of I know he's like a free agent now but kind of like a star to get that call back from the UFC and for it to be in your home state, we might get a way more dangerous version than 38-year-old

Lil Heathen than we have a right to because of that swagger, that peacock moment. He's being recognized in a lot of ways. I totally agree. So it's a weird one where Jones on paper has more ways to win, but Stevens is seemingly still kind of dangerous and in a once in a career, literally, for the UFC anyway, in him, a once in a career opportunity, I suspect you're gonna get something special out of him. Let's hear Jeremy Stevens cut a promo here

on how excited he is. Yeah, I was snapping bras and breaking jaws. And then my wife was like, hey, you should hit up Dana. And I was like, ah, you know, I'm kind of an older guy. They want these young guys. You know, I was just kind of like in my nerd thoughts. Everybody kind of goes there, right?

Like, ah, I don't know if I deserve this or what that really is. But my wife, you know, God bless her. She was just really on me. Like, dude, hit him up, hit him up. And I was on my way actually back here to Des Moines. And before I before I even got to the airport, I was like, hey, you know, write write me up a little message. I'm gonna shoot him over a message

because I think I lost his number. It got like an old number of his. We stayed in contact over the years and she wrote me a message and I sent it to him on instagram and I came back here to Des Moines. I came here to like see my mom, fill up my cup of family. That way I can go back home and just get back to business. And all week I had been around, I was taking my grandma out to eat, you know, visiting people and just the fans around here.

It's my hometown, everybody recognizing me. They're like, man, you know, they announced that car, you should be on that, you know? And I was like, yeah, I sent Uncle Dana a message I haven't heard from, you know, hopefully something pops up. And the day that I left on like Sunday morning, I sent Uncle Dana a message I haven't heard from him. Hopefully something pops up. And the day that I left on Sunday morning, I woke up at 430 in the morning. And I got a message from him like one, two in the morning.

You know how Dana is? He's up, maybe he's throwing like five grand on black, you know what I'm saying? So he sent me that message, he was like, hey man, I've been trying to get a hold of you, great fight. I'm gonna have Hunter reach out to you. I go to the airport, my flight gets delayed. I was supposed to go to Denver, Denver to San Diego, and I end up going to Vegas. So my delusions start kind of like kicking in,

I'm gonna be in the big boy office tonight. I landed in Vegas and I got on the phone with Hunter Campbell once I deported that plane. And he's like, hey, just go home. We had a really good talk. He's like, go home, send me some names, what you're thinking. And I shot big, Connor, Justin Gagey, Max Holloway for the BMF belt, considering he just got knocked out.

I'm thinking real big, I'm gonna shoot my shot. And they gave me the opponent, and he calls me up later. And he's like, man, congratulations. I'm gonna announce it as soon as we get off the phone. And you know, I told my wife, you know, I gave her a big hug. I was like almost in tears, you know, because, uh, you know, I know I made it happen with my work, but if it wasn't for my wife, I wouldn't be sitting here right here today. Hey, the hardest one 45 or it feels good to see him get a moment.

It does. I mean, he's, he's hung up on me, but not enough UFC fighters get a chance to compete in their hometown. Yes, and I don't mean like the ones who moved to Vegas and fight in the apex That doesn't count. I mean like where you have roots where you grew up. It's nice. It's not I'll never forget when they had and listen It was a great fight. I'm not mad at it I really enjoy but when dominant Cruz fought TJ Dillish I was in Boston It's like What the fuck are these two guys fighting in Boston for like put them in where they're from and so it's nice to see a guy who's just been a Consistent presence get an opportunity like this indeed and we do have one more piece of video related to the Bo nickel fight

That forgot to throw to here's him stepping on the scale there has been a lot of talk that he's talking about that Yeah, too bulky and he's had a bigger weight cut than maybe he needs to. Well, I wonder if this will play into our betting strategy. Let's watch it. I had my flip-flop on. It's a lot of weight. Okay. Okay.

Long Island. That's fake, right? I don't know if That's fake, right? I don't know if it's fake. How... When was it released is my question. This week. But was it from this week? Yeah, but look at the camera cuts. Are we not talking about the fucking camera cuts? I mean you can't believe any video or AI Photoshop. Yeah, it's what I'm saying. Like I just don't... I don't... There's no such thing as a leaked video anymore. You know what I mean? Well, I mean there are ways to do it.

But I agree, like in general, it's not, I'm not saying, once again, we don't know what the truth is, but my feeling is there's a high probability that could be faked. I don't accept it at face value, I can certainly tell you that, how about that? Okay, that's fair, that's fair, but maybe that plays. I mean, that's a big fight for him.

Big fight for him. He's got to come take his swing. You can't backdoor a gross decision here. Come take your swing, Bo. Let's find out, alright? The Dutch Knight is ready. Do you care about the featured prelim main event in the women's bantamweight division as Yana, don't call her Maheta Santos, Luke will take on Misha Tate. I mean, we gotta respect the brand when it comes to Misha Tate, but I can't say that this fight is going anywhere, or that... I am so surprised she's on the prelims.

Like, for an organization, like, for example, like... We got six fights on the main card, and she's not one of them. That is so surprising to me. Like, don't get me wrong, Santiago Ponsonibio and Danton D-Rod, I don't hate the fight. I'm not mad at the fight. But you know, you got Tate and Santos. I don't know. What do you think it says that they put this on the prelims? Like they're cashing her out? Yeah, yeah. They're cashing her out, right? I mean, she's two and four in her last six.

She's two and two since making the comeback. The two losses came against decent competition, right? Like Ketlin Viera was one of them. I double check, but yeah. I've got it right here. And then, you know, didn't look great in the. Murphy and Ketlin Viera, yeah. So those are, you know, decent sort of elite gatekeeper-ish and then beat lower level competition outside of that.

I know she made those recent comments about, I'll only fight Julianna Pena if it's a title fight, and we're all like, I don't know at 38 if we're getting any closer to that, even in a completely shallow division. So, maybe out of respect, you could have thrown it on the main card, or maybe this is, do they still do,

I mean is it still in their mindset of a featured prelim sets up as the preview to the main card if you're on the fight night level? Probably not. It's different when you're on the fight night level probably not I don't think it's It's different when you're using that fight to sell the paper. That's right. So put an old Robbie Lawler in there or whatever Yeah, um it's a little surprise. It's just a sign of the times I mean she what is she still fighting for just the competition loves it I she wanted to she took a five-year break and then wanted to come back and scratch that itch and

I'm not I'm not really sure what she wants out of this to be honest with you I mean, maybe she still believes she can be champion and honestly, you know at 35 Is it that hard to get a title shot right now? I mean, maybe it's not the craziest thought Wouldn't you rather see her in like PFL against cyborg or am I making to my acting crazy I? Would yes, I think it's a much better opportunity for her, but I don't know what she wants and obviously she's under contract Do you know that simple do you have levels of care for any other fight on this preliminary? Yeah, I will say that I was talking to I did the XFC commentary this week with Jessica Aguilar And she was telling me she had been in contact with Julianian Robertson, who's Dean Thomas. Actually, it was kind of funny. I was supposed to do the call this

past Wednesday with Dean Thomas, but Dean had to travel for this because he's cornering Jillian. Shouts to Dean. We love Dean here. We got to get him in studio. I want to tie Dean into this quick. Do you know, Jeremy Stevens, you mentioned when he made his UFC debut, Chuck Liddell was champion. Yeah, he fought Dean. Yeah. He fought Dean in his UFC debut Chuck Liddell was champion. Yeah, he fought Dean. Yeah, he fought Dean. Dean Armbradam. Right. That's fucking crazy. Yeah. In fact, Dean Armbradam and then he picked Dean up and slammed him, but it only like made the armbar tighter. Yes. Yeah. Dean's Dean's Dean's been around a lot.

Dean got knocked out by BJ Penn back in like the odds bro. Did he catch those Kenny Florian hell bows too? I can't remember anymore. Maybe. He almost fought Myoga until Don King sued at the last second. At the Bojangles Arena. Yes. Yes. So yes, I actually, that one's kind of interesting. Gillian Robertson has quietly put together a nice little record.

Marina Rodriguez, you know, she is... 38. Well, she's dangerous on the feet, very tough in the clinch. The ground is not her best place. So this is, you would imagine, a potentially very winnable fight. Jillian Robertson, I'm just gonna say, is sort of like a quiet kind of, you know, contender maybe a little bit at the back end, but making some moves for sure. Jillian Robertson has won five of her last six, very impressive for, you know, a certain level of competition.

And Rodriguez, while being, you while being greater in terms of experience and ranking in the past, has lost four or five. So it does have a little bit of a crossroads effort. And isn't Jillian a big backer of THC as well? Oh, is she? Yes, Long Island Luke knows that. Yeah, she's the one who took bong hits in the sauna. We put it on.

Have you seen this shit? Well, we just found our new favorite fighter, didn't we? Speaking of favorite fighters, you into the Killer Miller, Giuliana Miller against Ivana Petrovic's curtain jerker there at Women's Flyway? Not really, no. All right. Nor the heavyweight matchup between Thomas Peterson and Dante Almayes. Would you argue that you've lost the level of care for Killer Miller on this run?

I think that's a question for you, pants around the ankles. Not for me. That's very incorrect. Also, we didn't,'t we Augustin Bolanos is an interesting guy. I don't think he's performed up to the level of his potential. Very good kickboxer. But he is always at least good for counting on somebody who's going to, you know, bring the action. I think more often than not.

