The Ariel Helwani Show - Bill Goldberg, Cory Sandhagen, Rico Verhoeven, Fight Promotion Streaming News, On The Nose

Episode Date: March 19, 2025

Ariel Helwani kicks off the show with a look back at Jon Jones stopping a mugger on the anniversary of his world title win at UFC 128 (03:14).Ariel and the gang answer all your latest On The Nose questions about Tom Aspinall continuing to wait for the Jones fight, Sean O'Malley's chances at featherweight, and more (13:51).GLORY Kickboxing CEO Marshall Zelaznik breaks some big news and outlines the promotion's plans for 2025 (1:15:40).GLORY heavyweight champion Rico Verhoeven teases his next fight and discusses his dominant kickboxing run, potential progress on a Francis Ngannou matchup, plus more Rico (1:32:29).Cory Sandhagen previews his UFC Des Moines main event against Deiveson Figueiredo and discusses his push for Sean O'Malley, lessons from Umar Nurmagomedov, brutal body shots, plus more (1:46:43).Wrestling legend Bill Goldberg guarantees a WWE retirement match in 2025, tells crazy stories about the WCW and early MMA era, talks potential feuds with Gunther and Roman Reigns, plus more (2:17:23).The show closes with more On The Nose questions (3:11:22) and Super Chats (3:31:51).

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the Err-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r- 2000 and 25 Hello again, everyone. I sure hope you're doing well. It's great to be here on a Wednesday Hope life is treating you. Oh, so very well Wherever you may be across this great world and again We we are faced with one of those days one of those days that when I say them I am taken back to a different time, a different era, a different period. This time, a historic date. A date that I think every MMA fan should know about. You know what happened 14 years ago? Today my friends, March 19th, 2011, Newark, New Jersey, the Prudential Center, UFC 128.

Do you remember what happened on that night? Johnny Bones Jones, just 23 years young, made history, becoming the youngest champion in UFC history, defeating Shogun Hua, and thus, you know, the rocket ship took off, right? It was an amazing couple of months for him. He has the win over Ryan Bader. In February, we find out that Rashad Evans, who was supposed to fight Shogun Hua for the belt

as the challenger was out, Rashad gives John, we think, the blessing. Build up to that fight. They say they'll never fight each other. But then all of a sudden in an interview on Versus, they say they will fight each other. Or at least John does. And then Rashad feels betrayed by it. And there's the fight, the legendary Shogun Hua, the former Pride Grand Prix winner, going up against the 23-year-old youngster,

who at that point we all kind of realized was something special, like Phenom. He blew right through him. He became champion. And he hasn't lost since. It's really remarkable. 14 or so years. I say or so because he hasn't been active for those 14 years, but March 19th is a day that I always remember. I feel like a lot of big things are happening between like February and March. It seems to be a trend or maybe just March. Why

does it feel like these these memories are all coming back on this particular month? Anyway you all remember or I think you remember maybe you don't maybe you're a newer fan and don't know about this story. Do you know the story about John Jones going to meditate the morning of the fight in newark and then essentially taking down a pickpocketer a robber a mugger if you will do you know the story when you're hearing this story and when we started to hear about this story on the morning of the fight we're like is this guy for real is he straight out of the today Like, he's out of a promoter's fantasy. Young, incredibly talented, incredibly athletic, good-looking, undefeated,

and he's taking down criminals the morning he makes history? Anyway, just to jog your memory, here's the press conference where he told us about the story. And by the way, you may notice that it says March 20th at the top of the screen. Well that's because this technically happened past midnight but it was on this night. It was March 19th that's when 128 happened and that's where this incident that he's talking about that's when it happened as well. Take a listen. Oh here we go guys put your seatbelts on.

Alright so this will happen. I was hanging out at my Batcave on, right? And, okay, so check this out. One of my co-managers, his name is Glenn, and he has a family that lives here in the New Jersey area. So before my fights, I like to find a really beautiful site, whether it's the top of a mountain, next to a stream, anything gorgeous nature-wise. I like to associate nature with different levels of energy and all this. But

anyways, it's a different topic. So we find a place in Patterson, New Jersey, where there's a bridge and there's this very powerful waterfall. And there's almost like a little mountain. It was beautiful, but around this waterfall and everything, it was a really ghetto area. And as the guy pulls us up in his car, he's like, you know, I'm in the passenger seat, Greg Jackson, the Winkle John's in the back seat. He's like, listen, guys, before I drop you off here, I'm going

to let you know this is a pretty bad neighborhood, so you might want to be careful. And I'm like, dude, we're all MMA guys. And he's like, well, I'm just letting you know a lot of people get mugged here. Just as he said that, I turn to pull off my seatbelt and the guy, I see an old Spanish couple screaming and they're running, they look like they're out of breath big time and I'm like, dude, they just got mugged

and he's like, no, no, and I'm like, maybe not, I'm tripping, you just put that in my mind. So Mike Winklejohn hops out of the car and he's like, no, no. And I'm like, maybe not, I'm tripping. You just put that in my mind. So Mike Winklejohn hops out of the car and he's like, you guys okay? And then she's like, you know, the guy just, he just broke my window open and he took all my stuff and he's running. And so I'm like, what?

So Mike Winklejohn, without hesitation, he just starts running, right? And I'm like, holy crap. And then Greg Jackson, he just like, he just starts running and they both start running. So I'm like, holy crap. And then Greg Jackson, he just starts running. And they both start running. So I'm like, what is happening right now? This is the best part. So next thing you know, I have sweatpants on.

I have an iPod and my Druid X, my wallet. I'm like, what is like? Where am I? What is going on? So I'm like, OK, it's time for me to take action. So I take my hands in my pockets. I throw my stuff on the floor. And I tell our driver, I'm like, dude, it's time for me to take action. So I like take my hands in my pockets, I throw my stuff on the floor and I tell our driver, I'm like, dude, take care of my stuff.

I throw it on the floor and I just started running. Right, and you know I got these gazelle legs. So I'm running, right? And I'm running. And next thing you know, you know, I catch up to my coaches and I'm jogging and there's a sprint, right? I'm like, so what are we doing?

We gonna catch this guy? And he's like, he's like, he's like, John, you get back. He's like trying to swim with me, like get over me. He's like, get back, you don't need to be involved with this, right? And I'm like, nah, Coach, trust me, man. I'll be okay, I'll be okay. So then I put the jets on, you know.

I went TOL. So I put the jets on and I catch up to the guy. I'm like, how you doing? You think you're gonna, no, I'm joking. I'm joking. So anyways, the guy on and I catch up to the guy, I'm like, how you doing? You think you're gonna go? No, I'm joking. I'm joking. So anyways, the guy, like we're getting, I'm like closing in on this guy about 20 yards away and the guy's like, you can see that he's starting to get winded. So he's like, you know, he got this stuff and he's running and he looks back and he

usually sees me, you know, six four, you got Greg and Wink like behind us. Yeah. Greg and Wink's behind me and I'm just running running like, you know I'm gonna catch you, right? So the guy looks back, and then he trips over his own foot. And so at the time we tripped over his own foot, I got so scared because I didn't know what I was gonna do when I actually caught him. So I actually started barking like,

ah, I'm gonna get you, like ah, you know? Anyway, that's a part of the story, and I remember being back there, and he talks about, you know, taking him down and holding him down as the cops came. I remember being in the back, standing back there at the Prudential Center and thinking to myself, this guy is a dream. I mean, that smile, that charisma, the way he's telling the story. He just beat up Shogun Hu to become the youngest champion in UFC history. A record, by the way, that still stands. Many have said,

I'm going to be the one to break it. None have come close, if we're being 100% honest. None have come close. And here he is telling the story and he becomes a gigantic star. And it was just a very memorable time. And you know, obviously, what a career, what a story. It's one that we'll talk about for many years. And when I say the story, I don't just mean the story of that day, the story of his career. What I'll probably remember most about that evening is what Dana White said to me in our post fight interview, which is a clip that was used to promote Jones DC2. They took this exact clip as perhaps some foreshadowing

of what's to come, or perhaps some insight into maybe what Dana was feeling or what he saw was coming or what he thought he saw was coming. Who knows? Anyway, it proved to be somewhat prophetic. Take a listen to what Dana had to say. Here's the thing. John Jones got through a tough test tonight and passed with flying colors.

The real challenge starts now. When you become the UFC champion and you have the charisma and the personality and all the things that John Jones has this kid looks like he could be a breakthrough star that appeals to many different people but this is where the real challenge begins. Every scumbag, dirtball, what I call Klingons. All the Klingons, the Barnacles, they're probably trying to glom onto him right now as he's trying to walk to his car and go back to the hotel.

Here's where the real challenge begins. And he seems to be a grounded kid, smart guy, has a good family around him and people that, you know, care about him. So hopefully he can get through the nastiness that's gonna come at him over the next several months. Scumbag. Klingon.

Barnacle. This all seems, does this seem familiar? Does this seem like someone we know sounds like oh what what's this oh wow that's oh thanks Andy uh oh this is a tweet from Mohammed being on uncle I have a came Magomed uncle I have who apparently has changed his name tweeting me yesterday after I applauded his tweet saying Alex when you're ready to go again. You deserve this. I don't like this fake big nose guy I'm gonna block him, which he did and of course we know that that's not Him writing that

Magomed's a good guy salt of the earth guy. That's of course his manager Ali who still Is is is keeping up with this feud with me six years running? 2019 you know we used to talk on the phone all the time used to call me like literally five six times a day is keeping up with this feud with me. Six years running, 2019. You know, we used to talk on the phone all the time, used to call me like literally five, six times a day, ask me about World Series of Fighting and all the other stuff that's going on in his life. But then when I got to ESPN and he realized,

hey, wait a minute, it's actually better to not be on my quote unquote side and be against me to Curry favor with his boss, Dana White. He did this whole thing where he turned on me. And so there he is still tweeting me. All these years later, my old friend Ali. Ali the kind of guy that you want on your side, the kind of guy that you want in your corner,

the kind of guy that, you know, like he'll be, you know, he'll be at all your fights. He'll be in the cage after your fights. He'll, you know, you're fighting in London, he'll be there. You're fighting in Mexico City, he'll be there. You're fighting in Dubai, in Saudi Arabia, he'll be there. You know, he'll get on a plane and he will, you know, leave the country to be there for you, to be by your side. He will be there to support you. He's that kind of manager and he's maybe the

kind of guy that Dana was talking about, I don't know, or maybe not, but that's the thing I respect the most about him. Like, he'll get on that plane, he'll leave the country, and you know, he'll be able to be in your in your corner on your side wherever you may be fighting. So he does yeah he does deserve a lot of credit for that. Anyway all of this kind of reminded me of you know March 19th and the Klingons and the people and all that stuff so it's a crazy crazy world but happy anniversary to the great John Jones who made history 14 years ago today. We shall make history on today's program, my friends, because we'll have an announcement

of sorts at around 2.15 regarding a combat sports promotion and some broadcast home for them that will be announced. So stay tuned for that. Following that announcement, we will be joined by perhaps the most decorated heavyweight in all of combat sports, the reigning defending glory heavyweight champion, the one and only Rico Verhoeven. It's always great to talk to him. He has a few things to share with us, so stay tuned for that. Following that chat, we will be joined by Corey Sanhagen, one of our favorites. And I was trying to think, is this Corey Sanhagen's first time in the new era? I think it might be because his last fight was in August, and unless

he popped up, he might have popped up before in the fall. He might have popped up, but I don't think so. Maybe not. Anyway, good to talk to him. And of course, he now has a date. If you follow him on social media, you will know that he's been itching to get back in there. Well, he has a date. If you follow him on social media you will know that he's been itching to get back in there. Well he has a date. He is headlining once again. It's on May 3rd. UFC Des Moines. We've been all about UFC Des Moines on the program this week. Lots of chatter regarding it and and it's a sneaky sneaky sneaky good card. The headliner is Corey Sanhagan versus Davidson Figueredo at 135 pounds five round fight. So we'll talk to him about that. And then what about 315? Ah yes, where the pride of the University of Georgia, the pride of the Atlanta Falcons, one of the most popular professional wrestlers

of the last two, three decades, perhaps of all time. At one time, the face of world championship wrestling, a WWE Hall of Famer, a legend who last competed in 2022, and as he approaches 60, he says he has one more left in him, the great Bill Goldberg will join us. Yes. Goldberg. Goldberg will join us, yes. Goldberg, Goldberg. Do do do, do do do, do do do do, do do do, do do do do, do do do do, do do do do. One of the great entrances.

The knock, the walk out, the pyro, actually when my kids were into wrestling for like eight months in 2020-2021 Goldberg was my oldest son's favorite. Had the toys, had the shirts, played with him in the video game and I don't think I ever told him that but he loved them and so actually my kids were very excited when I did tell them that Big Bill will be joining us on today's program. But you know on Wednesdays we like to shoot, we like to answer some questions, we have a bunch of questions on the sub stack. So without further ado, time now for everyone's favorite segment of the week. It is... It's a weird thing. It always is perfect when we rehearse it, but then live on the show it goes...

Why does it do that? I think it's the breaks. You think it's the breaks? Yeah, it dims the breaks. Oh, got it, got it, got it. All right, well there you have it. On the nose time, let's answer some questions and hopefully we can get some hard-hitting ones.

Some of the fans I think like the fun ones and then some of them don't. I don't know. I don't write the questions. I just answer them. Shall we? We shall. Lex, hi Ariel. I have seen you do the thing recently where you drop hints indirectly and recently you've been talking about Aspenal Jones and how more likely you think it's going to happen given it's a renegotiation year and that

Jones needs six months and that there was talks of August. Be honest with us, Mr. Helwani, what do you know? I saw that a couple of sites, I think it was Happy Punch and another ran with the six-month thing that I said yesterday. No, they ran with it yesterday and I said it last week, more than a week ago. I don't know how that came up. Listen, I tell you guys what I know and we all know that they want to make the fight. We all know that Aspinall is in and I like I don't need to be some kind of insider to tell you this. He has said it himself. We all know that he's meeting with the brass this week in London. We know that John Jones is in at a certain price. We believe that price is in the vicinity of 30 million.

We all agree that he is worth that price. We all agree that they should make that fight and pay him that amount of money. And I personally think that in a time period where they're trying to drum up interest and buzz and hype as they you know, they take their US broadcast rights to the market, I believe having a fight like that is very beneficial. Does it happen in August? Does it happen in October? Does it happen in November here in New York City? That remains to be seen, but it is not a done deal, and I'm not trying to be coy.

This isn't one of those things where I know it's a done deal and I'm trying to like get ahead of it. It's not one of those things. I'm just telling you what I know in real time. I can also imagine that at some point, you know, Tom Aspinall's patience going to wear thin. Like, when could we start to have the conversation that this guy's career has been somewhat stalled and derailed because of this. Like are we there yet?

We've been there. We've been there. Yes. Like. It's past time. It's past. If I'm Tom Aspinall, how old is Tom Aspinall? 31? How is he? 31. He turns 32 in April. By the way, like when we think about conversations like this, we were ready to have that conversation about Michael Chandler the moment it was announced that he would even be talking about

Conor McGregor. People were rushing to have that type of conversation. Yeah, I think we're way past expiration on the idea of like waiting for John Jones is a fool's errand at a certain point. Just to refresh your memory, he injures his knee in July of 2022. He's out the whole year. He comes back exactly a year later, almost to the day he beats Marcin Tabor 2022. He's out the whole year. He comes back exactly a year later almost to the day He beats marcine tibura. He had nothing on the books After that, but then You got the jones injury. They call him two weeks prior. He beats serguei pavlovich. That's in november of 23 So he gets two fights in in 23. That's not bad. That's kind of you know on par

His next fight after november 23 is July of 24. Okay. I don't think that's crazy, right? That's eight months later. That's kind of on par with the top dogs. He's got nothing on the books. Now we are approaching it. It will be a year.

There's no way he fights before July. I would be shocked unless they pull a rabbit out of their head and they put them on international fight week, I would be truly shocked. So he will have sat out a year. He fought for a minute against Curtis blades. He fought for 69 seconds against Sergey Pavlovich. He fought for 73 seconds against Marcy and Taibura since he injured his knee, which by the way, was a 15 second fight.

He has fought for less than four minutes combined in three fights since July of 2022. This is a travesty. This is a travesty. The guy needs to fight. We got to figure this out. And at what point does the UFC say, all right, we're not going to meet your number, we're going to move on. We're going to take the belt away. And if you you wanna come back or if something tickles your fancy, I don't know. I don't know what the answer is. I'm not here saying they need to do X, Y, and Z

by X, Y, and Z date, but it feels like we are inching closer. And if I'm Tom and his father and his team, I'm saying like, how much longer? Like I'm sitting down at this meeting this weekend and being like, what's the plan guys? Like what are we doing here? Could we set some kind of deadline?? Can we set some kind of deadline?

Like, can we set some kind of markers? Like if we are not close by June, can we move on? Can I move on? Now, do you think that Tom wants to move on? Absolutely. No, I think Tom wants to fight John Jones, but I also, I also think that he doesn't want to sit around forever. He's not going to do the two year thing.

There's no way. He's in his prime. Like, you could make a case that Chandler wasn't in his prime so he could afford to sit out. He was passed. I mean, we're talking Conor McGregor. It's a different level. We're also talking big money fight versus just trying to get the undisputed belt.

I think it'll be a huge fight. It's not Conor. But my sense of it- Pretty damn close. Do you think it's the closest you can get at this moment? If you were Tom Aspinall and you went to the UFC yesterday and said all right look I'm tired of waiting for John Jones give me another fight you don't think they would have already given it to him? No okay so this is where the detractors will push back they'll say well Tom did say that he's not fighting

unless it's for the undisputed title because Because I think the UFC would then say, oh yeah, you could fight, but you'll just have to defend your interim belt. Mm-hmm. You know what I mean? So he is putting one kind of stipulation on there, and by the way, I think he has every right to. The fair one. This is a negotiation. And he's saying, like, I'm not going to be your interim champ, which by the way, you see in, like, Joseph Parker has been the interim champ for God knows how long and it's stupid. It doesn't make any sense. Can I ask a question? Yeah go ahead. I'm wondering right, thank you, love my boys,

just want to know what you think of this. Do you think the UFC are reluctant to make any big moves with John? Like I mean as far as the conversation was going, if this keeps going right? We're saying will will they force Jones to vacate the title so Tom can fight someone else for the undisputed Like you know for the title and I'm wondering do you think they are reluctant to do that with the broadcast deal coming up? They want to have John Jones. They want to be able to pitch John Jones to these potential suitors They don't want to make a drastic move in case he goes away completely In other words, are you saying are they trying to save John for when the New Deal kicks in?

Not necessarily alienate him. He wants John on side. He's saying keep John on side by making him happy Don't make a drastic move. We want to be able to pitch this guy to them like don't in July say right Well, if you're not gonna fight him or stripping you Thomas fighting Marcin De Borra again and you know they want to keep him on side to a certain degree because they don't want to rock the boat because they want to dangle him as a carrot to these potential broadcast partners. Can I say I think that they believe he only has one or two left max and so I don't think that they are worried about

that i think that that that kind of thinking applies more to McGregor you know what i mean like McGregor has two fights left he's younger i think they they would prefer to keep him on ice i think with John they know they only have one or two left and so they're not pushing him right now to the best of my knowledge by the way. To the best of my knowledge it's it's just kind of been like a stalemate. You know what I mean? And at some point the rubber is going to have to meet the road and someone's going to have to make the call but as we've said time and again they don't necessarily have to make that call just yet.

They are not, they are not in a position where they're desperate. They're not in a position where I think Aspen all is making them make a call, setting some kind of deadline ultimatum. They're not there just yet. And so that's the question I was bringing up earlier. When do we get to that point? When does that point actually commence?

You, you, you've said it perfectly. Like like Aspinall is not forcing them to make that call, but also the UFC knows that Aspinall is the easier one to make amends with if they need to, right? With John Jones, you've got a quantity that you're trying to grab a hold of, but he could just as easily go away. So you have to be very careful. It's a deer, you know, like you don't want to spook it. You have to keep John Jones on side and you have to handle this very delicately because if he goes away, that's gone now. Now that's out of the window and you have to go with the other plan.

Tom Aspinall, they can make amends with him. He's the one who's ready to sign up. Do it right now. Easy to work with. There's nothing to worry about on that side. You only have to kind of manage this side. The part you have to manage with Aspinall is like, if he goes, I want to fight and I only

want to fight for undisputed, like you're saying Ariel. That is now, you do have a conundrum on your hands where you do have to figure that out. Do we risk off, you know, upsetting John Jones in order to empower this champion who's ready and willing and able to fight for us? It's a tricky one. I'm not sure I would say 100% yes. I'm not sure I'd rush to do it, but it's a tricky one. From a historical perspective, it's amazing because historically the UFC has pretty much made all the big fights, except in one weight class.

Like dating back to, you know, Kator and Fedor, Jones and Ganu, there was the Lesnar-Fedor stuff. This particular fight, it's weird that as, you know, everything kind of like goes to the heavyweight division. I'm not saying that the heavyweight division is the glimmer division of the UFC. It's never been. In fact, because of John Jones, it was probably light heavyweight.

And prior to that, of course, with Chuck Liddell and Tito Ortiz, light heavyweight always felt like our heavyweight division if you get what I'm saying. It is amazing though they have been able and yes there are some outliers here and there for the most part at 170 GSP fought everyone including Nick Diaz including BJ Pentagon etc etc. At 185 Anderson Silva fought everyone that was available. Now there was the Anderson-GSP fight that people always talked about, but there was 15 pounds between them and I don't think GSP ever really wanted that fight. And you could say the same at featherweight with Aldo and McGregor, but at heavyweight

for whatever reason, it has proven to be a tricky one. I think I have a reason. It may be an oversimplification and maybe this is devoid of the context at the times, but there is a limited talent pool and when you have a limited talent pool it is a lot harder to make compelling matchups and therefore the people in those matchups can demand a higher price tag when you've got featherweight and you've got ten guys who you could conceivably say are great and you'd want to watch fight for a title that's different than when you're going shit

there really aren't a lot of heavyweights because if you can name somebody outside of John or Tom who could draw a dollar, I'd be shocked. It just does not, it's a very limited talent pool, especially right now. Like I don't think heavyweights ever been more desolate. And so you're looking around and going, if I'm John Jones or Tom Espinal, I'm super valuable. Or Francis Ngannou previously. I'm super valuable and I should be paid as such to make this big fight happen. Heavyweights are also kind of like, they're larger than life. They have big egos. That's just the way it is.

