MORNING KOMBAT WITH LUKE THOMAS AND BRIAN CAMPBELL - Usyk vs. Fury II Full Recap | UFC News | MORNING KOMBAT

Episode Date: December 23, 2024

The week of Christmas is here, but MK doesn't stop. Luke and BC are live to recap the historical heavyweight rematch that went down between Oleksandr Usyk and Tyson Fury. In another tightly contested battle, Usyk once again scored the decision victory. What were the key differences between the rematch and the first fight? How impressive was Usyk in being even more clear cut this time around? Talking about the victor, Usyk secured a 2012 Olympic gold medal, cleaned out cruiserweight and now heavyweight while remaining undefeated. It's time to ask where does he rank all-time among all heavyweights and even all boxers? Plus, the guys react to a small batch of UFC news. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Reveille Reveille Look at us now tip to tip Do you want a margarita? Fire! It's us doing what we love Do you want a margarita? Just three hoes. That's what's going on today here on Morning Combat. Welcome everyone on a Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah, Happy Kwanzaa edition, Happy Holidays edition. It is the hostess with the leastess. And I sound like I've been smoking cigarettes for 50 years straight. Hi everyone, welcome to Morning Combat here on this 23rd of December, 2024. As I mentioned, a Christmas edition has Christmas Eve Day tomorrow and, of course, the big day with Papa Noel on Wednesday.

But we wanted to get you ready for that. And, of course, by doing so, we're going to review everything that happened over the weekend, answer some of your questions, and look at BC's Feces. My name is Luke Thomas. I am, of course, joining you from the capital of the Estados Unidos, joined by my friend and hetero life mate, Brian Campbell. Hi, Brian Campbell. How are you? I'm doing great, Luke. I'm in a tight, ugly, medium Christmas sweater.

I'm fired up for the holidays. And if you ask me what donut might best signify the success Usyk had on Saturday and what type of show we're going to have today, I definitely go with glaze, if you know what I mean, Luke, because a hero has come along, okay? He's here. He's conquered. He's here. He's here. Anyway, shout out to the MK viewers out there, especially David Appleton, because you know what, Luke? Single dads need love too. You know what I'm saying?

Yeah, they sure do. They're lonely and probably have burners on Twitter where they say racist and sexist things. You know what I'm saying? Not happy. Not that guy. Okay. Not that guy. He just says it with his whole chest and, you know, normal identity. There's no need to conceal it. I hope everyone's doing well. BC, how are you feeling after the weekend and for the two days ahead? Is christmas is a big deal in your family or no yes christmas is a big deal it's the favorite holiday of everyone in my house but myself because you know i'm a big thanksgiving guy luke big on that tea on that high tea if you know what i'm saying but uh i'm very happy to be home everyone's healthy everybody's uh happy this is all you can ask for luke we talked about this i don't need any gifts i've got three big gifts

and my wife and kids and five more in my three cats and dogs, a roof over my head. The bills are paid for now, Luke. Let's just sit back and enjoy life, right? I mean, come on. Who could say it any better than I just did, right? Literally anyone who speaks the English language, but I do take the sentiment seriously and I'm glad to hear that. Fun weekend, Usyk getting the job done that'll be the majority of what we discussed today but there were some smaller although very important MMA news and notes which we'll get to a little bit later BC give me a number rating one being the worst fight ever 10 being the best fight ever I mean that's not quite right one being you know not at all

enjoyable 10 being most enjoyable I think it's a better way to put that would you give usic fury two i give it a nine i give it a solid that's a little that's a little strong strong really i don't just i don't agree with everyone who thought it was better than the first fight and thought it might be your fight of the year i think we also have to bring up obviously ortiz versus boachuk and fury versus usic one which i think had a little bit more in terms of trading big pockets of action and momentum. But Saturday's fight was a nine for me, Luke, because the pace was outrageous. The skill and constant adjustments of both was elite.

This is what I want out of elite heavyweight boxing at the peak of this Renaissance era that we've been in over the last nine years. I'm a very, very happy man on this Monday morning. I think that's a little strong, but we'll talk about some of the differences we might have. What would you give it, Luke? A solid six and a half?

You know what I mean? Give me a hot dog and a Hummer. There you go. All right. Seven, seven and a half? Something like that? Were you not entertained? Seriously, Thomas, what's going on here?

I was entertained for sure. No, I was entertained for sure. i was entertained for sure i thought it was really good i really enjoyed it maybe eight at the highest but okay um this one we talked about it last week the pre-fight pre-fight drama was not there which is fine there was good reasons for that but then the fight itself like it was a little bit of drama early but then not really once Usyk got cooking he just kind of left Fury behind him not so much in the dust and it just was like one guy was ahead of the other guy in the race and there was never really any change you just kind of kept that the whole time I don't know about that it's impressive as

hell but at each round was ultra competitive it was more competitive than the first fight which had more rounds of not one-sided dominance but I thought there were clearer rounds in the first fight even though I scored the second fight wider than the first I thought most of those 12 rounds felt like you had to really look look at the flying detail to pick out who you thought had come up and won that one so yes and no I mean I mean, we'll talk about hearing this in just a second, but I guess my basic read would be, because I went back and I watched it actually a couple times in preparation for today, and I think the lesson that I kind of came out with this, I had a little bit of a feeling with this on Saturday, but I definitely feel stronger about it now, is that Fury did well enough to

avoid the worst of what Usyk did to him last time. There were definitely things he was able to tighten up, but it actually made his offense worse. And if you look at his numbers, he did have higher power punch as a share of his overall offense and then what he was able to land. But in general, his numbers were down across the board. Not entirely, but mostly. And again, that's credit to Usyk, but I guess that's the point I'm trying to make it's like one guy not quite but once he got out to a lead took a few rounds to get out there once he got out to a lead for the most part really never looked back um and that makes it to me a little bit the first fight had all kinds of drama and this one was just kind of like I'm

better than you true but it was very high skill look i didn't think of it until usik said it after the fight and he's right this mirrored the two michael spinks larry holmes fights from the mid-1980s where it was different because because spinks moved up directly from light heavyweight to heavyweight where usik came up from cruiser but it was the smaller slightly more skilled man barely in two classic fights now look i think this series usic fury way more exciting than the two holmes sphinx fights but it was very similar in that it was very close both had arguments for victory the scoring was tight and in some cases in both directions i think usic won the second one visibly clearer, but I loved it, man.

I loved it. I love the high-level skill. I love the – Luke, when do you see heavyweight title fights at that pace? Come on. Put a little bit more love in your heart and pour it over that fight. We're also talking about one of the best heavyweights basically ever. All right, so with that in mind, let's set this up. Thumbs up if you're watching.

Hit subscribe if you haven't. We have a Gmail you can reach, morningcombat at gmail.com. Then, of course, you can see the socials. He had them up there. I apologize. I got the order of it wrong. Of course, we're on TikTok and YouTubes and everything else. You can go and find everything that you need there.

And, yeah, we have a lot to get to today. So a lot of Usyk Fury 2 breakdown, some MMA stuff. We'll get to some of your questions. I have one question for you that i think is probably on the minds of most people if you're willing to entertain it before we get into the the heart of this show last one let's do it would you make your family delay opening their presents on christmas morning so that you could joseph a bank your uh your uh your first floor restroom i mean mean, probably, right?

I wouldn't make the tukester wait, but anybody else has got to wait. I can tell you that very clearly. Also, as I told you off air, despite the best efforts of our modern-day robber-baron oligarchs, the land was administratively transferred between the federal government and D.C. to turn 177 acres of urban blight into something useful at no taxpayer expense to the federal government. So that's not a regional story. Look, Luke, that's a life story right there. When we score one for, for the people of DC score one for the humans, by the way, after that AI judge only pissed Tyson Fury off on Saturday. And I actually, by the way, so I'm

talking to those folks behind that company this week we're trying to work out a time I'm trying to figure it out I will say this they had two 10 10s well you know what we'll talk about this later we'll talk about this later so let's get this going topic number one let's just fire it off of course we've set the table here already the rematch took place between Oleksandr Usyk and Tyson Fury and Oleksandr Usyk getting BC the unanimous decision nod, which I think nobody really had any issue with all three judges having it 116 to 112. I'm going to ask you for what your score is in just a second for folks who may not have seen it, but I guess two pieces on top of that, that I want to know biggest differences between this fight and the first fight. Cause

actually just before we talk about what it all means, I just want to talk about the fight itself and what we observed. And then more importantly, importantly score differences in fight and then let's add on to that what you took away from usix performance to be even more clear-cut this time sure uh my score live was nine rounds to three uh 118 to what is that 117 to 111 in favor of alexander usic and i get what you're saying you just told me that fight was more competitive than the first one how could you score it nine to three look this is the subjective nature of the 10 point must system the rounds were more competitive but ultimately overall i routinely favored the pace the craft and don't forget this

the defense of a Usyk again. I did hear, especially during my live reaction Saturday night, Alan W., a lot of noted MK fans saying, hey, man, I agree with some of those people who thought Fury could have won it. Those rounds are closer than you said. Look, upon rewatch, I gave Fury every single benefit of the doubt. I still scored it like the three judges had it, 1-16, 1-12, eight rounds to four. So upon rewatch, I gave Fury one more round.

That doesn't mean that he wasn't in every round. That doesn't mean that there wasn't seven or eight rounds where you really had to fine-tune pick. But something has to separate them. And I just want to remind people, saying one guy won nine to three, it doesn't mean it was a shutout. You don't get bonus points for being close. They're 12 individual fights. So that's how it was scored. What was the difference between the first two fights? For me, it was this fury, despite coming in at 281 pounds, a career high. I actually thought he did find the perfect balance physically between leaving no stone unturned in the training camp, putting forth the best possible effort at age 36

to come out and know that he's going to have to fight 12 hard rounds at a high pace, while also being bigger, being more durable, in theory, being bigger and having more powderous punches, although that power didn't really show up in the rematch. So I thought that you had a better Fury than the first fight. But the difference here in this case was I thought Usyk was also even better, particularly not just taking away the effectiveness of Fury's jab

for the second straight fight, even though that British heavy announced team on DAZN, I thought was overly playing the effects of both Fury's jab and really his punching in general. I saw an Usyk who, if you look at what were the things Fury did well in the first fight, one of those was body shots. One of those was trying to slow down the smaller, quicker fire fighter. And what you had here in Usyk was turning the tables on Fury, attacking the body, establishing such a high, insane pace like the first fight, but almost

even faster. And look, Usyk's defense has to be on point to operate at the distance behind that high guard that he does, and it was at this point. So the difference was, I thought Usyk was even craftier. He slowed Fury down by going to the body. He landed the better power shots inside. And even though you can't always use the CompuBox numbers as a definitive judgment in terms of who won.

In this case, I think they only elevate the idea that these were close rounds and Usyk did that much more. He landed more punches. He landed 42, nearly 43% of his total punches in general, which is absurd. 50% of his power shots, which is absurd for a fight this close at this pace. So what my biggest takeaway was and how that plays into how we should frame Usyk is he is definitively the best heavyweight of this era. He was already trending toward becoming an all-time great when you consider the Olympic success, the two undisputed titles in separate divisions,

and the fact that he just kept rising, facing one great fighter after another in his last five fights at heavyweight, by the way, two wins over Fury, two wins over Joshua and a knockout of Dubois says it all. literally since Muhammad Ali. It doesn't mean I'm necessarily saying Usyk's better than Lennox Lewis or Evander Holyfield. I'm just saying the pure skill, the daring nature, the chin, this was in as close a fight as you can have visually, a master class by Usyk, who I think systematically took away all of the things Fury does well, including that counter right uppercut, which had a brief little window of success until Usyk took it away again.

Is there a problem? Usyk's got the answer. And I think that's why you saw frustrated Fury exit the ring. I think that's why you saw frustrated Joshua after the second Usyk fight. These guys come in with great intentions, but this great fighter who was giving up, Luke, six inches in height, eight inches in reach, and 55 pounds, not just to a larger stiff, but a larger skilled heavyweight who has been dominating this division. And what did Usyk do? Exactly what he's done his whole career. Be the greater class guy and come out with his arms raised.