Indeed. Let's go to topic number two, and it's going to take place in this city. This evening, folks. It's a Times Square triple header, at least in terms of the major fights that's being pushed. I know there's also an NYPD versus NYFD matchup, but Turkey Alashik is going to take his ring magazine series on its second stop, this time first on US soil

and the first boxing match in Times Square. This does matter. This is something. There are some young, must-see personalities on this card with a big tease for the future. It's a Dazon pay-per-view this evening beginning at 6 p.m. Eastern Time. And we've got three of the biggest young stars when you consider Ryan Garcia, Devin Haney, and Teo Fimo Lopez Jr.

in separate bouts. But Luke, with the exception of Teo's bout, which is probably the closest matched on the card, certainly from an odds standpoint, the main and co-main is featuring Devin Haney and Ryan Garcia in separate fights. There seems to be no hiding that the promoters, the Turkey plan is to see those two in the ring against one another. It looks like September they're targeting it with Ryan Garcia saying the deal's already done.

It's already signed. You can even get the feeling like win or lose, you're gonna see that one next. What do you think about the way that this fight has been promoted though and pushed? It feels like the focus has been almost completely on Ryan versus Devin, including the movie trailer that they put out. Is that the right push and angle here,

considering that's what they're building to? And is everybody else just sort of, you know, players in that larger drama? Yeah, it clearly is one of these cases where if the event ultimately goes how the promoter has set it up, all's well that will end well, right? There's really no problem there. But it has been very, very weird.

Long Island Luke, who is Ryan Garcia fighting this weekend? Rolando Romero, baby. Okay, who is Devin Haney fighting? Jose Ramirez. And Teo Fimo? Arnold Barbosa. All right, well you were on the show, you don't count. I feel like if you asked most casual boxing fans,

they couldn't tell you. They would tell you, hey, I know Teo Fimo's on the card, I know Ryan's on the card, and certainly Devin Haney's on the card, but I was looking through the Ring magazine's online content that it put out, yes or this week anyway, for the various media events they were doing. They promoted the shit out of this card.

They absolutely did. It's not a question of did they promote it hard. I didn't hear one fucking quote from Jose Ramirez. Yeah, well he's quiet too. I did hear some stuff from Barboza. Barboza managed to kind of chirp back and forth with Lopez Lopez by the way putting on the luchador mask We'll talk like that. I will tell you If there is any

Possibility of an upset among these three it is absolutely with Barboza jr. Against Lopez in part because I'm not fully convinced Lopez is taking him seriously. But I'll say this, if this ends up actually just being a kind of a showcase event to promote the rematch, we're gonna look back on this weekend and say, you know what, maybe it was a little bit of a, you know, we didn't have to have these fights, but it served a purpose. But the potential for backfiring here is significant.

Not so much because we think Ramirez or whoever is a genuine threat. But, but if they're, if Roley does something, you know, insane and knocks out Garcia, which I don't think will happen. But if I, I didn't think Garcia was going to beat Haney and holy fucking shit. Can't boss this beat Lopez. Right. Exactly. So if something goes wrong, we're going to look back and say, these guys completely wasted

an opportunity. And we should point out something. Garcia has been off a year. Haney has been off a year. There's been changes in their whole lives and to a degree of camps. Changes in their attitude and their latitude. The whole thing. And so it's like, there's a bunch of questions about this.

They're rolling the dice. Let's like a true Vegas businessman. Let's see what ends up happening. But it is not without risk in the end. I think that we talk a lot in the show about how boxing odds are naturally just way wider than MMA. They don't, boxing doesn't, doesn't often try to actually tell you the true chances of somebody winning a fight.

I mean, long Island Luke, do you have the odds right in front of you? They're astronomical in the main and co-main event involving Garcia and Haney. I don't have them right in front of me. I'm pulling them up, I'm pulling them up. I mean, we're talking like 10 to one. Okay, so according to our friends here at DraftKings, Devin Haney is a minus 1200 to Jose Ramirez's plus 700.

Rolly Romero is, let me start with Garcia. Garcia minus 1100 to Rolando Romero's plus 650. So, so, so that, that doesn't tell you the actual chances that the B-sides have. I'm, I'm here on record saying I love the way this fight was matched. I love the personalities involved. I love the chances Turkey's taking by putting it in Times Square. It probably cost an enormous penny. And you know, he wants to bring the next card in July

to an unnamed, as of yet, New York unique location. Same thing with Alcatraz. I'm all in on this. I'm also not going to criticize the idea of people just saying, well, why don't Haney and Garcia just rematch each other right now? Because although I'm not normally a fan of marinating like this, as we like to say in the boxing game, because that's dangerous, this is also an event tonight that we must see. It's got a lot of layers to it. There are a lot of questions to answer for both Garcia and Haney physically,

mentally from that big upset last year, the no contest, the drug suspension, the fact that Haney, you know, has sued Garcia. So maybe they're right,aney, you know, has sued Garcia. So maybe they're right, Luke, to make it all about this. In fact, it might be time to go even deeper on that level. It might be time to go Shots Fired, brought to you by Cuervo. Let's go right here. -♪ BOOM! -♪

-♪ BOOM! -♪ -♪ BOOM! -♪ That's what I'm talking about. Brought to you by Cuervo. Now, of course, is a good time to enjoy the tequila, that evented tequila. And the Trash Talk has been very good, especially at this week's press conference,

where it very much became Ryan versus Devin and Bill Haney. Let's go to the videotape. I got multiple personalities. I got multiple personalities. You don't want to see the crazy one. You don't want to see the crazy one. You don't want to see the crazy personality. You're the biggest **** out of all of them. That's why you was a pig, right?

You are ****. You are ****. It's coming back. Luke, I mean, you can cringe or you can love those moments, but I thought for the Haney's this whole tour, and it has been a tour, they've done multiple press conferences, they've done multiple face-to-face sit downs,

they've done round tables. Look, Turkey in the Ring have promoted the crap out of that part of it. I've gotta say, I like the way the Haney's handled themselves this week. They've acted like the villains. Bill Haney showed up to the public workout, was taking his own video of Ryan.

Ryan was kind of spooked and there was trash talk back and forth. And you can see right there, they got Ryan to go off script this week. The whole build to this, he has been controlled, focused Ryan. And there you got him going, you know, I'll open up the crazy for you guys. Do you think that's the right move for the Haneys? Even though they're not even fighting Ryan right here. I do. The best move for them might be to try to get Ryan off of his game,

going against a slugger like Rowley. Yeah. And anything they can do to trip him up, I think that they obviously have tried, and I think they should continue to try that. I mean, listen, that's the game that Garcia played when he fought Devin Haney. True.

All of the, remember there was pushing at the presser at the, or whatever, the media event at the Empire State. Pushing at the Super Bowl when they went to Media Day. There was that, there was of course the beer bottle, which maybe had at the or whatever the media event at the Empire State's pushing at the Super Bowl when they went to media day there was that there was of course the beer bottle which maybe an apple juice or whatever being in the club, you know, just every antique he could possibly do to completely be weird and maybe I think disarm Devin Haney to a degree or give him false confidence. He did all of that. Now, again, if you're Devin Haney, you need to focus on what is in front of you, which is Jose Ramirez. But nevertheless, I fully agree. Anything, any seeds they can plant of doubt or misdirection or just lack

of focus at a bare minimum, they should do that. And to the point you raise, it's two against one. If they leverage those strengths with Bill and Devin against Ryan because I think we have some sound around this Oscar tries to go back and forth but Oscar almost fought Bill but Bill is just and I say this as a compliment Bill is a loudmouth yes he's a liso he is a traditional boxing dad loud loud mouth instigator he's the new angel Garcia right something like that uh they probably say the n-word the same amount of times, to be perfectly honest with you. Okay, okay.

I'm just pointing out. I'm just pointing out that he is a fire starter. And Devin to me is a little bit like Demure in his attitude. Bill is not. Bill leans into confrontation. That is such an ally to have if you leverage it correctly. They've been doing some of the right leverage it correctly. They've been doing some of the right things. They're trying to get the pressure off of Devin, which is smart, because there is a

lot of pressure on Devin. No one expected him to get dropped three times by Ryan and not have an answer how to get away from that left hook. So I don't hate how pointed they're being in saying, okay, we've seen Ryan go to the extreme mentally. Now he seems to be some level of safer, which is good for him and his family and his future. But Ryan was involved in a lot of toxic shit last year. Maybe they think it's not going to be that difficult to get him off of his game mentally. But of course, Shots Fired were brought to you by Cuervo.

Now is a good time to enjoy the tequila, that invented tequila. And Luke, I got to mention about our friends over there at Cuervo. They'll be behind, of course, next Wednesday, May 5th. Let's go. Here in the studio, here at this table, when it's UFC 315 pregame preview brought to you by Cuervo. They'll be behind of course next Wednesday, May 5th. Let's go. Here in the studio here at this table when it's UFC 315 pregame preview brought to you by Cuervo and the Iceman Chuck Mindenhall is back and he better bring it because we've had we had old Jed in this chair and that guy absolutely. Yeah speaking of giving lice

to everybody. Yeah so so but luckily you know with Chuck's hair situation I don't think the lice will. He took that hat off before you got here, when I did the show without you that one time. And I was like, well, I didn't know I was doing the show with Anakin. Okay. Okay. There we go right there. And by the way, young Anakin was a bitch. Oh, fuck. I can't believe that that ho-ass bitch turned into Darth Vader. How was that possible? All right. One of Bill Haney's though, as we focus in a little bit closer to Ryan's actual matchup here with Roli Romero, has been the transformations in Ryan's body. Now, if you remember, Ryan was suspended for a full year due to testing positive for Osterine

in just one of the tests after the Haney fight. He claims it was a tainted supplement, but that's Ryan on the right when he fought Haney last April. On the left is Ryan Garcia during the open workout this week. And Luke, to be fair, he looks softer. He claims it's from moving up in weight from 140 to 147. Also, he claims I'm just in a different spot in my life. You're going to get a different version.

Let's say a couple things. I've seen some other pictures where he didn't look nearly as different. In fact, it could be to a degree quite negligible. That's one thing I want to say too. There is simply no denying he sounds healthier this time. His voice doesn't, he doesn't have that party voice or whatever that was. He obviously is not nearly as manic.