They're the big dogs. They're the alpha males. And so let's see. In this era where the UFC is getting into boxing, and I say the UFC, I mean Dana White and the TKO Brass, and they talk about making the big fights. Can they make this big one? Will Tom Aspinall's next fight be for undisputed? I mean, you know, Dana White and the TKO brass, and they talk about making the big fights. Can they make this big one? Will Tom Aspinal's next fight be for undisputed heavyweight? Has to be.

Well, the tougher question to answer is will it be against John Jones? Why? I, I, I. Because I think the next time we see him fight, he, he will have, I, I think, I think, I think Aspinal is going to stick to his guns. And I think the next time we see him fight, will have I think I think I think Aspal is gonna stick to his guns and I think the next time we see him fight it will be for that

title the question is fighting against John Jones. Honestly I find that compelling I'm because that would mean that something happened with the John Jones side of it and I'd be interested in that too so if he if you think that his next fight will be for undisputed heavyweight gold I'm compelled by that. What worries me is that they say, we're saving this for New York. And now- Give themselves more time to kind of-

Well, yeah, and Aspen Hall has to wait another eight months. That's an eight months. But do they say we're saving it for New York to actually have it happen in New York, or to save the time and say- No, you know them. They earmarked dates. John Stipe could have happened before New York,

but they wanted it for MSG. You know, they, they, they sometimes, so they don't care about Tom's dangerous game timeline. They don't care about that timeline at all. They, they, they have things laid out and they want certain fights in certain places. And that worries me because if they tell Tom, please just sit tight, you are getting this fight, you're just going to have to wait a couple of months. And then he waits those months and then it doesn't happen. Sound familiar? Chandler McGregor? And then what does he do?

Now he's staring at being 32 and wasting prime years of his life. I think that would be a good point to say we cannot hold this any longer. That would be the point for me. Kevin from Ottawa, hey guys, with all the talk around the Apex, would you rather watch UFC 314 if it was in the apex or watch

Emmett Murphy if it was in an arena? Interesting. This is an interesting question. But it got to the test here. What's the point that he's trying to prove here? It had to be 314. Of course, the card is better, but it's still being a shitty shitty setting. Yeah, and also we're never gonna get a 314 in the Apex. The quality of Apex cards matches the Venom.

But his point is the quality of the Apex, the problem is not only the atmosphere. The problem is the atmosphere and what has become the standard card quality. And I continue to make, I know you and I differ a little bit on how much the atmosphere matters. Like I'm not nearly as sold on it as you in terms of like, that's the make or break.

I care more about, to Connor's point, that fight would never happen in an Apex because it's too good a quality card and they have determined the Apex is only for lesser quality cards. I would watch... I guess what he's trying to say is, if it's a super stat card in the Apex... Yeah, you're still going to enjoy it. Begrudgingly. I guess what he's trying to say is if it's a super stat card in the Apex. Yeah, you're still gonna enjoy it. I will. I will be very very. No, no, the fights would be great but I would be sitting on my couch the entire time. Why the fuck is this in the Apex? Annoyed. And thinking you know how much better it would be if it was in front of me. It would be better. Here's the good news. We don't have to do it in the Apex. We just don't have to do that. They can do an entire calendar where it's in front of crowds. They've done it for years and years. You know what also doesn't get brought up enough?

When people say like, oh, you know, it's a lot of shows and this and that. Do you know WWE travels three times a week? They do three televised events a week in different parts of the world. They have Raw on Mondays, somewhere there in Belgium. They have NXT, which sometimes is at the venue that they have the full sale.

But they've taken, it was at the theater last week. And then SmackDown is in another arena. They do this three times a week. Oh, by the way, once a month, there's a PLE in a different arena as well. Like this idea that you can't happen, it can't be done once a week. They do that, by the way, 52 times. Like there is no off, there's no week off. We get 43. It's crazy. They can

easily do it and and they're easily popular enough to be able to pull it off and sell a lot of tickets. And they've done it. And they've done it. I'm looking at 2019. Stockholm, Rochester, Rio de Janeiro, Ottawa, St. Petersburg, Russia, Atlanta, Philly, Nashville, London, Russia, Atlanta, Philly, Nashville, London, Wichita, Las Vegas, Prague. They went to the Czech Republic. This is just the first half of the year. Phoenix, Brazil, Anaheim. Every single week. That bottom line was a lot different than it is right now. Connor from Canada, hey Ariel, is it possible the UFC actually doesn't mind

not having a huge megastar? Connor is bigger than the UFC and has been for a while But maybe they don't like stars having that much power sway and want them to have to rely on the UFC Not the other way around. I mean we've talked about this to a degree They don't want anyone to get the type of power and leverage that Connor had back in 2016-17 That's that's very very very clear. But of course they want stars, like they're happy to have Ilya Tupouria, they're happy to have Alex Perea. You just, you know, as The Rock once said, you got to know your role and shut your mouth. That's the bottom line. White Whale, Holy Grail, Shalom Uncle Helwani, yeah! I keep hearing MMA folks say that the GFL isn't real,

but I checked Tapology and saw that the Gladiadores Fight League has already had eight events. On a serious note, I remember they were aiming for their first event in April. Now that we're just a month away, do you think this will actually happen? Not in April. When can we expect a real announcement?

Are you still waiting to see how it unfolds, or do you have some inside info? I've been protecting my neck all this time, but I should have been protecting my heart. actually happened, not in April. When can we expect a real announcement? Are you still waiting to see how it unfolds or do you have some inside info? I've been protecting my neck all this time but I should have been protecting my heart because it's broken. That's pretty good. Look, it went from April to the Mother's Day weekend,

May 11th, 12th, back to back. Now starting to hear that it might get pushed. I don't know, man. Should we play the game that we played GC a couple of days ago about this? Remind me of the rules. I believe it was with you. Maybe I'm dreaming.

I think it was me. Was it with you? Sorry. I equate you with betting. I set the line one and a half, one and a half events. Over, under GFL has one and a half events. I don't want to do this. I'm half events. I don't want to do this. I'm telling you I don't want to do this, but I just have to be real.

I'm gonna take the over. I'm gonna take the over. Let's take the over. I think we get like four. But I'm gonna sprinkle on the alt line under half an event. I just had zero. You're getting that to me like plus 300, I'm gonna sprinkle. He's aging.

Plus 500, he's aging it. You know. I honestly feel like, I'm a sprinter, I'm a plus 500. I honestly feel like that's gonna be the highest odds option. Like you might have to sprinkle on the over. Give me the under a half alt line at like plus 400. And then also I will take like five plus events at like plus 500 as well. Just so like this.

There's so many red flags. I just think if they do one, they're gonna do a few and then it could be a lot. By the way, that's right. I agree with that. If they get one off the ground, I think there will be a few. A few is a few.

We're talking about... Can we boy the song? Can we boy the song if they don't use it? Yeah, that should be the new one. We can make our own AI song. Someone asked me. Whoa, AI? Someone said to me, I'm disappointed.

Yeah. Because you come next. Yeah. You oughta know best. They say no. You think they use this on the first event? Fuck yeah. 100%.

Are you crazy? Play it 10 times in the first 10 minutes. That's their theme song. Every fighter also has to walk out to it. That's like their version of. And their own AI play that's on the screen. You know, that song that they play at the beginning of the UFC walkouts.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. That's their version. Um, someone said to me, I'm disappointed that you didn't ask Jeremy Stevens about, you know, how he was able to sign with the UFC, uh, since he's, you know, a GFL fighter. And, and the truth is I thought of it. I just, I don't want to go through the and the truth is I thought of it I just I don't

want to go through the awkward exercise of seeing him just be like yeah you know I don't you know like it's not it's not a thing you know what I mean like well so you know I'm just waiting on my fight news yeah they said I could time with you exactly exactly exactly they gave me the green light James Ola Ariel I'm a Travis Scott fan but didn't enjoy his involvement at time with you. Exactly, exactly, exactly. They gave me the green light. James, hola Ariel, I'm a Travis Scott fan but didn't enjoy his involvement at Elimination Chamber mainly because he was just standing around. Don't you think he should be showing more energy going forward? Can I say something? On this show and on every other piece of content that I saw related to

John Cena's, you know, big, you know, reemergence on Monday in Brussels. I didn't see one person and I'd even think of it until James mentioned it, say, wait a second, how does Travis fit into all this again? You know what I mean? Like he never explained that Travis wasn't there. Like the Travis Scott thing just happened and I'm sure they'll figure out a way to bring him back and you'll probably be at WrestleMania

and whatnot. But as time has gone on, it has seemed to be like a little bit clunky, no? Like there's just been no explanation whatsoever. I forgot he was there. I forgot he was there until that question was asked. Okay, so when he says he was standing around, is he talking about the time where he slapped Cody?

Yeah. Okay. Which he was standing around. And then after that he has not been seen. Not only has he not been seen, like his presence had never even been brought up. Okay, got it, got it. And you would think John would say something about him. Yeah, and also were people calling them the new,

there's a name. NWO. Yeah. Yeah. Did they even bring him up when he was standing there? Well, he was brought up when he was there, but in the subsequent shows, oh, and how could Travis Scott do this to Cody? Like nothing. Yeah. It just kinda happened.

It is bizarre. He'll pop up at WrestleMania, he'll spear someone and they'll be like, oh, Travis Scott. He did it. Sean Plant, hello, Ariel and the boys. Do you all think Sugar Shane, perhaps he means Sugar Sean, will move up weight if he isn't able

to regain his title from Marab? I hope he means Shugashan. Yeah. Obviously he's not ready. No. Well it's Shuga. Will he move up to 145? I don't think, I mean, maybe, maybe if he feels at that point, he's not going to get a

shot at the belt again. I think there's. I got the height. Shuga versus Ilya would have been fun. Yeah. They seem to be building toward that. Now neither is the champ of those divisions, but.

He, he, uh, follows that up with how would he contend against some of the top featherweights regardless of title contention. I think some of the matchups there are fireworks for him. Sean Silva, Diego Lopez, Josh Edmett. Yeah, you're right. Have the web be a problem. Yeah.

You get to the grappler. Sugarverse. Yeah, it would be fun. Ooh, yeah. By the way, I don't think, I don't think don't think O'Malley looked that deficient in the grappling against Merab like to the point that I'm I'm going automatically anybody at 45 is gonna be able to take him down I'm interested I I think there's but by the way I think there's compelling matchups still for him at 35 I'm not like I'm not rushing him up there either but I think there's 35 and 45

options for him that I'd be excited about. We gotta see what happens in the rematch. Yeah. Sugar State Athletic Commission scored it for Sean. We should find out something very soon. I mean, there's still that June 7th pay-per-view that's not accounted for just yet.

So I feel like, I feel like we're in a two and a half, two and a half month out range where they're announcing the main events now. So let's see maybe he'll be on that one here's our Mac hi lads hello from Dublin I'll be going to my first UFC event in London this weekend and with no family or friends really into MMA enough to pay the very high ticket price I'm going over on my own any advice for a solo attendee at a UFC event? I can't say I've ever been in those shoes. No, listen, you're gonna have fun. You're gonna be around fellow MMA fans.

You sit there, go from the first fight, obviously. Take it all in, get your money's worth, and you'll have a grand old time. Really not much more to it. He does add, PS, shout out to Pizzi for all his coverage on Irish MMA related news. He does add, PS shout out to Pizzi for all his coverage on Irish MMA related news. He's handled some very complicated and sensitive non-sport related topics with a lot of decorum. He's done a great job reporting on a certain inactive fighter fairly when

many including myself would be unable to disguise our personal feelings towards the man. I must say Pizzi, we have put you in some tough spots since the launch of UGRA. You have had to handle, like here I am asking you about, you know, like civil lawsuits, about, you know, the elections on the spot. What else? What else have we asked you about? Like, I mean, some real conundrums. Roadhouse? Roadhouse? No, that was before. That was a year ago yeah appreciate it thanks very much it's a it's never and never a dull moment covering that

retarded fighter Matt Chewewe's Ariel and crew happy national automatic door day wow that's a good one who doesn't love a good automatic door how do you think John Jones's legacy would be affected if he loses to Tom Aspinall in a potential unification fight this year? Do you think he would opt for an instant rematch,

or would he just say, buy Felicia and sail off into the sunset? Should he win, who else is there out there for him? That's a challenge now that Alex has shown some weaknesses. Either way, I'm thinking when one door closes, another one opens, whatever the outcome. I think he probably tries to get it back. And look, I don't think, I think we're getting, let's set the line at one and a half fights for John Jones left. I don't think there's many left. I mean, 14 years ago, what's going to be worse? What's going to be worse?

Legacy was if he didn't fight him at all or if he fought, fought him and he lost. Lost for sure. Because. That's the way he's looking at it though, right? Eight, nine, 10 years from now, no one will remember this, but they'll look and say he lost his last fight.

If he could potentially go this entire time and be undefeated, it's, it's the greatest resume of all time. And yes, I know Khabib was undefeated, but like, please let's just resume of all time. And yes, I know Habib was undefeated, but like, please let's just compare the title defenses. I mean, you're, you're absolutely insane if you compare the two. Matt Hamill erasure is also not, you know,

come on. What do you mean? What do you mean? Are you being cheeky here? Yeah. Okay. Uh, if he beats Tom Asperall, then he's technically 30 and up. If he beats Tom, if he beats Tom, it's the greatest.

I mean, it's already the greatest. It's already the greatest. If he loses in his last fight, it changes a lot. Having that, having that, oh, even though it's, you know, obviously not technically an oh, is very important. And, and by the way, the justification for why John Jones should be able to demand exactly the amount of money that he wants to take that risk

because Tom Aspinall is a bad mother effort and you should be paid appropriately to take the risk to fight that guy and put your legacy on the line. So I think a loss would be pretty damaging to the resume as opposed to just walking away now to Ariel's point, memories are short. People will start the TikTok videos of, yo, you didn't know about John Jones and all of a sudden everybody will just forget the end of it A loss would be bad. So so pay him to take that risk a lot of John Jones questions this week

I like this. This is fun. Mr. Clean real quick Yes, if today really is National Automatic Day Automatic Door Day Yes, yes Oh and to pay yes Connor and I were leaving the Yahoo the other day and I ran smack dab into a door that was allegedly automatic and didn't open. So of course we had a good laugh, but then the next day there were technicians working on the door. Wow.

And I'm like, oh God, did I break the door? I think the actual narrative here is that it has been broken for a while and they haven't told anyone. So I just ran into it. So if today is National Automatic Day, please calibrate those things. People might run into them. Sure. National Automatic Day, please calibrate those things people might run into them Sure, it's automatic leaving the Yahoo. Yeah

Yeah, Frank was fully looking at me while he was talking and he walked right into it I am talking just like it open shouldered it There were there's the two automatic doors only one opened and the one that stayed Frank just it was bad. I'm gonna come to Frank's defense. That door has been broken. I have also walked into it. Wow. But nobody was around thankfully. You guys are on your phone too much. You're looking down. You're not focused. Where there's a blame, there's a claim. Where there's a blame, there's a claim. That's all I'm gonna say to you. You'll walk into it when you're here in July, Peter.

I'll be on the ground. Oh, no, that's it! Someone call a lawyer, quickly! No, no, no, yeah, who doesn't have workers comp? Mr. Clean, question for everyone. At this point, it's looking like Jones is pricing himself out of the Aspen Hall fight, or possibly the Pereira fight was holding things up, and now that he's lost, they have just started actual negotiations. Not true.

Or perhaps John doesn't care Pereira lost and still wants a Pereira fight. Who knows? I think that was more like just negotiation. Anyway, personally, I think John is the goat either way, but my question is, what do you guys think actually hurts John's legacy more? If he fights, did I read this already? No, PT proposed it, but it's the same question. If he fights Aspenall and loses a close fight,

not fighting him at all and retiring without another fighter, a third option. Okay. So we answered this. Yeah. This guy's really smart. Yeah. Wow.

What a question. What timing. All of a sudden I'm reading this. I'm like, this sounds. Pizzi didn't think you'd select it, so he. Thank you. He asked it ahead of time. Thank you.

Uh, Hut, Ariel, to add to the argument that the UFC has too few stars. I just bought a blaster box of tops UFC finest to open during this weekend's card. What a waste of money. The most notable fighter card I got was a green glitter refractor, Chelsea Chandler and a numbered Jack Jevons, WTF, Hugh, GC.

Are you still ripping packs? Thank you, love the show. I mean, the green glitter Chelsea Chandler, that's tough, that's hard to handle. Especially, who knows how much he spent on that pack. That's tough to swallow when you get that. I've ripped open many a packs where it was, you get a couple of Sungwoo choys in there

and that's your best offering. No, no, no, no, not ripping packs anymore. Why not? I'm crowned, you know, we had to tighten up the belt a little bit. By the way, that's not true. I gave you a few packs back in the day, you didn't ask. You did.

Yeah, I actually have a few boxes just lying around. Oh, come on, watch party, we'll rip them open. No one asked. You can have all the proceeds can go back to you. Proceeds of what? Are packs, like, are the cards that valuable? The whole thing has died? Not UFC. No, no, no, other ones are booming. There's a couple of UFC ones that are worth something.

I'd love to, yeah, bring them in, we'll open them on the 3.41 party. Was it just like a weird post-pandemic fad or what? I don't know, I think people still love it. I just don't think the UFC ones hold the same value as football, basketball, soccer. And there's like few and far between that are really worth something. I can tell you the green glitter Chelsea Chan,

like keep your day job. Yeah. Keep your day job. Zach, hello Ariel and the boys. Continuing on the celebration. And by the way, shout out to Kevin Durant speaking of the boys. Did you guys see this?

Yeah, KatieTray35. Yo, did you guys see Kevin Durant, big fan of the boys in the back, tweeting about it. Never seen you a day in my life. You're a BITB, bot in the basement. This to a troll talking smack to him earlier today or yesterday. How do we feel about KD using BITB?

Well, he obviously took it from an inspiration after seeing our tweets saying BITB, new BITB. Maybe he's a fan of the show. I think he's a fan of the show and actually this was paying homage to us. So other fans of the show would get it. You're a BITB, not a boy in the back, a bot in the basement. It's not bad. Is KD an honorary BITB now at this point?

Hell yeah. Do we know? I think so. Let's hang up a Kevin Durant. Let's take up a Kevin Durant, Sonic's jersey on the wall in a frame with the tweet on it. All right. Zach, hello, Ariel and the boys. Continuing on the celebration of Irish heritage this week, my school, the St. Mary's Gales, the name is derived from when our basketball team was once full of Irishmen,

will be competing in March Madness yet again. Is my guy, Pete C, aware of us? And if so, will he be rooting for us to make a run in the tournament? Thank you and go gales. Always supporting the gales, especially St. Mary's gales. Of course. As you say this, I've just been reminded that Ben Stark emailed me saying I need to join

the March Madness. You have not done so. I've not done that. I'm sorry, Ben. I just, that just came into my head right now, but if I do, I'll be picking the St. Mary's gales. Well, you got to do it.'ll be picking the St. Mary's Gales. Well, you gotta do it. If you do, you still got a day.

Yeah, we got a day. Oh, do I? Come on! Yeah, it doesn't start till tomorrow. You got 24 hours, and that is a good reminder. You can join the Uncrowned, what do we call it? Bracket Mayhem group, yes? Is this what you guys were talking about the other night?

I had no idea what you were talking about. I was like, what is this? What are you talking about? 68 teams, I had no idea what you were talking about. I was like, what is this? What are you talking about? 68 teams, well now 64 and it all kicks up. It's 66. Is it 66? Well, okay, after today, right? Yeah, and then after today.

Yup, yup, yup. There is nothing. There is nothing like that 12 o'clock tip on Thursday. It's better. Let's go St. Mary's. It hits better than the Friday one. The 12 o'clock tip, when it's just about to start I mean I used to go home At lunch to watch it my kids are getting into the bracket stuff. I am so excited about this

I'm rooting for st. John's my my my orange are not in it this year of course GC very excited that his His dogs are in it first time in ten years So any years I I'm gonna do my bracket tonight. I was waiting But I'm very very excited. So I urge I urge everyone, how can they sign up? Can we put it in the chat? I'm putting it in the chat right now. Thank you. You're a man, GC.

And the winner will get a Heelwani merch package, right, of some sort, a care package. And bragging rights, obviously. And bragging rights, most importantly. We're all going to be in there as well. It's, uh, it's going to be great. I'm going to get smoked. We already got like 170 people in there. It's, uh, it's good stuff.

I'm not going to get smoked. Georgia, Florida, final national champions. Oh, is that it? That's the one. What's it? What's your, what's your final four? Georgia, Florida, uh, Michigan state, maybe. And Johnny's. Duke and it Duke, maybe. Johnny's?

I'll laugh. Duke? Duke? No Johnny's? No Johnny's, I want to go with Florida. Georgia, Florida national championship though. Jesse, Ariel, are you able to take us through a story slash report from the past to let us know

how you process the information with multiple sources and validate a report. I mean it's all very different. You probably have to ask me about a specific one. You know, obviously the Brock Lester one, very notable. That one happened. We were in Inglewood, UFC 199, got the tip on a Thursday phone call got the tip on a Thursday phone call asked around Friday got the multiple confirmation Saturday you know that first fight you know the the first fight of UFC 199 was it was a was a Dung Young Kim what's the first fight it's a crazy fight UFC 199 the first fight is a very memorable fight. It was Marco Polo Reyes and Dung Hyun Ma. Yes everyone loved that fight. Yeah it was

pretty good. I remember I did not I did not make it in time to the arena because I was writing the story, believe it or not, while wearing a towel and coming out of the shower. And I was late and I wanted to write it before I got to the venue for whatever reason, because it was obviously gigantic. And so I only got there, I think, for the second fight or the third fight, because I still had to like actually get to the arena and whatnot.

You don't care about those details. But basically, unless someone is going to tell you on the record, like I am telling you this, I, Dana White, am telling you this on the record that this fight is happening on March 19th, you have to have at least two sources. So, you know, someone will give you a heads up. You'll ask, you know, that team, if it's accurate, you'll ask the other team, if it's accurate, you know, if you're, if you're able

to ask the promoter, you'll ask them as well. And it's a tricky game. There have been times where I've asked people and then they've leaked it to someone else, but that's generally how it goes. Uh, long dawn. Long Don. Long Don? No, Don, Don.

Hello, Ariel and crew, long time watcher, first time sub stacker. Since the star problem in the UFC has been a big subject, who do you guys think could be the next wave of upcoming stars? You know, you guys were talking about this last week. Who would have predicted Alex Pereira, right? You said this, and it's almost hard to predict these things.