Long Island, Luke, if we can't put the stats on the screen for the jabber stats i don't have the compu box stats here but these are the jabber stats you could take it for what they're worth i just focus more on the left side of your screen here you can see punches landed usic was able to be busier punches of high impact i'm not sure exactly how they define it but i i think your eyes would tell you that this was, you know, probably close to accurate, you know, more than triple quad, actually more than quadruple in terms of what Tyson Fury had. So they, you know, I know copy box counts power punches, but in terms of the ones that actually have big noteworthy impact, Usyk, according to Jabber anyway, had a lot more going through a little bit less. Fury was

busier in certain respects. They were about equal with pressure, although I disagree with how that's measured. And then aggression, you know, the slight lean there again for Usyk. And of course, you can see landed and, you know, over time and on the right side, sort of a plotting graph over the course of the 12 rounds. Thank you, Luke. I appreciate that. BC, I generally share your assessment. I want to look at the judges' scorecards here in just a second,

but if I may, I think you're basically right on. My biggest takeaway in real time, which, again, when I watched the subsequent review, was that there was no big round nine for Usyk. There was no big breakthrough moment that really changed the tenor of that fight. I mean, it had been building a little bit towards the round nine in the first fight where he rocked Tyson Fury, but this one was different.

He got off to a quick start right away, right away. We were wondering, is this going to be round 13 or is this going to be round one of a new one? And really it was to me more like round 13, where Fury was able to make some meaningful adjustments to avoid the worst of what Usyk could do to him. That is true, but Usyk was able to build off of everything he learned from Fury the first time, so that even with a Fury making some meaningful adjustments about ring generalship, spatial positioning, what shots to throw, the uppercut to the body, shot selection, it just didn't really matter. Every adjustment that Fury was able to come up with, Usyk was able to come up with a subsequent adjustment.

And BC, perhaps my favorite one of the entire fight that you saw was in the later rounds where, what did we discuss in the first fight that was a big thing that potentially could change was how much was Fury going to be on the front foot versus the back foot. And there was a difference this time right there was a little bit more of that definitely in favor of Tyson Fury again he did so he tightened up some things that I think were low-hanging fruit that he was able to do he had better stamina Luke you got to say that too he had better stamina than the first fight he had better stamina although that extra

weight I don't I don't really know what it did for him in the end I don't think it meaningfully helped him you know I really think maybe there was a little bit it did for him, I don't really know what it did for him in the end. I don't think it meaningfully helped him. You know, I really think maybe there was a little bit it did for him early. I don't think it serviced him down the line. But the thing I wanted to spotlight was you saw Tyson was big on shoulder rolling, right? He rolls and then he leans and that kind of a thing. And then he often bring his feet with him and he ended up surrendering space the first time in the first fight. That didn't really happen this time.

In fact, in some of the later rounds, you had Fury bringing his hands up, something that Usyk is more common to do, and there's trade-offs to both styles. One of the things that you saw Usyk doing is when Fury stopped moving his head, or at least just kind of kept less of a keep-away game and brought his hands up,

Fury began, excuse me, Usyk began to touch, touch, touch, touch, and then find big shots around it occupying his guard and then putting more power punch combinations together having a much more demonstrative effect you add on top of that that up down up down up down game he plays where he's pendulum stepping he's changing levels he is fainting inside he is pulling his head inside to bait the jab then he's stepping outside and then coming over with a lead outside foot position. And like,

he took all the things that worked the first time adjusted on the fly the second time and got to work quicker this time. And Fury was basically not entirely the whole way BC, but was basically playing catch up the entire time. And every time he tried a little turn of the screw to get ahead, Fury got ahead of that. Oh, excuse me, Usyk got ahead of that very, very quickly, ultimately in the end.

How do you beat a guy where even if you prepare differently, and to your point, BC, you are in shape, and maybe a little bit bigger this time for whatever calculation they were trying to make. And some of that stuff works, but the point is, is even if that stuff works, the other guy can quickly come up with some kind of an implementable adjustment that has an immediate and meaningful effect. I don't know how anybody, at least of this generation of this ability is supposed to be the guy like that. That is an unenviable task. If ever there was one at BC,

let me pitch this back to you, if I may, with this thought. There are meaningful differences between their careers and their styles. But surely, for the folks who may have missed him, we were there, we saw a lot of his fights in his prime. If you didn't collect some rounds, the first six of them against Mayweather,

it was fucking hopeless for you on the back six Usyk is just like that Usyk is just like that he gets stronger as the fight wears on even for a Fury who was doing his level best to try and maintain pace yeah one of the three judges had uh Usyk winning the last seven rounds and I know that was a point of argument for Frank Warren, the co-promoter of fury, but look, I mean, think about the things that you and I just said, but narrow it down even more and frame it.

This guy is a mini heavyweight in the super heavyweight era. I get it. He's six foot three, but like he is somebody who we assumed would be too small, wouldn't have the punching power. And maybe most importantly, wouldn't have the chin against the sluggers of this era. Yet, Luke, think about it.

The smaller, older man giving up 55 pounds in weight, giving up legitimate gaps in every major measuring category of reach and height brought the fight to the bigger puncher, was leading the dance, pushing the pace, controlled the center of the bigger puncher was leading the dance pushing the pace controlled the center of the ring more and that was really the central struggle between them and oh by the way landed 43 of his punches and 50 of his power shots this is perfection this is like go out there and throw a no hitter against Tyson Fury look I think that we can all be honest Fury was better the second fight than the first and there's not another heavyweight alive that

is going to beat Tyson Fury this version of him included except for Usyk and look at the way he executed it or had to execute it he had to be perfect and was, you can't be at punching range against somebody like Tyson Fury with that speed IQ and length and be able to not get hit consistently while getting off huge power shots and combinations and body shots, unless you are super special and an all time. Great. It's why Fury breaks the mythical scale of saying, okay,

he's great, but what would he look like against Jack Johnson, Rocky Marciano, Joe Lewis? He's 6'9 and just as skilled as these guys, right? Yet Usyk could bridge that gap and figure out a way to decode him. Yes, in some ways it is similar to what I mentioned, Michael Spinks moving up from light heavyweight

and doing that twice to Holmes. But Fury is the ultimate heavyweight unicorn, even at 36. And Usyk exited that fight looking like he wasn't even touched, Luke. This is brilliance what we are watching here. Let's put up the judges' scorecards if we can here and take a look at them. These are all three of them. I'm trying to see. So you have Martinez on the left, Mor Morley in the middle and then Robles on the side

Robles giving one round which was round nine to Fury uh basically since you know Jesus from round six on my god and then you have Morley giving everything to Usyk from round six on. And then you have Martinez giving everything to Usyk from round six on except round 12, which I really disagree with. I thought that was a pretty clear Usyk round. I agree. But nevertheless, look at that back half dominance. It's stunning, stunning when you realize everything you had said before, a significant height disadvantage, a significant weight disadvantage,

a significant reach disadvantage. And once round six got started, basically, yeah, and there was tight moments. And of course, you know, some of this is debatable, but he really truly never looked back. That is the sign of someone who has, again, the only other guy I can think of like this who could consistently do it against, in many ways, bigger guys than him. I know Mayweather got bigger as he got older, but he wasn't the same size as Cotto. He wasn't the same size as a lot of guys. Certainly not, well, he had drained Canelo, but you get what I'm trying to say.

And then to just outbox them so cleanly down the stretch that all they could do is just sort of helplessly do their best and watch. It is truly historic what you are watching from a guy like this. If Usyk had tried to just outbox him from the outside, which is what we always assumed Usyk would do against these super heavyweights, I'm not sure if he has that success. He walked down the bigger man And landed the better power shots And the more efficient ones

I mean this is like you said Mayweather level brilliance and dominance Canelo level at his very prime When he was that efficient counter puncher This is absolutely amazing Which is why I gotta call out DAZN here While this card was paced A lot better than previous Riyadh-Sizan fight cards

Even though it still took You know know, nine, nine hour broadcast, having a full British team call the fight. Like they did. They overly threw it. I thought in favor of fury, it wasn't the best look. Why is Todd Grisham who called the first fight and has delivered such great sound bites and big moments in this era of, of heavyweight magic on the zone and in Riyadh season.

And why are you having Anthony Joshua be your unofficial score when it's obvious the business of Fury winning that rematch and potentially winning a trilogy to regain control of the division would only benefit Joshua in not having to go back through Dubois and instead cutting the line and facing Fury, who will probably fight next anyway, and it'll be a big deal, title or no title. I just feel like that came off as a weird fail

and maybe helped fuel the argument that Fury was a lot closer in this fight than he actually was. I didn't love that part of it. I didn't love that part of it, but I also want to say this outright. I want to be clear about what argument I'm making. Maybe you feel differently,

but it doesn't sound like, at least on this issue, I do think Fury, in certain important respects boxed better you can't look at this performance BC and say Fury didn't learn any lessons from the first fight I just don't see how you can look at this and say oh he picked up on nothing there was no meaningful difference he didn't try anything different again all the way down to his facial appearance which i know was some measure of controversy his weight we talked about his his spatial awareness and ring generalship he got bullied a little bit as the fight went on especially in round 11 i thought he got really bullied but in general relative to the first fight did a much better job about maintaining effective

positioning again relative to the first fight in this one however with all of that being said while that was a very commendable performance against a super unenviable challenge there is no I'm sorry a scorecard for Tyson Fury is a fucking joke it's a joke sorry take it and shove it up your ass I don't agree with the AI judge that had you know I think they gave Fury at most two I think that that's a little on the extreme side and then two of those rounds ahead is like 10 10 rounds which is also a little strange again we'll talk about that a little bit later, but I do think that 116-112 is more than fair. BC had a 117-111. Again, is that within the realm of, I think, reasonable? It is. I could see as much as seven to five for, you can give five, four-ish, five-ish rounds for Tyson Fury. There

is no possible way to find him six, and there is certainly, BC, absolutely no way possible if you have even a remotely functioning mammalian brain that you can find seven rounds for Tyson Fury. That is cope. That is fan fiction. It did not happen. Tyson Fury lost it cleanly, even if I can admit he fought an improved and admirable performance and let's let's just remind everyone who are the people that are saying the most prominently publicly

that tyson won just to reiterate it's the british broadcasting team that the zone used it's anthony joshua who was scoring the fight and wanted fury to win it was eddie hearn who didn't have a dog in the fight but was sitting next to who the co--promoters of Fury, Bob Arum and Frank Warren, who also had it for Fury. So did Oscar De La Hoya, who they interviewed live in front of the arena and said he had Fury up three rounds at a point where most people had Usyk ahead. So I think it was the wrong people. I'm glad what you said.

Usyk, the rightful winner. Luke, will we see this fight again? Will we see this series continue again despite the 2-0 nature here of Usyk? That's a question I have only you can answer right now. We're going to get to that a little bit later. That's going to be question number three. Oh, yeah. But in general, this is why I like the fight, BC.

I think you found it. It wasn't a thriller. It was. It was a thriller. It was a technical thriller, in my opinion. It was edge of your seat for a long time, but I can't put those scorecards up one more time. Put them up if you can.

I mean, it's hard for me to look at everything from round six on. And I understand just because someone wins all those rounds doesn't mean the rounds weren't close. In fact, that's not what I'm saying. What I am saying to you though, is amidst all of this, it is hard for me to look at scores like that. Thank you, buddy. I appreciate it. And then come to the conclusion that this had ebbs and flows. There were times when Fury was able to kind of wrestle back a moment,

score an errant shot. Again, he had a couple good uppercuts to the body, I thought, from round five on before that got taken away. But this one didn't have the up and the down and the swings. It didn't have that one for that reason because it was just one guy setting a cross-country pace on another one. It was anticlimactic is not the word but thriller seems a little aggressive i think well all right i mean i'll argue it all day but uh i was entertained by the high level skill the entertain yes absolutely

absolutely entertained yes meaning everything across the board dude can we say anything bad about usik does he seem to win every category every conversation he's hilarious he's humble he gives respect he's a family guy he's a man of god he's all these things that maybe i'm looking for in an extreme athlete um what can we say negative about this guy luke he's kind of stole this era in some ways like he just he's the train that keeps climbing man he's 37 years old look at the shape he was in heavyweights don't fight at this pace it's just insane man i'm so humbled by this performance it's kind of to me it is always really interesting that like the very very very best guys i've ever seen now bud crawford just

putting errol spence to waste is a little bit of an exception to this. And, you know, obviously Usyk has had some dynamic performances as well, but I don't say this has any kind of downside. I actually think it's kind of like an interesting experiment. There are guys that are much more devastating punchers, obviously. And then there are guys who are good boxers and better finishers. But the guys who have that like really generational next level skill they're not super dynamic finishers they're not super um aggressive aggro guys the kind of thing that you would really sort of paint as maybe your model boxer it turns out that when you actually get in the real world what the very best boxer looks like, he is, or she, but in this particular case, he, he is measured, he is thoughtful, crafty, tuned in, extremely dialed in with their fundamentals right but they're not necessarily hardcore punchers they're not necessarily dynamic finishers they're not really any of the things that we would tend to associate with being true prowess in some in certain respects in boxing it's all the things

that lead from here out not from here down so to speak right kind of an interesting twist yeah i agree with you all right topic number two so now we have an interesting conversation to have about usik beyond that namely where does he rank all time so let's go through this for just a second he was the among other accolades the 2012 olympic gold medalist he cleaned out cruiserweight and obviously has remained undefeated. And now heavyweight, again, the entire time, hasn't lost a fight in his professional record. So BC, there are three ways we can ask this question. I'm going to ask them for all three. Where does he rank all time among cruiserweights?