He's not partying to my knowledge anyway. He's not in the club partying. He made the way, he didn't miss weight this time. I remember he missed weight last time. So it's not a case that you can look at this and say he's as unprofessional as he was last time. That's not. But it'll be interesting to see what kind of performance

we get from Ryan because I'm gonna say it one more time. Forget all the stuff where he was talking toxicity about every aggrieved, you know, group on earth. Going after fighters' wives aggressively? Wives, black people, Muslims, you name it. He was going after everybody. He's obviously kept, he just seems so much healthier now. But the point I'm trying to make is we see he did miss wait last time.

And he did pop for Osterweil last time. The villain in the soap opera with Haley. Well, not with the crowd. The crowd absolutely loved him. Why has the crowd in your eyes come back that quickly and maybe not held against him his own toxicity? Is it because of the throws of mental anguish, substance abuse, his mom having cancer,

Ryan going through a divorce? You think there's been an active like pass given? I just think people, we live in a very gross time where nobody cares about anything terrible anymore and so I think that's part of it. The other part of it is, obviously, without any kind of question, people just fucking hate Devin Haney. And I think it's over the top and comical at this point.

I agree. They're like, oh, he sued an opponent. His opponent maybe intentionally missed weight and had performance-adancing drugs in his system. Well, I don't agree with the suing, but- I don't necessarily agree with the suing, but BC, everybody in boxing sues everybody. Why are we pretending like the Haney's are unique in this situation? They are not.

When you lose a fight and then you sue and Ryan Garcia broke every fucking rule in the book. But wouldn't you agree that was a bad 12 months of PR for the Haney family? It was a disastrous 12 months of PR. That's what I think a lot of the fans are responding. Sure. Let's hear from Bill Haney, who continued the stance this week think a lot of the fans are responding. Sure. Let's hear from Bill Haney, who continued the stance this week that Ryan's the bad guy in this scenario. He was cheated.

He was violated. He was robbed. And it was my job to make sure that it doesn't happen again. Turkey made sure that for this fight, all of the fighters would be not just tested, but be extensively tested in a way that they couldn't cheat. Or it would be very hard for them. Whereas they said that it was only a little bit, it was 60 times the limit. But they tried to create the narrative that it didn't have any effect.

How does he look right now? He's the one that played guilty. He's the one that had it in his system. And he's the one that's shrinking before our eyes. Wow. Did you see Rick Reno dressed as Hudson Hawk in the end? Yeah, it was awesome right there. It was great.

That's such an insight. Dude, Rick Reno's going for it this week in fashion. Have you noticed? Like, he's going for it. Indiana Jones hat, classes. Every day he's like Crocodile Dundee. The next day it's who knows, you know. Do your thing, player. That was interesting right there. As it pertains to the fight with what Bill's saying, here's the big question here.

Look, should Ryan beat Rowley? Yes. I do think people are overlooking the fact that Rowley also has his back against the wall right now. From the standpoint of you're not going to be- His stock has collapsed. Right. You're not going to be a viable B-side who will come in and talk shit and have a puncher's chance if you can't win. And in his last four fights, he was knocked out by Tank.

He was kind of brutally stopped by Pitbull Cruz in a fight he was not even in. The weight cut played a big part. He had the win against Barroso that he clearly didn't deserve. Where he was getting tuned up. And then in his most recent fight, a tune up against Manuel Jimas, he just looked too safe and too not into it mentally. Rowley is saying that his biggest fights have come in title fights at 35 and 40 when he should have been a division or two higher.

He's saying he will be reinvented now at 47 without having to make that weight cut. Do you think, or how much do you think, not just the puncher's chance, but the idea that Rowley realizes I need either an upset win or a very good performance, a very good representation of what I bring, or he's going to drop many pegs, will that make him extra dangerous if Garcia is softer than we've seen?

If, like Bill Haney's saying, maybe Garcia was on a shit ton of ostering last time and this time he won't be. Well, let me just say I did not take Garcia's chances seriously last time. I'm not gonna make that mistake twice. I think I think he rolls here but let me just sort of point out something about Roli Romero. Dude, he hasn't made a clip on social media of note the entire fucking week. He's been quiet, right? Very quiet.

And I can't tell if that's because he's finally wising up that like, you know, he needs to focus. But what I can say is the guy who was shit talking tank about his, you know, the size of his Johnson and everything else, like, where is that guy? Nowhere to be found. I think his confidence has been shattered and I can't quite tell if he's internalized that or if he's rejecting it. He might not be a

sly as a fox sitting under the radar. You think he might just kind of be broken. This is what's so interesting about this promotion. Like as we mentioned, the tailfemale fight against Barboza is great. It's a really good fight on this one. The other ones are all kind of lopsided, at least by the odds, but it's just weird that you've got Rolly Romero on this card and no one's talking about him. It's all Haney It's all Garcia. It's all about Bill Haney. It's all about tangentially now Oscar de la Hoya Rolly is and I can't believe I'm saying this a wallflower in this. Yeah, it's weird. It is so Unusual to ever see wasn't doing that against a Barroso

He wasn't do that against pitbull and he sure as hell wasn't doing that in the lead up to the fight with Tank. A new turn for him. All right, there are some things to think about that Haney said. Is Ryan off the stuff and will that change it? My belief is that Ryan will be fine, will look fine, and actually could be on the path to the best stretch of his career

and the most dangerous he's ever looked. Why? Because I think he got close enough in the toxicity of last year to losing everything. His career, he had to sit out a year, he got arrested, he almost lost custody of his kids, he almost lost his mom. Like, there was so much going on, a lot of it self-imposed that I think he got close enough to that line that it scared him and it rejuvenated him. He seems to be back in a better mental state.

Physically, Luke, outside of looking softer, I thought he's looked good. Specifically, the training clips with Derek James, he's showing a right hand more. His technique has been very good. His footwork seems improved. There's a big opportunity for him to come in and pinata the shit out of Rowley and get a thrust forward in the public eye of not only do we need to see this second Haney fight, but holy shit Ryan's a killer when he is fully dialed in, when there's no BS. So, Luke, for me to believe that, for me it's fueled by something we saw in

the Haney fight. But the question is, was what we saw in the Haney fight an indomitable version of Ryan Garcia, one who would not be denied? It's not just the heart he showed in getting up off the canvas against Luke Campbell, which was the first sign that like maybe he is that guy. Then he went through a lot of ups and downs. Am I wrong to look at the Haney fight and the way he carried

himself, even with a shitty training camp where he couldn't fight three minutes of every round, his defense was smart on point. He had head movement. He was smart in the way he utilized the stamina he did have. He knew how to set up that left hook, he carried himself like a killer in there. That's not the guy from the tank fight who came in reckless, got humbled, and then kind of sheepishly, you know, worked his way into a stoppage loss to the body. I know he had the pre-existing injury. I'm just

wondering if he has matured mentally at the exact right time, if he's been someone who's been open about the stuff he's been dealing with mentally, maybe he got a lot of that anxiety out of the way, maybe he got a lot of that shit out of the way, and we will see the most focused version of him, because if you talk to his ex-trainers, some of them will tell you the focus wasn't there, he's not great at carrying out game plans. I wonder if now is the time that it is the right opponent at the right time, the setting there's gonna be a lot of Eyeballs on this even though it's a disowned pay-per-view Do you believe we're gonna get a better version than we've seen before of Ryan Garcia based on all of that is there enough?

That he could have gained Confidence wise from that experience or could have been PED driven Hard to say about whether or not I was PEDs I mean, I know he failed for him, but Osterine is one of the ones that is easy to get via contamination, so that's something we have to understand. What I'll say is this, BC, I think that your theory is probably correct, but let's add a little something to it if we can. Devin Haney, I know everyone shit on him for that performance because he got

knocked down three times and got his, you know, he got rocked within the first 30 seconds. But BC, he also cleverly clawed his way back in several rounds to kind of make it, I'm not gonna say like crazy close, but closer than you might imagine. Respectable in a way that he's not getting credit for. Romero can't do that. Romero does not have that kind of a skill in the same way that Haney does. And so to the point that you're raising, could we see a more, you know, a guy who's coming into his own at just the right time, trying to put some of the negativity behind him? Absolutely.

Also in his favor is that even if he is that way, he's not going to be going up against a guy who can challenge him in the same way that Haney Haney is Doesn't have Romero's power not not by a long shot, but he is a much better boxer Oh, and he can steal rounds from you in ways that Romero absolutely cannot do this is set up for Garcia to look great and I think honestly the pressures on Garcia a little bit here because There's no reason why you shouldn't. If you are what you say you are, you should cruise here. Let's see. You know Long Island Luke jumped into my live chat this week on the BCX and asked about the

over under and it's like certainly all your knees are jerking toward the idea of under. I think for it to go the distance really Ryan has to underachieve and get hurt and have to try to like box his way to the finish yeah I just don't see a scenario because of Rowley's lack of defense he squares up way too much even with the threat of his power that left hook is monster now we're gonna see what took in boxing and now we're gonna see a full 147 Ryan without the weight cut issues without rehydration clauses like the tank fight which you know that there was a part of it Big Ryan KO coming then again, even if there were no PEDs there were there were substance abuse issues with recreational drugs It does appear like that is going to like I said man. This is set up for Ryan to have a

Phenomenal New York homecoming I think is most intriguing for me outside of just seeing the event seeing how it's gonna be remember They couldn't sell tickets for it under New York law, there's going to be a bunch of influencers and media and selected turkey friends and people around there, but obviously it's such a cool locale and location, we want to see it. I want to see how good, and I think that's what everybody else wants to see, how good Garcia and Haney look in their matchups, so you see how that changes the narrative entering into their inevitable rematch. For that to happen in a lot of ways, both need to win, of course. Both

are favored big to win, but in that co-main event matchup of Devin Haney against former unified 140 champion Jose Ramirez in a 144 pound catchweight bout, so it's a soft move up in weight. Devin has looked incredible in picks. He's been working with Sugar Shane Mosley on sitting down on his shots. They've been using him as a consultant in camp. Luke, I'm here to say Jose Ramirez is a live dog in this. Not a live dog to knock him out. Not necessarily even a live dog to pull a decision.