People just emerged. So he's asking about John Silver or Payne Talbot. It could be, I mean, those guys have something, and especially like a Carlos Prada's Akaya Bohaglio, who speaks English already, they're ahead of the game. But God knows who it could be. It could be a million people. It could be Patty Pimlet, you know,

like Patty could win against Michael Chandler and then win his next one and then fight for the belt. Like these things, you know, some of them you can pinpoint, but you know, Connor obviously came in with a ton of hype, but you didn't know how it was going to turn out. And a lot of people thought, oh, he was going to get exposed this time and that time and that time.

So it's hard to predict these things. Also, not all stars are the same. You mentioned us talking about Alex, but even more than that, GC brought up a great one that I really don't think about all the time. Charles Oliveira. It could be some guy who's 500 right now in the UFC, and all of a sudden they become a star overnight.

There is no way to predict this is what I've ultimately concluded. You can certainly hedge your bets. You can certainly go with somebody like a proches, like these guys that have undefeated records or very low losses and are on meteoric runs but sometimes they just come out of nowhere sometimes it's just Alex Perra comes out of kickboxing and is chasing down Israel Adesanya it's random it is and it's it's it's very hard to do Jordan happy Wednesday gang

can you guys rank these in order of likelihood to happen? One, Ariel genuinely saying, do you know who I am to get out of some sort of jam? Two, P.T. to go a week without an alcoholic beverage. Three, Frank to show his face on screen. Four, G.C. to lose to someone on the Averon bike. Or five, Rick to go a month without contracting some sort of illness. Psst off.

All right, I am not losing on the Averon bike, so that's five. Rick will be sick. Tomorrow. Not even monthly, so that's one. All right, now we just gotta fill in the sandwich here. Franco is never gonna show his face. Frank not showing face is number one.

Wait, we're ranking them in order of which way? I don't know. Most likely to least likely? One is most likely, five is least likely? Or do we wanna go like that? Yeah, PT to go weak at the beverage. Ah! Now how many on St. Patty's?

None, zero. Because you were on the show or? Because he had to work late that night, he wasn't able to squeeze in. He was out in the garden and then he had to work. No, zero. Because you were on the show or? Because he had to work late that night, he wasn't able to score. He was out in the garden and then he had to work. I haven't drank since last Tuesday, was. Oh, eight days. You already made it a week.

I already did it. Congratulations, man. No wonder you looked so ill the other day. The real question was, when does Ariel do the, do you know who I am? Like, have you ever done that? No, I have not. If he did, would he cop to it right now

and just be like, yeah. I guess not. Not a great look. I did it that one time, I got pulled over. It's not a great look. That one time I T-boned the teenage driver and tried to put it on me, I said. No, but I did call the cops and the guy's like,

oh, I know who you are. I was like, oh, thanks. Thanks for saving me on that one. Didn't really help me. That's different me in any way, shape or form. It made me feel good in the moment about myself. Gabe, hey Ariel and crew, thanks for keeping it one hundy. That interview with Leon Edwards was a master class. Your harmonious rapport with him is tangible.

He can be a tough cookie in interviews, but the energy and connection you bring makes it an awesome atmosphere. We always get the best of Rocky on the A.H.O. Bravo, wow, thank you. Question for New York Jackman, GC has locked up a Tony Hawk boom boom Hawk Jam shirt for Iowa.

Will you rock some Slipknot gear? I didn't, is Slipknot from Iowa? Frank would know. Yeah, definitely. I have an album called Iowa. What we currently had planned was a Caitlin Clark jersey, but... I've actually been getting a lot of flack online. Everyone's been telling me to not wear the trash ass Iowa gear

and to go with Iowa State instead. Oh, so should I not wear Caitlin Clark? Should I wear Iowa State? I think you go Iowa State. I mean, you go Caitlin Clark Iowa. I'll go boom boom Huck Jam and then I'll get an Iowa State hat to rock. Okay. Cyclone? It's gonna be great. Yeah, shout out to the Cyclone. Yeah. It's gonna be great. I mean you go Caitlin Clark Iowa. I'll go boom boom hug jam and then I'll get an Iowa State hat to run. Cyclones gonna be great. Yeah, shout out to the cyclones. Yeah, it's gonna be great. We'll have all the bases covered. No, no

And what is Nick wearing? What's Nick wearing? Oh who cares? Alright, they'll be behind the camera Jordan Salaam alaikum, Ariel and team. Walaikum Salaam watching and supporting the show from Perth, Australia. Thank you. Any chance we could have an NBA section or more NBA talk during the shows? You know, people have been asking about it. I don't know. Do we have any time? Do we have any bandwidth? I also was presented with an idea of a sort of like our version of the South Beach Sessions, kind of like what I was doing on the channel before where it was these long form non-combat kind of off the beaten path interviews.

But again, so many ideas, so little time. Would be nice, maybe one day. I mean, it was fun doing the Showtime one. The trickiest part about it was it was very humbling because I realized very, very quickly that obviously the Rolodex isn't quite as deep as it is here. And there was a period there where I had like a borderline panic attack because I couldn't get a single guest.

I couldn't get any commitment. And this is why I will always, always, always adore Mike Brown. Mike Brown, the now former coach of the Sacramento Kings, someone I kind of like developed some kind of texting relationship with because he's an MMA fan. He was on, this is March of 23, he's en route to becoming the coach of the year. He revitalized the Kings. I text him, he replies to me within two, three minutes and says, sure I'm in. And he was my first guest. I mean like the coach of the year was my first guest. I was so relieved, thankful, grateful. I do have to say, I have not texted with Bill Goldberg

in almost a decade, and I texted him on Saturday, and he replied within two minutes. I couldn't believe it. It was so quick, I was like, is it possible this is a fake number, and the guy's just trolling me? But he was like, yeah, no problem, I'm in. Very few things make me happier than those moments. Adele, hey Ariel and the crew,

I've got a bunch of questions. Does Frank use an audio modifier for his voice? Reason for this is, we actually heard his real voice on one of the episodes and at first I was like, who's this? But he quickly fixed it. Also, lay off off good old Frankie I feel it's been hostile lately Frankie do you use a modifier no I don't has it been hostile no I don't think so if only he saw us no I'm just kidding all right does anyone from the group smoke I'm drinking I'm ripping cigs all day when I'm on the sauce.

GC is way too comfortable with those smokes. He is way too familiar. Look at that. We turn the alarms off or what boys? I can't do that. I cannot do that. Even that even what he just did there even this couple are gonna have to get smoked with big pizzas here in New York I was trying to get you to rip snakes all the time this right here like how do you do that how

do you do that so smooth I don't know never smoked one before I don't believe that for is it now my dad's watching cause of Bill Goldberg. Oh, sorry, sorry. Okay. Okay. All right. Sorry. No, no, never, never. I could see you at like a Kentucky Derby bar. This in a, in a sports book in Vegas, wearing a visor.

Nothing like it. GC. That'd be on the ponies on the ponies. Oh, don't, don't give me the electric ponies are the real ones. I'll bet on either, whichever one you guys want to do. Whichever one's moving. There's always a race too. The best is when you walk into a sports book in Vegas at like 11 a.m. and it's just the ponies and there's like a smattering of like six, seven dudes there. I had to go cash a ticket in person a few weeks ago on a NASCAR bet and I had to go into a sports book that had ponies at like 8 30 p.m. on a sports book and I had to uh I had to go take a ticket in person a few weeks ago on a NASCAR bet

And I had to go into a sportsbook that had ponies at like 8 30 p.m. On a Sunday And it was uh it was a sad state of affairs Anyway, he says does anyone smoke maybe some fatty boombadi after a long day listening to Ariel Why do I feel like a new crick used to smoke cigs? Thanks for everything you and the boys do. Enjoy the content very much every week. I will reveal one thing. There was a period like a year and a half or so ago. I was partaking in the the e-cigs? No, no, in the in the in the edible department. The edible department. I went with him on it. It was great.

Oh, yeah, you did go. We should have vlogged it. You should have logged it. You should have made a video. The guy that has been through 20 questions. Yes. And so what happens then and how long does it take and what does this taste like? It's like, I'm more interested in why did it stop? Like, um, you know, honestly, like there was one where, and I was always taking the same amount, but like one where I felt I felt I went to bed and also it's not

as fun when no one else is doing it with you, I feel like. So like I'm there and I felt like I was on, I was sleeping on a water bed and I felt like the whole thing going like this and I felt, and it just, it got to be a little much. Nice. It got to be a little intense.

But. Did John F. Penney when you get home every once in a while? No, but I will say, speaking of which, there is a very famous person, who I won't say their name, who's a fan of the show, who said that he named his bull Ariel Bullwani.

And so him and his friends, I thought it was, I was, You gotta name it, that's a good point. Yeah, is that what you name yours? No. I had a elongated pipe at one point in my life and it was called the Gandalf. You gotta name it. We had a bong that was just Yoda from Star Trek.

It was so cool. One of the greatest bongs of all time. Boy, I'ma change my name. I've never tried that. I've always been fascinated by the sound. The. You never ripped the bong out on me? Never. In college. It's surprising. In college never ripped the bong, have you? No, never.

In college, I was literally sitting next to kids who did it and there was something about the water and everything that felt gross to me, but I was always kind of captivated by the sound. Are there some ice in there? Oh yeah, there's not. Pizzi. Never hit one myself.

That's Yoda from Star Wars, bro. What did you say, Star Trek? Yeah, yeah, yeah. This is Star Trek. What did I say? Unless it's different in Ireland, you know. Pizzi's high right now. Yes. What did I say? Unless it's different in Ireland, you know. BT's high right now.

I mean, aren't we all? Eric, with the negativity in the comment section seemingly getting worse over time. Really? How do you differentiate constructive criticism and trolling? Not from that comment section. There is no constructive criticism. I handle it by ignoring it completely and doing exactly what I want to do. Let's have a conversation about this. Why do you think it's that and not constructive criticism? And why do you think people...

You're talking generally? Why are people more negative as opposed to... No, no, no. Why do you label it as people more negative as opposed to no no no like why do you? Why do you label it as just trolling as opposed to constructive criticism? Oh why and me you specifically? But then let me just follow up with a secondary question Which is you know obviously we all look at YouTube watch YouTube things of that nature I've never felt compelled to leave a comment, and so I'm just wondering What compels someone to do it and then if you're going to leave a comment like I think if I would leave a comment. And so I'm just wondering what compels someone to do it, and then if you're going to leave a comment,

like I think if I would leave a comment, my inclination would be to be like great stuff or whatever, as opposed to just like a McGilla of just hate or, I don't know, I'm trying to kind of like get into the mind of someone who would feel that way, but. All right, let me answer it. It's a weird one. The specific part for me.

Okay. I don't actually feel like they're that negative, to be honest. Like people saying like they disagree with my take or like he has bad takes, like even that, that's like an opinion, right? That's somebody voicing their, the same way I'll go out and be like,

I feel strongly about this. If they feel strongly against my point of view, I don't view that as necessarily negative or like, oh, this guy always has bad takes. I kind of see that as just like their stance, right? And I don't ultimately view that as negative. Where it gets negative is like personal attacks, feels like that.

I don't feel like a lot of that stuff is directed at me. Maybe I'm missing it. So I don't, I honestly don't like feel that way. People saying like, I I'm missing it. So I honestly don't feel that way. People saying I think you're an idiot for that take, I kind of accept that. That is the nature of it and I'm okay with that. Now, I would imagine you face a lot of different. I have felt a massive shift.

Yeah. And I have my theories. There's multiple theories. A, if you've been around long enough, there is always going to be some sort of sentiment as like, let's take this guy down, you know what I mean? Or like, enough of this guy. There's always gonna be that.

When you're the new kid on the block, everyone's kind of rooting for you. But even when I was new, I remember vividly the interview that I did with Forrest Griffin. And I was getting roasted. I remember going on MMAmania.com and they were killing me. And that's when I did the interview with Gina that same day. I was in my feelings and it's tough.

It's tough when you start and you're like, holy shit, why do people hate me? Why are they so mean? But then you luckily I've developed much thicker skin, but it's still, I mean, Twitter is, yesterday, what are we, I tweeted something, you know, we're tweeting things throughout the show and sometimes I'll look, okay, what did well, what didn't do well, and then like, it just so happens that the first thing I click,

the first comment is, you're the bastard son of a whore. And I'm like, this is not a really fun thing to read. You know, why do we do this to ourselves? And who is compelled to write these sorts of things? Obviously, whether you want to admit it or not, since October 7th, a lot has changed. The sentiment towards people who look like me and believe in the things that I believe in

and support the things that I support has changed dramatically. In fact, this morning I woke up to a litany of tweets breaking the news that the Jews killed JFK. And now my whole timeline is filled with that. Very fun stuff. And the best is when you follow people for a very long time and you're like, oh wow, you feel this way.

Well, that's a bummer. That makes me a little bit sad. So anyway, I don't know what I'm getting at, but. No, I think what you're getting at is like, there's a difference between like, somebody disagrees with me and is like, you're a dummy versus an unprompted, unrelated, not topical, just attack to try and. Just hate, yeah.

Hurt somebody's life, hurt their day, make them feel bad. If someone says like, I couldn't disagree with you more on your take on like, Aspernol, he needs to wait five years. This is too big of a fight. I'm like, oh, that's constructive criticism. That's just like healthy, fun sports debate. You don't want the, I don't like this fake big nose guy.

I'm going to block him. Yeah, yeah, not the greatest not the best Yeah that one Shout out to Andrew Feldman who who always pops up with this video afterwards of Ali himself saying that if you're a Muslim and you Speak this way. You're not a real Muslim and yet he he continues and make no mistake about it. That's a thousand percent him There's a very good chance of my gonna be an uncle. I doesn't even know who I am At this point, but anyway. Ultimately though, these kinds of things say a lot more about the person sending them than they do about the person that it's being sent to.

I'd like to consider that. I'd like to think so. When you are sending your negativity out. Right. Consider that point. Sucker-free topic, Canadian Saturday morning cartoons. I like this topic when you came to America for school did you discover any Canadian Saturday morning cartoons missing from the American childhood or did you learn of any American cartoons that you learn to like well when I moved

here I was 19 years old so I wasn't really watching Saturday morning cartoons anyway I bet you guys had samurai pizza cats also I assume someone as young as GC missed the Saturday morning cartoon wave GC. Are you familiar with? Saturday morning cartoons, of course. Yeah, it's the best Now I used to love Saturday morning. Is that not still a thing? Macaulay Culkin used to I don't think it's a thing because you know, the YouTube is taken over

Yeah, kids wake up and they just put on YouTube. My kids don't watch TV, they watch YouTube. Exactly. Do you remember the one where it was, I think it was Wayne Gretzky, Bo Jackson and Michael Jordan? It was called like Power Stars or something. I do remember that, yeah. And then they had the serial.

What was it, what was it? Wayne Gretzky, Bo Jackson, cartoon, pro stars. Yes. Look at that. My favorite one of all time, 1000% is Hulk Hogan's Rockin' Wrestling. That was the best. I even... It was amazing.

I loved that because it was all the characters and there was the good guys and the bad guys. McCauley Culkin had a... Oh yeah. Yeah. snap into a slim gym. McCauley Culkin, Saturday morning cartoon, he had one. I was obsessed with McCauley Culkin. I wrote him a letter. Wish Kid it was called. You know, I once wrote McCauley Culkin a series of letters and then I got a an 8x10 back and it said Mac on it just MACK and I wasn't quite sure if it was a real signature it was fake but it was still better than the cease and desist that he could have sent back that's true it was still exciting nonetheless where are we where are we a few more questions and

then we'll get to our first interview of the day can you sell me this from Ben on a subscription to the zone, which cards do they offer and which promotions boxing is hard for me to fall. And I feel like the cards are never in the same place. Well, yeah, they aren't in the same place. They're all over the place. Um, well, if you're, it depends on where you're

living, let's just, cause if you're living in, in Europe, you're getting a lot more, but if you're living in the United States, you'll get all the boxing, you'll get matchroom, you'll get, um, you'll get a Queens more, but if you're living in the United States, you'll get all the boxing, you'll get match room, you'll get um, you'll get a Queensberry, you'll get golden boy, you'll get misfits, you'll get MVP. Um, Queensberry is about to start in, in, in April, uh, you'll get BKFC.

Um, you'll get, you'll get some, you know, you'll get like Women's Champions League. But if you're in France, like they are the home of League One. Like where PSG plays and all that, they are the national broadcast home, if you will. The same in Japan. If you're in Canada, by the way, they're the home of the NFL. Like they have their own version of Sunday Ticket. It's called, I think it's called Game Pass. And they're adding more and more each and every day. That might be some foreshadowing.

Stay tuned. Thomas, following your chat with Bo this week, are there any updates with Dana fixing the rankings? I heard him talk about it recently that they were close to announcing something, but that's all I got. I heard him talk about it recently that they were close to announcing something, but, um, that's all I got. And it sounds like he was, it sounded like he was alluding to some sort of AI situation.

Galloway David, Ari on the Lads, first time question asker, about attending my first ever event in London this weekend as a gift from my girlfriend. Are there any must have items to bring with us? Not really. Why are people always asking about what they should do? They're like, just go to the event and have fun. My one rule, just go for the first fight. Enjoy it all. I'm worried about how it will be for so many hours

with no commentary, but I'm sure the crowd energy will suffice, 1,000%. Also, have you ever had your partner pick against your favorite fighters? We watched the events together every weekend. In the early days when we lived in a 500 square foot apartment, we used to watch them all together, but she didn't really pick against them. It was more like, I like this person, I like that person. And at that point I was covering, I wasn't really rooting people on. Shout out to Pizzi, the Mrs. thinks he is great crack and she loves to watch the

fight feasts and pound for pound rankings with me. Thanks guys. David from Galway. Where's Galway P.T.? Galway, it's in the west coast of Orleans, a beautiful town and really really great town. Honestly it's one of the best towns in Orleans. Love visiting there and great place. Coastal town. Fabulous. If she likes, and there. Great place. Coastal town. Fabulous. If she likes pizza and she likes, you know, the stuff we do on the boys in the back, she's

got good taste. So you can keep her even though she's not a keeper. Mikey, Ariel, have you seen the trailer for the Happy Gilmore sequel produced by Netflix? Yes. And it's very exciting. I do believe MJF is in it and other notables from the world of combat, but You know, we love Adam Sandler. I particularly loved his his new Stand-up that he came out with the special was didn't hear anything about that It seems like it's a sleeper, right? Yeah By the way, I did watch did I talk about this on air the the full Andrew Schultz? Stand-up special and it's fantastic and I

can't confirm you do cry. There's no doubt in my mind. In fact, I was watching it in bed as I'm known to do and my wife was wearing one of those like red light therapy masks. Do you guys ever see these? Oh yeah. It's kind of terrifying. It looks like a Jason mask. And so she's listening to it. And with a stand-up comedy, you could just listen to it. No problem. And then it comes to the part where the crying starts and then she's listening to it and with a stand-up comedy you could just listen to it no problem and then it comes to the part where the crying starts and then she's like are you crying because she couldn't really see what I was seeing it's a whole montage so she was turned to you with the mask on she's like are you crying yeah it was I felt like I was being a little bit

mocked see everyone makes fun of my crying I will say how do you play that how do I do you try it I said yes I am crying and if you were watching this you would be crying too you know I think the Adam Sandler special would also make you cry but yeah so bad get there my one of my favorite stand-up specials of all time is Martin Lawrence you so crazy have you guys ever seen that one yeah so good where he's wearing like the full leather outfit. He was like the fucking man back then as well. Mama gone work it out.

Mama gone work it out. He was so good. Um, okay. A couple, do we have, we don't have our next guest, do we? Okay. Keep going. Um, Ahmed, Hey Ariel, longtime listener.

First time here. Welcome. My only question is since you are from the Middle East, well, technically my time listener, first time here, welcome. My only question is since you are from the Middle East, well technically my parents are, I'm from Canada, they're from Lebanon and Egypt, how come you can't talk Arabic but you can speak French? Well I can understand, like I called my grandfather Albert, my grandfather has been playing Lotto 649 in Quebec, which is like our version of you know, the Lotto, lottery, whatever, which is like our version of, you know, the Lotto lottery, whatever you say,

where you pick the numbers. What's the version of it here in America? It's like Powerball or something. He's been playing that for as long as I've been born. Like as long as I've been alive, he's been playing Lotto 649, that's what it's called. He won $30,000 on Monday. Holy shit. Yes.

And he's like 95. And so I called him and I said, I call him Dodi. I said Dodi Mabruk. Mabruk means congratulations in Arabic. Mabruk, Mabruk, Mil Mabruk, like a thousand congratulations. And he starts speaking to me in Arabic, like just by saying that it just triggers it.

So he tells me that he's going to my parents' house and then he's going to go get the check. And we'd like to play a thing with my kids where we time how quick my conversations are with my grandfather. And they're usually on average like 12 to 15 seconds long. And it's just like, OK, bye bye. And then you'll hang up.

But I understood everything that he was saying. And so when my parents would speak Arabic to each other, I'd understand everything. And I understand Shwe. I understand Shwe. And I know some of the bad words, kissiqtakhsh the bad words and all these things. So I'm like, um, how dare you?

Um, I, I, I understand it, but I, I can't have like a full conversation, but if you speak to me in it, I will understand the majority of it. The reason why I know French is because 50% of the, uh, the school day in Quebec has to be in French by law. Um, so you can't get around it. And my mother tongue was French. I could not speak English until I got to pre-k and I went to pre-k and I didn't

speak English and they told me I had to go home and learn. And so my mom taught me like the basics and I came back two months later with just like bare minimum English. And then, of course, you grow up in an anglophone neighborhood. And, you know, you're you're you're you're able to you're around kids who are all English. And so now my accent is a lot more English. And of course, I've been here now longer than I was in Canada. So I've lost it all. But yes. And then he asks, are you proud of your

Arabic blood? I'm proud of my family's history. I'm proud of what they've been through. I'm proud of what they've endured. I'm proud of what they've overcome. I'm proud of our lineage. Yes, the food is something I'm very proud of. I adore. I'm very proud of our roots, and I got to go to Alexandria to see where my dad grew up. We never went to Beirut. It wasn't advised, but I have a lot of love and an admiration for the culture and the lineage.

And I pray that we can all live in peace and harmony. We put a pin in things. Let's go to our first guest of the day. So I've been teasing that we will have some very interesting news regarding a combat sports promotion and some streaming information pertaining to said combat sports promotion. And so without further ado,

let us say hello to an old friend, the CEO of Glory Kickboxing, the one and only, Marshall Zalaznik is here, kind enough to join us on this Wednesday afternoon. Marshall, long time. How are you? Yeah, good. Good to see you. I'm a big fan of the show. I'm pumped to be here and excited to be chatting with you. You know, before we kick into things, there's something that's always been on my mind. I don't know if we ever spoke about which was Do you remember I think it was the first UFC in Abu Dhabi, was that 110 maybe? 112. Do you remember sitting with me and a guy named Jamie Pollack,

and I remember saying to you, you remember me asking you, are you a lawyer? Because I always found your style of having a conversation, you actually would get relevant information out of people where too often there are journalists that just have their set of questions and wanna get through them, but I was always taken by your style, not to pump your tires too much right now, but I was always curious if you remembered that.