Where does he rank all time among heavyweights? And if you can hazard a guess, and I realize the bigger that we go with this question, the harder it becomes to discern, but where does he rank all time among the best boxers ever? Yeah, these are really hard conversations to have because it's not an apples to apples comparison. Boxing is, it's weird. Maybe in some ways it's easier to compare in different eras

than other sports where the rule changes so much effect uh you know what you're seeing statistically but you know boxing like this guy's got 23 fights how can you active actively accurately compare that to somebody who had you know 114 and did so many great things and was fighting every other month that is the hardest part to to compare era wise But let's talk this through Even though cruiserweight has rarely Been a sexy division in boxing

And many eras Since it's relatively recent creation It has been kind of dead Or featuring exclusively guys From other countries that we may not be In tune with at the states I just want to point out that the cruiserweight division Usyk went through is arguably the deepest that division has ever been.

And thanks to the structure of that world boxing super series tournament at that time, he literally had to go through every unbeaten champion in order to acquire all the belts. So when Usyk's cruiserweight career ended with that brilliant knockout of Tony Bellew, there really was a feeling from historians that we were looking at maybe the greatest cruiserweight of all time, or if not, maybe second to Evander Holyfield. So that's first and foremost showing you what he's accomplished there. I think secondly, he's got seven heavyweight fights. How are you going to compare in terms of greatness, in terms of accomplishments, seven heavyweight fights to 25 heavyweight title defenses from Joe Lewis, right?

You just can't do it. So can I accurately and confidently put Usyk in a top 10 heavyweight frame and try to compare that perfectly? No, it's, it is difficult to be very fair but the last five fights of this seven fight heavyweight reign have been absolutely ridiculous to go into two title fights against a unified champion in AJ take some damage and win you know close but clearly two tough decisions then knock out Daniel Dubois before his own you know rejuvenation to become a title holder and then do this back to back at this age to fury. Look, one thing I can say, it's obviously special and unique. The track record at heavyweight is so small that you almost have to have this discussion more in a larger scale of where does he fit in sort of pound for pound. Again, never

easy to do, especially with how many belts there are these days, which can really inflate somebody's worth compared to back in the day where there was eight divisions and one champion per division. But with all that long talking said, if you don't think after this fight that he's not one of the greatest fighters of all time,

that if he's not in the discussion of greatest fighter this century of this era along with and it really depends on how are we blocking off the eras if we're talking about this century then you're talking about floyd mayweather manny pacquiao canelo alvarez maybe nioa in a way when it's all said and done and oh yeah usic belongs in that category but look i think the most interesting conversation we can have about Usyk from a heavyweight ranking standpoint is simply from that mythical matchmaking point of view or just from the point of view of pure skill remember he's doing this

in the super heavyweight era where yes we can quibble and argue and say would this era be as competitive in the 70s or the 90s the two greatest heavyweight eras of all time? I think this is the third best heavyweight era of all time. Other people say, hey, man, these guys may be fun to look at and watch, and they're charismatic, but I don't know about that. But you can only fight who is in your era. This era is much more difficult and deep than the one Vladimir Klitschko went through just by comparison.

I think that Usyk is among the most skilled heavyweights of all time. And at 6'3", which makes him small for this era, but perfect for any other, do the mythical matchmaking in your head. He takes away everything you're good at. He fights at an incredible pace. He's got a ridiculous chin, a daring nature, fights for his country, like seems to be about the right things.

Dude, you want to do any kind of mythical thing? He belongs in these conversations. We are watching all time greatness right now, but because of the fact that he only has 23 fights and he's been on the upward build and not hanging around in one division for too long, it comes down to whether you're going to take his small sample of greatness and compare it against somebody who's done a lot more for more hall of famers. It's never going to be perfect.

So Luke, that's a long way of not giving you an answer at all, but it is a way of saying, however, you want to frame it. This guy's the goods. He's of that ilk. The criteria, Isaiah Thomas, he did. I have some specific answers. I think as you get bigger, it's a little harder to get, but let me tell you where I'm at.

So one thing that you said was he's an all-time great. I think by any standard, this is inarguable. And Steven Breadman Edwards made a point. You can debate who he would win against, who he would lose against. But he's competing. He's competing against any heavyweight ever. That's a fact. That's not a fucking opinion.

That's a fact. He can compete against. Listen to exactly what I am saying. Oleksandr Usyk can compete and potentially beat, but certainly at a bare minimum compete against any of the top heavyweights ever. That's the kind of guy we're talking about here. Whether you think he would beat him or not, certainly we'll never know, but that's the level of skill we're talking about. As we narrow it down, cruiserweight, he is at worst the second best cruiserweight of all time and arguably number one. So he's either one or two at cruiserweight. At heavyweight, it becomes a really difficult assignment, BC, for many of the reasons that you raised. You've got guys like Ali, Lewis, Frazier, 50 plus fights, 60 plus fights, you know, reigns over a division

for long periods of time, which is in some ways I think you can appreciate. I know the fans as well. If you just think about the UFC side, having a title and holding it and then accepting all the contenders is very difficult to do over a long period of time versus I'm going to go up to one weight class. I'm going to make a short burst at it, relatively speaking. And again, that short burst he made is insanely good, but it's only a short burst. It's Chaz Witherspoon. It's, oh, no, was that Cruiserweight or not?

That was Heavyweight. No, that was the Heavyweight debut. Witherspoon was a late replacement, yeah. Yeah, yeah. It was a late replacement and then Chisora, then he was off to the races after that. So you get the point I'm trying to make. It's a short amount of work. So in that sense, it's a little harder to say.

But I think in terms of what it does mean to beat Fury twice, what it does mean to beat Joshua twice, what it does mean to beat Dubois, three of the very best of this era, I think somewhere top 20, top 25 heavyweights of all time is probably a fair discussion maybe even 10 to 20 if you're keeping the pound for pound angle in there because think about what he did with a 55 pound weight disadvantage like this is ridiculous this is the definition of pound for

pound that's true i mean again he was what 220 ish this guy was a fucking you know 81 right he's he's he's essentially staying at cruiserweight for these matches and then letting the guys have these significant weight advantages. So I think somewhere in there is probably best. It's going to be hard to get him to go past the Foreman's and the Ali's. And honestly, even his fellow Ukrainian Klitschko Vladimir, who held the titles and unified them for long periods of time, right? This is a very, very difficult guy to unseat based on the length and the depth of that resume. Once you get to the question of like all boxers, well, that becomes really difficult to say.

So BC, let me throw this out. We're talking every boxer ever. Where would Usyk fit? Again, hard to say, but I'm going going to ask where is he no worse than right no worse than top 75 all time yes no worse right and maybe even better than that yes no right this is what we're talking about of the millions of people look at this sort of like way in which you can understand his resume he was the wba cruiserweight champion the wbc cruiserweight champion ibf wbo ring magazine and then he did it all again at

heavyweight and bc something to keep in mind here by the time he had his first real title which was the wbo cruiserweight title which he won in 2016 he fought the uh a polish opponent for it in poland he then fought his next fight in california he then fought locally against michael hunter in oxon hill maryland he then fought in germany he then fought in latvia against british and his back those are all his opponents backyards literally right then he fought gasiev a russian in moscow then he fought tony belu in manchester then he beat chaz Witherspoon in Chicago. And again, there was some issue there about the replacement, but he beat Derek Chisora in London, Anthony Joshua in Tottenham Hotspur, which is in London. Then the neutral-ish territory

of, so to speak, of Saudi Arabia, one he wins there. He then goes back to the grind, BC, and beats Daniel Dubois in Poland, not ukraine then two times more in saudi arabia this guy from the moment he was fighting championship level fights never one fucking time had hometown advantage and in fact most of the time was handing that over to his in many cases b-side opponents in certain ways of course he was b-side certain times but you get the idea this guy has done all of this without any of the benefit of the trimmings that a lot of other a sides typically enjoy whether it's a commission familiar with them judges that are familiar with them again people who are of the same nationality in the same country in the same city he had absolutely none of that in b, there was this narrative last week

about Usyk, you know, being, everyone wanted Fury to win to make the trilogy. And some people might think that that's overstated or not, but here's one point I wanted to make. It's not to me that boxing ever conspired to like not let Usyk get to the front of the line. I don't think that's quite right they did they were not hostile to him in general in that way but what you can say very matter of

factly from looking at the places where all these title fights happen among any other number of criteria he was never the favorite son no he was not the guy that boxing luminaries and power players designated as somebody that they had kind of had their eye on as we're going to put all our eggs in a basket for this guy. We really believe in this guy. He had to take the throne of power by blood against unenviable circumstances and in certain cases, extremely difficult opposition all while having to do it uphill guys wherever you rank him it will be another 20 years another 30 years before you see a guy quite this good yeah you just nailed it and you you think about not being the favorite son you think about you know a lot of people didn't see his cruiserweight run why because it wasn't for the most part it wasn't on american television it was like this guy was

you know in the shadows but like i said fighting killer undefeated cruiserweight champions one after another it's remarkable what he's done i mean i wonder if he was american or british if he would be a worldwide star you know way before way before this, because of the success in the ring, the way he carries himself, how hilarious he can be. But then on the flip side can be all about his God, family, country, be on the front lines with soldiers in Ukraine. I mean, it really is an absolutely remarkable run that I'm so happy he's finally getting the close-up for.

But he also, from a a business standpoint had to navigate it definitely just the same he had to sign with matchroom to get in position to face anthony joshua for the unified crown he had to co-promote himself with that saudi arabian promotion he was the first big fighter to really do that to get himself in line to try to get the tyson fury fight because remember tyson fury kind of pushed this fight off for a little more than a year, for a long time, saying that Usyk's not a big enough name. He's small. He's this. He's a rabbit.

He's all this stuff. It took a while. We thought there were periods where this fight wasn't going to happen. So whether it only happened because of Turkey or not, Usyk, the right place, the right time, the right guy for the job. You said 20, 30, 40 years. I don't know if you're ever going to see another career exactly like this. It's been brilliantly perfect and it hasn't been

selective matchmaking. It hasn't been this. It's been who's the next best in the world. Where do I have to go? Who do I have to sign with? What country do I need to fly to and i will show you who cares about the size who cares about anything um i am feel do not worry do not be afraid i will not leave you alone i mean these are now in hindsight almost triple g style one-liners that we as american fans you know get all behind but like in every category quietly behind the scenes this guy has built a dream legacy. I mean, look, is there an argument to be made historically to have him higher than the other heroes of this era, than above Mayweather, Pacquiao, and Canelo?

I mean, not as many fights, not as many pay-per-view main events and big blockbusters, not as many titles in as many divisions as those three, but perfection from start to finish. I mean, here's the thing. You just never saw Usyk go face down like Pacquiao did when he fought Marquez. You know what I mean? Like, let me ask you, how many times has Usyk touched the canvas? Do you know?