I'm saying a live dog to make it more competitive than people think. Because Romero, Romero who also had trouble cutting what 140 in recent years, even though he's a step down for sure from where he was five, six years ago heading into the Josh Taylor fight, he'll get inside on you. He'll work aggressively. He's precise. There's a lot to like about him. He's also not getting caught up in trash talk.

He's only worried about the job at hand in redeeming his name. I think he's going to make this tough on Devin. I think you're going to see a fight. That's you know eight four seven five in the end. I think he can in spots but I feel like Devon's ability to move around the ring is gonna be real hard for him. Do you have any fears mentally that Devon will carry the skeletons from that from the fight? No I think it's really oversold. Okay. I don't believe that. Then are you gonna go go as far, even though Ramirez is durable, to imagine a scenario where Haney, is there a scenario where Haney exits this card as the favorite against Ryan

in the rematch? No. No. I don't think so. Wow. Yeah. I think he's going to, could be close, but no. So no stoppage, but a solid win over 12 rounds

You're gonna guess for Devin Haney. He yeah, I would pick him by decision. I would pick Garcia via stoppage I think those are probably locks. They're probably very those are not the ones that are interesting to me It's the fucking Lopez and barbosa fight. That's an interesting one Teo Tfimo Lopez jr. Will defend his 140 pound title against unbeaten mandatory and 33 year old Arnold Barbosa Jr. who has taken the long road, not been given the, you know, huge promotional push opportunities, but has consistently won and got the job done. He went into Manchester, England to beat a very tough Jack Cattarall to put him in this position. And Luke, maybe most importantly, along with the odds actually representing the chance

he really does have in here, is he's come in here completely confident. He has not gotten caught up in any of the Teo-Femo antics. He has answered it, I think, the right way. He's presented himself as strong. He's mentally focused. Like I said, 33 years old. This is his moment.

Luke, is it though, are his chances fully dependent upon which Tao we get? You know what that means. It's the pound for pound Tao and the Loma and Josh Taylor fights and then it's the just barely won the decision and wonders if he's still got it version that has popped up a few times. Even if he's not only always doing this at the end, more

often than not lately, we've exited tail fights going. Does he still have it like I should have done more he could have done more maybe not as most recent one when he beat up that jobber but in your eyes is Barbosa's upset chances pinned upon which one of those two show up for for Teo Te Tao at his best should not lose. But I saw Sean Zatelle talking about this, and he's got pretty good takes.

Oh, he had some takes coming after Turkey, Dana, the FBI. He was cooking. He was cooking. But I mean, as it pertains to this fight, and he was sort of pointing out, like, you know, if you're going to get a 100% motivated Barbosa, this is a monster opportunity for him. If you're Teo and you're 80 to 90, that's a big drop off. I mean, Teo is a much better athlete

and I think at his highest can just do much more. But if he's showing up in a luchador mask and you know, kind of playing second fiddle to the circus that is surrounding Haney and Garcia, to what extent is he locked in on this one? And I just don't know how to answer that. Also, more to the point, there's a bit of a style issue between them, where Barboza doesn't throw

a ton of punches, he's a little bit more economical. And excuse me, I was with Haney and Garcia. Lopez tends to be a counterpuncher, tends to want to wait around. The bad version of Teo does not throw enough punches, does not. Right. So if Barboza is economical about this, and he's the one moving Teo around,

and Teo's going for these big hitters, and a lot of them aren't landing, some of these rounds are gonna get away from him. Dude, Barboza is good. Again, I don't think his full upside is as good as the full upside of Lopez question But look solid but not spectacular exactly but Lopez but but highly motivated. Yeah, very professional jab good jab again good Good good good movement with his feet. Yep Lopez if he's fucking around dude if

Lopez, if he's fucking around, dude, if Kam Boses can beat Lopez when Lopez isn't dialed in, 1 billion percent Barboza can beat him. I'll still throw the asterisk of the torn esophagus that mattered in that fight, but I think you're right. And I think it comes down to this. The problems for Teo in these performances of late, where he hasn't thrown enough punches and it just, he hasn't figured it out, Luke, is he doesn't always adjust back to his boxing roots when things aren't going his way and just win rounds with jabs like he needs to. He tries too hard to come up with more ways to do the explosive Roy Jones stuff when sometimes against tough opponents and Barbosa's not going to give him a lot of windows

to land these huge shots unless he hurts him early. We're going to have to see Tayo work for it. We're going to have to see him get behind that jab and make sure he's out working Barbosa. I tend to believe he'll rise to the occasion because history has shown that. History has shown that you bring a big opponent or a big opportunity, he will rise to the occasion. I know that the jury's a little bit out

because it's been a while, but this is set up for him knowing what's at stake and what is at stake by the way because Ryan if he beats Rolay He's gonna fight Devon in the fall, but Ryan and Teo have been talking like crazy that they're gonna fight next spring And by the way, you also now have Connor Ben Who's gonna be at this fight him and Ryan have been exchanging that they'd love to do it in a stadium big big big Opportunities for these young still 20 something four prints five prints-prince, five-prince guys that are aligned with Turkey,

and the fact that they all want smoke and all want to keep fighting each other, that's the best thing we can say about the Turkey experience. Then there's, you know, there's lots of criticism, we've tried to be as honest as possible, but look, the Turkey experience has surrounded the fighters that we kind of care about the most, that are the most exciting,

and it might, it might help inject the opportunity for them to continue to face each other. So, Teo is going to need to be the best version of him if he wants to fight Ryan, Boots, Connor, Ben, all these guys coming up in big fights. I don't have much to add to that, but certainly it gives you a sense of the stakes tonight, involved in the universe of what is possible given the results. Indeed, indeed right there. All right, topic number three, let it, let us slide over to the rest of boxing this weekend. And look, it's a big week.

Obviously, it's a huge weekend for Turkey Al-Asheek, not just going to Times Square on Friday and putting his ring magazine series right on the streets of New York. It's going to be Canelo Alvarez on Saturday night in Saudi Arabia in the first of his four-fight deal with the kingdom. And it's also Sunday's top-rank card in ESPN+, in which Nayo Inouye is an ambassador for Ring Magazine, one of Turkey's focus close guys. So he has some hand in that. But Luke, before we talk about Canelo and Inouye's return,

if you are going to criticize Turkey, because there's a lot of this weekend that is very good for boxing. Instead of one big Cinco de Mayo pay-per-view card, we have three cards and three nights, all of different levels of value coming through. I don't like the opponents for Canelo or Inouye. We'll get to that. But is it, should we accept that? Accept Turkey raising the profile of the sport and putting it in Times Square?

Or is it safe to counter even if it sounds like sour grapes and be like, you're also counting the Conor Ben fight last week giving fans three pay-per-views on Dazon in eight days. You're also keeping all these young stars off of regular TV or channels in which casuals can stumble into them. They're going to be on his own pay-per-view. And the only one that's not Sunday night, the top-rank card is going to start at 10 p.m. Eastern on a Sunday night.

Do you think it's fair to criticize that it's not like we think Turkey's doing it for the betterment of the sport? He's doing it for himself, for his country, and of course for fully his trying to take over the entire sport. But does this weekend actually help boxing if that's a thing that still matters? Pulling Canelo out of the States, doing a card where fans can't show up on Friday, and having three pay-per-view cards in eight days where you could argue if you're going to throw that much money at the event, and I get a time buy on CBS or NBC or something where you can put it directly in the living rooms

of the people that can go, if that's the future of boxing, I'm in on it. Well, let's give them a little bit of credit. The U-Bank and Ben fight was in 65,000 people at Tottenham Hotspur. So that one was touching the people, so to speak. I mean, listen, whenever we do these Saudi Arabia cards, I don't want to sound like a broken record, but to me, we have to acknowledge

there's a lot of good with them, as well as a lot of things that I think we have to be aware of critically. The good part is the stuff we've already talked about. We are excited for the return of all of these guys. We are excited about what it could mean down the road for Haney and Garcia to get together. If you didn't see the trailer that Dazoner,

I don't know if the Saudis paid for it or not, but the one they put out for this that was, oh, they pay for it. Yeah. In any case, it was really well done. Like there's a lot of fun stuff about this. And again, it's going to look really good, I think on TV tonight on this, um, for this, for this Friday night card and the weather's holding up. Yeah.

Yeah. So like, listen, there's a lot of positive there that you bank Ben card was incredible. This one tonight should be really, really good. I don't think tomorrow is gonna be a home run. I think tomorrow's gonna be a bit of a dud and Sunday probably too. I don't know if you guys have been following this. Apparently the Las Vegas economy is not doing great. Have you long out Luke have you heard anything about this? Can't say that I have. I've been reading about this a little bit. It turns out like not a lot of people are showing up to Vegas these days I don't know. I don't think it's strictly a function of the fights not being there as often

It's probably a number of factors But anyway, I'm pointing out in a way is there kind of on a kind of a dead weekend in the city Well, isn't the rumor that the Vegas was value extracted even more than TKO is doing in the other specific combat You know, listen go to Vegas, everything is insanely expensive. So here's what I'm trying to point out. I am happy to talk about the good parts of what the Turkey experiment is going to give us. And it has given us some great English fights.

It is giving us right now, pretty consistent use of their talent. He has paid for previously for any number of big heavyweight fights. And of course, there was Bival and Better BF and we got that twice and you know, the whole nine yards, all that stuff is great. But at the same time, to that point, everyone was telling me, look how cheap the pay-per-view prices are, but how cheap can they be if you're getting three in eight days? That's the first thing I'm going to say. Second of all, let's

just be honest about it. Canelo fighting in Saudi Arabia is borderline a crime. It's ridiculous that he is fighting there. It is absolutely indefensible, other than everyone's just trying to cash in on what is probably gonna be a monstrous payday. Or they needed to keep Canelo away from Jake Paul knowing that they could put that fight on Netflix at that time.