It sounds like you might. Yes, absolutely I remember it. And why it stuck with me was when I was a kid, my parents told me they thought I was going to be a lawyer because of that style So that was a great time and of course for those that may not know You were the former managing director of international at UFC UK for years You and our good friend aunt Evans did a lot of great work with the likes of Michael Bisping and Dan Hardy To you know make that region into a powerhouse that it is today.

And it's quite fitting that we're speaking to you on the week that the UFC is returning to London. Also former Chief Content Officer and very instrumental in the launch of UFC FightPass. Long, long time UFC executive and now CEO of Glory. In your second go-around, you returned about a year ago. Can I ask why, by the way? Why did you return? Yeah, it seemed, you know, there was always this feeling of unfinished business. When I left, I didn't, it was never in my mind that I would return. I had been doing the e-sports thing for

a while and then we had sold that e-sports group and as we were transitioning the company, I had an outreach from Pierre Onderon, who is the owner effectively of glory and he asked whether I'd be interested to come back and So that caused me to think I had gone to my wife. She was game for it. So Yeah, you know not often you get a second chance And so for me some of the unfinished business was I always had hoped that we would make glory into finished business was I always had hoped that we would make Glory into not only a more well-known brand but a more viable business, a more viable ecosystem for kickboxing. And so yeah, I think it was just maybe a little bit, I hate to admit it, of my ego thinking, man, we can make a run at

this. I want to take another shot and I did it. Okay, welcome back. I hope it's proving to be a great decision for you and your life and that will get us into the news because I want to ask you some subsequent questions about the news. Tell us what you're here to announce today. Yeah, so the first thing we're announcing is that we've now partnered with the zone in many regions around the world, including the US. For us, as I was saying, our ambition is to become more relevant worldwide. DeZone being the leader, frankly, of combat, of let's just say marquee combat sports events, it was a natural fit for us. We had done a smaller deal with them in France and Belgium, which was very successful. And so we ended up doing a multi-territory deal around our last heavyweight standing, which is our multi-event tournament

that kicks off in April. And so for us, there's this notion of the company you keep. And so we're excited to announce that we're going to be with the zone, that it'll be available to many people around the world. We have other distribution partners, of course, but certainly in the US, to have their support and their position is critical for us and helps to launch a new US strategy where there's other news

that we're announcing involving working with the Better Group, which as you know, is owned by Jake Paul. We just announced today that we are doing an event with that group on May 1st around F1 weekend. It'll be the Thursday. We're bringing a champ versus champ fight into the better warehouse. This really does kick off a new US strategy for us. Then you're also here to talk about Glory 100, which is coming in June, which I am excited

about as well. There's a lot of things happening, and you had said I hope it works out. I really feel like we're on a bit of an upswing and i'm excited for what this year is going to bring I love the um the reintroduction to the u.s market because it's always been one of those things where i've i've wondered why Kickboxing while you see, you know, mma popular here boxing, of course jiu-jitsu is having a moment as well Why hasn't kickboxing? Um, you know had this connection with the audience here in America? And I know that in a previous lifetime,

Glory was quite active here. Shows at the theater, shows in Chicago, shows on the West Coast. And so I do believe this event that you're talking about in May, on the 1st of May will be the first show in America since 2019. And then you partner with Dizone to have a home here.

And you know, full disclosure, I work for Dizone. So this is very exciting I think that they are the best at what they do is as far as combat streaming is concerned This is great So is this is this the beginning of like a new commitment because for a long time it seemed like you were having major shows In in Europe, of course in the Netherlands you guys are gigantic, you know with the likes of Rico, you know leading the way Is this a new commitment? Are there gonna be more events in America after this one in Miami?

For sure, this is, as you described it, is a re-entry. We do think this partnership with Better allows us to take, we have, I believe that there's a lot of awareness of what glory is generally, and that it was obviously helped by the success of Israel and Alex Pereira, and everyone's been talking about glory. But I don't know that people have really had a chance

to experience it. There's this belief I have in some way that all MMA fans are also kickboxing fans. There are always occasions in fights where you'll hear fans chant, stand them up, stand them up. The biggest UFC fighters, you know, many of the biggest UFC fighters are strikers. We've got a set of rules and quality fighters that should translate to a very knowledgeable US audience.

So we will be doing more of these events. We are bringing the events to these influencer creator communities. And so we like this strategy. We think it will help relaunch us. And we're not here to eat anyone's lunch. We're here to take our space in the combat sports landscape and really change the trajectory of the business for our fighters and the business.

And all of our efforts to stay in Europe is where our bread is butter. That's where we make the majority of our revenue. We'll put 30,000 people into an arena in the Netherlands. No other fight promotion's going to do that there. I don't care who they are. And so, but if we're gonna grow this business, we have to get out of our comfort zone

and this is our way to do it. Why do you think it has never taken off here in America? What's your theory? Well, I used to think in my first go-around You know, even though I'm much younger than I look I do remember that Sort of kickboxing on ESPN in the 80s. Yeah, you know was guys and geese with shin pads And it was point fighting and so I used to think there was like this holdover to, well, this isn't very exciting. I don't know that I believe that anymore. I think what's more true is we, at least at Gloria, and I will admit to the first two

years I was here, is we were a very reactive business. We were not planning well, we were reacting to what the market would allow. And I think we didn't do ourselves any favor by being start and stop, start and stop. But we've got a new commitment where we're going to be announcing events further out. We're going to have the chance to build talent. We're investing in the marketing and promotion, into the storytelling so that people compare about, I'm sorry, care about the fighters. So yeah, I don't have a really great answer for you because I do think the product, when you watch it, and if you listen to even UFC fighters talk

on other programs like yours, they talk about the skills and the tenaciousness of these kickboxers. And we just have to do a better job of getting people to see it and understand why these fights matter. We are the top promotion in the world and if you're the champion in glory, it means something. And it means something in the fight community.

Now we just need to make sure the fight fans understand the importance of that. Part of the pun, you are the last one standing as far as kickboxing promotions are concerned. you are the UFC of kickboxing for those that may not know and so to be clear this first event Glory 99 April 5th in the Netherlands the first event of this last heavyweight standing tournament which will feature 32 heavyweights 16 fights on that first show all leading up to a one-night tournament I do believe where there'll be the eight fighters left. Will it be and and there's the poster right there? I love the poster

It's great Will all these shows be on the zone and will they be behind the pay-per-view paywall or are they just a part of the subscription? Yeah, so they will all be on the zone. We're working with the zone now on pricing and availability with the zone now on pricing and availability. There will not be a need to subscribe in order to be able to see. So if that becomes through a transaction or some other means of watching. So there won't be that sort of barrier to it.

And for sure, they'll all be on the zone in the DZONE markets. It's funny, I know that you've, you don't necessarily love tournaments. I think I remember seeing one of your programs where you spoke about it. I do think this tournament is unique. These are all heavyweights, 32 of the top kickboxers in the world, all competing to get to the end of the year in an eight-man tournament where they have to fight three

times in a night. And I think this tournament format will be very easy for people to consume and understand. And we think we'll start to highlight and elevate not only the sport, but some great fighters. Just to be clear, I don't mind a tournament. I don't like the season and the standings and all that stuff. Tournament is old school. I could get behind that. I just don't like when it gets too convoluted and we try to make fight sports into team sports.

You know what I mean? Yes. So you're loving the GFL team Yes, what a fascinating time Marshall What do you what do you what do you make of the state of combat sports? Especially in this country right now with TKO and it seems like they're trying to really dominate, you know All of combat but no no word on a kickboxing You know a kickboxing pillar in their portfolio. No, not yet.

Listen, there's never been more combat available. And it's one of the challenges for a brand like ours, for a property like ours that's trying to get mindshare because there's so many opportunities to consume it. You know, the UFC is doing over 40 events. They take a lot of the oxygen out. Obviously TKO getting into boxing. You know, I've been a boxing fan forever, so I'm watching this very interestingly. I was looking at all of

the sanctioning bodies, and I was comparing their top tens in boxing. And I don't know if this is true, but it looked to me that maybe 30% or 40% of every one of those sanctioning bodies, top 10 by weight class, share the same fighters, which means there's a total mess about in terms of who really is the best. And so if TKO can clean that up or start to create some understanding and appreciation for these fighters,

I have a lot of friends who either work with, train, manage boxers, and it's a very frustrating industry. So if it helps, great. But for a group like ours who's trying to gain awareness and gain interest, it creates a lot of headwinds. And it's so different from, you know, 2016 when I joined the UFC and, you know, they had this sort of spectacle or sport notion to it.

And it was drawing a lot of interest from fans just who were curious about it and Obviously it had amazing stickiness. So yeah, there's a lot of challenges for these promotions and The good news I think is for fighters There's plenty of opportunity and for groups like ours who look to only sign the best I think it creates a chance for us to secure talent that is getting experience in places outside of say glory or UFC so that those fighters become available to us. You made a really great point earlier because it feels like we talk about glory a lot these days whether it's about Alex Perra or it's

about Israel Desenia or it's about Cedric Doumbay. How do you get you know and they become super popular once they leave, the trick needs to be get them popular, you know, get the world to know about them once they're under your umbrella. How do you make that happen? Yeah, you know, when I was coming back, you know, the there's, you know, is it, you know, there's always this discussion and, and fight promotion, if you will, you know, you've got to get people to care about the fighters, no, you need the right matchup. No, you need the right platform. And so the discussion has been, boy, we had Alex here.

We had Dume Bay here. Now, COVID played a role in that. There was Ada Sonja was here. And I think what the reality of all that is is you need all of those things to line up. And of course, our goal is to hold on to the talent, make them big, and give them the shine that they deserve. But for us to see the success of Israel and Alex

and Doumbay and see the shine they get, you know, it's something that you can be proud of, but I'd be lying to say we want them to stay here. We want to give them a platform that they don't want to leave, that we can pay them and be competitive with every other promotion, which I think we can when the negotiations happen. But yeah, it's a certainly gives us confidence and hope that we can do it because those fighters have the skill,

and there are fighters sitting within our rankings now that are some of the most dominant in the world, and it's our job to get them elevated get people to care and Make sure they want to stay with us Rico Verhoeven your heavyweight champion in my opinion the face of your promotion for many many years the the king of Glory in the heavyweight division is going to join us in a matter of seconds But I do want to ask you I threw out the idea of Rico versus Francis and Ghanu I feel like that would be a tremendous Francis has gotten nothing I heard there was some chatter.

Is there anything you could tell us about this? Yeah, well, it all sort of, you know, germinated from your show maybe six weeks ago. Thank you. And yeah, no, definitely you get credit for that. And so there were conversations. There were conversations at the PFL level. There have been, you know, Rico's all in.

Francis seems to be interested in it. There are still conversations happening. We think it would be an amazing event. It is curious that Francis doesn't have anything that has been publicly disclosed yet. You know, the thing with fighters, as we all know, is you've got to stay active to stay in the mind's eye, and we're going to do everything we can

to try to make a fight like that happen and you know you can ask Rico but you know Rico is game and Rico deserves the chance to call his shot he's done so much for our support so much for glory and and you know we're happy to call him a member of our family and we'll do everything we can to support him we will not stand in the way of trying to make a fight like that happen. I love it and I really do love this Dzone support him. We will not stand in the way of trying to make a fight like that happen. I love it. And I really do love this Dzone deal.

It's been a little tough these days to know, okay, where are the glory events happening? The great Alan Murphy, who does tremendous work for you guys on a PR level is always letting us know. But I think for the casual fan, it's a little tricky. So now we know here in America, in the Netherlands and other regions around the world, you can go to Dazon to watch Glory 99, Glory 100 coming up and all the big events.

Great to have you on Marshall. Thank you very much for the time. Congratulations. And we look forward to our next chat. Good luck to you and the team. There he is, the CEO of Glory, Marshall Zalaznik. And in a matter of moments, we're gonna be joined by the great Rico Verhoeven.

I can tell you also that Glory Miami, this event that is taking place with the Better Group, F1 Weekend is actually going to air on YouTube. They're going to try to make it into an event of sorts with celebrities and influencers in attendance. So that is going to air on YouTube on the 1st of May. Glory 99 is on April 5th and we've got Glory 100 coming up. Now let us speak to the face of Glory, the king of the heavyweight division, dare I say, the most successful and decorated heavyweight in all of combat sports. If you talk about the last decade or so, the man is undefeated. We're speaking to the great Rico Verhoeven right now. There he is. Hello Rico, how are you? Thank you, Ariel. What an introduction. Always, my friend. Always. Great to have you on. Great

to talk to you as always. So, some exciting news from Marshall that Glory 99 and subsequent glory events here in America will air on Dizone. I love this. And we were talking about Glory 99 and we saw the 32 men last heavyweight standing. Conspicuous by his absence is you. It's a heavyweight tournament, but you're not a part of it. Why? No. Well, I did a tournament last year, so yeah, I didn't really feel the need to jump in another tournament again and I thought like hey let the winner of this tournament fight for something so his journey towards winning this tournament and then when he wins the tournament he can face me for

the World Championship. So you're basically the prize at the end of the tournament? Well that's what they're gonna get of course they're gonna win a lot of money winning the tournament but then afterwards they get a shot at the champ. So my understanding is the finals of the tournament is like an eight-man one-night tournament. Will you fight that winner on that night or does he win the tournament and then at a later date fight you? Yeah, exactly. Exactly. Or else that man is going to be fighting four times in one night. Yeah, that's awful. That's awful.

OK, just want to make that clear. Let's give him a chance to win. Are you fighting before that tournament, before the winner of that that tournament is able to face you? Is there another fight on the books for you? Yes, sir. OK, tell us about it. Yes, sir. I can't tell you too much.

I got a date June 14th and I'm excited. I'm excited. We got a new opponent and what makes it exciting for me is this opponent is for me like looking in the mirror. He mirrors a lot of my own strengths, and I think this is one of the, yeah, most formidable opponents I've had in a while. So this is gonna be a handful, 100%. Okay, so June 14th is Glory 100. It would make all the sense in the world that you would headline Glory 100.

You have been the face of glory for all these years. Look at that poster right there, the king on his throne, Glory 100 on Saturday, June 14th. No mention of your opponent there and you didn't just, you didn't give us anything other than that you seem excited. Can I ask you, can I try to pry a little bit? Have you ever faced this man before? No, and I'm going to keep it at that. So I believe

that somewhere next week we're gonna announce the opponent. So if you're up for it we can do it in your show of course. Is it a big name? Is it a name that obviously kickboxing fans and non-kickboxing fans would know of? He just keeps thinking. I'm sorry, I'm sorry. 21 questions. I love that game. No, no, no, no. I know, I know. Yeah, it's an amazing name and I'm sorry, 21 questions. I love that game. No, no, no, no. I know, I know. Yeah, it's an amazing name and I'm really happy to have him as an opponent. And it takes, yeah, you need a good opponent to have an amazing fight. So, and we have one, so we're happy.

Okay. I did just ask Marshall about the Francis fight and you'll recall after Francis's last fight, we had you on and we talked about this. Sounds like it graduated from just being sort of like a thing that we talked about to an actual thing that the executives talked about. From your perspective, where does that fight sit? Yeah, most definitely. It's 100% on the radar.

And I recently saw an interview with Francis that it's also on his radar. and he's also interested in that fight. So yeah, there are a lot of talks going on and I'm excited for it because I think it's a huge challenge. And it's something new. It's something different. Something we haven't seen before. What we've seen is boxers and MMA guys versus each other. But I think we are way more aligned than the other guys. So, yeah, I'm excited for this challenge. Could I ask, like, how close to it being a reality do you think it is? Like, are we like 50 percent there, 60, 70?

How close is this? Well, we're in talks with different organizations like Marshall said, they're different people that showed interest in a fight like this. So, let's say we're halfway. Okay, I like that, that's good. I'm always very positive, so let's say we're halfway. And that's of course always the beginning

that people are interested and they want to see a fight like this and That is what's going on. So and I'm interested Francis is interested now. We just need to see like who's gonna Yeah, be the promoter for it. I love this In large part because a it's fun, it's different, it's unique. Francis doesn't have anyone to fight under the PFL banner. We've seen him do the boxing thing. My question though is what what rule set would the fight be? Would it be a kickboxing match? Would it be a boxing match? Would it be

multiple fights? What are we talking? I'm open. I'm open for whatever the promoter finds interesting. I think it's something new. And a boxing match could be really interesting because then we both go out of our way. So he's an MMA fighter and I'm a kickboxer. So we're both not boxers. We could do a kickboxing match. We could do an MMA match. So let's see. Let's see what's on the menu. Can I ask, you know, we've talked to a lot of fighters over the years. And one thing that has always stuck with me, especially when you talk about like the George St. Piers of the world, the Anderson Silvas of the world, the Demetrious Johnsons of the world.

And what I mean by those guys and why I compare them to you is they held their titles for years and years and years You know decades multiple defenses faces of their divisions and all that stuff and more and then when they would lose the belt There would always be this sense of relief because as the saying goes heavy is the head that wears the crown and then it's like, okay I don't have to worry about this anymore. I don't have to be that guy anymore Do you sense any of that, you know, undefeated since 2012, never lost in glory, you do one night tournaments, grand prix's, you're defending titles multiple times against the same guys. Do you sympathize with that? Do you think about that? Do you dream of that? Like, man, one day it's going to be nice to not have this massive bullseye

on my back? Or is that a complete change from how you actually think? No, definitely not. So I put out a little paper for myself, like, how do, what do I see for myself in the next five years? And one of those things, or actually the number one, the first thing is, I want to retire as the kickboxing world heavyweight champion. So the reigning kickboxing heavyweight world champion. So I want to win the fight. I want to retain the belt and then say, all right, guys, this is it. I'm done. So that's like the main goal for me.

And so you want to go till 40. Is that your goal? You said five years and 35 right? No yeah I turned 36 in two weeks so uh three weeks so we I think we we got time I think definitely have a handful of good fights in me but am I gonna push it till 40? I don't know. I don't know. It's always hard to say. Of course, like the heart and the spirit of a fighter is always there. But as you know, the passion for other things such as acting is so big and is so much fun

that if things are starting to pop off more and more in the acting and entertainment world, yeah, that's where I'll be drawn to more. Well, speaking of acting, we did have O'Shea Jackson Jr. on the program just a few weeks ago. I knew you were gonna say this. And he spoke about you. In case you missed it, here's what he had to say.

All right, real quick. Number one, that Vera Oven? Yeah. You just gotta relax, bro. All right, when you're on a movie, Alright real quick number one that very ocean. Yeah, he's got a relaxed bro when you're on a You're on a movie set with a bunch of fighters. All they do is like Shadow kick in my shadow box all day So like you don't want to be around one when they're bored because they'll just be like come on man. What's good?

Yeah, right. You know chill, I can't let you get close. So it's, yeah, it's real. They're just, you know, just big warriors. Rico's so cool though. I still gotta play Call of Duty with him. He's very aggressive about me playing Call of Duty with him. Okay, so there's two accusations there. You're a bully on the set and you're aggressive

in trying to get him to play Call of Duty. Your response? No. I'm not aggressive. I just, we're just having fun. We're having fun. Now it's, yeah, you know, O'Shea is also a huge fight fan just in general.

So he's always like, or he's's on a set like looking at fights or crazy videos. So of course when we don't have anything to do I'm like yo I'm just moving around like throwing low kicks like in the air or like close to hitting him or just like walking up to him hitting him from the back but not too hard of course We don't want to take out one of our lead actors, but just having fun with it. Did you enjoy the experience? Den of Thieves 2 seems to have been well received. Yeah, Den of Thieves 2, Pantera, yeah, it was huge. It was the second one of a great franchise. They actually, like I think two weeks after it came out, they announced that it's gonna be a number three.

So that's huge. That's really huge. I'm crazy excited about that. So proud to be part of the Den of Thieves family. And it was such a cool experience being surrounded with so many talented actors and people that do this for a freaking living. And I'm just, I feel so blessed to be surrounded with them

and just learn and gain experience from that. So yeah, it was so much fun. Really, really happy with that experience. We took it in the backpack and now on to the next one. On to the next. One thing that we didn't really mention because we're obviously focusing on the United States here is that this dezone deal, what's to me massive about it is it will be the home of glory in the Netherlands as well and and yeah you know glory

probably you would I think agree there's no country that enjoys glory that is that is there's more into glory kickboxing than the Netherlands 30,000 you're you're the face of it you're Dutch all that stuff and more so this is gigantic your thoughts on on the DeZone deal. Are you happy with this? The DeZone deal, I think it's amazing. I think on different sides, it's really, really interesting. So I think for DeZone itself,

now partnering up with Glory makes it really interesting because now they have a whole new market. Like the Dutch market is definitely gonna open up for them and For glory is super interesting because now we're always also on the US it's gonna be seen more because I think the zone embraced just martial arts in general so well and Everybody's on there. The big names are on there so I'm really excited and proud to be on there now as well. Well I'm excited and looking forward to the announcement

that you're fighting Francis Ngannou next week because clearly that's who you're talking about. I mean what would be better than you versus Francis at Glory 100? I mean it just writes itself but of course I'm joking. That would be really nice. That would be amazing. We will find out next week. You said next week it's going to be announced your opponent? Yes sir. Yes sir. All right. Well there you have it. Glory 100 some very big news pertaining to the world of glory kickboxing. Congrats on all the success. Looking forward to the announcement next week and we shall be talking to you very very soon. No doubt. Thank you Rico., sir. Thank you for having me, Ariel. Talk to you soon.

There he is. The great Rico Verhoeven, 65 and 10, amazingly, 35, the king of kickboxing, heavyweight world champion, Grand Prix champion, held the title for over a decade, 12 successful title defenses. And you know, Marshall brought up a great point. It is amazing. It's almost like when someone graduates from glory into the UFC, we use Glory, right?