Not many, right? No, I'm trying to think of even one here I I I'm not sure how many times he's ever touched the canvas a glove touched the canvas once on the rise I'm trying to think right here the fact that we can't figure it out is answers it right meanwhile some of those other guys you mentioned this is what I mean it's like it's hard to compare across eras it's hard to compare across weight classes but i've this guy more than anybody and not even like it's not even a close second this guy reminds me of what mayweather did times a million like it just i there's to me he is absolutely the heir to the kind of boxing dominance the specific strain that mayweather was able to employ but the difference is mayweather got a lot of criticism, some of it unfair, some of it fair, about getting guys pre or post prime. Not like crazy post prime, but like just a little bit off. Always advantageous, yes. Yes. Usyk doing

the exact fucking opposite. Yes. Doing the exact opposite. It's insane to me what he's been able to achieve. It's hard to even quantify because there's so much depth to it when you really begin to think about how he was able to use boxing's architecture to build what he's built, but having to do so, frankly, the hard way, he just was unstoppable, quite literally. He has been unstoppable along this journey. Do you know how hard it is to be pound for pound number one when you're a heavyweight since the whole system was created as a way to compare non-heavyweight you know essentially and then he's

holding number one at the same time that bud crawford and inouye have accomplished what they have in the last 24 months that's telling you something huge right there yeah it truly is all right so with that in mind bc it now brings up a question for topic number three which is where the hell do we go from here now it could be retirement for both guys maybe usik continues maybe fury continues bc before i ask you the question about where we're going to go with this turkey al-ashik who of course was present for these and is obviously an architect of a lot of these fights, what he thinks, whether we like it or not, matters. And he was asked

afterwards about what he thinks will be next for both guys, or at a bare minimum what he wants to see next. And this is what he said. Next I want, if Dubois if Dubois win in February, I want to see

Ozzy and Dubois again again that would be fantastic and I want to see Tyson maybe with Joshua or something we will decide I was going to say

just very quickly I just spoke to Eddie Hearn we know that we've all as British boxing fans we've been desperate to see Anthony Joshua and Tyson Fury let's see what can happen

do you think it's realistic? everything in Real season is realistic absolutely look everything in Real season is realistic. Absolutely. Look, everything in Real season is realistic. Please don't behead me. Okay. BC, what will happen? What should

happen? Give me the road ahead for both gentlemen. Well, even though Daniel Dubois didn't read the room and crashed the party like an ogre and was like, give me my rematch during Usyk's sort of moment of trying to hear the translation when they're just asking him you know about winning right there uh his response was hilarious doing the how do you say turkey al-ashik make this fight next he said

afterwards in the press conference that he's going to continue he'll fight whoever turkey wants for him so we are setting ourselves up nicely dan Daniel Dubois on February 22nd at that absolutely loaded, uh, better BFB ball two card is going to fight Joseph Parker. The former champion. It's a very legitimate fight, but if Dubois wins and he will be favored to, since he has turned himself into an absolute psychopath destroyer. I mean, just remember, if Usyk hadn't won on Saturday, cementing the fighter of the year ballot ahead of people like Inouye, Bam Rodriguez, etc. Daniel Dubois would have rightfully been your fighter of the year. So Dubois versus Usyk too, given the controversy of the body shot knockdown or knockout

that Dubois thought he had in the first fight is very viable I think it's a different fight now given Dubois new demeanor he did gas out late against Usyk and got stopped but it's a different man right now so that'll be happening on one side of the bracket the loser's bracket is this you know gift that we're gonna get and it doesn't need a title it's Anthony Joshua versus Tyson Fury. And whether it happens in Riyadh season in Saudi, or you put it probably where it belongs, you know, Wembley Stadium with as many people as you can pack in there, that's obviously a sort of UK generational fight that was going to happen in some form regardless. But it's also, in my

opinion, going to play a big role in terms of once Usyk gets through the winner of Dubois versus Parker who might have next so I don't think we're done personally with this Usyk versus Fury series I think we get to a trilogy I think it's completely deserved given how close Tyson Fury fought in the first two obviously he would have to get through Joshua to get there. But I don't see him stepping away either because I thought for as much as there were elements of sour grapes to Fury not doing the post-fight interview, you know, walking away in the tunnel as the cameras were saying, and he thought he was three rounds ahead. If you really listen to him in the post-fight press conference, there wasn't as much of what he did in the first fight saying, hey, fair play to Usyk, but if Ukraine wasn't in war, the judges wouldn't have scored it for him. He didn't go that range.

He just said, look, I don't know what else I can do. I fought as best as I could. I trained as best as I could. And I think I won both fights. I think that stance and the fact that there are people who believe these are so close, like Spinks versus Holmes one and two, I think it gets us back to these two potentially seeing each other again but even though this is very much nearing the end of this renaissance heavyweight era which did start in 2015 when fury upset klitschko and we did get almost every matchup we wanted or deserved with the exception of aj versus wilder and you can always argue whether that was al hayman's fault for not letting Wilder at that time,

except that huge offer of $100 million from DAZN for three fights, two of them against AJ. And we never got Wilder versus Usyk, but that's fine. It's not relevant anymore. We've gotten almost everything we've wanted. And now we have the promise, in my opinion, of more. Martin Bacoli is still lingering. There's still a couple guys with name and known, you know, Jaleh Zhang. I mean, we are at an exciting time right now.

You saw Moses Atalma in the co-main event at just 19 years old with a big breakthrough knockout at heavyweight. Turkey loves the heavyweights. I think he understands that that's the way you get boxing back to the extreme prominence. I actually think in totality this week, Turkey gave a great performance, in my opinion, from the ring magazine relaunch in the gala. We didn't have any chicanery with

the scoring for Fury, even though we had some questions coming in. I think all in all, heavyweights in a great place, even with these aging legends, you know, getting older by the day. And I think we might end up back at Uic fury 3 luke what about you i don't have any interest in a third fight well not tomorrow but if they eliminate the other players including dubois and aj from you know being in line to get that title i mean wouldn't you like to see do uh usic versus bacoli one day i mean there's some fights to make here no i don't have any interest in seeing that none uh all right well hey luke what are you into then well okay slow then let me tell you first of all your search history please in depth yes it may rhyme with schmazers i don't know um let's start with the other direction because i think the more

interesting conversation to me is actually not about Usyk. He could retire BC, and we just said that, like, he's one of the best to ever freaking do it. I mean, I don't, it's not that I don't want to see him. It's, but I don't, I have a very, I don't know. I guess I'm really different than other fight fans. Once a guy is as accomplished as Usyk, and again, we're talking about a very rare breed,

but once they are as accomplished, I get diminishing returns when they keep going, especially when the really relevant hills have been conquered. That's not to say that their matchups couldn't change things. Or again, Bacoli's a puncher. That is something that you have to take

seriously. But just given what he's accomplished, he beat the game. I mean, he truly accomplished he did he beat the game i mean he truly truly truly beat the game now the one exception to that would be dubois i want to circle back to that in a second but the one that is actually interesting to me is what they do with fury fury versus aj they missed a window the british public the fighters themselves to really make that a thing before Usyk ever came along. And I think it would have been a much bigger deal, like who's the real face. Not just of the heavyweight division, BC,

but British boxing more generally at that time. Or even in all of boxing, if you're really talking. It's Canelo and those two, right? Great point. Absolutely. Like there was a window in time they could have had that. A bunch of that has been lost.. A bunch of that has been lost. A bunch of that has been lost. However, for MMA fans watching, there's a lot of nostalgia, for example, around Chuck eventually, Liddell fighting Vanderlei Silva in the UFC.

I have to tell you, when that fight was made, there were a lot of concerns and gripes from people that it was a little bit past its due date. That was a fight that should have happened in pride that's why chuck went over to pride and you know now they're doing it late and it ended up being pretty good and now folks look back on it like it's a really historically relevant fight i can tell you in real time that was not exactly how it was perceived but it kind of shows you what the lesson is here bc even if they've lost the window to make what AJ versus Fury could have been and maybe should have been, it's still a hot-ass ticket. Oh, hell yeah.

That is still something. I don't give a shit what stadium they want to do that in the UK. It's going to be gigantic. And a wide-ended knockout either way, to be fair. Exactly. It's competitive. It's probably going to be gigantic. And it might end in knockout either way, to be fair. It's competitive. It's probably going to be thrilling. Both guys are vulnerable to degrees that Usyk is simply not.

It might even be for the casual fan and even us too, a better overall fight. Surely, BC, that's the fight to make. But I want to ask this question to you. What would be the reason that wouldn't get made? Because it seems to me it's a promotional layup it's there's no reason it will be next like everyone wants it they've wanted it they've basically been waiting for an excuse to do it there was even a time when uh fury was trying

to figure out how to extend the usic fight even more to slide in aj but aj i think was you know not the the right point at that time and maybe coming off a loss. I mean, it's always been in conversation. So it will be next, and it almost reminds me, even though it's not a perfect comparison, but to Bo Holyfield III. Obviously, that was the third and final meeting

in one of the most historic trilogies, but it was the only one that wasn't a title fight at the point where both had already been champion there were some questions about do they still have it and that turned out to be one of the wildest heavyweight fights of the great 1990s in which both were down and you know Holyfield was was still battling what we thought was old age in a weak heart but really it was hepatitis and you would have these flushes of energy and momentum. And it was this absolute war. That's kind of inevitably what Fury and AJ at this age will be. They're both kind of wounded or, and, or vulnerable as you mentioned. So it will be next.

It's one of the biggest fights you can make still in this entire sport on the short list, you get Riyadh season and Turkey involved, and're gonna you know make you that movie trailer again and hopefully put it in a massive stadium it's gonna be great um but Usyk has not sounded at all Luke like he wants to go away that's what that's the thing though if you take it as word but then let me let me stay with this one for just a second and we'll turn my attention to Usyk what would it happen under okay if they put that fight in Saudi Arabia, it seems like that'd be a travesty, but that's a real possibility. You can't exclude that. I don't think that they would, but one never knows.

But more importantly, how bad would it be for their careers if that fight never gets made? Yeah, it would be bad. I'm just basically trying to say there's no question that, in my opinion, that it doesn't get made and it doesn't get made next. It's made next it's next it's a giant it's happening it's coming it's a coming attraction luke there are no impediments to it you don't have you don't even have the slightest concern it would no because not only do they both want it not only is it the biggest fight both can make next financially but they both seem to want back in on the title picture

to some degree and they got to go through each other to do it. It's perfect. We're set up. Even though it's the tail end of this era, even though we feel like we kind of know who's who in this era, Wilder's going away, Joshua's not what he once was, et cetera, et cetera, there's still some unanswered questions. We still need Dubois, Usyk, too. I still need to see what happens when AJ and Fury meet,

but they're all going to survive and advance somebody, and we're going to have another undisputed payoff at the end. I mean, that's the alert for me and Usyk Dubois too, not just unfinished business, but it gets us back to the undisputed level. And hopefully uncle Turkey can fix the issues with the sanctioning bodies too. So we didn't have to do stuff like this anymore. All right. So now to the other side, I am totally cool. If Usyk wants to come back and do one more with Dubois I think that is fine we already know the controversy of the perceived low blow bc is that how you would call it something like that it sounds like you're trying to retire this gentleman where he's not

trying to retire himself he's not he doesn't sound like he is he sounds like he still has an active interest but I cannot imagine it goes on for too much longer although I guess I could be wrong about that. One never knows. He's a weird dude, right? I mean, if nothing else, Usyk has always marched to the beat of his own drum. He's got his own idea about things and whatever they've been,

they have been proven correct. Let's just be very, very clear about that. My only concern is BC is like the self-assessment. Obviously he's still good enough to be the very best that we have right now. And I think he should be Dubois. And given that what Dubois has done against Anthony Joshua, I think the rematch is actually even more compelling. I'm all in on that. I guess I'm just trying to say, who would be an opponent after that that would be a meaningful contributor

to his resume? Not like the guy wouldn't be tough or it wouldn't be you know there would be some value in watching it for entertainment's sake but you beat dubois twice that would make it unified you beat joshua twice you beat wilder's not eligible ruiz forget about it like that's that's the game the whole game is that like i don't understand i got you but but they got that 19 year old who's coming up and making noise. You got Pakoli. He looked awesome, by the way. Jai Opetiah eventually is going to come up, and also there's also the possibility that Usyk may say if Opetiah continues to extend the idea that he's the best cruiserweight

in the world, maybe they do that again at cruiserweight. I get what you're saying. He's not going to linger around forever and just take whoever's coming next, but there are a couple matchups left. Did you hear, by the way, duringursday's ring gala ceremony that they ran on the zone there uh one of those british announcers saw francis and ghanu in the crowd and was like could we be saying in ghanu next against bakoli in riyadh season hits africa and i'm like who's been talking about that is this new my did i miss out on that would you be down is in ghanu still

in play here luke, in your opinion? Yeah, he is. For fights like that? Yeah. I mean, but I think Bacoli would fuck him up. I do too. I mean, I love Big Francis, but I don't like that fight for him at all. I basically only want Big Francis against Deontay Wilder. That's where we're at right now.