Fine, but even then it should not be absolutely in Saudi Arabia at all. Oh, of course. And it shouldn't be this opponent, I mean come on. Total disaster and Inoue versus Cardenas is fine But the real fight is the Akhmedalia fight Which this one is supposed to set up and it's happening in a weekend where I don't know if Inoue can actually be a big star In Vegas Absent some other real kind of promotional force and top ranks doing their best

But there's just not a whole lot necessarily to it. And the Riyadh season shine does not appear to be the halo does not appear to be extending in that particular way. Also, you know, some of this stuff is a very fan inaccessible. The U-Bank Ben card is a clear opposite of that. But you know, there's going to be not many people to see Canelo. Yeah, it's a mandatory, but I've seen other mandatories. But the last one in Guadalajara when he fought who was it? It was the white guy from England. Yes. He couldn't finish him off. Yeah, but you know, the opening scene john writer john writer had this huge almost orchestra and all

these mariachis and this giant show is a fucking show. You know, what are we going to get in Saudi Arabia with this like nothing even approximating putting it in a 6000 person arena. What is this? What is this? This is this isn't as this is absurd. I hate to say it. I it's a mixed bag is the answer.

It's a mixed bag. I've never seen this much apathy anger or just I don't give an F about Canelo's fight. So for the record Canelo's defending his unified super middleweight championship against unbeaten IBF title holder, William Skull. Now Skull only became the champion because Canelo was defending his unified Super Middleweight Championship against unbeaten IBF title holder William Skull. Now Skull only became the champion because Canelo wanted to fight Edgar Berlonga last year instead of defending against Skull, his mandatory. So Canelo was stripped of the IBF title. Skull fought Vladimir Shishkin in Germany. It was not a fun fight. Didn't make either one look good and Skull kind of had a hang on late.

He got hurt and kind of staggered, you know, and faded a bit late, although he was the clear winner. But Luke, even though he's unbeaten, he's from Cuba, fights out of Germany, has almost no footprint, has, you know, victories over some second-tier guys. The Shishkin fight is a decent win. Skull is terrible. But now he's in here against Canelo, only really to be fair, because when you do Canelo versus Crawford later this year,

which we expect Turkey and TKO to do in a Vegas stadium, Allegiant Stadium, it's going to be a much better sell if Canelo comes in there as undisputed Super Middleweight champion so that Bud Crawford has the historical chance to become a three division, four belt undisputed champion. But yet what you're doing is you're tossing it on a weekend where the focus is really on tonight. And this just feels like an extreme afterthought.

The crowd's not going to be wild. It's not going to be going crazy. There was nobody at that at that grand arrival. It's in Riyadh. And oh, by the way, he's a 50 to one favorite. Yeah, I mean who gives a fuck? It sucks. It sucks. And it just further pushes him away from Benavidez,

which is the fight he should be doing right now. Nobody's making Canelo though. He doesn't want it. I mean, the IBF stripped him, but it's not like WBC is like making him, you know, defend his title. They'll just give him super champion bullshit. It feels like Turkey would just rather have him

than have the enemy have him. And obviously Turkey wants to do big things with TKO, with Canelo. But this is a waste of the remaining fights that we are going to have left with Big Red. I feel like it's the kind of fights he wants though right now. He's more than happy to take this money and do it. Here is Canelo talking or grading potential future opponents on a good and great scale when he did talk to the media this week. Williams Skull.

Good fighter. Chris Huback Jr. Good fighter. future opponents on a good and great scale when he did talk to the media this week. Great fighter. Edgar Belanga. Good fighter. Terrence Crawford. Great fighter. So Skull. Billy Joe Saunders, by the way, is incredibly fat. Yes, he was trying to get involved in that Eubank bending last week. Yeah, he got a little racial back there too. Yeah, well, he likes that. In terms of this one, look, Skull is taller than Canelo. He's got quick feet.

He holds distance well. He's pretty accurate with his punches. Decent speed. He's got a lot of speed. He's got a lot of speed. He's got a lot of speed. He's got a lot of speed. He's got a lot of speed.

He's got a lot of speed. He's got a lot of speed. He's got a lot of speed. He's got a lot of speed. He's got a lot of speed. He's got a lot of speed. He's got a lot of speed. Heull is taller than Canelo. He's got quick feet. He holds distance well. He's pretty accurate with his punches, decent speed, but he doesn't throw a lot. He does nothing remarkable.

He holds a lot. He holds a lot, which keeps the output down, but that's not the avenue to getting a decision over Canelo. He did come out this week and say, I'm going to eat him when talking about Canelo. I mean, you know, God bless him. It's the biggest opportunity of his life, but here's the belt on the line that the WBC is going to eat them when talking about Canelo. I mean, you know, God bless him. It's the biggest opportunity of his life. But here's the belt on the line that the WBC is going to float.

Obviously the undisputed championship. This is the coolest thing about this. I mean, it's unnecessary, but it is pretty cool. The design is absolutely incredible. Okay, WBC continue to put out the Caliente belt or what is that called? The Zico 10 Kato belt? I don't even.

I mean, like shout out to, I mean, like, that's the only connection to Mexican history that we have here on Cinco de Mayo. Not that that's a Mexican national holiday that they take seriously. It is in boxing. It is in boxing. It is in American bars.

It's not an actual Mexican holiday, but it is in boxing. For young white women, it's their holiday, okay? There's no question about that. Hey, hey, or 45-year-old Washedad's at Vegas doing live shows. Let's see William Skull working out here. I mean, his body is a wonderland. Shout out to the guy. He looks like a fucking tank, but don't be deceived.

Don't be. He's not good. He doesn't have power. He is 19 and no overall. And here's Skull talking about wanting to shock the world, which is exactly what he needs to do. Most of the time they have underestimating and coming like the underdog. But he says at the same time, it's a great feeling, you know, because people are not expecting a lot from you. And then you choke the world and then you choke who you are. So here's the deal though. He's been the mandatory for three years.

And he has constantly taken step aside money to take instead six or eight rounders. You know, he fought Sean Hemphill, who's an American journeyman who was on the showbox level He fought him on a canelo under card to take step aside money. This is his moment. He's waited He's put these put his career on hold. He's been fighting mostly nobodies But he doesn't even have like Reculable wins before that like the fact that he even could become number one in a sanctioning body for not having beaten anybody is The other side of how boxing alphabet works. Like, you know, what's going on.

Two best ways to get money in sports, be a backup QB behind a franchise quarterback. It's like Colt McCoy money. He wasn't, he didn't have a franchise guy in front of him, but still, or that step aside money, just keep taking that step aside money. Did you can get rich doing that shit? Yeah. Well, Sunday night in a way is good, and I went away, the monster is gonna defend

the undisputed 122 pound title against Ramon Cardenas. Look, I covered Ramon. He fought on Showbox in the past. He's from San Antonio. He's got legit power for this division, but this is a monster step up opportunity, and the unfortunate part is you feel like he only got selected because he's Mexican-American and we're doing

this fight on Cinco de Mayo weekend in Las Vegas. But it kind of spoils Inouye's return to the U.S., which was supposed to be a big exciting deal. I'm not going to say that the card's going to be awful, but Inouye's a bigger betting favorite than even Canelo. But Luke, I actually think Cardenas has a better shot in this than Skull does against Canelo. Yes., I actually think Cardenas has a better shot in this than Skull does against Canelo.

Yes. Skull is not going to throw a lot. Canelo is going to break him down to the body and probably stop him midway. Now Cardenas might not even make it through four rounds for all we know, especially if he fights aggressively. But is there any redemptive thing about like I'm shocked that they're doing this?

I know that Inouye wanted to stay busy and this just fit in on the time on the calendar. I'm shocked that they would put it on Sunday night on an already loaded weekend at 10 p.m. Eastern against an opponent that's not gonna move the needle. A dead weekend. Again, maybe that was the only chance it was gonna work because Inouye is supposed to be going to Saudi Arabia later in the year. He wants to fight twice more. He wants Nakatani, maybe MJ Akhmedov. Here's my view on this. The way that that John Rider fight went and who was the also

Canelo at the Hard Rock Stadium? What's the name of the Hard Rock Stadium? Billy Joe Saunders in South Florida. No, but he had a he also had a tune up there. Avni Yildirim. It was a mandatory defense. And he came out with J Balvin and it was a whole thing. My view on this is if you're a big megastar in boxing or a pound for pound guy, one of the two or both, and you have to take a mandatory, make it a fucking show. Make it a fucking show. Yeah. This whole thing that we're doing in Saudi Arabia or in case of the Inouye, what venue is he competing in? The venue at Riyadh season in Saudi Arabia that has six times more.

No, no, no, no, the Inouye. I think it's T-Mobile Can he fill T-Mobile long on Luke is it T-Mobile? I'll check yeah, I mean there's a couple good cards It's basically like a pretty good regular ESPN top rank. That's right That's right. I'll ask for knows in the co-main some good prospects one of the Vargas brothers on the bottom take a fighter to their Place where it's either their hometown or their hometown fans are reliable to be. So for Canelo, that could be a lot of places. He is a global superstar, but you know, Miami makes sense for a lot of reasons. Vegas makes sense. Guadalajara,

where is it going to be? It is T-Mobile. Yeah. I mean, I can't wait to see what the numbers look like for that one. I just cannot imagine he's going to sell big there, but you get my point. Like we're doing these things in weird ways to accommodate other interests and it makes the fights themselves a little strange. I agree with you. Cardenas has a much better shot than Skull, but Skull has basically no shot. So that's not really saying a whole lot. And Canelo felt like he's been going through the motions in all the interviews this week. He is going through the motions. Like no, no, no, this is a great opportunity for Mexican fighters because if I show everybody that I can fight

Or all around the world then Mexican fighters can believe that they can do the same like that's that's mine That's the fuck are we talking about he's talking about money That's what he's talking about and maybe he deserves it Luke Maybe we should shut the f up, but you're still gonna be that guy, and you're still gonna carry yourself as that guy Right the guys I mean I love the Crawford fight But I'd almost rather him rematch Bevil or fight Benavides or fight Morell or fight like... Or Fight Skull, but Fight Skull in, I don't know,

Mexico City or Miami again or something. Something where there's a show, everyone can kind of get into it, it's a fun, it's a, you know, it's festive. Nothing about Fight Week with Canelo this week, it's the opposite of festive. It feels almost afterthoughtish. Yeah. But quite literally distant. You know, it just doesn't feel anything.