We say, oh, this guy's a former Glory champion. Oh, he's a two-weight world champion. We say this about Alex, we say it about Israel, we say it about Cedric Doumbay, to name a few. And yet, when they're in Glory, we don't talk about them as much. And so how do they get people to be interested in these guys when they're when they're doing that thing that they're so good at before they have to graduate and and not allow them to graduate? That's going to be that's going to be a tricky thing for them. But here they are partnering up with Dizone. Love it. And here they are coming back to the US for the first time in six years. Love that as well. So let's see. Very exciting stuff in the world of combat sports. On May 3rd, so that weekend's going to be a big one. They've got that glory event. There's

obviously the Times Square card here. There's Canelo. There's Inouye. There's the UFC heading to Des Moines, Iowa. And the boys will be there and the headliner will be Davis and Figareto against our next guest at this time. We love talking to Corey and it's been a while since we spoke to Corey Sanhagen. So without further ado, let us say hello to the Sandman himself, Corey Sanhagen. Hello Corey, long time, how are you? How are you?

I'm great, yourself? I'm good, I haven't seen you in a long time. I know, I think this is your first time on the show in the new era, which is quite surprising, but you've kind of been, you know, on your social media, I noticed like you were kind of jonesing. You were you were antsy. You said finally you got your fight. Why has it been so long? August till May? What is that? That's nine months. I know. Yeah, I know. Yeah, definitely not on my end. So, I mean, me and Vicky, they

were trying to do us on that March 8th pay-per-view just for a three-round fight. Okay. And then, yeah, I think something happened on Figgy's side. I mean, not think, but yeah, something happened on Figgy's side where they just had to move the dates. So now we're going to be in Iowa on May 3rd, which I'm actually really excited about because that's where my dad's from. So I kind of used to take a lot of visits up there as a kid. And yeah, I get to go back to Iowa.

I was just going to ask you, what was your reaction when you found out the fight was happening in Iowa? Not exactly like a staple of the UFC schedule, but it sounds like this was actually something that excited you, that meant a lot to you. No, I love Iowa, man. I love the Midwest part of the US. Colorado kind of used to be pretty Midwest,

but then Denver turned into kind of a big city. But I like that feeling. It's a fun one. I like the people of Iowa. They're Iowa nice. And yeah, like I said, I spent a lot of time driving through that country, and it was like, or not country, but state.

And that was kind of like some of the most fun parts of my childhood was road tripping up to Iowa. So I'm excited. What's Iowa nice? I've never been to Iowa, so I don't know what that, I never actually heard of that. Yeah, Iowa nice is, it's just like what they call the people because the people are really nice.

Oh. Yeah, it's super Midwest, man, and like, it's cold as shit, but yeah, it's really beautiful. It's like super pretty, especially in May with everything that's cold as shit, but yeah, it's really beautiful. It's like super pretty, especially in May with everything that's gonna be growing and all the trees are pretty and stuff like that. So that's kind of fun for me. I care more about that than I do about like city stuff.

So just out of curiosity, like you said, okay, March they were talking about, but it wasn't good for Figgy. Why didn't you fight someone else? Like why were they keeping you for him? There's really no one else I feel like for me to fight right now. You know, like I could kind of fight down, but I feel like even my last fight against Umar, it was a super razor close fight. I just needed to do like a couple different things in order to win that fight. And then

I mean Umar and Marab just had her super close fight together. So I feel like they still want me knocking on the door of title contention. So yeah, I think that that's kinda why they had us wait. And then, I mean, me and Figgy's a good fight too. Figgy comes out and he tries to knock your head off and he's an experienced guy and he's a vet. And yeah, so I mean, I think it's a great fight just kinda on paper too. What did you make of his last performance? and he's a vet and and yeah so I mean I think it's a great fight just kind of on

paper too. What did you make of his last performance? I thought he did okay against Jan. I mean I think he's been fighting differently at 35 than he has at 25. Oh how so? Yeah he doesn't like really march people down the same way that he used to I think just because we're much bigger in this division compared to him so I mean especially me like my frame, it's kind of hard to like walk down this frame. So, so yeah, I mean, Figge has been fighting a little bit different.

He's been grappling a lot more with the guys in this division. And, you know, he didn't have a lot of success against Jan in the grappling department, and that was the one that he lost. So, so, yeah, I mean mean he's just kind of fighting different He's a little bit older now to not to be around the bush, but he's definitely like a older guy now And and yeah, I don't really think that he fights with the same amount of like ferocity that I feel like he used to The first thing I thought of when I when I heard about this fight was the the height difference 5'11 5'5

The first thing I thought of when I heard about this fight was the height difference, 5'11", 5'5". Top of your head, has there been a bigger discrepancy for you in your career than this? I don't know how big John Lineker was, but our picture standing next to each other was pretty hilarious. I think that he might even have been like around 5'5", too. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

You're right. What are the challenges? I mean, I feel, what do you think? Does it favor the taller guy or does it favor the shorter guy? I feel like at first glance, it would favor the shorter guy because he has more to work with.

You have to punch down. Am I wrong about this? A little bit. I mean, yeah. I mean, I'd definitely rather be me than Figge. Like Figge's, if you're gonna be shorter, better you be me than figgy, you know, like figgies if you're gonna be shorter better You'd be a wrestler and shorter, you know, but figgies not really a wrestler I mean he has good jiu-jitsu and good submissions and stuff, but he his takedowns are very one note

He doesn't really change stuff together very well. So And then taking down if you're shorter taking down really lanky long guys can just be obnoxious And then taking down, if you're shorter, taking down really lanky, long guys can just be obnoxious. A lot of wrestlers have kind of like told me that throughout the years, just being built the way that I am. Like it's just an annoying style to have to deal with. So, I mean, I think Figgy's just gonna come out there and try to like catch me, you know?

That's kind of the way that I feel like he's been fighting a lot of his fights is he's just gonna either try to catch me with a punch or a kick or catch me in the submission. And I think that time has kind of showed that that's not the winning strategy against me. So I don't really know what he's gonna do after that, probably take me down. But I mean, I don't think he's gonna have any success

doing that. And then even if he does, I'll get up. And then I think it's gonna be just me kickboxing him the whole time. Man, intense confidence is exuding out of you right now. Okay, good. I like it. I'm working on my confidence.

No, I mean, it's very blunt and it's very confident. Is this always how you are? I feel like you're a little more confident going into this fight, or is this new year, new you? Yeah, I mean, oh no. Yeah, I don't know. I guess I've had so many damn close fights I'm kind of like I don't want to be like the best at almost winning anymore and so I'm trying I know that I can hang with all of these guys I just kind of like need to make a little bit of improvements. I think a

piece of the confidence though is that I feel like I've gotten really, really good in this time off in between the Umar fight and now working with Trevor, like me and Trevor worked together three times a week in the mornings, just me and him one on one work, which is a lot and was a lot. And I really appreciate Trevor big time for putting in a lot of overtime hours for me to do that too. So I feel like with my style and just the way that I'm understanding everything,

I also kind of have a little bit of a sense of relief now just in my camps because I feel like the people that I've really have like a lot of trust in, you know, doing their jobs really well is I don't really need to like micromanage anything anymore and I'm kind of taking a little bit of a step away from being like the head of the ship and I'm kind of letting Trevor Banks and Ryan do their jobs a lot more and yeah so that's kind of like relieved me of some stress and stuff like that so yeah I mean as far as like me and my team and me just personal development stuff I feel like I'm on a really good path. And then also, you know, just kind of constantly working on myself, adding little things to myself and here and there.

So yeah, I guess I feel pretty good in life. I like that. That sentiment about like not being the guy who's close anymore, did that come after the Umar fight because it was another close one and that maybe that could have been the one to get you back into the the title fight picture? Did you say like enough of this? I'm tired of this Yeah, pretty much pretty much. I mean losing just sucks and especially When you're losing like especially after watching umar and marabh

I was like, ah man like you could definitely do it You know and I knew that I could always be champ like i'm one of those guys that kind of lives in the delusion of thinking That he can do pretty much whatever he can or wants to as long as he works hard enough at it. So I definitely have always known that I can be champ, but after kind of watching Umar and Marab and then the way that kind of O'Malley and Marab went, I just, you know, like I'm so in that mix.

I just kind of need to like have my couple of nights where I really perform and show out and I can easily be there. And it's just like right at the fingertips, you know? And I kind of feel like I'm at the beginning of my peak years and they don't last very long. So I'm trying to really get everything going in these last couple of years that I got left.

I saw in January, this was right after Marab's win over Umar, you posted something about Sean being like, come on, let's do it. And this is one that we've been talking about for so long. No one wants to see you fight for the belt again. Let's go, me and you. Was any of that ever discussed? Was that ever on the table or was that just-

No, I threw it out to him. I was like, hey guys, I really want to fight Sean. Can we please do that? And they were like, it's not going to be Sean next. And I was like, hey guys, I really want to fight Shawn Can we please do that and they were like it's not gonna be Shawn next and I was like, okay, that's that's fair I understand but um, you know me and O'Malley I think would just be a really big fight whenever it does happen I think that you know O'Malley gets a rematch He's kind of one of the UFC stars right now and O'Malley's worked really hard to do that kind of in the outside Other parts of the fighting and in the fighting too. He's had some really awesome fights too. So you know and then

Murab and him were a little it was a little bit close the vibe of that fight was that Murab was in control most of the time but it was still a fairly competitive fight so yeah I'm not gonna hate on Sean for for kind of getting his rematch or whatever but I just kind of want to fight him just because I want to fight some of the best guys in the world and Sean and Murab are kind of getting his rematch or whatever but I just kind of want to fight him just because I want to fight some of the best guys in the world and Sean and Marab are kind of the two guys in the top five that I haven't fought yet and I really want to kind of see how I do against him. Does it annoy you at all that he's getting another crack? No, I don't really waste my time being super annoyed or mad about kind of the way that I know that it works. works. But no, I mean some people have that stuff

and then some people don't. I get the luxury of always saying that I was myself and I never really cared about being famous or making a ton of money or anything in the sport. I literally just wanted to be the best in the world at fighting and say that I was that. And so, you know, I am doing things differently and, you know, whether you kind of like it or not, I really feel like my fights speak pretty well for themselves and yeah, I'm just kind of, it's really weird because when I start to be inauthentic, like my skin crawls, so I literally can't do it.

So yeah, I mean, hard to be a star, I guess, maybe like that, or maybe I'm wrong, and I don't know, I'm just gonna keep doing my thing. Man, I just love martial arts, and I love learning about it, and I love fighting, and I just wanna be the best in the world, and I just kinda keep it that simple. I think you're coming into your own.

I think people know who Corey Sandinghan is and like your vibe and like your voice and like your demeanor, and I don't think, I think that the version that you show us is a star, does have star qualities. Not everyone, you don't have to have crazy hair or tattoos or things like that to be a quote unquote star. I think there's, you have a loyal fan base that I think like it's almost like

It reminds me of being a fan of a band that maybe isn't on like the top 40 But you're like proud to be a fan of that band because it's like that means something about you if you're a fan That's what it's like being a Cory Sanhagen fan. Do you get what I'm saying? Oh, absolutely you know what that that's probably some type of reflection of kind of who I am too is because I never really liked like the super, whatever everyone liked. I was the person that was doing like a little bit

of a different version than that for whatever reason. But yeah, I'm cool with being that guy, man, just because I think that I have some super solid fans and I know that like they're cool you know like I feel like you kind of attract what you put out and I think that I got some cool fans. By the way do you think Murab beats O'Malley in the rematch? I think the likelihood is pretty high but also I mean O'Malley is good, but I think that in a Marab vs. O'Malley fight, you kind of

only, like, Sean kind of only has a puncher's chance a little bit because I mean, he's not going to win in the grappling areas. And then Sean's not really like a point guy when it comes to striking. So I mean, Marab's pressure and his conditioning and all of that stuff, I just don't really see how O'Malley is going to win other than catching him with something good, which he definitely can do, especially if you have a full another 25 minutes to try to do so. So I mean, he definitely has a chance at winning, but I wouldn't put money on it. I'd bet on Marab for that one again, but O'Malley has a puncher's chance and he gets like twice

as much time to try. So hopefully he does it and then I knock out Figueredo and then me and O'Malley has a puncher's chance and he gets like twice as much time to try. So hopefully he does it and then I knock out Figueredo and then me and O'Malley can do it for the belt. That would be perfect. I wanted to ask you about a fight that happened in your weight class recently and two parts about this fight. I'm talking about Song Yedong versus Henry Sohudo. Part one is you work with Trevor Whitman.

Trevor Whitman has been the guy who's been pushing this new glove that he has said, well it's not really that new anymore, but that he has said would, I believe it's onyx, right? That will stop eye pokes from happening. Have you tried these gloves and can you confirm that they would help dramatically decrease the amount of eye pokes?

I haven't tried the ones that would decrease that, but I'll say that, I mean, Trevor uses like top of the line materials and stuff. So, I mean, the gloves that we get from the UFC, I'm honest, I don't even like hatin' on the new gloves. I like the new gloves way better than the old ones. They're just more narrow, and in my opinion, they like fit my hand better but I kind of have

narrow hands so if you have thicker hands I understand why you wouldn't really like them but the material in them is kind of like not the greatest in the world but that's okay because you're only fighting for one night or whatever but I do think that it would be nice to get some onyx gloves with some really nice materials and some nice foam to maybe potentially stop us from breaking our hands and stuff like that. No, I haven't tried the finger poking ones, but finger pokes are pretty scary stuff. I see a fairly bad one about once a month training in the gym and stuff, and I've had my fair share of them.

I'd like to be able to get around that, but I kind of, it seems hard to do. What did you make of how that all played out? Because clearly, Sohuto got poked in the eye and there wasn't a point taken away. And then even in the aftermath, like Song was fighting like this, right? Like clearly that in itself should be viewed as a foul because your fingers are just so outstretched

right in front of his face. And then obviously the fight goes on. He tries to fight through it. He can't fight through it. They go to the scorecards. He loses. Seems like it was a bit of a raw deal for Henry Cejudo. Yeah, I suppose so.

I mean, Song fought really good in that fight. So Song was looking good in that one for sure. I mean, maybe Song, I don't think Song doesn't really give me the feeling of a guy that would maybe do that on purpose by any means. So, right. But, but yeah, I mean, I thought that Song fought really good in that fight. I think that, I don't think that Henry like wanted a way out or anything. I think that he literally just couldn't see. I know that I've, so I got, I got PRK like years ago, man, and for about a year or two years after that

PRK is like LASIK it's just eye surgery. Oh okay. For like a year or two after that dude if I even got touched in my eye it would scratch immediately and for the rest of the day I would just be on the couch like in a tremendous amount of pain like the most amount of pain I've ever been in as a fighter is when you scratch your eye Like hands down nothing else hurts more than that But uh, but I've had that happen in fights a couple times to where you kind of see double and stuff like that It happened against Marlon Marais and then it also happened against when I fought song too But it wasn't because the song poked me in the eye. It was just because I got hit and it scratched but Yeah, I mean fighting with like that type of thing really sucks so I mean I don't hate

I don't like I'm not gonna hate on Henry too much for that but I do think that a younger hungry or Henry maybe would have handled the situation differently okay fair enough I appreciate that um Omar Marab you know Omar obviously he broke his hand do you think that fight goes differently if he doesn't break his hand or did you think marab was? always gonna win that fight No, I feel like marab was always gonna win that fight. I don't really think that there was No, I mean marab is picking up a lot of steam you can kind of tell when you're watching a fight of Who's fighting better than the other person even if they win a couple rounds or lose a couple rounds or at least I feel like I sometimes can and that doesn't always

mean that they're going to win but it's like when you watch any other sport you're like whoa that team's playing good you know like even if the other team is doing some good stuff and keeping the score really close you can kind of see that on a long enough timeline what's gonna kind of happen and I feel like that's what happened in that Marab versus Umar fight. But all the credit to the both of them. It was an amazing fight. I think that Umar was dead tired going into those last two rounds and he kind of toughed out a couple of them and then Marab is just like an absolute animal and being able to

fight at that pace and then just keep composure and do his thing and in all of the rounds too. So good on the both of them. I thought it was an awesome fight but I don't think that the handbrake had a ton to do with it. I see you're revved and ready to go. I see you training with your teammates. You seem to be you know peaking. You're in high spirits. I saw you even knee one of your teammates so hard that he was throwing up blood. Are you a gym bully? What's going on here? I can be a gym bully a little bit. You know, we get better by beating each other up and that dude, that's actually one of my main training partners and guy that I

coach pretty closely. His name is Connor Owens. But Connor had a fight coming up so we were, I was not going easy on him on that day and he had beat Juice earlier that day but dude I swear to God man, I thought that like I had a moment where I thought that I had killed someone and it really scared me because after that happened that's like whatever like people get dropped by body shots they go and and puke outside, that's not a big deal. But when I looked outside and I saw just straight blood in my head, I was like, do I call the cops or do I rush him to the ambulance or rush him to the hospital right away?

And then I see that he's laughing and my brain just did not know what to do with the information. And then he was like, it's beet juice, dude. And I was like, oh my God, man, I thought that was you, you son of a bitch. I mean, I could imagine, well, how long did that last? Like a my god I thought that was you you son of a bitch that I mean I could imagine well how long did that last like a minute where you

thought that that you thought that you actually killed him that it was blood no it was like I mean he told me immediately like hey dude it's beat you so like as I'm terrifying first split second my like brain felt like ripped in half I was like I was like what's going on in reality you know but what are you reading these days I always love to to hear what you're reading and what you're you're thinking about outside of fighting Yeah, I've been I've been reading this book called saga. It's like a graphic novel novel. It's one of the more famous ones It's really good. I like it a lot, but I've been reading a lot of sci-fi stuff lately. I'm trying to write my own book

I've been kind of doing that for the last couple years actually I just kind of haven't really been talking about it because I didn't know if I was ever actually gonna finish it But it's kind of come into a place where maybe it'll get finished. But yeah, it's kind of just a sci-fi comic book I got to get it illustrated and all of that stuff so that's gonna take some time but as far as like finally getting down like the final draft which I've said a thousand times and I just keep revising it and revising it but that's almost done so that's kind of what I do with my free time now is just kind of write and write my story. Wow so a sci-fi comic book is what you're writing? Yeah it's a sci-fi comic book is what you're writing? Yeah, it's a sci-fi comic book. I really like sci-fi stuff.

I think that it's cool. And then I have a lot of interest around human nature and human psychology and how religion overlaps with that and how our beliefs and values kind of impact our perspective and change the ways that we live dramatically. So the book is, there's some like world building stuff, but it's more around the theme of, you know, religion and God. And if God could like, if we could have like a personal conversation with God and there's a way to do that,

like for everyone would everyone do it and how society would react to that. And just all of that stuff. So that's kind of what I've been writing because that's just been an interest of mine for forever. So do you consider yourself religious? I think everyone has their religion, even if they're not religious. I think I would kind of define religion as like trying to organize the unknowable things in life. And I think that everyone does that, whether that just be like setting a value to be the most important thing, like their family or making money or, or, you know, approaching whatever type of God you want to define in your head or individuation or enlightenment

or whatever you want to call it. But I think that everyone definitely has that. Even atheists have their way of organizing the world in a certain way where it's like now when we die the lights turn off so we should live in X, Y, Z way. So I think that we're all religious in our own way. But my idea of God is kind of like a sci-fi creature. So yeah, that's kind of fun, but it's like a never-ending thing for that, you know?

But yeah, it's a big-time interest of mine. I've always been super fascinated with the way that people view whatever is going on in life. So you do believe in a higher power. You say like a sci-fi creature. Do you pray? Do you talk to this creature? Oh yeah, I think that all of those things are really important. a higher power, you say like a sci-fi creature, do you pray, do you talk to this creature?

Oh yeah, I think that all of those things are really important. I definitely believe in unscientifically studied things, like I believe in energy, I believe in like, I believe in trying to like listen to your heart and listen to your intuition, although I don't think it's like this kind of gamey thing where it's just like, my God told me this, like I don't think it's like this kind of gamey thing where it's just like, my gut told me this. I don't think it's that. I think that your intuition is something that you hone and you can only hone it through deeply knowing yourself and your flaws and your awesome things about you. So I believe in like an inner person inside of all of us that is knowing more what's going on than what our brains kind of knowing more what's going on than what

our brains kind of tell us what's going on. And so I definitely think that we have a lot of that in common as people and it could be this shared idea about you know it being like this collective hive mind where we all have a little piece of God inside of us and maybe it exists somewhere else out in the world and is projected to us or maybe it doesn't but I do think that we have like an inner knower inside of us. That's pretty wise. Do you do you follow that? Intuition like when you make decisions about your life, but your career Do you check in with that person or do you lead and they kind of go along? I

Mean as much as I can, if I can, I think that there's like two pieces of that. There's like knowing what your heart says and then having the courage to do it. I don't know which one I struggle with more, to be honest, but I definitely think there's two of those. But yeah, I try, I guess. I think everyone kind of tries.

But then you have to start talking values and it's like, well, what do I value? So what am I trying to get out of life and if that's not in a good place you might start acting kind of shitty without knowing it and then so so that's pretty interesting to think about too. Do you speak to that higher power before a fight? I say a prayer that neither one of us get hurt and that both of us you know do our best and may the best man win. I don't really pray for myself to win or anything, but I kind of just want us both to leave the cage safely and for whoever's better to win. I don't ever pray for myself to win. I always want the better man to win.

Wow, really? Even if you're not the man on that day, you don't want to prevail? No, I don't. Winning the belt to me is, it's like, it doesn't matter if you actually aren't the best. So if I go in and like accidentally poke a guy in his eye and then have to like beat him up for the next 15 minutes, like that won't feel very good. I think that the point of fighting is to like reach your ultimate level of skill in something and no man I really I care a lot more about it now because I'm older you know like obviously I care about money and I care about all of these things but I kind of only care about that in like the material like realm of things where I got to kind of only care about that in like the material, like realm of things where I kind of got to like tell my brain that we're safe and stuff.

And if I collect these resources, I'll be safe. But outside that in like a higher, like more inner me, I think that there's just more important things. And one of the more important things is like that your title that you have is actually true. And that's why sports I think are so awesome is because we have an arena where we can actually say who's true and who's not true. Like who's better and who's not better.

You don't get that in all worlds. You don't get that in business. You don't get that in other things. You kind of only get that in sports. So, you know, sometimes the integrity of that gets lost a little bit but not for me yesterday we spoke to Jalen Turner it was an unbelievable conversation and you know he just retired suddenly at 29 and he talked about how I'm very much paraphrasing this he doesn't want to hurt people anymore he just doesn't want to be that

guy can you sympathize with that I ask you this because you're very introspective. You're very thoughtful and and a similar demeanor to his what you're not like alpha male Can you sympathize with that sentiment? Yeah, I mean I've been there, you know, and the way that I've gotten over it is like we're not really you know Like we're not killing each other. We're not like, you know, like if you want to go if you want to like fill the spectrum of like really mean messed up things and Fighting or like really nice things. We're not even near the really mean things, you know, so like Hurting people is Not what we're really doing.