Seriously, that's where we're at. That's where it is. People hate this idea, but I love this idea. You got to mix it up. You got to do that one in MMA gloves. I'm telling you. Oh, no, just do it in boxing. It's fine.

Why? Why? Because Wilder's washed as AF, and he doesn't seem to know it. He keeps saying that he's going to come back and win the heavyweight championship. BC, to what extent is it a reasonable worry that Parker could beat Dubois? It's certainly in play. Parker is rejuvenated. He is a different fighter from his initial

title reign but if the Dubois from the Urgovich fight from the Joshua fight from whatever fight he had to close 2023 that I'm misremembering right now was it Zhang who was it he is a new fighter he is a destroyer right now. So I still think this Dubois is on the forward momentum to get himself back and do an Usyk fight. But Luke, you gotta fight it out. Parker's got a chance in here. He's always been a smart boxer. He seems to

be more offensive than he used to be. He's taking more chances. He's going after people. So this will be a very fun fight. Long Island Luke saying, Jarrell, Big Baby Miller. Maybe we can slow the roll on that, okay? Let's pull in well that was the name sorry that was the name thank you long island that was the name he beat yes we haven't talked to him once about this fight i'd love to pull him in here let's what's up y'all let's pick your brain first of all you did not find any knockdowns for against usic on his box rec resume correct dude if he's never been knocked down with

that kind of resume against those kinds of child that's fucking insane dude if he's never been knocked down with that kind of resume against those kinds of challenges that's fucking insane dude because here's the issue canelo's been like drilled you know what i mean it's a chin issue for him usik it's a chin issue partly it's a skill issue that he was able to avoid that fucking absurd come back on look i'm not i'm not done with you yet i mean i don't I don't like to linger while you guys are talking. First of all, your impressions of the fight and what you want to see next.

I scored at 8-4 real time. That's right. I thought the first four rounds were pretty close. I think I had it 2-2 after four. But yeah, Usyk, just way too good. What I want to see next, I agree.

I think Fury Joshua is definitely the fight to make. As far as Usyk, I guess Dubois, but I think my boy Joseph Parker might come for the upset here and ruin everyone's plans, so I don't know. I don't know. Does anybody have a huge interest in Usyk versus Parker? I'm not saying I hate it. I don't love it. It's a good name to have on there

if he gets him. It's a good name. Sure. And depending on how he beats Dubois, if he knocks out Dubois, then sure. Yeah. If he goes in there and starches Dubois, by the way, go back to the Herkovich fight, Dubois gets hit. He gets fucking hit. You know what I mean? Like, that's a real thing. So you'd have to watch

out. Give me my rematch. Dude, he's in the middle of this incredibly triumphant moment. And then Ogre Hands just comes over and goes, Me cookie. Cookie ski is for cookie. I'm like, get the fuck off screen. What are you doing? That's the thing about Dubois, dude.

He builds up all this goodwill and then spends it in the worst way imaginable. He's kind of hilarious. His interviews are so weird. Did you see when they had him on the live broadcast? He gave nothing. They're like, who's going to win tonight? I don't even know what he said.

It was just words. It just, you know. Dude, he's a different one. And who is he signed to? Queensbury? Yeah, Queensbury. Frank Warren guy. All right. But it almost doesn't matter anymore as turkey said luke in riyadh season there's no like what do you say anything's possible there's no yeah like like just like jesus christ all

things are possible through riyadh season exactly that's what i yeah exactly okay perfect comparison right there. Okay. Except for the AI judging, which we're going to get to in a little bit. Anything else about this fight you want to cover? Any other point you wanted to make? No. Oh, I did wrong myself. Obviously I was wrong in playing that video earlier this week of Usyk from the first fight. I'd forgotten that they brought out the crucifix and that's what he kissed Luke.

It wasn't a vape. It wasn't a breathing machine. it was big news to me I had never seen that before I was like wow I didn't know I forgot that that ever happened and then I was like oh yeah he did okay there you go so yeah that's all I got for you okay very good let's get then to topic number four let's turn our attention if we can not to BC's cats but to a little bit of MMA. BC, we now have reports that have confirmed for UFC Fight Night. I don't know what the name of it will be, but it'll be on March 1st. Looks like your main event is going to be Brandon Royville taking on Manel Kopp. Royville obviously has kept his name relevant, despite some setbacks, but with some great wins as well.

And then Kopp most recently coming off that dramatic performance over bruno silva at ufc 310 now bc give me a your impressions of the fight and b it has to be number one contender but i want to talk about what the implications of that would be if brandon royville wins your reaction yeah i think this is really good matchmaking because there is sort of a what are you going to do next we think it's probably kai kara france for the belt for pantoja unless you bring down figuereto or bring back demetrius johnson the success that pantoja has had speaks for itself but we got to figure out who's next i thought you could have done the moreno versus royval rematch cop i think has virtuoso performance himself enough in that win over bruno silva to have a say in here but maybe didn't deserve to cut the line,

even though I was cheering for that because of the sort of unpredictable elements of entertainment that he brings to the table. But this is a very good style matchup in my opinion. This is going to be five wild rounds. If it goes that long, I like that. They're both going to have to go through each other to really figure out who stands alone.

I see some early odds here from Long Island Luke according to DraftKings as you have cop minus 198 Royville plus 164 which is interesting Luke Thomas to me that's about right does do those odds reflect to you what we can expect when these two I do think those odds are accurate again they're partly designed to induce betting but royville is more well-rounded i think or at least has more weapons in different dimensions beyond just striking i think it's maybe a better way to put that sure uh but cop i think is quicker i think he's a better athlete he's certainly a much better striker we we love raw dog on the show but we just got to call it like we see it so i think kick though he can kick

he can put that threat out there okay and dude he's battle tested like at this point truly battle tested and so you know he's seen what the mountaintop looks like and he he understands what that what that feels like at this point so i think between his improvements and by the way he has his striking has gotten much better. So between that, his jiu-jitsu is leaps and bounds better than Kopp's. There's no question about that. But I think Kopp, we saw the physicality of his speed and his use of it and then his shot selection

and his combination work. That makes him dangerous. But at the same time, dude, he's got a little bit of Ankalayev in him. You know, where he's... Ankalayev doesn't showboat, but An uncle i've has these periods where he's like don't don't don't don't and just makes bad decisions cop is a little bit like that at times usually servicing off of the the fact that he can't stay focused on a task um and that leaves you're calling manel cop a donk he has does he of has donk. At times. It's not like he's a donk all the time,

but there are moments where I'm like, dude, stop doing the fucking moonwalk and finish this guy off. What are we doing here? He's doing shadow puppets on the wall and shit. And I'm like, guys, guys, please focus your brain and accomplish this task as best you can

in an orderly and direct fashion. That leaves openings for Royville. There's absolutely no question about that in my mind. But BC, it brings up a couple of interesting situations. If Royville wins, does he get the title shot? And also, what's happening to Kaikara France? France, however you want to say it. What's happening to France?

What's happening to France? I think France is getting the title shot. I think my question to you is what's happening with Brandon Moreno I don't know I don't know somebody's going to be left out I mean do you think if Royval beats a streaking cop right now that he automatically gets the shot at Pantoja let's not forget he lost to Pantoja twice that hurt him but he was very competitive in that rematch I think with some adjustments he can certainly be right back in that but will they grant him that or are they just looking for him to eliminate Kopp from the setting you know from the standings here or for Kopp to eliminate him because as you indicated Royville sitting at one Moreno sitting at two we

don't really know what's going to happen with him albazi is good but he just lost pretty thoroughly at that kai car france sitting at four do you think coming back do you think they're gonna they're gonna end this sort of punishment that they gave him i do think he makes his way back to ufc yeah i do think i know how quickly i don't know probably this year but it's hard to say exactly when i would imagine third-ish quarter something like that but you know that that hard it's hard to know Tetsuro Tyra is sitting up there but of course Royville just beat him and then Kappa sitting at six in a fight of the year contender yes so those are your relevant contenders unless Figge comes back so what they could do BC is I mean I I don't know if they will are they going to do a fifth fight between Figge and Moreno?

Is that a real thing that could happen? I think that would be poor judgment because if you have a Figueiredo who's willing and can physically make 25 again and he says he can, you save that for a title shot because Pantoja is 9-0 against your current top 10 and running out of viable opponents. So I don't think that happens. Unless Moreno's going to get a fourth shot at Pantosian. We're going to see France, France versus Figge.

No, I don't think so. No. Okay. So then we just have to figure out the rest of this year. What's going to happen with, Oh, you know what they're going to do? I bet they're going to do Al Bazzi versus Tyra or maybe Tyra versus. Yeah, no, I think they're probably going to do that. That seems like a reasonable fight you could make.

And that actually would be pretty fun. We get brandon roival on friday show that i love the raw dog that's my god yeah you know that's actually not a bad idea we could talk to him and then he could help us usher in the new year raw dog if you can hear the dog whistle that we're putting out there okay if you can hear it let me ask you before we move on the topic though what does roival need to do to the best of his ability to secure a victory here like he's the odds makers tell us he's up against it where's what can he do to in your mind to really level this out oh kicks to the body will be a big part of that luke there's got to be some form certainly of distance control not let cop get in that flow in front of you of what he's doing there but obviously the ground as well luke do you think he will have advantages in potentially taking cop

down i think cops take down defense looked really good recently or at least again his quick down blocking but I think if you can put long on Luke if you can put sustained pressure on cop now you might have to take a couple big shots along the way but we know there's gonna be a five rounder not a three if it's a three rounder I really wouldn't like roival's chances but five i definitely do if you could put sustained pressure on cop can you force him to make enough mistakes to win on the ground if you're roival yes i fuck until you guys started laying out this fight on paper i was like yo i'm actually gonna take brandon roival here i at plus 164 i like that a lot but damn right the more you talk about it cops take down defense is really fucking good and i i don't know if roy ball is going to get this fight to the

ground and like his stand-up's decent enough but cop looks so fucking good that like i'm almost talking myself out of it as i talk about it when he's on he's on you know what i mean it's just i don't know what to say the thing is you got to pressure that guy and make him make mistakes and i think i could do the course of five rounds roival can do that i do believe that also i want to give a shout out to who i called as my dark horse of the year asu omabayev he's ranked number eight he's on a three fight win streak he should get tyra albazi moreno one of those guys yes and of course that guy do have i seen that guy fight yeah uh he just beat nicolau you probably saw it maybe possibly he he didn't

see that shit let me just call it but i was probably like in the eighth row and scratching my you know my my mailbag so to speak right yeah you're getting your mailbag ready yeah yes i was i was sorting out things yes and uh okay that's weird yeah that's gross wow all right our last and final topic uh this should be a fun one here we've got like a few things to go through we got some mma some bjj some boxing bc let's go down the list here so put up the uh graphic if we have it long island look for the gaethje and hooker now do you want me to give you the size of my package in really justin gaethje and dan hooker have kind of hinted at a 2025 showdown bc is this the fight that both of them should make and if they do are we talking

the frozen steak that was in conor mcgregor's dungarees at the mayweather way in what are we talking about i mean we could be be because the personalities and styles involved can only produce fight of the year contendership here in just an absolute violent brawl. But I'm only going to go rock solid at this news because, call me crazy, but in this great era of lightweight brawlers who have put to, and these are elite title contending lightweight brawlers, some of them champions, who have put together nothing but memorable wars. My two favorite players and my favorite fight is still Poirier-Gaethje 1. Gaethje winning the rematch for the BMF by head kick. There's unfinished business here. I want that trilogy, Luke, more than I want Hooker involved or even Chandler involved. Now, obviously, I'd get involved on a Chandler-Poirier rematch if that was Dustin's best option to

end his career. But before I'm going to try to break out that frozen rope, let me stay relevant, sober, rock solid, though, because this one will deliver. But I want what I want, and I want it now, Luke. Give me that. Give me that Pourier-Gaethje trilogy. I realize it's a little late in the game for this. The fight absolutely makes sense, and if you're a fight fan,

this is exactly the kind of thing that you want to see. I'd be lying, BC, if I didn't feel a little bit worried about their health. A little bit worried. Gaethje hasn't fought since max flatlined him and took an a metric ton of abuse in his career before that dan hooker has taken the kind that makes me worried about his future dude they're gonna kill each other you know what i mean like they're there's no way that fight doesn't go some kind of deeply violent distressing way i'm a you know what i mean like i don't know like i i can't say no in any way that makes sense other than i'm kind of watching that one through my fingers a

little yeah you almost hope for like an early second round finish rather than five crazy insane rounds of back and forth where it looks like round five of hunt versus silva one you know what it is like when poirier and hooker i don't remember if this is exactly the right one but you've seen it before where it's like the fight was incredible they win fight of the night and then on social media it's both guys in their 9-1-1 hospital fucking gurneys and they're like they're like they're like high-fiving and shit and they look like they've been mauled by a pack of wolves. Yes, yes.