The Saturday pay-per-view with Canelo will have Hami Munguia rematching Bruno Seres, who beat him in the Upset of the Year. F.A. Adjogba in a heavyweight bout against... Boccoli. Martin Boccoli. By the way, did you see them getting after each other? I did not, but that's pretty awesome. They were talking greasy to each other at the press conference.

That's going to be a fun fight, no doubt about it. And I also like they've got that young, the Mexican Olympian who signed to Canelo's manager and trainer, Eddie Reynoso signed him. I don't know his name. Marco, I think is his name. I forgot the last name, but he's debuting on there as well. So there's some things to look out for, but of like the fights that really matter this weekend, my focus is the most on Ryan Garcia because I think he's the biggest story and I love Roly too,

and I think that's gonna be an explosive fight. Of all the fights this weekend, what is your focus on the most? Lopez, Terofimo Lopez. That fight is very interesting. Lopez can either really hurt his stock or become a player in an unusual way for the rest of the year. Yes. Kind of all hinges on what happens here. Third title defense at 140 he's trying here. Let's go. Let's do that thing. All right. Well, are you ready, by the way, speaking of this weekend, to win some cash during the basketball playoffs? Because you know them, them pro hoops are heating up at the moment. Celtics Knicks on the horizon, by the way. Check out Pick Six from DraftKings if you are.

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One per new customer. Bonus awarded as non-withdrawable Pick6 credits that expire in 14 days. Limited time offer, C terms at pick6.draftkings.com slash promos. Well done right there. Degenerate, Bong Island, Luke, who's winning the NBA playoffs? No, probably Thunder, the Cavs.

People keep saying the Cavs. I know they were number one seed. I did not pay attention to the Cavs at all the season and then I saw them absolute. Who did they just play in the opening round? The Heat. And I saw the last one where they finished them. They fucking, they're really good. I couldn't believe how good.

Also I have to say this, Pascal Siakam, I know he doesn't play on the, he doesn't play on the... He used to play for the Raptors. Yes. On the Raptors. Yes. I want to change. Yes, dude. He consistently finds himself on these unusually good winning teams. Yes. I'm amazed by him and Schroeder have this kind of ability.

It's like Mike Coppinger. He just keeps showing up at the top spot. You know, just there. Walk on in. That's amazing. Real quick breaking news. Greg Popovich is leaving the Spurs as coach. That's interesting. Winning as coach in NBA history. There you go. We also have breaking news. I meant to open the show with it real quick, but I did want to hit you up with it. Ilya Toporya has gone public in a video in Spanish confirming the rumors that Ariel Hwani has been ahead of this, that he will be fighting at UFC 317 International Fight Week. We don't know if it's Maine or Colman.

You would assume Maine given his star power. And what we don't know, will it be for the lightweight title against Islam Mahachev or will it be an interim lightweight title opportunity, maybe even a vacant, I don't know, against someone like Charles Olivera, Armand Tsarukhin, Justin Gage. I mean there's some names out there. Luke Thomas, I'm very happy that that level of star power in terms of carrying the story forward will be there. Do you think the uncertainty

and the lack of an announcement so close have everything to do with what will happen next Saturday first? Yes. You have C-315 in Montreal. No doubt about it. When JDM challenges Bilal Muhammad for the title and the idea that Islam could be

Moving up should his buddy Bala lose. Yes. I think that's the entire conversation No, I have nothing else to say about it. Except that is exactly what they are waiting. All right. We'll have this to say about it I think we all want Islam right? I mean that's the best fight you can make in the sport But if it's not what do you want for him? Ola Vera? That's sexy. Yeah, that is a sexy ass. Charlie Olives. And I think to Tupori Orexum. Wow. What about Tsarukyan? Do they save that? That's an interesting one. I don't know about that one.

I don't think they make that one. Tsarukyan would have chirped up already. I mean this is gonna be better than Gachy Mahachev like I don't think they make that one. So you can would have chirped up already. I mean, this is going to be better than Gaijin Mahjab. Like, Ilya versus anybody will be better than Gaijin Mahjab. Yes, that's right. I agree with that. I did talk to Balal last night. It'll be on the Brian Campbell experience today. And he said he is, what the rumors are true, he is willing to move up to middleweight

and face Hamzat for an interim title if necessary. And is willing to give Islam a chance at his bell against somebody else. I don't think that's likely. Okay, interesting musical chairs being played on the Titanic deck that is TKOs, UFC. Yeah. The only thing is as they're going down into the water,

they're cashing more and more checks. Yeah, I don't quite get it. All right, topic number four. Hey, how about this? Former UFC fighter Jeff Molina was, of course, embroiled in the betting scandal. Remember coach James Cross, Derek Minner involved as well. That would lead all three of them, right, to be black sheep,

to be removed from the UFC, suspended, and really what you thought would be a huge casualty to whoever would violate UFC's current era of embracing sports betting, of having Draft Kings of a sponsor, and all of that. But this week, it was announced by BKFC that the promotion was going to sign Jeff Molina, which led to Molina appearing on the Ariel Hauwani show. But after that interview aired, it was an announcement from BKFC that the signing was actually premature. Why? Because Molina suspension doesn't actually end until November.

BKFC would tweet yesterday's announcement regarding Jeff Molina signing was premature. We respect the ABC's current suspension and will honor their rules and suspensions. So, Luke, let's just start right here. Should BKFC have signed and shown public interest in Molina when he's still suspended and we're so close to the can't miss toxicity

that came out of that betting scandal? I saw people saying he should be banned for life, which, well, can we hear what Molina, can we hear his side of the story? Let's get his side of the story first. Let's hit it. How long have you been betting on MMA? Let's see, I had my debut April 2021 on, am I pointing the right way?

There it is, yes. 261. Fight of the night, don't forget it. Yeah. So, because I got the bonus, kind of similar to Wellmaker, I was able to quit my job. I was working like 30 something hours a week at T-Mobile, slinging phones and it was paying well. My employer, my coworkers were all super cool and awesome. They'd come attend my fights and knew that the goal was to get into the UFC and eventually quit that job and kill it in

the UFC. It's been my goal and dream since I was a kid, since I was 14 years old. So they got to watch me have these regional fights, attend them to contender series to then have a debut. Get the bonus. Because of the bonus, I was able to quit my job. But so I had that debut in April and then I ended up quitting my job job I think late July, early August around then. But I was freaking out, man. I was scared to quit my job, but I knew it needed to be done. I knew I needed to be able to...

I was training full-time, but it's tough when you're getting off from practice and then you're going to work and then you're waking up six hours later to go on a run and practice again. So it's just a lot easier if your full-time gig is fighting, especially at this level. But I was terrified to quit my job. So I went to my coach at the time, James Krauss, and I was like, Hey, I think it's time I quit. But I'm fucking scared that I'm going to tear my ACL next week during practice. And then I'm shit out of luck that there's no way to make money. And at that time he was like, dude, don't worry.

He was like, there's ways to make money. And I got into betting on MMA August of 2021. It started off with a WhatsApp group chat with four or five people. And if you know Krauss, he's one hell of a coach, man. Um, that's what sucks with all this is that, uh, his legacy is like forever been tarnished, but ask any fighter that's been trained under James, like he would have went down, I think he would have been like the first hall of Famer coach. Like he was that fucking good. Um, so obviously a mastermind of the sport

could break down fights very well. And, uh, you know, it started with just making a couple extra hundred bucks a month, you know, which helped for a guy that wasn't working a job and training full time. Did you ever bet on your own fights? No, no. My second fight in the UFC, I thought about it, but I was like, I got so much shit to worry about, man. Yeah, no, never bet on myself. Did you ever bet on your teammates' fights?

Yeah, yeah, for sure. Did you ever bet against them? Yeah, yeah. But it was never like people that were, we have a lot of people coming from out of town. Um, so it was never, one name comes to mind and I don't, I don't mind saying that I bet against a former teammate and he would come across training and do like two or three weeks of his campus. It was never like really his own base. Joe Holmes, I remember betting against him. I just didn't think he looked the best. Yeah. But that was my own personal decision. There was. Yeah. But.

Was there ever a scenario where you knew that someone was hurt? I'm not talking about Derek Minner here, where you like saw someone like twist a knee and you're like, oh, this guy's going to get smoked. So let me bet against them No, no Okay All right Pretty damning stuff here Let's bring in long Island Luke because I feel like of anybody who would have a sense of things here Like there's a right way and a wrong way to bet right and I feel like long Island Luke does it the right way

And we should be clear like you know We should ask his girlfriend if that's true Long Island Luke as somebody who tries to bet the right way as best we can tell What do you feel about what Jeff Molina is saying here? I mean he's obviously in the wrong if the UFC tells you you can't bet on fights anymore And then he continued to bet on fights. That's obviously wrong, but it's not like... It's almost like- Should he be banned for life? No, I know, I 100% disagree with that.

I think the UFC needed to set an example with him, so I don't disagree with them whatsoever saying you're done. It's almost like a Paul Daly situation. Exactly, that's what it was. You're our example, get him out of here. But now, I'd be totally fine if he pops up in PFL, I don't care. That's kinda where I'm at. I don't really care if he comes out with BKFC.