You know, like it is and it isn't, but no, I mean, that's not really, like we're not killing each other, man. Like, I mean, the worst that probably happens is you get like a headache for a few months, you know, and over the course of a lifetime, it could be way worse. So, you know, I kind of always see my opponents like that too whenever that thought will pop in my head.

It's like, oh man, like this guy seems like a good guy. I don't really want to hurt him that bad. It's like, I just rub some dirt in it. He'll be fine. Fair enough. We've talked about the YouTube channel. What do I get if I subscribe to the OnlyFans? Same stuff. You get... Same stuff? Yeah, no. so you get courses. All of my instructionals are being sold on OnlyFans. I worked out a pretty good deal with OnlyFans, so thanks to them for having them all on their

page. But yeah, for this fight blogs though, because I literally can't stand watching myself doing a fight blog. I tried them last time and then maybe one time before this and I was like, dude, literally can't stand watching myself doing a fight blog. I tried them last time and then maybe one time before this and I was like, dude, I can't have you following me around with the camera anymore. So these fight blogs are gonna be, I tried to make them pretty funny,

which they kind of took a lot of work and we're still working on them, but those are gonna come out five weeks before the fight. So at the end of this month, hopefully, I think they're funny. They're a little bit weird, but I think that they're funny. We're gonna have some kind of office style blogs

coming out on the page. So that'll be fun. And yeah, so that'll be cool. I love that. Okay, looking forward to that. Looking forward to your return. Always enjoy these chats. Always look forward to them.

Always appreciate them. You're one of a kind You're a superstar dare. I say Corey Sanhagan So thank you as always for the time good luck in training and can't wait for it May 3rd The whole show is going out the whole crew is going out. So if you see them in the crowd feel free to wave to them All right. Let's go. Nice. Yeah, thanks for having me on Ariel. I appreciate you, man Thank you. There he is the great Corey Sanhagan joining us May 3rd headliner against Davidson figurado. I hit the thing here Frankie. Did you see that? But we got a new thing. I Hit this thing. Yeah, you couldn't even hear it, right? Well, I think I heard it, but maybe you didn't hear it

Okay, perfect Great stuff there always loved talking to Corey. What a guy. What a great fighter What a great personality and very happy that he is finally returning to action. May 3rd, UFC Des Moines. The talk of the town. Ah, my friends, I'm so excited about our last guest of the day. I have to say, you know, there I was on a Sunday morning walk.

And, you know, I rack my brain. And I say, you know, I want some fun guests, some different guests, some big guests, some unique guests. And I'm going through the Rolodex in my mind. The Rolodex, we don't have Rolodexes anymore. And I'm thinking, who can I get? Who could be fun? Who could be pertinent?

Who's a big name? Who we haven't talked to in a long time? And all of a sudden, my old friend Bill Goldberg comes to mind, just like that, out of nowhere. And so I go through and I actually sent him a DM and I'm like and he's probably not gonna see this He gets a million DMS So I unsent the DM and I'm like I think I have his number because he was on once when he was doing work With glory back in 2016. Do I just text the guy and I did and I kid you not

This is one of the most famous people on the planet One of the greatest pro wrestlers of all time one of the most beloved pro wrestlers of all time, WCW champion, WWE champion, Hall of Famer. He probably responded within three minutes. It was unbelievable. So quickly that I thought perhaps it was, you know, a new person, a new owner of that number and they were just messing with me because there's just no way that he's that nice and he responds that quickly.

And so let's find out. Is this some random guy or is it in fact the great Bill Goldberg joining us? Let us go to the screen right here and see. And there he is. The man. You know, I don't first and foremost, thank you very much, Ariel. But I'll be honest with you. I don't know how many of those boxes I actually check. I mean the boxes, the accolades and the intro for me.

So it's always an honor to be on with you. You're a very good friend of mine and that's what I do to very good friends of mine. I respond back within three minutes. You do, you really do. And I appreciate it and you're just being humble. I get it, I appreciate that as well. But you're a freaking living legend you know man. I'm the captain self-deprecator. You know that I mean the fact is is that you're only as good as your next event

you're always good as your next conversation your next day and For so many people who live in the past man. I'm I'm I'm luckier than hell. I got so many opportunities I've got so many fans, thankfully still. I guess I did something right, but you know, it's just every day's a new day, man. So it's an honor and a privilege to be on with you, brother. How you doing? Thank you, I'm doing great.

Does Bill Goldberg deal with imposter syndrome? I mean, everybody does to an extent, right? I mean, what's your definition of imposter syndrome? Okay, so imposter syndrome to me, and it's something that I think about a lot as I try to expand and do new things. It's like, am I worthy of this? Should I be here? Why am I here? Should be someone else here? Am I good enough? Am I qualified enough? And with you, like, I don't believe you're doing the shtick of like, oh, I'm not a legend, I'm not this and that. There's a part of me that almost wonders, like, do you actually believe that?

There's no way, right? There's no way you believe that you are not those things. Oh, a thousand percent I do. I mean, again, you know, you never pat yourself on the back. You never rest on your laurels of yesteryear. And I mean, hey man, anybody that would say that, I'm absolutely honored and privileged. But again, man, every day is a new day and you've got to redefine yourself every day. I tell my son that, who's playing at Colorado right now, and every day

is a fricking struggle, man. And you've got to just wipe yesterday away and work on the present and the future. I'll tell you a little story. I just hired a new company to take over my social media. Yes. They do my Instagram and my Twitter, which now is X, and I actually lost Twitter like six years ago. It's a funny but not real funny story as to how I lost it, but they got it back and like, I mean,

people have been trying to get it back for years and they got it back while I was on the phone with them in about a 15 to 20 minute period of time. And it's funny because anybody who follows me on social media knows that I don't usually, first and foremost, I do my accounts myself, or I did up until 10 days ago. And I did that basically so that everybody would understand

that it was actually me and that I cared and that I took the time to respond to the people that have put me in the place that I'm in right now. Well, some places. But the fact is is that you've seen wrestling reemerge itself on my social media. Yeah. And there is a time and a place for everything. And the fact is, after watching the things that through analytics,

this company has deemed worthy of being on my social media to drive traffic, you know, I did some pretty, I did some pretty freaking cool stuff stuff. I'm pretty amazed at some of the physical feats that I was able to accomplish and the feat of actually becoming a professional wrestler after a very short NFL career. So man, every day is awesome. I'm sitting here on 200 acres. As I said, my son plays for Colorado. I'm about to smash somebody for the final time hopefully in 2025 in the wrestling ring and most likely hang my boots up 99%. It can always be worse, man. It really can. I am truly the self-deprecator because the second that you start believing your own shit, other people's accolades that pump you up every single day, that's the day that you don't progress.

And so I fell short of the NFL. If you listen to 90% of the people in the wrestling business and or that are fans of wrestling, not 90%, maybe 78%. You know, I was nothing in the ring. I, you know, they don't credit me for starting the probably the most replicated finishing move in wrestling now. So you know, 90 90% of the time I buy into it and I self deprecate and it just makes me work harder. That's all in a very long answer to your question.

No, no, no, I love that. I actually have like eight follow-ups from just that answer alone. Could I just ask, you refer to those people, the detractors, if you will. Do you pay attention to them? Do they get to you? The revisionist historians?

Not at all, because I mean, everybody, everyone is a human, cares about what people think, but you have to care to a certain level, number one, and you have to care about what they think and how they express their thoughts towards you. And if it's negative, you have to learn to turn it into a positive. So all it is, is fuel for me. I'm not afraid of hard work. I'm not afraid of going out there and being better than I was yesterday, like I said. And, you know, if these people don't deem me worthy of being in the position that I am and being Goldberg and, you know, attaining some of the goals that I've attained, then I'm going to show them by the next thing that I do. So it's a blessing and it's a curse. And I've said this many times. And I try to teach a lot of athletes coming up, but most importantly, I try to teach my son that it's a very good

thing to be extremely hard on yourself, but it's also a very bad thing, right? Because you have to step back every once in a while and really look at your accomplishments and understand that all the hard work has paid off and it's gotten me to a place that I never would have dreamed that I would have been at. I love how much you talk about your son, about your family, about your wife. Like you could tell how much you adore them.

And you know, your son, as you mentioned, Gage, University of Colorado, and starting to look like he's got the neck. He's got, like, it looks like the photos that we see of you, there you are with him, and you can see how proud you are of him. And I'm lucky enough to have three children myself, and my older boys, 12 and 11, are starting, I can see when they play sports,

they're starting to look like me and act like me. And when they're five or six, you don't remember what you were like at five or six, so it's hard to say, like, oh, I was this way. And so now that you're seeing him get to be this amazing athlete playing the sport that you adored so much, can you even describe what that feeling is like? A thousand percent. You know, I had a bad day at practice yesterday or something or one day this week and you know,

he gets down on himself. And like I said, you know, that's a blessing and it's a curse. Getting down on yourself makes you work harder, but getting down on yourself can grind you down to a point where, you know, it's hard to pull out. There's a lot of me in him. And I try to live vicariously through him when he's on the football field. And the struggles that he's going through right now are struggles that I went through, man. My brother went through. My brother played at the Raiders

for a very short period of time. And every time he heard a knock on the door, he hid under the bed so they couldn't cut it. Because he figured if they can't find him, they can't get rid of him, right? So again, you have to think less of yourself so that tomorrow you can be a better you. That's just how we work, man. It's part of being Jewish, you know that. Yes, yes, absolutely. So is self-deprecating.

And so there we were in Atlanta in October. It's bad blood, and they come to to town and there's Gunther and there he is addressing you and your son is by your side and he's taking some shots and you jump over the guardrail and there's a thing there with security and we presume here are some of the images, Triple H, Paul Avak is in the ring as well, we presume like we are building towards something. This is pro wrestling 101. Although nothing ever happened in the aftermath. Why?

Yeah, you know, there's probably a reason for that. I'm a WCW guy, man. They want to accentuate the John Cena tour and all that kind of stuff. If anything ever happens, you know, I'll pop out of midair and do my thing, wipe my hands clean of it and leave. And they'll be, they'll be done with me. So there's a lot of truth to that, but, um, Hey, what do you mean? What do you mean?

What are you trying to say here? You lost me there for a moment. Come on, man. I'll always be a WCW guy. Still, you still believe that. Look at how, look at how they treated Sting. But you, you were there longer than Sting was. That was like a cup of coffee.

No, well, you mean a WWE. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, because I was talking to Booker T the other day, and if you don't get into the wrestling business wanting to be a part of the pinnacle of the wrestling business, which is WrestleMania and pay-per-views as they used to be a part of the pinnacle of the wrestling business, which is, which is WrestleMania and, you know, pay-per-views as they used to be called, then you're crazy, right? And so I had goals to attain at the WWE.

But the reality is, when we were going head to head, we were kicking their ass, they were kicking our ass. It was back and forth, like a big heavyweight fight. And I'm a football player inn Aitley man and they were the enemy right and and I I still believe at the bottom of my heart at the end of the day it's still kind of it's still kind of that way a little bit. So how did that all come about? What?

You know the the whole thing with you and Gunther they call you up they say we do this, we have a plan. It surely wasn't just like that one-off. No, because I had expressed a number of times that I wanted another match after Roman. Yep. That Vince had promised me another match because not too many people know this, but I took the Roman match with like a month prior notice and I had COVID. And, you know, that's not the way to go out.

It's surely not the way to go out. And surely not the way to go out in Saudi Arabia where so many of my fans couldn't be there live to watch the finale, right? So I always in the bottom of my heart, in my heart, wanted to go out and present myself a little bit more positively than I was able to. I'm the mild understatement guy, but yeah.

I mean, Paul and I spoke and we came to an agreement that in 2025 I'd have my retirement match. Don't know what it is, don't know who it's against, but you know, they planted a little seed like they always do and don't think that there may not be a swerve here and there, but I mean, it's professional wrestling. I mean, it is what it is. It's not what you see is what you get. And if anyone knows that, it's you. Do you like the idea of the retirement match being against Gunther? If it was, then I mean, I guess I could look at it.

Like I'm kind of passing the torch. You know, he's a young talent comparatively. Well, everyone's young comparatively, but he's the new part of the new generation and they need to be lifted up. I think if that were the case, that if it was Gunther and I, that it would be logical. There's some heat there, obviously, that's already been placed.

He's the new generation. I'm the old generation. It's kind of like a passing of the torch in a way. I wouldn't turn that one down by any stretch of imagination because you don't ever open your mouth in front of my wife and my son negatively about me. That guy that you see over my shoulder, one of my shoulders, I just got off another podcast and I'm looking at that guy.

There's not really much difference between me and that dude up there and that was that was almost 20 years ago. Wow. Right. One of the dreams of my life was to have an automotive car show, automotive series, right? Episodic automotive content and I was lucky enough that was the first one that I did. That was the first one that I did. And I'm looking back and the truth is that I'm 58 years old, man. Certain things are a lot harder than they used to be. I might be the only one in the world

that has a 3000 square foot gym on top of this garage and doesn't have a mirror in it, right? Cause I don't wanna not be that guy for the rest of my life. But I'm always going to be that guy. And whether I'm on the football field, whether I'm in the wrestling ring, whether I'm doing my car show, whether I'm at a glory event or a UFC event or a one championship event, I'm always that guy. And if I'm gonna have to do this retirement match in 2025, I need to reacquaint myself with that guy more often. So I'm always gonna be that guy, man. And I cannot wait to present him at 58 years old.

If you had the pencil, if you can, you know, lay it out for yourself, who's the match against, Where is it? When is it? The retirement match? I never got a chance to get my hand around Cena's throat. That might have been cool. There's a lot of people that I would have loved to have faced back in the day, but the fact is that you look at what does that do for the business now. And a lot of people that don't even remember me that watch wrestling right now. And a lot of people obviously don't know me because they speak negatively of me. And I think that I was an innovator of sorts.

So, you know, there's a plethora. I mean, I'd love to have a rematch with Roman. So there's a plethora. I mean, I'd love to have a rematch with Roman. There's so many guys that are so talented and on the cusp of stardom, if not there yet, that are possibilities brawn breaker. I mean, hell, think about it. It's a logical solution.

But it's all in how the powers that be want to make it happen. Dana White's the biggest example. Vince used to be the biggest example. Now it's Triple H. So we'll figure it out and hopefully, at the end of the day, I'm able to present myself in a positive manner

to where the people of today who don't remember me will sure as frick remember me after they see me my last time. And it won't be in a negative way. Physically, you know, hopefully physically understanding that yeah, I do have a couple limitations, but. Is that in stone? Like, is this a guarantee that it's happening in 25? Yes.

Okay. Time frame? Don't have any idea. I just know that I got stem cells. What's today? Wednesday? I got stem cells five weeks and six days ago, and Okay, I got stem cells five weeks and six days ago, and I'm cleared physically in a very short period of time. And I haven't been able to do much at all preparation wise, but I think that the positives of the stem cell treatment were such a positive that it was worth me staying out of the gym for the longest period of time I ever had in my entire life.

And staying away from physical activity. I'm going to jump in the ring and start sparring, you know, seven to eight days from now. I got to be smart about it. But, you know, yeah, 2025, man, it's gonna happen. And I don't know who it's gonna be against. I don't know when it's gonna be, but I guarantee you whoever it's against, they're gonna understand what it's like being in there with Goldberg. And Goldberg 58, Goldberg 28,

well, I probably wasn't in the business at that time. But, you know, it's gonna be fun, I hope. We'll see. There seemed to have been this narrative that the Saudis loved you and that they demanded you be on those cards. A, was that true? Was that a thing?

And B, does that mean that the retirement match is going to be in Saudi Arabia? I wouldn't think that it would be, again, because of one of the reasons why I was displeasured with the way I went out, right? I went out in Saudi, and I went out, you know, Roman in the short period of time, and I was sick, but I'd love to do it here in the States. I gotta do it stateside. I have to. About the Saudis adoring me or whatever it may be. I'm appreciative of any positive response anywhere I go. And as a Jewish person, I must tell you that I had reservations about going to Saudi because, you know, the first time we went was years ago and it was a different landscape than it is now.

And I'll tell you what, I was so pleasantly surprised. I was flabbergasted that, man, they were so welcoming. And it was one of the best receptions I've gotten anywhere. And I'm so appreciative of that. And it shows you can't judge a book by its cover. You can't have predisposed opinions about things without actually knowing what the hell you're talking about. And experiencing it yourself in real time is what it's all about. It's not about asking somebody about their experience. So I had the same experience,

by the way, I had the same feelings. And then I went there last March and felt the same type of warm reception. Can I ask you, I was thinking about this last night, can someone named Goldberg, get into wrestling in 2025 and be liked and be successful and be the fan favorite that you were? Absolutely, I wrestled in Alabama, the place where you would think Alabama, deep South Louisiana, a lot of places where people like us

probably weren't as welcomed as they are these days. But at the end of the day, they didn't care what my name was. It did not matter. That's why I kept the name Goldberg. Well, that's one of the reasons why I kept the name Goldberg. But because it wouldn't matter as long as I was able to perform something that they had never seen before. As long as I could do something that made them sit on the edge of their seat, not knowing whether I was going to rip a guy's face off or whether I was going to catch on fire in the sparks. They didn't know what I was going to do. And that's the only thing I've ever really emulated, really copied on somebody, is the feeling that Mike Tyson gave people once they were sitting down with that popcorn, eyes freaking glued on that television,

and they wouldn't move for a second because they didn't know what was gonna happen. And you kept them on the edge of their seat. You know, Hogan taught me a lot about that, and I just believed that if you're gonna do anything, you...there's no reason to be like anybody else. And I wasn't like anybody else. And the people didn't care what my name was. It didn't matter. I just did stuff that people had never seen before.

And I got them excited about it. And I drew, and I was able to draw that line again between fiction and reality. That Roman match that you speak of in Saudi was in 22. Why nothing in 23, obviously 24 came and went, here we are 25, why that break in between? If it seemed to have not sat so well with you, why not one immediately after?

What am I gonna pick up the phone and beg someone to give me a retirement match? I don't do that. You're freaking Bill Goldberg. I don't do that, man. I'm Bill Goldberg, but I lead my life in a very different way. I'm very simplistic, and I don't beg for shit.

I'm never gonna do that. I never have, and I never will. And I was lucky enough one day to be on my tractor here on the property, cutting the grass, and I get a phone call from Hunter, right? Mr. Levesque. And I was astonished. I hung up the first time because I didn't know who it was. And once we had the conversation, I was extremely appreciative and honored that he would think of me. And it was an interview that I did that he said that he saw that I thought I was owed a retirement match.

And if I would still be up for that, and maybe let's talk. And again, it's a testament to, I guess, something that I did in the past because I deserved that kind of respect. We all know it's a business decision at the end of the day. To what degree? Nobody really knows. But I do believe that he was speaking from the heart

and he thought that, you know, if that's something that I really wanted, then I deserved it. And so, like I said, it took him that long to call me. I wasn't gonna pick up the phone, man. I wasn't gonna do it. I don't work like that. If I had to go down like I went down in Saudi,

then so be it. Because people's perception of me doesn't define who I am. And my perception of myself, sometimes though extremely critical, I got to step back. And I got to applaud some of the things that I did, because some of them were kind of cool. And I'm still doing cool stuff. I'm extremely lucky.

I got a show coming out on Paramount Plus called Carlectables. It's again about my passion. It's automotive. It's fun. It's friends of mine. I got to fly around in helicopters. I'm sitting in my garage right now. My neighbor landed right in my freaking driveway and picked me up.

We went to Houston and drove the fastest car in the world. What kind of cool shit is that? I mean, it was unbelievable. So I'm living the dream, man. It's tough. Like I tell my son every day to get up and to have the energy to try to make yourself better than you were the day before. And that's all my intent is now, whether I'm a better father, whether I'm a better husband, or I'm a better fisherman, or I'm a better hunter,

or I'm a better car guy, whatever it is, man. I mean, life's spinning your wheels and being like a hamster ain't for me. I mean, I'm not a, I ain't a Tesla guy. You know what that means. Sorry if you drive a Tesla. No, no, I do not. I do not.

I've heard you talk about your relationship with Hunter like way back in the day when you first came. Would that conversation suggest that you guys are on good terms? Yeah, man, you know, we were different people back then, I believe, number one. Number two, yeah, we all grow up and he's a consummate business man now. He's

segued into the role, you know, with a tremendous amount of success. And I'd like to think, as I said, I now have an 18 year old son coming up on my 20th year anniversary with my beautiful wife. And man, I've grown up a little bit. And my dad always taught me that, you know, one of the best things in life to live by is the path of least resistance. Right. So take that and define that however you may. But, you know, it's a simple yes or no question. And I, it's, for me, it's always based on my ability to replicate something that I did to make people excited about what I did in the past. Right. And physically, you know, at 58 years old, that that's a, that's a high mountain to climb. Number one.

And number two, it's not like I haven't had injuries that have been debilitating over the years But since my son has left I keep referring to gauge but I you know, I just love him to death. Yeah Since he left I lived in the place that I live right now for six years. Okay They know me as Goldberg, but they also know me as gauges dad and Wanda's husband but they haven't really seen Goldberg. They really haven't. And I'd say the last couple days, couple weeks, couple months that I know that I have to get myself in that mindset and bring that Godzilla dude back, these people around here are learning who I am, especially the guy that was parked on my grass in front of our high fence yesterday.

It is Tesla, by the way, feeding our animals and thought that number one, it was respectable to park on someone's grass and number two, to feed their animals. I mean, I got to be me again. These people are kind of finding out who me used to be. And I'm kind of liking it. I enjoy it. It's a high test lifestyle. It's a high test life. I'm on the edge all the time, but man, I got to...

Your producer called me a minute ago. I was working out and I've eaten since also, right? So I'm on a regiment again. I'm turning into Godzilla. And as I said, it's kind of fun. Did you ever think that we would live in a time where Vince McMahon was alive, but not running WWE? No, no, not at all.

Never. I never would have imagined that. It must have been something pretty gnarly to get him out of that role. I'm not going to get into it by any stretch. It's all an opinion and I don't give opinions. You base everything on fact and then people are judged by facts and you go on. But all I can say is Vince was always wonderful to me, other than not giving me my retirement match, but he couldn't because he wasn't part of the organization anymore. So up until then, I mean, you've got your guys,

you got your Vince guys and you got your guys who weren't Vince guys. And I like to think that I was a Vince guy and you treat people how you wanna be treated. And he always treated me with respect, I believe. And so I tried to show him the same. And so if you're ever gonna try to get some kind of bad news for me about Vince and that situation,

I can't give it, man, you know. But no, I never thought there would be a day that I'd be alive or he'd be alive if he wasn't leading the church. That wasn't what I was getting at. I really do think I agree with you that Paul has done a tremendous job as the Chief Content Officer, whatever you want to call him. And his latest masterpiece, I think, is this John Cena heel turn.