And it's like, oh, I don't know if I want that for them a little bit. That's all I'm saying. Well, here's the thing, Luke. You can't control them, and they're going to find just as easy another killer to open up against. You're right. Because that's what they do. And if they don't do it in the cage, they'll probably do it in a bar and down under or something. I mean, if you're talking about Hooker, I mean, this is the life that they live.

It's who they are. Luke, you got to let them, can you please let them bang? You got to let, you got a leopard, be a leopard. You got to let a lion be a lion.

You know what I'm saying? Let me bang, bro. You got to let, you got to let a sex pest be a sex pest. All right. Let's jump around on this one. If we can Long Island,

Luke, let's talk about the burns and covington back and forth so this seems like a lot of manufactured nonsense but basically gilbert burns didn't like some analysis from chael sonnen about him and then released his number in public his phone number which by the way can confirm that's his real number i was texting with chael all i was texting with chael all last week, and he confirmed to me. I was like, dude, what happened there? He goes, I got to admit, Gilbert got me good.

He got me good with that one. But Chael did a 45-minute show answering phone calls from fans. It's a brilliant way to appeal to him. He's so good at this. It's insane. But in any case, now it looked like Colby was like, I'm going to get back in his honor, which could just be a bunch of bullshit. So let me ask you, BC.

A, is that a good fight to make? And even if they make it, where is your temperature on this one for two, let's say aging, but still somewhat viable welterweights? I mean, you have to understand that I'm aging too. So I hope that I'm able to- You're AG1. I'm AG1 over here. I hope I'm able to still produce a frozen rope on call

luke but no there's one word to describe this flaccid dude i don't want anything to do with this i don't want to see colby again in a big fight i saw those excuses he made i was on the campaign trail for trump but i know i know he's like he's the deputy director of national security policy. Get the fuck out of here. You know what I'd rather see for Gilbert? The kind of fights that Gaethje and Hooker are trying to make with each other at this point. You know what I mean? There's still something.

Hold on. Old guy and Burns, who I think is still viable, but certainly he's closer to 40 than 30. And I think Colby's probably washed, but he's asking for a full camp. They're both in that area. Old guy versus old guy? I've got to tell you like it's not the i don't know what's what's what do you want to get entertained by colby i'm not going to be entertained by if he gets knocked out flatline i don't want to see him anymore i'm done i just wanted to pop in to say that the top seven and eight if you include the champion are all kind of like should be matched up against each

other and then that kind of leaves gil Gilbert Colby on the outskirts. So the fight does make sense from a matchmaking standpoint, but I'd rather see Gilbert and Kamaru again, even though they're trying to fashion Usman into a really big fight. I mean, I'm not into it. Yeah, which I don't really get. Everyone's like, oh, Usman's still viable. I'm like, I think you're going to find out in the next fight that he's not.

He's lost three in a row. He hasn't fought a welterweight in like five years. What are we doing here? I know. I can't believe that. I mean, again, I still think he's not a's lost three in a row he hasn't fought a welterweight what are we doing here i know i can't believe that again i still think he's like not a pushover that's not what i'm saying but i don't like people like oh he could you know make another run i'm like no that's not happening at all no i gotta tell you i don't need to see colby again but gilbert wants it it's two old guys again old, old guys. So what's your level right now? You're rock solid for this? No.

What's wrong with you? No. But like, you know, what would be the middle ground? I don't know. Morning Wood or something? I don't know what the hell would be. If you've got a big, let me search it, I guess. You know what I mean?

If they make it, I'm not against it at all. I am totally okay with it. You seem to have much less interest. I do. I don't see it on your list, but did you hear about Bobby Nux over there? Robert Whitaker? He might go to 205. A man after your own matchmaking heart is trying to make the biggest

and best fight you can make against Jon Jones at 205. No, he's saying that he's more likely to move up to light heavyweight than he ever would be to go back down to Welterweight. That's really what he's saying. Yeah, I know. I didn't bring it up because I saw it. It was kind of funny, but that's great. That's great. Yeah, but he's right. I mean, dude, he, like he was, he was, it was hard for him to make one 70 at the time in which he moved when much less now, you know, I can't believe he got sunned twice. I mean, it happened to two

very good fighters, but that guy, if one little thing changes, he could be fighting for a title again and be your champion again. Is it over, Luke? Not over in the fact that he can't be competitive against good fighters, but is Robert Whitaker never going to put that belt back around his waist again?

Yeah, it's over. I don't want to live in a world where that's the reality the fight game is dude i don't have to tell you this it's unforgiving it's unforgiving unforgiving all right an all-time great luke a little couple more notes let's go to the ai scorecard if we can long island look let's put this on the screen so this was very vaunted here is the scorecard the ai scorecard such as you want to call it that they had it 118 to 112 if you'll note rounds 1 and 12 were 10 10 upon rewatch i could entertain the idea around one was 10 10 i don't think that's correct i definitely don't think 10 10 for a 12th round is correct the right guy won bc but your impressions of all of this my preamble noting

that i think it's this is largely not useful technology aside what do you think i mean look no one's putting a gun to my head or offering me a check to say this but i apologize for assuming given the history of chicanery in this sport that turkey al-ashik's aggressiveness in terms of saying look fury's my brother I look at him like family. I want him to win. But Turkey ultimately said right before the fight, he's picking Usyk. I thought Usyk won. My scorecard's pretty damn close to the AI.

I thought it was hilarious when Tyson at the press conference was like, fuck computers. Fuck electric cars. Which, by the way, fair enough. Fuck computers. I'm okay with that. We're going to go to war one day with them, Luke so i'm on tyson fury's side in this war i'll have to say the ai guy wasn't wrong i guess so do i want this involved in a trending direction toward becoming part of our sport no but if it's some independent thing of saying well look the computer scored it you know reminds

me of that scene in willy wonka and the chocolate factory when they're trying to enter into the computer the exact whereabouts of the remaining golden ticket and he's like you can now tell the computer exactly where he can shove his lifetime supply of chocolate am i the only one that knows every word from that movie and still thinks it's one of the best five films ever made luke or my load is gene wilder dead because otherwise it's you wow okay okay luke thank you grandpa joe why don't you defraud your family out of money for years and then miraculously just get up and oh we get we get free chocolate let's hit it you know uh here's my read on it it was inoffensively worthless like i don't really understood what it it gave to us i mean one thing i mentioned before there was no demo about it we didn't get to see the technology in any way

beforehand it wasn't explained to us how it worked i mean i realized they read talking points but they didn't actually show us this and the folks at jabber were even kind of distancing themselves from the very version that this fight was using, saying like our full technology is not even being applied here. This is something a little bit different. So like even the people who make this stuff, this was not even the full breadth and depth of what they do. And in the end, you got a scorecard that's not like totally insane, but it's like, what are we adding here to this?

I saw people being like, yeah, a little more training and it would have had eight to four. I'm like, right. What is the goal with this? Is the goal to be just as good as a normal judge? We don't need AI to be what a normal judge does. We need it to fix judging problems. And if the best that you can hope for

is that it can match existing performance, you're not changing anything. And by the way, you can't even do that with this right now. Like, again, I want to be clear. Is there a world in the future BC where we could get to a place that technology could meaningfully do it, especially again, not so much in MMA, but in boxing where you have a constrained universe of rules. I mean, you can't even back fist punch in boxing, right? You can only punch with the front and then the top of the glove. You can't do it on the blade of the hand. You can't spin around and do stuff like that. You have to punch above the waist. You can't punch behind on someone's back. It's a very constrained universe of rules and you can see the reason why i got 118

110 is because their proprietary system which builds stats it's based it weighs the performance of statistics in predicting score but like how useful is this i i i if you watch in bc there's a video that jabber put out and again i'm going'm going to speak to them at the end of the week. I think that their stats work is really good. I really like their stats and I can be persuaded over time that this is something that could lead to an improvement in judging down the road. I want to be very clear. Like I like Jabber a lot and I like what they do a lot. I cannot overstate that, but this was a bastardized version of that that was never demoed and never tested. It didn't meaningfully add anything. I mean, look, if it said 115, 113 Fury, we'd be like, get this off the earth and we never want to see it again.

But can it account punching power? Because judges have to take into account the effects of punches. That's why you can win rounds landing four shots if your opponent landed 15 if you landed the meaningful shots that moved them how can a computer figure that part out so that so they do motion tracking and they say that their motion tracking can tell them that i don't know how true that is what if you're moving with a punch this is so true this is what i mean if you look at the video that jabber put out over the weekend they put out something on their youtube channel and they showed about that i think we may have called i don't remember this but it was michael fox and he

spells it m-y-k-a-l i think he's out of my area i'm not gonna be wrong about that taking on uh gabrielle maestri the venezuelan guy and if you recall, Maestri won in like an insane fucking robbery. And they showed how their proprietary software would have given it to Fox. And it's like, okay, so then what you're saying in this particular instance is it could solve the problem of like egregious, like fucked up scorecards,

like the ones that you can't even comprehend. Okay, that's a valuable service. That's not nothing. And in fact, Michael Fox would probably tell you can't even comprehend okay that's a valuable service that's not nothing and in fact Michael Fox would probably tell you he would welcome something like that but how is that useful for at this current stage for something where you have to have a keen eye for an Oleksandr Usyk where what do the body shots do and how is that changing things and you know again all of the different ways in which you have to use human judgment to make an evaluation of this I know people complain about boxing judging

and if AI gets rid of the worst version of it that's not nothing I don't trust the computers I mean Luke I can put an Apple watch right now and do this for a few minutes and they'll be like oh you ran two miles no I busted a pair of nuts okay that's the only thing that happened right that's

it okay hey red fox you over there yeah wow that was a lot for me to to visually kind of wrap my head around there and now i need to take a shower well gene wilder died in 2016 at the age of 83 good he missed all the bad stuff um okay last but not least bc last but not least cji2 craig jones who by the way i reached out to me last week um hopefully we can get him back in studio uh first quarter of the new year looking Looking forward to that being a thing. They're going to do it again. CJI 2 will take place in August of 2025.

And this time it's going to have a team's concept. We have a bit of an announcement video. Let's roll it here. Gus, grappling is boring. Stalling is boring. People being afraid to be submitted is boring. For CJR2, we're mixing this up. We're going to do eight teams battling for a million dollars. Last time we found out who the two best athletes in the world were. That was Cade Rotolo and Nicky Rod. And we paid them both a million. Now we're going to find out who is the best team in the world. Atos, New Wave, B-Team, Checkmat, Gracie Baja, 10th Planet, whatever teams

and let's see who truly is the best team in the world. Quintet style, last man standing, team versus team is the most exciting form of grappling and that's what is going to be the bulk of this show but we're also going to have a few crazy super fights. I won't be fighting a woman this time, although the guy has many feminine attributes. But that is yet to be announced. CJ, I too, team versus team. BC, your reaction. I mean, I love Craig.

I think he's hilarious. I would love to have him on MK again to promote this. But you got to talk me into team grappling, Luke. I don't to have him on MK again to promote this. But you've got to talk me into team grappling, Luke. I don't love grappling to begin with. I understand that Craig sweetened up the entertainment value the first time around, brought legitimate money to the table, and is changing

the game. And oh, by the way, everything he did leading up to that matchup with Gabby Garcia was extreme elite comedy across the board. I'm interested to see who he's going to be his super fight against, but tell me why the team concept is going to be the rage here and why I should care. I don't care about team NFL or team,

team MMA or, or regular season PFL. Luke, why should I care about this? So again, they're not making an entire season about it. They're making a two day event about it. I think that's really kind of important.

Again, I could imagine teams working in MMA, if structured right, depending on the rule set, but for a short one-off event, which is what this is. It's a one-off event. He mentioned they're going to use the quintet rule. So by the way, they're not just drafting five randos, calling it a team. New Wave is the danaher team b team is a real team uh atos check matt gracey baja these are all real teams that exist and here's how quintet works quote quintet is about survival and submission until only one

team is left one athlete from each team starts no matter their size whoever wins by submission stays on the mat, meaning one grappler could take out an entire team by themselves. Like a gauntlet match in WWE. Yeah, that's right. And dude, he's actually been posting like what's it? What's it called? We're like they send one guy out every like minute or whatever.