Now, there is the question of the timing of it all, and I think that's a little bit of an issue, because he's still suspended through, what, November? Yeah, let's throw that tweet there from Nolan King about the actual breakdown. Jeff Molina has been suspended 36 months by the Nevada Commission for failing to disclose Derek Minter's injury and knowingly placing a significant bet on that injury. It's retroactive and will terminate November 5th of this year.

That's bad. Well, look, I think there's a couple sins at once. Like one, if the UFC says no betting because of obvious reasons as an active fighter, then it should be no betting as an active fighter. But I get that even within that it's a little bit of a gray area. But when you add on his admittance that I've bet on

or against fighters that I'm training with, then you're using insider trading. I mean, that's like, it's the same reason why me as a CBS sports writer can't go apply for survivor on CBS and win a million dollars, right? It's considered a major conflict of interest. So right there, he sealed his fate with UFC

at the worst possible time, and he's been admitting it too here, along with being caught. So to me, the question isn't, what is the proper suspension from the UFC? The question is, should he be allowed to fight elsewhere in the sport? I mean, should you lose everything for one mistake in a situation like this? I don't think so.

As me personally, I know other people disagree. There is a range of opinions on this. To me, it does not strike me as the nuclear option kind of scenario. It strikes me as bad. I mean, I don't think anyone thinks it's good. It's bad. It's quite bad. It just doesn't strike me. I mean, dude, I say this all the time, dude, if you can't fist fight another guy for money in this country, I'm really not sure what you can do. It's like one of those things where the government has a compelling interest in regulating it, but there should be a low barrier to be, not to be in the UFC, but to be able to be an

active combat sports participant. Tommy Morrison took an MMA fight under mixed rules on a Native American grounds when he had HIV. Yeah, well, I mean, that's a little different. That's regulatory shopping. What I'm saying is like you're saying everybody finds an opportunity to fist fight in some form under every circumstance. Yeah, but BKFC is a big brand. But what I'm saying is like you're saying everybody finds an opportunity to fist fight in some form under every circumstance. Yeah, but BKFC is a bigger brand.

They put out a statement if we have it. Let's take a look at it. Yeah, we read it already. Did we put the graphic up? Oh yeah, we even read it out loud. We did? Yeah, it was when you were on your laptop. Oh, sorry about that.

Yesterday's announcement regarding Jeff Malina signing was premature. We respect the ABC's current suspension and we'll honor their rules and suspensions. There you go. You remember earlier in the show when you took your thing out and you're all itching it. We're like Luke. That's not really appropriate.

Right? Right? Listen, sometimes when duty calls, you just got to go. Anyway, you get the idea. I don't mind BKFC signing him. I really don't. I think it's a different sport too. It is and that label shouldn't go away.

Like he did it. He admitted to it. It ain't right. It ain't good. I mean, is there like is the there's the gray area The fact that sports betting is so prevalent and people like Conor McGregor are constantly posting their betting, you know wins and losses But is he not even an active fighter? I want to bring that up if I may here's the thing that I just don't Understand about all of this if people want to crucify Jeff Molina again

There's a debate about it and I do understand that there is at least an argument for a lifetime ban. To me, it's not the most convincing argument, but there's one that exists. This comes to us from ESPN, Mark Ramundi, shouts to Mark Ramundi, January of 2023 BC. This of course is all in the fallout of the whole James Krauss scenario. Quote, UFC Chief Business Officer Hunter Campbell wrote to fighters and teams in a memo Thursday that the promotion quote expressly prohibits end quote UFC fighters from betting on UFC fights themselves or through a proxy. UFC insiders, which is a designation that includes coaches, managers, handlers, athletic trainers and quote other individuals affiliated with the athletes of the UFC end quote are also also prohibited from weight training on UFC fights.

Disciplinary action would be taken against the UFC contract athletes if the insiders were to violate the rule. Campbell also added that it is the UFC's expectation that any fighter who has knowledge of a violation of these restrictions will immediately notify the UFC. Long Island Luke, how can that be the rule that they put in place? And Conor McGregor is tweeting about putting 500k bets on Michael Chandler's fights. It seems like a direct violation. Yeah, and then we get into the whole that they're technically independent contractors So like there you go. I'm in between bouts or in between like am I an employee of the UFC?

No, the whole thing is where you are gray area. Also also I want to talk about pre that tweet from Ramundi Justin James extreme couture fighter Publicly said before his final bout on his contract that he bet on himself his entire purse on himself Maybe whether he used to do that unfortunately lost that fight That I feel like shit like that going public was part of the prompt of like oh, we should probably so here's my point It seems like there was a big wave to the point you guys raised to like clamp down on this stuff. Fine, I don't have a problem with it. But I just can't tell what is or isn't

being enforced at this point. And if that's the world we're living in, why should Jeff Melina have a lifetime ban under this new whatever we're in? And what do you add into that? The culture of where we're at in modern UFC, which is everything about free speech, everything about why are we gonna discipline Conor McGregor for the Dolly incident?

He paid enough fines to the New York court system. That's a commission issue. That's a commission issue. I still think it's such a, like if you have insider secrets, whether you're a trainer, whether you're on the UFC, imagine if UFC matchmakers got caught betting on fights that they matched.

Yeah, that would be terrible. I think it's separate when a fighter caught betting on fights that they matched, you know, that would be terrible. You know, like I think it's separate when a fighter is betting on themselves. We found out fighters were betting against themselves. Like I think that's unforgivable. So if you're going to be banned for life from a certain promotion or job, I'm I get that. I get that it breaks the sanctity of what you're trying to offer. And there's too much at risk with the DraftKings sponsorship

and with betting being where it is. And betting is such a big part of the UFC ratings if you really think about it that I'm okay with that I think the bigger question is should it be okay that they work elsewhere? Should James Krause be allowed to carry out his craft moving forward the rest of his life? And I would need more information about exactly what he did or didn't do I think some of that is still there there hasn't been a full report about some of these matters So it's a lot of like Malina is able to go public this time So we have some information at least of what terms of what he's telling us Krause hasn't been a full report about some of these matters. So it's a lot of like, Malina is able to go public this time. So we have some information, at least in terms of what he's telling us.

Krauss hasn't said a word really. Should we, is it okay if BKFC just waits for the suspension to end and then... I'm okay with it. I'm okay with it. Now, obviously, if Malina does something sketchy again, well, then you just simply cannot trust him anymore. But if this was a true learning experience and he can live on the straight and narrow, reasonably speaking, you know, fine. I want to say again, like there's nothing, I don't think there's a single thing wrong

with sports betting, particularly in combat sports. Combat sports and betting go hand in hand. The New York Commission was created in the early part of the 20th century to get a hold of some of these things. They're just part and parcel. But there's a right way to do it but there's a right way to do it and there's a wrong way to do it and we always encourage people who listen to this show

or watch it, you gotta bet the right way. Indeed, indeed, that's true at the end of the day. I feel bad for Molina but also like, knew what he was doing, right? I don't think these guys sometimes absorb the seriousness of it. He just admitted on Ariel's show that I bet with knowledge that I got from That time what what kind of infraction did he think that that was?

Well, he would have to know if he signed a paper from the UFC saying you you as fighters We're not gonna allow you to bet but that wasn't till maybe this is 2021. We're talking about here Oh, so that was that was it was pre it was pre Yeah So is this the same debate as like you can get on McGuire for using the Royds? But all that stuff was legal for most of his career It feels to me it feels to me like the TRT thing again where these guys were getting commission approval to do it But that whole thing had been gamed to an absurd degree that it just became untenable

Dude, this has gone away so quickly this story Yeah to UFC and TKO's credit because it could have been a very bombshell thing. They got on top of it. I mean worse than Dana's, you know, mishap of slapping his wife. Like that thing just went away and it's like it never happened. It's on the board of meta. There you go. Alright, that was topic number four and topic number five about looking at the PFL. They had their, I believe it was their fourth tournament card on Thursday night that went down in Orlando, of course. And I thought it was a very entertaining card,

top to bottom, shout out to PFL. There were a lot of issues though, Luke. The lights went out during one fight. There was an egregious amount of fouling, but that's modern day MMA, not stuck to the PFL. There's no such thing as fouling. There are just certain things you can do at certain times, and that's it.

Yeah. And I do think PFL is going, and obviously so is UFC and TKO, but they're going so gratuitous on, let's put an ad on every piece of the screen, on every piece of the canvas, and everything we do is sponsored by a different sponsor, which is a weird time if you read Zach Arnold's piece on the MMA draw this week that suggests

PFL currently has lawsuits against five major sponsors that haven't paid. But notwithstanding, I enjoyed the show on Thursday night. They even had who was in the crowd chanting the fighters name, so it almost had like that college basketball small arena build to it. But in the end, in the main event, light heavyweight Phil Davis came back from a two year break. He had not fought in the P in the main event light heavyweight Phil Davis came back from a two-year break.

He had not fought in the PFL tour world before after that long run on in Bellator after the long run in the UFC and at 40 years old he gave it to Rob Wilkinson who two years ago was a champion at 205 pounds for PFL. It goes down as a second round stoppage. It was a beautiful right hand that dropped him and then Davis jumped on and quickly ended it and Luke the first round was a second round stoppage. It was a beautiful right hand that dropped him and then Davis jumped on and quickly ended it and Luke the first round was a typical Phil Davis round where you're like just not trying enough offensively just not doing enough even though he's sound in every way and he's in great shape always but when his corner challenged him at the

end of round one, he went in there and did the thing. It's like we could have been doing this for the past decade Phil. Come on. It's so weird to see what's happened with Phil Davis not that he look by the way 40 years old. Look great. First team all body let's just be very clear about that but you know again by the way national champion out of Penn State you know I called one of Phil Davis's fights back in the day. Ultimate warrior challenge? Yes when he fought Terry T. Rex Coens beat the fuck out of him. I called that fight I was you know this is a long time ago. Oh yeah. Phil Davis for folks who don't remember had a lot of hype fuck out of him. I called that fight. I was you know this is a long time ago. Oh, yeah

Phil Davis for folks who don't remember had a lot of hype coming out of college because he was a national division one division one national champion and when he was at UFC when when John Jones fought Glover to share in Baltimore that was the night that was the same one of Anthony rumble Johnson was kind of coming back from World Series of fighting and fighting Phil Davis who had been on a great win streak. And we didn't really know what to expect. We kind of thought, well, maybe Phil will come back and, you know, Phil will really shine here. And it was actually Rumble who surprised him. But he was, you know, there was a moment where John was supposed to face off with Glover and then Phil got in the way. And so Phil kind of faced off with him. And I remember John being like, you better worry about Rumble first. And he was right.