Dying to know your take on it. We've only just begun, there was the turn, and then there was the thing on Monday. I'm not sure how much of it you pay attention to, but your thoughts on John Cena turning heel finally. Last time I watched it was when I was on. Okay. Not even a clip, not even something, uh, you know, being sent to you. I'll see if it pops up on social media and you know, you hear stuff. And the fact is, is that I think Cena's turn is most comparable to Hogan turning.

Yep. Right? Yep. I could have done the same thing, but I refused to. Now that was when I didn't know the business, but to me, it meant more for the Make-A-Wish kid that's in my dressing room the night that I'm wrestling Hacksaw Jim Duggan and he's coming back from some kind of surgery. And I would turn heel that night and they wanted me to do the thing. And for the business, it would have been freaking unparalleled, right? It would have been like what these guys are doing with Cena, I believe.

Because I was the make-a-wish dude. Before Cena was doing his thing at WWE, that was kind of me at WCW. And I was the antithesis of what people thought out of the ring, or I could be at least. I'll rip your face off, but then when I get out of the ring, you give me your baby and I'll hold up and smile and give them a moment of their lifetime if that's what they like. So I think Cena's turn is freaking fabulous, no question about it. I don't know how it's all transpired week after week, but I know how it happened and bravo to all of them and bravo to what John's smart enough to understand how monumental it would be. At the time

when they wanted me to do it, I wasn't smart enough. But as I said, it meant more to me for one little girl to have a smile on her face than for me to come back and she's fricking in tears, which is what happened. So, I don't know, call me a, I'm a mush for kids, man. There was that, I think like a two month period in 2000

where I think it was Bischoff and Russo that got you to turn with, I mean, they were desperate at that point for something and then they quickly pulled the plug. Do you regret not ever, because really other than that, you were never a heel, nothing close to a heel. Do you regret never having that run

where you were a total bad guy? Well, the heel, being a heel gives you the ability to get your ass kicked and not be that superhuman guy, right? Mm-hmm. You know, so there were a number of negatives to my character, and that was one of them, is that in that respect, it was one-dimensional. And so, you know, you can only be that good guy

for so long, that's my opinion on it. Okay. Did you ever pitch it later on? No, no, no. I had such a bad experience with it when it happened. I didn't want to go back to it. And I didn't understand the business enough and, you know, honestly care about the business enough at that time, in retrospect, to, and nobody really asked me to do it, either, again, it was never really an option.

I think I would have said yes, wholeheartedly, but I don't think it ever really came up again. Do you have any regrets when you think about that period? Not the heel period, but just like the totality of your career as your rounding third here? Oh yeah, I wish I would have picked up the sledgehammer walking out the door at WCW to smash the limousine instead of using my hand. I wish I would have let Jericho have a program with me before I did. I wish I would have done a lot of things differently,

but again, nobody's perfect and you live your life and live with the trials and tribulations and try to be a better person and learn from them all. And yeah, man, I would have changed a lot. There's no question about it. But we did a benefit the other night on Buff Bagwell's YouTube channel and at the end of it, Dallas Page and Sting and I were on. And it was funny because Dallas was talking about a match or the match that he and I had at

Halloween Havoc and it went over and famously it went over the television time or the pay-per-view time. I don't know which, yeah, the pay-per-view time. And so people had to see it on Monday night or something, I can't remember exactly what the stuff was. But, and I made the joke that Dallas came to me with 14 pages of a match. And I think he wanted me to spear him seven times.

And prior to that, I'd only speared one, I'd only speared anybody one time. And Sting, Bing Sting said, you know what Bill? I think that was the best, one of the best matches and best decisions of your life. And you can look at it myopically, or you can look at it in its totality, right? Business-wise, I should have made more of those decisions. And I shouldn't have been so protective of my character. A lot of people say you're a mark for yourself, right? Well, I was a mark for myself.

You know why? Because nobody else had my back, like nobody. I came as a professional football player and I tried to take dudes jobs that had been in the sport and in this business since childhood, mentally, because that's the only thing they ever wanted to do. It meant so much to them. I took that for granted a little bit. a little bit. And, you know, so I always came in with a different mentality. But at the end of the day, if I didn't have that

different mentality, I wouldn't have been, you know, what I was. And what I was was something different. I think I was fairly successful at it. And I still haven't seen people do some of the stuff that I was able to do. There wasn't a vet in the early days who took you on under his wing that, you know, Oh, there were. Yeah, there were a number of vets that did that, but not, you know, to a degree. Right. That was Paige, man. Instrumental. Kevin Nash, instrumental. Sting. I bow to him because he taught me so much in the business. The Steiner Brothers, Kurt Henning, I mean I had the opportunity to be with so many unbelievably unique characters that knew so much about the business. But again, there's so much of the, you know, I got to take care of myself kind

of thing because nobody else is going to do it, right? And nobody else has your best interest like you do. So you have to be protective to a certain degree. I don't think you do anymore, maybe. But you know, if a veteran comes to me and wants to put a match together, and I'm on a winning streak, and he wants me to punch him 50 times and he doesn't hit the canvas Well, it's not really gonna make sense Barbarian Did a belly-to-belly suplex to me from the top turnbuckle in the corner and

I'll never forget it. I came in the back and Bischoff yelled at me and he said don't you ever do that again I'm like why I look up to Barb I'd look up to guys like that and Haku. They were staples in the business. They were men. I mean, this was not playing with boys with those guys. They demanded and deserved so much respect that I didn't question anything. Who the hell am I to question anything?

I'd only been in the business six months or I think when that happened, six weeks. But yeah, man, there were people that looked out for you, but truthfully in the end, everyone's got their own best interest at heart and Sometimes it's it's not It's not what you say. It's what you don't say I mean and i'm not saying anything negative about any of the guys that brought me up by any means I'm just saying that no, uh Uh, I think people were too involved with what they were trying to do and rightfully so in being successful as opposed to trying to teach me the ropes.

You mentioned the Steiner's, Bron Breaker incredible. He reminds me a lot of you. Do you see any of yourself in him? Bron, we've got a relationship that goes back 20 years, man, you know, almost, uh, uh, riding with his dad and, and, you know, his uncle, uh, I learned a lot in the business and that kid was growing up just like Gage did when I was, when I retired, you know, a couple of times ago at WWE and he was around and, um, you know, he's, he, we knew he was always going to be a dude, just like us following our footsteps in a certain way, whether it's in the business or another endeavor.

I mean, he and I spoke a lot when he was in college playing football. We spoke in high school when he was playing football. We spoke when he was attempting to play in the NFL. And we've spoken a number of times since he's turned into who he has at WWE. Yeah I'd say we're really close man. We don't wear it on our sleeves but people don't ask you know and you asked and so yeah we're extremely close and I see a lot of myself in him and you know if it wasn't for his respect for me and my respect for him, you know, along the way people have tried to get him to do more things that I kind of did, right? And whether it's a

phone call to me or just a no, man, he's a great kid. He's a wonderful kid. And he's got, his only limitation is his height. That's it. There ain't nothing in the world that can stop him. He's a wonderful kid. And he's got, his only limitation is his height. That's it. There ain't nothing in the world that can stop him. He can't, unless he can grow like eight inches taller, that's the only thing in the world that could stop that kid. You know, and that's, that's, that's a formidable resume right there. I mean, that kid, that kid deserves everything.

And the sky's the limit for him. And to be compared to his 4'3 in the 40 yard dash, you know, delivering that spear, man, I'll take that. Considering that also Scott's son, I believe Brock, seems to be on route to a wrestling career as well. Is it inevitable that Young Gage will at some point at least attempt to fall on your footsteps in the wrestling world? There's nothing inevitable in burial, you know that. that young Gage will at some point at least attempt to fall on your footsteps in the wrestling world.

There's nothing inevitable in burial, you know that. What the fact is is that it's hopefully always gonna be an option if he chooses to go in that direction. Would you want him to? If I was his fricking manager, yeah, because nobody could do anything to him. If you were his dad, as you are.

Like if he said to you, Pop, should I do this? You know what? Yes, I'd let him do it. If he looked me in the eye and had the conviction in his soul that that's what he was gonna put 120% of his attitude and his life towards to be the best,

I knew he could fricking do it because he could do do it because he could do anything he wants. Most people can do anything they want. They just have to put their mind to it and be willing to put the work in. And that's the problem with a lot of people now is they want shit for free and they want it to be given to them and they want respect given to them and they want this and that and you got to work for it, man. And the people that I see the walk in this earth that have learned that that's the way you should work for it, man. And the people that I see the walk in this earth that have learned that that's the way

you should live your life, they're always gonna succeed no matter what they get into. So, and, you know, another long answer, I support him in anything he does, you know, short of being like a crack dealer or something. Right. You know, but I mean, yeah. I mean, if the kid loves it, then he can do it, man. And I'm completely behind it.

I love it. Um, and you know, I read this right there. Thank you very much for putting this stuff up. It really means a lot to me. Um, this kid just did 24 reps with 225. Right on the bench. And that's like combine numbers for linebackers, not 18 year old, you know, redshirt freshman numbers.

So he has the potential to play football if that's what he wants to do. He's playing for, you know, an ex teammate of mine. And you know, Gage had, Gage, I only let him play in the ninth grade. That was the first year I let him play football. Oh wow. I got him into Muay Thai when he was five,

you know, to be able to protect himself because having the name like Goldberg on the back of your anything jersey is a target. And so I wanted him to be prepared physically, mentally, and emotionally for what he was about to embark upon. And I think he's performed admirably and he's got a hell of a long way to go. But, you know, he's 18 years old, man. I mean, give this kid time in the day, day and to go. But, you know, he's 18 years old, man. I mean, give this kid time. In the day and age of portals,

you know, when you got 20, 22 year old or 25 year old kids that are like in the, on their eighth year of eligibility, it's tough for a kid to come out of high school and make a difference on a football team, especially division one team. So it's a tough hill to climb. But again, like I said you

know if he wanted to do the wrestling thing whatever you know it wouldn't be my first choice by any stretch but I just I want him to be himself he's a very independent kid he's not following my footsteps by any means he wants to be he wants to be gauge he doesn't want to be me I always appreciated that you had a great affinity for the martial arts your style the gloves talking about MMA talking about UFC remember seeing you at the fights when Brock was fighting and obviously involved I went to the first four UFC's I think when I played when I when I was playing for the for when I was cut from the Carolina Panthers,

I was the first guy cut from the Carolina Panthers, right? And I remember during practice, we were in Charlotte, we drove to Charlotte to go to one of the fights, right? And it was right in the embryonic time of it. And I've been around that for so long, man. People just don't know what a fan I am of it. When I was able to commentate, when, when, when, what was it, Hustle One who I wrestled for, they own Pride, right? And so they would cross promote. And when I got to commentate with, with Morrow and, and Boss,

you know, Fry's fight, and I was there, Sapp's fight, and man, there, and Sapp's fight, and man, I know Barnett when he was the babyface assassin. Crow Cop asked me to go to Croatia and train with him. I told him he was freaking crazy. I'm so lucky to be alive and be able to appreciate the things that I have learned to appreciate in the martial arts world.

And I mean, I was at the Tokyo Dome in front of 100,000 people in the ring, you know, standing across from Ogawa, right, who was fighting at pride at the time. And he also wrestled kind of like Sakuraba. Yeah, I'm thinking Sahakibara. Yes. But man, I wrestled the first time I wrestled Japan was at the Budokan I am so honored. I've been such a fan of martial arts for my entire life I think it comes second to to playing football Because I took martial arts for the first time at University of Georgia To help with being a better football player and it just stuck, you know and I co-owned a Muay Thai gym in Oceanside, California. And then I got to hang out, I got to be a part of glory.

And then I got to go to Amsterdam and train with Rico. And man, Simon Marcus was a huge fan of mine growing up. And then I got to, it was in San Diego and I did part of the event there. And now I just did a promo for one, you know, championship with a big fight coming up this weekend. I saw you walk out with Liam Harrison. Dude, he had freaking Liam. He hung him up and then picked him up again.

But I'm going to see Liam. Yeah, I'm going to see him soon. He's doing a tour in the States right now, a training seminar tour, and I may see him at one in Denver in the upcoming months. It'll be a year. I'm just, again, so honored. Hell, I can't even remember, shark fights. Oh, yeah.

Me and Eric Apple. Yeah. I am so honored to know all of these people, to train with Sam Greco, to train at Core Hammer's freaking gym, Core Hammer's freaking gym in Amsterdam, to train with those guys, Boston, and those guys are going to be up in Austin in a with those guys. You know, Boston and those guys are gonna be up in Austin

in a couple of months and I'm gonna go up and say hello and you know, get my new gear from them because I'm gonna fricking need it here soon. But again, you know, you brought it up and I can talk for days about it, but my, the luck that I have had to be around so many bad-ass martial artists and know them as friends, I pulled, I pulled Fry and Coleman out of one of those bars,

I guess at two o'clock in the morning, the night before Randleman's fight where he knocked Krokof out. What? What do you mean? Yeah, nothing, you heard me. Okay, all right, all right. Someone else heard me too probably. But I'm just so lucky to know these dudes as friends of mine.

They're idols of other people and they're idols of mine too. Dan Severn, I'll never forget. Severn comes to see me in San Diego when we lived out there. And Gage was like five years old. And Gage, we're having breakfast. And the Beast, I don't know if you know it,

but where I got this at the end of my, when I'd spear a dude and jackhammer him and I stand up and do that, I got that from Dan, right? But I didn't wanna steal characters. I wanna steal parts of people to make a character. But Dan is sitting next to Gage and Dan and I are engaged in this conversation and fricking Gage is eating off of Dan's plate and

Dan doesn't see it and I'm like, oh my god, you know, Gage has no idea who this guy is. He's an idol of mine. He's one of the gnarliest dudes on the planet. I wonder what's going to happen if he catches Gage eating off of his plate and man, he was as jovial, he was as interactive and as much fun with Gage as I ever could have asked. Or ever could have wished. And again, having those relationships with the baddest dudes on the planet. Bas Rooten was the first guy to ever show me Muay Thai. Right? And I took it and I wanted him, I remember we're upstairs in the pre-production room, I guess, for that fight. I think it was when LeBanner and Fry fought. And there's a whole other story there. I got to be on your show again.

You got to be on my new show. I would love to. Can I just ask? I love everything. And by the way, I don't want to keep you much longer because you've given us way more time than we could have asked. So we'll let you go in a couple of minutes. I promise.

But could I just ask, did pride at any point post WCW before you went to WWE or post WWE that first run, the one year run, I feel like you would have been perfect for, for pride. Cause they love the pro wrestlers over there. Right. Was there ever any talk of you fighting in pride? You know, I've always kind of dabbled in the thought that I could have crossed over. Glory and I actually were closer than any promotion of me doing something like an exhibition. But, you know, I'll be honest with you, man. My abilities fall so short in what my expectation for myself would be as an outcome, you know,

in a sport like that. My injuries prevent me. It's hard for me to throw a right hand without breaking my hand or blowing my shoulder out. I'm not worried about getting hurt by other people. I'm worried about what's going to happen to my body once I connect with somebody. And I never was a wrestler, a true wrestler. And so I don't have that ground game, even though I was the co-owner of the largest MMA gym in the

freaking country back in the early 90s, right? Obaki Fight School, look it up. To do a crossover like that, I mean, I don't know, I wasn't around when the Mike Tyson money was around to make him lower to the point of getting in the ring with Jake Paul. For the amount of money he did, I don't blame him. I don't think that type of money was around or I might have really considered it. But I always have such a high expectation of myself. If I don't feel as though I'm prepared,

I'm not going to take that chance in front of national television, you know, just for the sake of money and doing it. Okay. Last thing, you mentioned one more match, you put it at 99%, I guess in the world of pro wrestling, you can never say 100%. But it seems like you want that that one match, if for whatever reason, it doesn't seem like it is you want that that one match if for whatever reason it doesn't seem like it is materializing with WWE are you willing to do it elsewhere? Obviously there's the A.W.s and I've heard you talk about talking to them and and it just not being a fit but there's you know doing your own thing you know Ric Flair did that there's promotions all over the place does it have to be? I wanted to do my own thing in Israel but but I don't I don't over the last number of years. But you know, COVID hit and then the war hit. And so it's the timing, you know, obviously someone's telling me that's not the place

to do it, right? Or maybe it is, maybe, who knows? Again, you can never say never, you can never close the door on anything. And I can't foresee the future or forecast the future. So I don't know man, I really don't. I can't honestly give you an answer. But you want one more. 100% because there's a lot of people walking the planet that have no idea who I am. And that bothers you? Well, yeah a little bit because they seem to forget who I was, right? They only base it on what they read on the internet or the choice clips that they are given.

And, you know, the fact is, if you look at my social media as of late, I did some pretty, pretty amazing things, you know, and it's extremely rare for me to give myself any kudos, but I don't see anybody else walking around with the big show for, you know, 30 seconds around the ring when he's upside down weighing 525. You know, am I wrong? No, you're not. And by the way, that team, because I have seen your stuff and I've seen what they've done over the last 10 days or so, the social media team, they're doing a great job. I enjoy what they're putting out and it's great reliving that because as you know, I was a huge fan and I haven't told you this but there was a period in the pandemic where not much was going on and I have two boys like I said and this is you know several years ago and I started to show them pro wrestling because you know, we had a lot of time at home and I didn't push them in this direction

but for some reason or another, just like many other kids, they were drawn to you. And they don't ask me about anyone or they don't pop when I tell them about anyone being on the show, but I told them last night, you know who's going to be on? Bill Goldberg. And they were like, holy crap, Bill Goldberg, that's amazing. Tell them we say hi. 12 and 11, Oliver and Walter. So you mean a lot to a lot of people. You are a legend and I'm glad you mean a lot to a lot of people. You are

a legend and I'm glad you're getting at least one more. And I'm so glad and honored that you gave us all this time here today. Really, really a pleasure and I appreciate it every second of it. Ariel, I've always been a fan of yours. You knew that the first time we met and I appreciate what you do and I appreciate the way you do it. You do it with respect for the business and yourself and And you tell your kids and you give your kids a big hug for me and tell them that they're the reason why I kept my name Goldberg and did what I did. Because I wanted to give kids like me

growing up somebody to look up to, man. And that just that warms my heart that they would think that of me. And I'm greatly appreciative because, you know, maybe through osmosis, they got it from you. Love it. Thank you, Bill. All the best to you and the family. Good luck. Hope to do it again soon. Sadikah.

There he is. The great Bill Goldberg. What a freaking legend. What a pleasure that was. Oh my gosh. I loved everything about that. And shout out to Mr. Burks, who I believe is a tuning in a big Goldberg guy, I mean, who isn't, who isn't?

Yeah. I mean, honestly, it's because of Georgia. That's, that's why I thought it was so cool today that he became a professional wrestling after his, uh, after his football career. A freaking legend, a Georgia legend, uh, you know, had that, that stint in the NFL. And then, you know, in, in anticipation of this, of this interview, I was rewatching and reliving some of his old stuff

and there was nothing like it. There was nothing like it. And he came at a time where WCW really needed a really strong baby face to combat the NWO as they were, you know, battling WWF attitude era. Here he is coming in freak were, you know, battling WWF attitude era, here he is coming in, freak athlete, going 100 miles an hour.

And yes, elephant in the room. You know I adore Bret Hart and you know that there has been a back and forth and there's been a lot of things said, but I can separate the two and have a lot of respect for Bill and have the love and admiration and respect that I have for Brett as well.

And I love those old chats and love the fact that he's getting one more. Everyone deserves the opportunity to go out on their own terms if they can. He is very clearly in the physical shape to be able to do so. So we wish him well. And I think a match against a brawn breaker

would be awesome. A passing of the torch or a Gunther. They had that, that, uh, that schmazz if you will, they had that, uh, at bad blood in Atlanta back in October. So let's see how it all pans out. Hope you enjoyed that as much as I did. Uh, let's, uh, let's answer a few more

questions and then, uh, go to the super chats and call it a day. What do you say guys? Goldberg really knows shit by the way. We gotta bring Goldberg back to that He really knows his stuff We didn't even really get into like he had that giant garage behind him housing like million dollars worth of cars Yeah, that's all nice, but I want to hear about the stories with the boys at the bar I want to hear about pulling Coleman out you're gonna you're gonna have to go deep with him on that and then we'll have him on boys in the

back and we'll just talk NASCAR for right yeah that's right yeah he's got Goldberg's garage look at that yeah he's got he's got a YouTube channel where it's all about the cars he mentioned this new show with Paramount Plus. I'm not a big, like, I appreciate what that is. I don't know what that is. Like, there are people who could tell you, like, what is that, by the way? Is he?

It looks like the frame of, like, a Dodge Challenger or something. Yeah. He's not a big fan of the Teslas. Yeah, Rick got hurt from that back here. Oh yeah, that's right. Sorry, Rick. Look, again, pending legal matters as well, like we're not going to...

I understand that, by the way. And I'm somebody who grew up like reading Motor Trend and like loved cars and still kind of love cars, but as a car guy, I would understand why you wouldn't want to... Like Tesla is more tech than automobile. It's more of a gadget person's car than it is a car guy's car, so I would completely understand that.

He's very much a car guy's. Can I tell you guys something? So there's little things that make me very happy in life, and obviously a lot of my life revolves around booking guests, as you guys know, as I've talked about. And the little things that make me truly happy is like that feeling on a Sunday morning as I'm walking around the park and I'm like, I'm going to give Bill Goldberg a text, like a shot in the dark and he'll respond in three minutes. And it's that easy.

No PR person, no nothing like that made my day. And then just like how responsive and how, and how nice is, I mean, I use the word mentor all the time. And I talk about like the, the, the, the, the intricacies of booking a guest, like, Oh, are they a WhatsApp guy? Are they a text guy? Are they DM guy? Or they go through a manager, go through a sibling, a coach, a friend, a wife, a brother.

Like there's, there's, I could go, we get, you can name any fighter on the planet and I'll give you the breakdown, but there are very, very few fighters, very few. I'll say 0.001% who will do the thing that I do when the show is over. One of the first things I do is go through the whole list of the people that came on the show and who helped get them on the show and text them, thank you, I appreciate it. There is a 0.0001% of them out there who will text me right away. The guy just texted me. the guy just texted me.