Royal Rumble. Royal Rumble. He's been doing. He's been posting stuff like that. Okay. This is brilliant. Craig's a brilliant man. This is what I mean. Dude, I'm like super all in like that. Okay. This is brilliant. Craig's a brilliant man. This is what I mean,

dude. I'm like super all in on this. Okay. I mean, he, you know, he's a brilliant man. This is exciting.

He's finding ways to take something and add spicy elements to it, to get us all involved. Everyone's getting paid. Everyone's laughing. And at the end of the day, he's going to spend the next three weeks after the event with cocaine and hookers so really you know short of getting to finally smell what keith peterson smells like this is great luke i would love he went to cartagena columbia a place i've been to for a million times after the last cji and i saw all the places he was visiting you know

conspicuously with like luke rockhold and other guys like with wealth on their bodies and they had an armed escort at all times and i was like yeah you that was right that was the right you made the right call you made the right call all right with that out of the way those are our top five topics let's get to where the fans get to ask us questions it's time for dms from dogs wow is that donkey's name Ron Jeremy, Luke? I need an adult every time I hear that fucking thing. All right. From Appy Fatathon.

Oh, God. That's David Appleton. Yeah. With the next card not planned for a few weeks, do you think the UFC are missing a trick with the Christmas and New Year enthusiasm for sports in general? Because you recall, it's all over my Netflix. They're going to do the NFL and all that stuff there. People have said there's like a window here.

Why not do it? What do you think? Well, I think it's a double-edged sword here because they go almost every week, right? There's like two or three weeks, it seems like, during the regular year where you're like, oh my God, no fight night this week, even though I'm inevitably complaining about the apex and the matchmaking

we still want it we still need it so to give their athletes their employees their you know i mean look the you dude i love the people that work for the ufc to be fair we can have you know quibbles with things that dana says or decision making by the good people. There's some incredible people in PR and beyond, right? To see them get almost like a month off, it's like the only off season they get. I certainly understand it. This is typically the dead zone for combat sports anyway. But to your point, I mean,

look at what they've been doing for years in Japan with Saki Karaba and making that New Year's Eve cards. What did you say? Saka Karaba? Saka Kabara? Saki Kabara. Yeah that New Year's Eve cards just, what'd you say? Saka Karaba? Saka Kabara? Saki Kabara. Yeah, that's what I think. Sorry, I was trying to get that off.

All right, there we go. I mean, you know, he was telling me, Luke, when I talked to him at that press conference, that they're going to have, you know, three events on New Year's Day alone there in Saitama. So I do think there's an opportunity there, but you'd have to sort of figure out, like, are we a 52-week-a-year operation? Because they're trending toward that. I cannot believe people, like, are complaining about this. I've seen people do, like, daily memes about, like, the UFC break. And it's like, first of all, if you have Fight Pass, I know this is going to be hard for some people to hear.

Good MMA took place before 2020. Like, really good MMA. Like, you have a universe of WEC, Strikeforce, UFC pride that I am certain the vast majority of people complaining about not having live events haven't seen. And in fact, many of those events would be far better than UFC Apex,art 379. Okay. Let's just be very clear about that. Second of all, do something else with your fucking life. That's, that's my plea to everybody. Read a book, do some sit-ups, eat a fruit cup, go for a walk, do something else such that you're not utterly dependent, especially if you're a degenerate gambler, hashtag Long Island Luke, go diversify your interest in life so that you are not dependent on one single thing as the source of both your entertainment and frankly, at this point, your personality. This is the most meaningless thing to me ever.

Do something else. And I make money from them having events. Are you speaking to Appy right now? I'm speaking to everybody complaining that they're not live having events. Are you speaking to Appy right now? I'm speaking to everybody complaining that they're not live UFC events. You're completely right, BC, that the employees there work their balls off. They need some time off. This is a great time to get it. And there's a million

other things people could be doing with their time that would enrich their lives. They do not need to have constant fucking titillation like a strobe light at a rave. Well, I like titillation, to be fair. Luke, I've always been more of it. But I'm saying the strobe light just i like to be fair everybody does but i'm saying the strobe light of just in your face all the time take a break go to the bathroom do something else you're gonna be okay did you see ufc got ice cube to play their holiday party that's pretty badass reminds me of

being at espn in the 06 area where the money was overflowing they had chaka khan at the christmas party luke okay well i mean if you're monopoly, you can just afford to do whatever. I saw Dana White talking about his office and, like, all the nice things he has there. I'm like, yeah, if you don't pay guys, you know, 50%, this is what you can afford. Luke, it's the holiday season. We're letting, you know, the sins of the past, you know, fade away. Yeah, we're not. All right.

Question number two from Flannels and Jits. Where does Usyic rank as the best heavyweight of all time what is next for you we literally did this one so i hope they got the good answer for that um okay okay it looks like move on with your life please well i mean we just did like we got it we did this one we did this one i got a new one for you i got a new one for you okay because cji got me thinking and I was thinking back to that season of tough. Black Zillions versus ATT. If GFL or any of these other team combat leagues were doing gym versus, let's say they had ATT versus Fighting Nerds versus City Kickboxing,

would that make you guys more interested in it? Would that be? No, it wouldn't change anything. It wouldn't change anything. No. It's better than arbitrary Team Florida versus Team New York, and none of the guys are from those places. The reason that CJI might work where GFL can't work

is CJI will have some of the very best grapplers in the world going up against some of the other very best grapplers in the world under, let me finish that, under a very novel rule and surface set. So you actually have super meaningful jiu-jitsu happening between people that are well known and celebrated like the ruatolos versus andrew tackett that kind of a thing this is washed guy versus washed guy for the most part it doesn't solve the central problem you can do other things to make it different but it doesn't actually defeat it doesn't it doesn't

solve their problems all right it doesn't solve it but it does make it better you would agree with that right sort of yeah all right from uh telvin key papa yeah best christmas luke love that guy right yeah best christmas present you ever gave someone that's a good question man luke i'm not a great tipper or gift giver but i'm a lover luke probably not a great lover either but i'm a lover look um have i given great gifts before i'd have to ask my wife i don't know the answer is to that. I mean, I feel like I do pretty well with this, but I'm not sure if there's like one that truly, like I've never gotten my wife a car or something like that, you know? I've never given someone a gift that's like talked about for years to come,

where it's like a landmark turning point in their gift-receiving lifetime or something. Yeah. You know, I put a roof over people's heads, Luke, and I put food on the table, okay? So leave me alone, all right? Yeah. Yeah, all right. thing um yeah you know i put a roof over people's heads luke and i put food on the table okay so leave me alone all right yeah yeah uh i mean i've definitely gotten some good ones before i feel like i don't really ever struggle with this uh but i don't know if there is like one that's like

unbelievable relative to some of the other ones i mean the most recent one i got that was good was you know like the vacuum um that the dys that the Dyson, the Dyson mixed vacuums, if you actually, so there's a Dyson store in Tyson's corner, which is just outside DC, but there's probably many of them across the country. And if you go to these places, you can buy their vacuums there, but Dyson actually specializes in like all of this, like jet technology and they use it for a series of different appliances. They made a hairdryer for women dryer for women that, you know, I don't know anything about.

I've never used a hair dryer in my life. My hair is not like that. I don't need it. But it was a little on the expensive side as far as hair dryers go, but apparently it was like revolutionary technology. Wow. And I got my wife that, and here's why that's relevant. Here's why it's relevant.

She has like raved about how good it is. It has reduced her time to get ready by like 50%. Oh, so everybody wins in the house. Yes. Bingo. And like, she's happy. We're happy. Everyone's happy.

I don't know. I feel like that's a win all the way around. You know what I mean? Now, do you do this in your house? I know this because I don't buy a lot of the gifts that are given out of my house because I have a wonderful wife, but i wrap most of them i was wrapping multiple gifts per dog and cat in my house god you're a fucking loser i mean that's you don't love your animals that much i mean these dogs get so stinking excited for christmas you see if you saw the

vet bill that i just had to pay for barbis i don't think you'd accuse me of not loving him i think that'd be something you would never, ever accuse me of. You're like, I'll put food on the table and a roof over that dog's head. Deal with it. I'm not wrapping a fucking bone for him. I mean, I'll just be honest with you. I'm not doing that shit. You know, I'm willing to wrap gifts for Reggie Jackson

because that guy is currently in life clinging to my soul, Luke. And your nipples. At times, yes. At times, he's hanging on for dear life there yes all right question number four from mike i'm gonna say this the best i can here in the shin something like that 1995 happy holidays guys what are some fights with you have seen boxing you would ask combat santa for in your stocking like like pick three or so that you would like really recommend to folks okay it's just that we haven't seen yet right fights to make in both sports kind of thing right yes okay yes in 25 I really really really and not everybody agrees with this but I really still want Tank Davis against Shakur Stevenson at 135 love it Shakur saying that his plans Are to end this calendar year coming up

With that I really really Want to see even though you disagree with me Ilya Teporia versus Islam Mahachev I really really want to see that That takes me to you know From flaccid to rock solid to Oh my gosh that guy We you know we thought he was fatter than he was

We assumed he didn't have a respectable Pipe we were wrong right You know we were dead wrong We thought he was fatter than he was. We assumed he didn't have a respectable pipe. We were wrong. We were dead wrong. It doesn't have to be Friday. We were dead wrong in our assumption whether that guy brought any form or level of girth to the table. Turns out I did. God, you're disgusting.

All right, my turn. It's got to be Tom Aspinall john jones no question about it i have come around much more aggressively now in the last like two weeks to bud crawford and canelo alvarez really hope we get that murky really wants that for me you know i don't see i want him and everything but i really hope he can get that one made so that's the second and then i'm gonna go a little bit to the side. It can't really happen unless something crazy happens, but Dakota Ditcheva versus Valentina Shevchenko I think would be awesome.

Awesome, awesome fight. Would love to see it. That's interesting. I'm thinking more, yeah, what other creative matchups are out there? I mean, are you getting siced the it's it's angling toward it that the winner of better bfb vol will face the winner of david benavidez versus david morel gotta be another huge one i mean they in fact they the fact that they made benavidez morel already kind of solves one of the ones i did want to see um but yeah i'd be in favor of that i mean

again let's see how they look if both guys kind of end up looking like but if the winner really has a strong performance i would be totally okay would would bam versus the monster movie on that level or just be like a an interesting thing say that again bam versus in a way would that be like an attraction destination fight for you or just hey something cool and creative let's see what it looks like yeah more cool and creative because of the size or what i think is the size difference i'm not sure how big it would actually be but seems like it'd be it'd be cool yeah all right and then last but not least bc from oso al daco uh what are some of your your Christmas traditions that you guys do at home? BC? I thought it was a ridiculous tradition when we started it as newlyweds randomly one Christmas Eve,

but it's caught on, and everyone makes Christmas story jokes because they had to do that on Christmas Day, of course, because the bumpus hounds got into the house and got into the turkey. But Christmas Eve, as a family, we get Asian takeout, typically Thai food, and we get a whole lot of it. And that's a big tradition in this house. And I love it. So we're going to we've started one where we go to an Italian restaurant for Christmas Eve. Oh, instead of cooking, I'm going to get Asabuco, which is one of my favorite things to eat when done correctly, obviously.

Sure. We do the Christmas – I don't know what the proper terms are. Can I say what my mom told me what the terms are? The Christmas crackers where you pull them apart and it pops and there's like a little toy in the middle. Oh, I never heard of that. That sounds cool. I do that too. I don't know what they're called either, but we do that too.

Yeah, so that's a fun little tradition. Yeah. So my wife is obviously Catholic and we do Christmas Eve gifts. Now, we won't do that for a fun little tradition. So my wife is obviously Catholic, and we do Christmas Eve gifts. Now, we won't do that for the Tukster. We'll do that after Santa gets here. She might be listening. But for everybody else, we'll do it on Christmas Eve. And we have a couple things where we go see the national tree and stuff like that.

Oh, that's great. Yeah, we do. Even though my kids are 16 they still love it we do one gift on christmas eve and it's always the christmas pajamas oh okay that you would have christmas pajamas yeah but then you would put them on sleep in them and wake up and open your presents ah yes yes very cool okay yeah stuff like that long island look you got any traditions that your family does besides hitting the bong? Yeah, besides using a Pepsi can to hit a bong?