Give John his credit. He was right about that. But the point I wanted to make is when he went to Bellator, they also did a huge media push with him. He was like a fake presidential role. But the last few years, pre-pandemic even, but certainly since then, he has been quiet as a church mouse. I haven't seen a single interview that he's done nothing. He just fell off the face of the earth and then to the point you raise was off for two years. He comes back and gets maybe the best win he's had in, I don't know, six years? Something like that. By the way, another win over a Bellator guy over a PFL guy just pointing that out both UFC veterans though, obviously What a win for Phil Davis. What a weird story he's had but I gotta say this was a

Film in Bellator we called some or we were you know, we were covering it together for Showtime at the time and they were dreadful They were fucking dreadful. This was not he looked pretty good here and you great even good for him It felt it did it did and he looked so thrilled about it, too So in that light heavyweight bracket he advances to the semi-finals He'll face former Bellator fighter Sullivan Cauley who on the undercard needed less than a round to take out easy Polizzi by first round TKO. Well, his team is going to they're gonna fight the result there. They think those shots were illegal Okay. Well, I I like that matchup potentially and on the flip side. I really like what we saw the UFC vet screw face It's it's shoe face from mark for death with Steven Sebel

The series of illegal knees in this fight that did not get called legal everything on this card There was like there were either were crazy amounts of cheating going on in this card. There was like, there were crazy amounts of cheating going on on this card. It was crazy. Remember they went to replay in this fight and then the referee was like, yeah, replay's not working. So we're just gonna warn you.

That's right. Anyway, Shoeface Antonio Carlos Jr. who is ripped and a former PFL tournament season champion takes home a split decision. 29-28 on two scorecards against Carl Moore, who fought for a Bellator title in his last fight. Luke, it wasn't the best performance from Carlos, but I'm glad that he got the nod,

because I thought he did enough, even though the announcers were kind of expecting that Moore would get the decision. We end up with Phil Davis versus Shoeface at the end. I'm not going to be mad at that. Shoeface will have to fight the other side of that bracket, which was Samian Powell, who had a very good finish over Carl Aperkson of Bellator fame in the second round.

Sick elbows in the clutch. He just exploded and became violent. So I have to say, is this super high profile? Is there tons of stakes? No, we actually don't even really know what's at stake in these tournaments. You get half the money you used to, you become a number one contender in the champion series, but I don't know if that counts you as a PFO.

I don't get it. Can you imagine if every one of these was headlined by like Apache Mix or a? Yeah, I don't get it. It's just insane to me. I still don't get it, but I enjoyed the fights. I kinda like where they're going. Shoeface seems a little reinvented

over all of the last few years. This was kind of a plus, this main card. Powell getting that stoppage. To me it's not, I keep saying this to people, it's really not a question of does the PFL have good fighters. They've got really good fighters. They just don't feature their best fighters in the spots that matter. They just don't feature the ones that matter in spots that matter.

It fucking blows my mind. But yes, there's quality up and down this roster. And if you tune into a PFL card, there's a good chance you're gonna see some good fights. Absolutely. So that co-main event was former Bellator interim heavyweight champion, Valentin Modovsky, who was trained of course by Vadim Nemkov. He took on fellow Russian Sergey Bailosteni.

Luke, that was a wild fight. Did you see the end of the second round when they were rock'em sock'em, hurting each other back and forth? Yeah, it was surprising actually. Uncle Randy Cooter was losing his shit, hoping that there's grass on the field Did you see the end of the second round when they were rock them, sock them, hurting each other back and forth? Yeah, it was surprising actually. Uncle Randy Cooter was losing his shit hoping that there's grass on the field next time he checks out those nudes. But Valentin would get a close unanimous decision win.

And dude, you know who he's going to fight? I'm down for this. Moldavian Hulk Alexander Romanoff. Who's the fattest man alive. the fatest Moldovian Hulk, Alexander Romanoff, who's the fattest man alive, who has completely given up the fitness fight but still has to cut down to 265 and the featured prelim he took on

Timothy Johnson and submitted the **** out of him in a first round submission. Well, so again, this isn't like must see TV but at the same time, fat Moldov or Moldovsky against Fat Romanoff like I'm in this, dude. Yeah, I mean, I wouldn't say it's blowing my skirt up, but... Did you see Fat Romanov celebrate? And he was just like, just like moobs jumping around and rolls, and he's like...

Brother, his... He's got, you know, he's got Dunlap disease. Have you heard about that? No. His guts Dunlap-ed over his belt. Oh, boy. Dunlap. Oh, boy. Huh? Hey, you gotta get... Yeah. Oleg Popov got a disputed split decision went at heavyweight over Carl Williams on the undercard to advance. And Rodrigo.

Rodrigo Nacimento got a win. Rodrigo Nacimento, a split decision went over Abraham Babble, Babley, baby. I didn't see this fight. Father Abraham. I watched the main card and then. Had many sons. Two of them, three of them.

Luke, I wanna say good things about the PFL. I want Had many sons. Two of them. Luke, I want to say good things about the PFL. I want them to just give us a reason. Them putting Jonathan Kochman in the post-fight press conference. That's a good idea. In the way that he answered questions and tried to spin it forward and was like, look, we're not going to harp on the negative. That's a much better change.

Getting down, sorry, straight up, getting down off the TV is a much better change. I couldn't disagree. I think it's a good role for coach. much better change getting down, sorry, straight up, getting down off the TV is a much better change. I couldn't disagree. I think it's a good role for Coach. I think he leans into it quite well. I think it helps him, but you know, once again, why didn't we see Patchy Mix the last month?

Oh, we're gonna save him for the Champions Series. You could use him both times. Why did you not build around Aaron Pico? Why? You could use him both times. Luke, are they gonna make... Honest question as we stand right now, May 2nd, 2025 on the 10th year anniversary of May Pack. We're in the fifth month of the year and we haven't seen a single... except for Usman and Paul Hughes. That's it. And they took two months off by the way after that. Will we see PFL in 26? It's a real question right now.

Yeah, 26 yes. It's 27 I can't quite tell. Okay. That's where we go. I enjoyed the last card, though, of this quarterfinal round. We'll see what happens in the semis as we roll on. I know they're going to move around. They're going to Wichita. They're going to Chicago for the finals. Wichita is a great city to go to for this kind of a product, like this Lincoln, Nebraska. Backerville. Well, Backerville is the land of time for God. But Oklahoma in general, what's the shittiest U.S. state? Is it Oklahoma? Mississippi.

Mississippi is the poorest. It might be. Arkansas? Arkansas is another number. Yeah, some of those states. The Dakotas are barren. Oklahoma. I got robbed in Oklahoma, so I have less than wonderful feelings.

Also you had two uncles that went to Oklahoma State one played football University of Oklahoma, that's a famous sound bite from documentary number six and the other one went to harvard so Nice deep cut there all right we ran over time with really not much to talk about and we don't have fan Segments this week, but morning combat at gmail.com is your email address. Let's let's step it up next week. Fansubs last week were fire, so thank you very much. Thank you very much to all the fans. Thank you to Long Island Luke for playing ball this week. And we'll check you out, what, Friday and Saturday,

Luke, on the main card minute on YouTube? Yeah, I'll be live in about five hours for the boxing and then tomorrow night main card. All right. How many bong rips on air will you deliver in one show? It's usually one per fight. So, you know, do the math, add up the fight have you ever ended one of those streams like not even sure if you just said race to shit for an hour 100% but it's not because of being smoking it's usually because of the drinking and then

I'm like I probably shouldn't be drinking hey you want a party you want someone to hang out with long I'll look my wife said that margarita marijuana combination is That's that's that's all that's a wash dad special right there. All right. Thank you to Ken Nadir Daniel Snyder's nephew for helping us out as always um it's been fun LT. Okay. I'm not leaving or dying yet, but it's don't you go dying on me I'm gonna go home, and I got coverage tonight for CBS sports of this Times Square event. I'm looking forward to it I'm looking for turkey show me what Square event. I'm looking forward to it. I'm looking for turkey. Show me what you got.

I'm looking forward to it. Yeah, I mean, it's the biggest event of the weekend, yeah? They're claiming they have bells and whistles and surprises on this card tonight that we've never thought of. I might do a watch along. I'm really not sure yet, but if I don't, for sure I'm doing a watch along for the UFC tomorrow. Final question, final topic, final part of this show. What's the deal with Bill Belichick's girlfriend?

Does she already have his complete 401k? And should we be as worried for his future as we once were for a Las Vegas combat sports journalist? Here's what I'll say. As long as it's not elder abuse, I don't really care. Also, can you imagine having to bang Bill Belichick? That's really gross gross in one of those sweatshirts with the holes in it just do you think he has all a pipe hole in one of those just so like she doesn't okay that we've gone too far there it is i think our sponsors are going to love this

conversation we should go thank you thank you to all our sponsors hey check us out next wednesday don't forget may 5th right may 5th no may 7th 7th god i've been giving you the wrong. May 7th, Wednesday, 11am. Pre-game preview brought to you by Cuervo right here. For Luke Thomas on BC, for our whole staff and crew, hey, enjoy the fights this weekend. Check out our coverage. We love you. We out.