No, a Pepsi can? What are we, in fucking 7th grade? My mom's Italian. She makes lasagna for every holiday, especially Christmas. What does your dad do on Christmas that's like real Aussie? Starts drinking beer at 10am.

Is that a Foster's? It's Australian for beer. He does get Foster's sometimes, but he's a big, what does he drink? Newcastle Brown Ale, which is not Australian, but that's kind of like the closest. Where does your dad live? Long Island. Okay, your parents are together, right? You're not divorced.

Yeah. How many times are you out with your dad and someone's like, are you from England? Or like, are you from Scotland? Like, how many times do they wager and they get it wrong? Oh, well, I will say every time we're out with him, they have to bring up,

Oh my God, where are you from? But I will say nine times out of 10, they actually say, I'll get it right. Okay. I figured those long Island. Can we ever get this guy on the show and ask him inappropriate questions

about down under. He knows like zero about technology. So probably not but uh yeah we can make the same success i've had in trying to get luke's dad or brother it'll it'll never happen yeah you might you might as well you'll get satan on here before you get there wow sometimes yeah bc with that in mind it's time for your feces yeah so i scoured the globe and you know i put together some funny clips i hope makes luke laugh. This one's called, Have You Seen This Ish, Biatch? Luke, hoo-ah!

Yeah, it's the holiday season, Luke, which means it's always better to give than receive. Want your presents early? Sure. Sure. Sure. That's my kind of Santa right there. Oh, good. Luke, have you ever brought this to the table on Christmas dinner? It could change the way your family celebrates.

You know what I mean? Oh, boy. That's what I mean? Oh boy. That's a bowl of joints, Luke. All right. Grandma loves it. Yeah. That's me on Christmas. And look, he's wearing the raw, like a roll.

Rolling papers. Yes. Rolling papers for the, for the sweater. That's sick. Great stuff. Luke, your ugly Christmas sweater of the week time. Jesus Christ. You've won.

I tell you what, buddy. Redneck ingenuity powers this country. It really does. Powers this country. At this point, yes, we better buy in. Let's go over to the Bills Mafia and see what they're up to, Luke. All of them should get paralyzed. I hate every single one of them. Look at what they're doing to Patrick Mahomes. Okay, I take that back.

Those guys are great. They also groom their children young, Luke. I'm not necessarily talking about Pat Berry's coaching style. Watch this. All right, I'm going to toss her up and catch her and drop her in. Ready, Mandy?

Yay! Go, Bills! All right, I'm going to toss her up and catch her and drop her in. Ready, Mandy? Yeah! Go, Bills! That kid is going to grow up with, like, lead poisoning and all kinds of shit with a family like that. I mean, it's going to be the worst life ever. Look, you may remember when my train, or I tried to take that bus home from MK and NYC that time. Just the dumbest decision you've ever made. That's all. And among many

things, including the driver taking the longest possible way to get there, then getting on the highway in the wrong direction, as we're like Boston, you know, 60 miles away coming up. We then got into Hartford and got the bus caught under a bridge around the corner like just low clearance low class unbelievable here's another great moment some low low clearance history wow wow wait do we does anyone speak german what did that what did that thing say uh i don't know but i think he was declared dead shortly after which was probably the fourth death we've now shown in the history of this show uh luke do you remember when you got your diploma

at graduation did you do anything crazy like the dx chop or you know i screamed yeah i did scream actually all right watch this man's decision he's gonna live luke he's gonna live not everyone deserves to go to college they should have revoked his diploma right there uh luke it's time for mma fighters in the wild and here's roman delizze checking in from the nation of georgia this is my homeland i'm in georgia and look what I found. Guys, I don't teach you what and how to do, but I'm against this. I always think that clear brain is very important. Think twice before starting using stuff like this.

Any kind of stuff like this, I'm against. against well luke he's not my least favorite fighter what what the fuck was he talking about he found a gravity bong there that somebody had made out of a water jug and a two liter soda just some ingenuity out there in georgia right yeah i, I couldn't tell if he was just against littering, you know? No, no, he was against the use of that. But, Luke, you know, he is connected to one of our favorite fighters, so I guess we can't turn on him completely, right? Who? Cheyenne, Luke.

Oh, that's your favorite. Thank you very much. Let's go over to this MMA fighter in the wild. That's Hamza Chemaev and Luke. I continually play videos and he can get down. Look at this guy. Do you think chicks adore this? Look at the move.

Uh, a certain kind perhaps. So if I learned those steps, would I, you know, clean up in a, in theory, Luke,

I think for the kind of person you'd be looking for, this could do you some good. It wouldn't really help me much. All right. Okay. Luke Stipe was elected dog pound captain by the Cleveland Browns. Check this out. Yeah. Yeah.

That team sucks balls. All right. There's a guitar, you know, rock and roll hall of fame. Is he strong enough to still smash it? Let's see if he could do the honky tonk man bit. Oh, okay. He's still got at least a little bit of that left. I'm sure his family's enjoying the John Jones paycheck this holiday season. Yeah, I bet they are. I bet they are.

Speaking of John Jones. That franchise is God forsaken and they deserve every bad thing that happens to them. So there you go. Speaking of John Jones, Luke, not a big NBA fan, it turns out. I just went to the New York Knicks game this weekend, last Friday night. And was it Friday night? I think it was Thursday night.

Last Thursday night, New York Knicks was playing against the Buffalo Bills. Not Buffalo Bills, but the Buffalo Bulls. Buffalo Bulls, Luke. There you go. Yes. Okay. All right. New York Knicks against the Buffalo Bulls. There you go. Yes. Okay. All right.

New York Knicks against the Buffalo Bulls. That's you talking about Premier League soccer. You're like, yeah, isn't Hazy Burrow playing Shibblesworth? Exactly. Luke, speaking of Boney, if you've ever wondered whether he's packing heat, Dana confirmed it to TMZ. So you would be shocked if this was the last time we saw John in an octagon tomorrow night. I wouldn't be shocked if he said I retire

tomorrow night. That wouldn't shock me at all. I mean, he's earned it. I mean, the guy's 37, 38 years old now. He's beat everybody. He's never lost. 16 years, the youngest heavyweight champ, hungest champion of all time, right?

Look, the hungest champion of all time, right? Luke, the hungest champion of all, the most well-hung champion of all time. He is the GOAT. That is, you know, listen, that is a certain form of royalty in this world. Luke, I don't know if your wife have confirmed that this is correct, but did you hear about the new pronunciation

for Aljamain Sterling's first name? Teddy Atlas shares it. And yours who have sterling um uh alajan alamind sterling close close teddy very close all right dude he's out there naming dinosaurs uh allosaurus uh velociraptor. Yes. Yeah. Luke, have you ever gotten high with your grandma before? Uh, no. I cannot say that I have.

What could go wrong? Let's watch. Hurry up. I don't want your mom to see. You ready? Yeah. Oh, holy Jesus. Oh, give me that.

Hey, hey, hey. Right now, I'm locked this fucking door in. Trying to burn down my fucking house. What is it? Smile. Where's my mother? dude somebody surely there is somebody in the mk universe that can get me a hair dryer and then do that to me what that guy just did to his grandma like i think it's possible just send me to the next realm of existence please shout out to that guy who showed up to our three margaritas show with that little container of brownies luke did you not did you not uh shake that i think i think i think after the day that i had had i probably brownies was not the best idea you know okay uh let's go to karate combat uh rafael alvis delivered this insane capoeira kick ko luke watch this some of those violent rotations oh maybe it wasn't a finish, but that was great. That's insane.

Dude, he was the guy that also knocked out James Vick. You'll recall that. The one who sent James Vick to the land of wind and ghosts. Like, dude, maybe he wasn't the best fighter, but that dude is athletic as fuck. Luke, are you subscribed to Shab's other channel, Eat Fast, Get Gas? Well, let's watch this clip.

I'm going to show you something else watch this oh my god can you eat pussy like that you know what it's a relevant question yeah yeah it's a relevant question it's a relevant question. Yeah, yeah. It's a relevant question. It's a relevant question. Look, you ever hear that song, this store is on fire? This house? This girl? Oh, let's watch this.

All right, that guy seems angry. Oh, what the fuck? I mean, what happened there, Luke? Everyone was kind of nonchalant. He's just setting shit on fire like the Joker in the hospital scene. Yeah. All right, pick a number, Luke, on this next one. Any number.

I just want you to pick one of these numbers. And whichever number you pick, that's the prize you'll be getting. Go ahead. Three. Three? Are you sure? You can change your mind. Three. This one?

Yes. Are you sure? Yes. You gotta call. That is awesome. That's a good bit. That was a good bit. All right. Check out this bad-timed photo bomb.

The Illinois State Fair is taking place right now in Springfield, Illinois. If you've ever wondered what a thousand pound cow looks like up close and in person this is the place to come also maybe if you wondered tough break for that poor young woman wow all right uh lucas time for your hat of the week you down with this that's a that's a great lifestyle that's a great lifestyle yeah that is i've lived in a long time all right luke time we don't have elder abuse this week we do have child abuse let's watch this oh look some sweet chin music right there dude look at this she comes flying out bah hold that wow a young ditch of all right there wow and look at look at the smile on her face that's a self-satisfied

abuser look you ever see when they show old commercials from our youth and we're like man life was just different back then right that's true yes i got this one i'm not john elway but i'm gonna smash john elway's record with the new cortex megaflight a new record i was a little aggressive but that was the 90s look right wow foreshadowing the foreshadowing the 2000s in a very unusual way i remember that commercial so well too yeah i don't remember it ending like that let's go over to this uh this kid luke i don't like him what is um your aim in life what would you love to be doing in say 10 years time have you thought about it because i I know you love history, right? You love history?

Driving planes into buildings. Driving what? Driving planes into skyscrapers. Right, well, let's say that's not a career option. What else would you like to do? Move to Iraq and become a terrorist. Okay, that is somebody. Somebody get a handle on that kid. Wow, alright.

Online world will radicalize these kids, you know. No doubt about it. Finally, Luke, you can do it for the gram. You may die in the process, though. Get the fuck out of the road. Get the fuck out of the road, you idiot. Oh, yep. Oh, Jesus. Oh, my God.

Oh, wow. You know what? This is, that's just, that's just, I mean, there is, BC, I never know if there's a God. It's really hard to know. But then I see this and I think God loves us all. Wow, that's street justice right there. That's all the shit I got this week, Luke. I hope you saw it.

That was great. That was great. All right. Well, thank you to everyone who watched today hey happy holidays to all of you merry christmas we will be back on friday we'll have a live show on friday i don't know what the fuck we're gonna do so i think we're gonna do what are we gonna do you want to do we should let's let's do this let's get raw dog out here all right we'll get raw dog out here let's put up the gmail address one more time if we can morningcombat at gmail.com morningcombat at gmail.com send us some emails let's do like a end of 2024 kind of thing because the reality is we can't do

our year-end awards until the following monday bc because that's the last day of the year before the end of the year. Sure. So we'll do like a bit of a grab bag. Whatever else you guys want to get to, morningcombat.gmail.com. Hit us up. Let us know what's going on, and we'll have a good time. All right. I like that idea.

And, you know, happy holidays out there. I mean, happy Hanukkah, Kwanzaa, Christmas. It's a great time, Luke, to press pause on the life, to put the phone down and focus on the blessings you have in front of you. Wife, kids, animals, parents, nephews, cousins, neighbors. Get out there and touch somebody. You know what I mean? Yeah.

Yeah. Just legally. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Hey, guess who's here, Luke? Guess who's here? Guess who made it?

Look at that. Puss buddy yeah is he is he yelling at you he is yelling at me he's very vocal he knows you know he knows he's you know he really lives his whole life only focused on him it's a remarkable existence that's every cat yeah it was specifically this guy you know yeah i want him to bite your fucking face no way no way he's in a good mood right now let's let him let's let him stay okay great guy happy holidays to you happy holidays to long island luke everybody who works on the show no texting and driving no drinking and driving let's all be safe and uh let's reconvene obviously on Friday after all the holiday festivities and we'll get ready to close out 2024.

Alright. There it is. There it is, Luke. Okay, you can follow us there on all our socials. Again, one more time, morningcombat at gmail.com to contact the show and send us some stuff for a holiday mailbag edition. But we're done for Long Island Luke, for Reggie

Jackson the cat, for Brian Campbell. I'm Luke Thomas. Thank you guys so much for watching. And until next time, may all of your gains be loyal.