That is, that is, and to consider like who he is and what he's done. And I, and I know that doesn't define people, but like that, that, that should actually blows me away because we deal with all of them. I'm not saying the ones who don't, you know, are bad people, but it's just like a, it's like a, it's a next level.

Not to, you know, not to further the love train, but like some of that stuff he was talking about working with glory, San Diego, those events. I was the one running like PR for, for those events. And I would ask him, obviously naturally he has a name that when you're trying to make a splash in the U US market means more to US audiences and US media publications and things like that than necessarily like Orico Verhoeven, especially at that time. And I would set up these interviews and nobody was a faster response and a better pro than Bill Goldberg. Like it was true then for me, not somebody like

you who could be like I'm Ariel Hawani and I have a relationship with him. Just the PR guy for glory and he always made my life easy. He's a true one of one. Here's a pertinent question, Shy, hey Ariel, when having back to back interviews, how do you go about putting everything you just heard from one fighter to the back of your head to give your full attention to the next fighter you're talking about?

I notice you will have a fairly deep conversation with the fighter and as soon as the interview is over, the next guest comes on and you'll transition so smoothly. I don't know, I guess just doing it all these years. I don't really understand any of it really. You go into this trance. The best way I could describe it is, there's a part of me that kind of like,

hates how the sausage is made, because I always lament like the booking and all that stuff. But I don't know if I am happier as a human being than in the four or so hours, three or so hours when I'm doing the show, because I don't think about anything else. I guess it's the closest to what I've heard fighters talk about a fight, which is a lot shorter,

but like you have to have such tunnel vision. You don't think about your problems. You don't think about your appointments. You don't think about social media. You don't think about what you have to do tomorrow or tonight. You have to be so locked in and that's a gift. And you probably get that if you work out and you're able to put your phone away, or if you're able to be better about your, like, the gift of not being connected in any way, shape or form,

email, text, whatever, is an amazing gift. And so, I don't know, I just, I stay locked in and try to be ready to go. Keane, Ariel, do you think the Lakers will win the NBA title? If not, who's your pick? Ah, he said you can't say the Knicks. I will always say the Knicks. I will say if it's not going to be the Knicks, I feel like we are trending towards an OKC

versus Cleveland or OKC versus Boston final. And if I had to pick right now, I think it's going to be Cleveland. I think Cleveland is an incredible team. They're incredibly well coached. They're, I stress the word team. I felt what they did at the deadline was fantastic. The Hunter trade. And can I just say one thing?

This thing that I keep seeing from people who are like, this isn't a sexy finals, who cares about this? You should never speak about the NBA. If you are not intrigued, interested by OKC versus Cleveland. If the only thing you have to say is not big markets, OKC, Cleveland, boring, you're not excited about Shea Gilder's Alexander in his first finals if that's what we're going towards. You're not excited about Chet Holmgren. To me, OKC is must-see TV.

I don't care if they're playing the Wizards, the Magic, the Spurs, the Pelicans, OKC is must-see TV. And I'll admit, I love Shea, he's Canadian, Lou Dort, Canadian, but that team, I love Hartenstein because of what he did for the Knicks for those three or so years. You don't appreciate the Cavs, you don't appreciate Donovan Mitchell, you don't appreciate Darius Garland, Mobley, the trade for, for Hunter.

You don't appreciate what they've been able to do and how they were able to, you know, regroup after last season's disappointment. You don't appreciate the Celtics. I hate the Celtics, but I appreciate them. Like this idea that you have to be the Lakers, the Knicks, um, you know, a big market, a sexy team, get out of here with this nonsense. And I see it, I see it all the time.

I think the Thunder are incredibly entertaining. And I think the Cavs are as well. I'd be down for a OKC Cavs final. In fact, I'd prefer that because I'm tired of the Celtics and I'm just salty towards them. But yeah, I'd be down. I would love that actually. And I would, my only gripe with the Thunder

is that they were the Sonics. And I have a thing about, you know, the fans didn't do anything, they didn't steal the Sonics away, but the Sonics should have never moved, and it's near and dear to my heart. And the Sonics and the Expos aren't the same situation, but I can't imagine being a Seattle fan and thinking like,

golly, could you imagine if we had these guys? Or if we had the Durant-Westbrook-Harden 2011 finalists? It sucks. And I feel for them. So that's the only thing I don't like about the Thunder. I don't like rooting for teams that have moved. But Shea is just butter. I saw Shea against the Knicks in January and I was just blown away by how smooth he was. And I saw him

in the Olympics as well, but like seeing him against the Knicks in January, they they kicked the Knicks ass and he was just so it's so effortless for him. It's unreal how good Shea is. He's unbelievable the guy. And he's the third best player in the NBA, which is the crazy part. Like third best player. Who's who, who do you have as number one? Jokic? But, but then Shea's winning MVP. Oh yeah.

Shea is the MVP. No doubt. Shea butter was nice there by you. She has. That's right. Shea is going to win MVP. Oh, Janis or Luka. You can fill in one of those guys.

And then Shea. No, come on. Stop Janis. Janis is better. That's debatable. Thatis is better than Shay. That's debatable. At this juncture that's debatable. I'll give you Jokic. Jokic is a no-brainer. There's nobody better than that guy. Yeah, but. Janis. Luca too? Yeah, Luca's still better too. Look, I love Shay. He's great. He's fantastic. He's not above Janus. Janus is still there. Tyler asks how many brackets I fill out. I'm a one bracket guy. Meaning I will have, like I have something with my kids. I got something in the Uncrowned one. There's a

Yahoo Sports one. But I can't have multiple brackets. I need to be rooting for one team. I would dare say if you fill out multiple brackets, you're conning the system. Yeah, it's no fun. Elaine, I'm with you. One bracket. Just do the one. One bracket.

You can have it in as many pools as you want, but one bracket. I had high point in one of my nine brackets. We don't care. Useless. We don't care. And also it's not fun. No, do the one.

Do the one. You ain't getting the perfect one, so just do the one. Go all in. Have you ever gone 16 and 0 on Thursday or Friday? No, no, no. I think the best I've ever done is like 14-2. Yeah, I think I once went 15-1 but I don't think I've ever gone 16-0. Across Thursday and Friday though it's actually 32 games. Yeah, of course. No, I just met on Thursday or Friday. Yeah. Yeah. No, on one singular day, I've never gone.

Nah, neither have I. Undefeated. Ariel, baked beans. I know it's a running joke that whenever Frank is called out on something after the show, he'll call you up and go, hey, man. So, you know, in the show earlier, it made me think how many times has this actually happened and what's the one that springs to mind the most? Could you believe this question?

Frank, I mean, come on. I can believe it. Really? It's become a thing. Okay. Hey man. That's right, that's it. There's a little, there's a little like.

There's a little bit more breath to it though. Hey man. Hey man. Hey man. No, no, that's not it. How often do you think it's happened? Truthfully. Truthfully? Probably not even that it. Yeah. How often do you think it's happened? Truthfully. Truthfully?

Probably not even that much. Exactly. Yeah. Wow. The way you said exactly there was strong. Exactly. Okay. Adam Nelson asks about the new TKO boxing.

By the way, have you seen this report from boxing scene about what the proposed, now I'm not verifying these, but they did put out this report about what the proposed now I'm not verifying these but they did put out this report about what the the purses would be this has everyone in the boxing business all up in arms oh there it is 20,000 for a 10 round bout by an unranked fighter 50,000 when ranked by the quote-unquote company at number 5 to 10 125,000 when ranked by the company at 3 to 4 375 when challenging for the company championship, 750 when defending the company championship.

You know what's my reaction to this? The top half is actually pretty good. It's the bottom half that's going to be the problem. 750, 375, if accurate, if accurate. If accurate. Hey, this is from Emil. Ariel, why did you let your subordinates bully you into pronouncing iron instead of iron when you were introducing Mike Tyson? You say Tyron, not Ty-urn, right? That's a little ironic or ironic as Rick and GC probably would say.

English is not my first language, but the by the way, so I have no idea what I'm Tom bout be just annoyed at the lack English is not my first language, but though, by the way, so I have no idea what I'm tombout be. Just annoyed at the lack of respect of the alphabet. That is all. This is what we heard. Yeah. David Velasquez says, I know you have a great deal of respect for Dave Meltzer. Don't you think his pro-AEW stance has done more harm than good? Honestly, I see this pop up from time to time. I stay as far away from it. I think it's all craziness.

I enjoy pro wrestling. Most importantly, I enjoy talking to the wrestlers. That's the thing I enjoy the most. I'm not sitting there watching all 15 hours of pro wrestling that's available to us each and every week. I don't sit there rooting for one organization over the other contrary to any popular belief. And I'd like to think someone like Dave doesn't as well. But if he does, and if that's a thing, I wouldn't know about it because I just don't.

I don't pay attention to it on that level. What else? What else? Just a couple more here. Anything else? Just a couple more here. Anything else? Hi Ariel from Domberneddy. Few quick rapid fire questions. Is there an interview you wish you could redo?

Yes, every single one. Ummm... No, I... Really? Not every single one, but I'm never really, truly content, happy. Is there one that I wish I could redo? I'll tell you...I'll tell you one line that always pisses me off. When I did the interview with Dana White, where he announced the purchase of Strike Force, two things pissed me off about that.

I said it and I should have let him say it. That pisses me off. And I said that the UFC bought Strike Force and I should have said Zufa bought Strike Force. And that always has annoyed me. In terms of other interviews that I wish I could redo, I mean, I think of the ones that I didn't particularly like. But there's way more that I liked. I don't know. Are there any? Can I play devil's advocate? Please. What would you do different about the Goldberg interview or Jalen Turner this week? Those are great.

So I could just have a hard time believing that you're like every one. So the Jalen Turner one, I felt like I could have been a little smoother. He was great, I don't think I was great. The Goldberg one was great. You know, my only gripe about that one is like I wish I had more time because there was so much more that I wanted to ask him. But I'm at peace with that one. I think to Frank's point, like I feel similarly as somebody outside it who watches it, the magic of it is the moment and some and it's never gonna be perfect. There is no. So you put somebody in that position who is great at what they do and can strive for perfection and tries it. And if it falls a little bit short, it falls a little bit short, but ultimately the product is always gonna be pretty high quality. And so, I don know the lot the live like nature of it the rawness is the is the appeal I appreciate that no that that is true I

don't know I'm just like Bill I would say somewhat hyper critical and very extremely critical of my performances. The way I speak, the way I act, the way I deliver, the way I pronounce things. Puddingboy asks, hey Ariel, last week you mentioned that you're a big fan of Megyn Kelly's podcast. I'm curious why that is considering that you always mention the importance of journalism and its integrity and yet Megyn Kelly on many occasions seems to show she represents the exact opposite of that. Well first of all I didn't say that I was a fan of it because like I'm a fan of her as a journalist per se. There's many different things that I'm a fan of that I'm you know that don't always go like into the journalism

funnel. Why am I a fan of the podcast? I'll tell you I really enjoyed her conversation. Can I recommend a podcast of the podcast? I'll tell you, I really enjoyed her conversation. Can I recommend a podcast to you guys? There was a conversation, I know this is off topic, I'll get back to it. There's a podcast called Honestly hosted by a journalist named Barry Weiss who is a woman, just for the record, so it's B-A-R-R-I, or actually it might be B-A-R-I.

And the podcast is Honestly. She's the editor of the Free Press, and she had Andrew Schultz on, and I had to text Andrew about this because I thought it was one of his best interviews ever, because when he's interviewed by a comic or when he's on his show, he's great, but I felt like, and I feel like sometimes

it's like a tit for tat. Anything you could say, I could say in a funnier way. It's like this competition, but him being interviewed by a journalist who I think does a great job brought out this whole different side of him and there was serious stuff talked about, you know, fun stuff, family stuff, phenomenal, so I really enjoyed that I do think if I can offer a criticism of Megan Kelly For you know anyone who cares She is way overboard. I'm not a fan of bias journalism. I

100% I 100% like if this is the tone of the questionnaire. I'm a hundred percent in agreement to that I still can't get over the fact that if if if I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, And yet in the world of politics, it's not only like understood, it's encouraged to be biased. I don't understand that. And so when she was on Fox, I felt like that wasn't really her thing. In fact, she sparred with Donald Trump a lot, but now she's very clearly all the way to the right. And so when I said that I liked it, if you recall, I said I liked the morning update thing because it was like a 15-minute digestible. And it is slanted a little bit, I will agree.

But I think what she has built, post NBC is commendable and there's like an entertainment value to it. But I sit there sometimes listening being like, this is a little much. And so I haven't been able to find the sweet spot because there's other podcasts that are on the other side that I find to be a little much as well. I try to sample as much as possible and I've noticed lately that I try to sample less

and less sports pods and maybe this is just a sign of me growing up and more of the real-world stuff and I kind of Jones for that because you know there's only so much sports that you could take but mainly what I'm drawn to are good interviewers and I think that she is I would say she is a good interviewer so if you could strip away the you know the the opinion the bias the the politics I think you could see what I'm I'm seeing or hearing but I can understand not everyone's cup of tea is what it is hey Charlie hey Ariel serious question here so please treat it with the severity it deserves how does it feel to be the fucking man inquiring minds would like

to know shout out BITB I appreciate that I'm alpha alpha. Yeah. It's in the basement. Hell yeah. Ali says, hi, Ariel. I was going to comment this week asking if you've seen Louis Theroux's interview with Leon Edwards until you mentioned it on Monday. So my question is, what is your favorite Louis Theroux documentary? Actually, it was the one where he tried to become a pro wrestler.

He went to the power plant. It's a great one. If you type in Louis Theroux pro wrestling, it's a great look at the business because he spends a lot of time with WCW and he sees Goldberg at one point in the hallway of an arena. But then goes on the real indie scene, meets up with Sarge. It's a great one. That's by far my favorite one. Obviously it hits close to home just because it's something that I'm you know very into but I think he's great and I would love to have him on the program. We've DM'd but we haven't quite nailed it down and he was at the Misfits Prime card in Manchester in 23 and I was there as well

and I just wanted to shake his hand but it didn't happen. Frankie, any super chats? And by the way, thank you to everyone who sent in questions. Appreciate you all, love you all. Thought they were good ones. So thank you. Speaking of a good one. Oh.

J.N. writes, why hasn't GFL announced a show, for example, LA and meh? Well, that was, uh, yeah, that was something that we addressed earlier. Um, I don't know. It's, uh, perhaps I need to reconnect with them, but this would be me speculating, but maybe there's some broadcast plans they're trying to nail down, fighter contracts matchups, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. But yes, developing story.

What else? Duncan says, a massive thank you to New York Rick for wearing the MAGA hat yesterday. Wow. We appreciate his support. I just want to correct the record. Wow. Wow.

Look at you. Hagler. Hey, they clipped that off on the top rank socials. They're smart over there. Top rank, 10th rank, nose ball, you know? You look good in it, man. Thank you, brother. You look good.

A quick like that, it's like, oh yeah, I know that hat. You know? But yeah, shout out, shout out to Top Rank. Thanks for sending. Hagler-Hernt's anniversary coming up, April 15th. Oh yeah, 40th. War. What else?

Joseph K. asked, which fighter would you most want to see become champion? And why is it Arnold Allen? You know, there's a few guys that you would have to put in that category. By the way, what was that 10 with the? So they've asked 10 questions. Oh, wow, wow.

Or I thought maybe like 10 years. Imagine they were a 10 year subscriber to the channel, but there was a period of 10 years there where we did nothing on the channel. In any event, Arnold, Corey, who goes in this category? I know there's a million of them. Like the just like true nice guys. I mean I wouldn't mind seeing old Dustin Poirier.

Ah, DP. I'm just gonna go before it's all over. At the top of the list, yeah. That's more of like a sentimental old school part of me. It's not necessarily like Dustin, but man it'd be nice. He really wants it. Honestly Dan Hooker too, Dan Hooker's talked about all he wants is that one night with the strap in bed he wants to wake up and have the belt in the bed when he wakes up that one night it wouldn't it wouldn't

break my heart to not have them have that moment. Arnold Allen as UFC champion would be incredible. The tweets would be next level. Is Arnold Allen front runner for a composter tweeter of the year? He's having a good year. He's having a good year. He's fantastic. What else? Terrence writes, John's saying he needs six months to fight Tom after fighting the equivalent of Jake versus Mike. It's like Jake saying he needs a year to fight Nate and MMA, or me fighting smaller guys and someone my size comes and says, I'm like, nah fam. So first of all, John didn't say it, I said it.

And second of all, like, yeah, he's older and he wants to prepare. And that's the, like, are you surprised? John Jones said no to Chelsea Sonnen on 10 days notice. Now, if it's five months away, does he bend his, uh, his stance? Who knows, but he has always been this guy. There are some guys who just don't want short

training camps and as, as they get older, they especially don't want them. So I don't think it's a crazy thing. We also have to be like these two things, these two things are opposing. If Tom Aspinal is as good as everybody says he is and is such a crazy fight for John Jones and we can't wait for it, it also has to be true that A he deserves the 30 million whatever number dollar payday and two that he deserves to take six months to

prepare for it if it's that big a challenge. Like these things are, are, have to be necessarily equate. So if we're just going to say like, yeah, John Jones, go fight Tom Aspinall on three months notice for X price. That's not the price that you want. Then Tom isn't the challenge that we've built him up to be. If he is that challenge, John deserves to be paid what he deserves to be paid and deserves to have as long a training

camp as he needs for it. So, yeah, he's fucking John Jones. He should have as long as he needs to train for Tom Aspinall. Agreed. Because Tom is that big a challenge. I agree with everybody. I think Tom is that big a challenge. So he deserves that.

What else? Suckerfree asks, I know a lot of your interviews sometimes come together last minute, but would it be possible for us to submit questions? Pre-approved of course. I understand if it ruins the integrity of your show. It doesn't ruin the integrity at all. Would you believe at one point in time when we were here at AOL on this particular floor in this particular building, we used to take in phone calls for the guests.

There was actually a time where I believe when it was Dana White and Mike Tyson on together, we took some phone calls for the guests. There was actually a time where I believe when it was Dana White and Mike Tyson on together, we took some phone calls. Made it a little complicated, but... I've never loved the... Hey, I've got this guy coming on the show. You got any questions? Like, I feel like you should be able to figure it out. You know, I'm sure that some people

will come up with good ones, but I don't know. I feel like I could do it. It's just a different kind of chat when you start to go. But, by the way, great, you know, great responses can come about from those. Speaking of which, are we mentioning something about golf? Yeah, I mean, why not? Okay, what do we got? What do we got? Well? It's still it's so work Okay, so let's not mention all right all right fine. It's like a little teaser you know

Plus money MMA What else thank you? What's the odds a New Orleans card really happens? Oh, that's a thing. That's definitely a thing That's that's a plan. I think they went ahead with the car but DC got moved. Something like that happened. Anyway, it's a thing. It would be great. Let us see. What else? All right, give me a second on this one. Okay. Hanashi MMA asks, New York Rick, did you discuss New York ricking a trip to Iowa 17-hour car trip there from New York? Oh hashtag

Championship only lol. I New York ricked a trip to Toronto and guy interrogated lol also shout out to Frank He follows me on Twitter Wow I'm aware of hanashi because he he sent us the video like after the fact that he went and Did the trip and like got a video interview I believe he went to like an MMA gym and and got an interview no and for the simple reason that we are on a short timeline we have to get into town Saturday and then back out of town Sunday morning there is not time to drive to make these things happen we want to be here for the Times Square boxing card that is happening on

Friday. We do not want to miss that and so we have to fly in Saturday morning for Iowa. Oh and what does he mean when he says New York Rickett? No sleep, straight drive, do the damn thing. No hotel. No hotel. Just drive. Just a few beers. No no beers we don't drink and drive. What are you talking about? Come on. No. But no, there will be no New York rick in this one. The Tesla's staying in the garage, but we're flying. What else? Jose asks, since I'll be supporting with one chat per week, I'm curious. Does this go towards the team vacation fun? Ariel's Westphalia, Rick's Galakir?

You know what? It just goes into the pot, the pot that supports the show. The pot you were talking about earlier, the Gabalan? No, yes, that pot. And that's not me being coy, by the way. You know, like, it's like when you have a sponsor, like Averon, like NordVPN, like our good friends here at Celsius,

who are probably my favorite of all sponsors. No, I shouldn't say that, but I do love them very, very much. If only because we just, yeah, we just have them sit here and they're great and we love them. That goes into like a revenue pot. And so that's where this goes.

Trust me, it doesn't just like go off into the ether. Now, I did always wonder where it went at Vox but I know specifically where it goes here I am a hundred percent certain of that and it is appreciated it is appreciated I would love to get that was felt I saw by the way last weekend the Volkswagen ID do you yeah did you did you test drive it no no it was in a parking

lot it was parked my kids saw they're like oh there it is we could we talk about it all the time. And both they and I were disappointed when it just, it's kind of like a minivan. Is it the new version of the Westphalia? Oh, yeah. Have you not seen it? I think I have.

It's fully electric. What makes a minivan in your mind? The seating, it's just like Rose. It's not like the Westphalia has the benches. Because exterior, it is that bus. is that you know it doesn't have like a modernized version of it yeah oh yeah the inside literally is just so many of it yeah so it's not as cool it's also no percent electric and I'm not into that soyboy

electric stuff if I'm being honest I'm kidding I'm kidding I'm kidding I'm kidding you're about to make some enemies no no I'm kidding um I I thought when it was first announced, I believe I thought they had configurations where you could do like the benches, but I guess they ultimately went. Well, I'll say the one that I saw was just like a straight up minivan.

No, I mean, he just looked it up and I'm seeing the, I'm seeing the rows like a standard thing. But when it was first announced, because I was looking for an electric like three row and they don't really have great options, that was coming out and I was looking into it. Oh, you were? And they had the like open seating,

like benches on the side and then in the back row, floor plan, but I guess they didn't end up with that. What do you think of your GC? It's a nice looking car. Looks like a modern electric West Valley. Yeah, that's pretty much it. By the way, some breaking news I'm seeing here.

Oh, I probably was too excited. No, I see. Well, you know, I'm seeing I'm very excited about this. I see NBA inside stuff might be coming back next year. Oh wow. The NBA going to NBC. I mean, I grew up on that show Willow Bay, Ahmad Rashad. I was about to say, is Ma coming back?

What? Listen, you talk about Saturday morning cartoons a little later in the day after Saved by the Bell at around 1130. Hell yeah. The inside stuff with Ahmad and Willow, I mean, that was the best. Yeah.

Oh my God, I cannot wait. No, I'm genuinely asking, is Ahmad Rashad coming back to this? I would love it. I'm just kind of reading the top line headline here. That'd be amazing. But I cannot freaking wait for the NBA to be back on NBC. Da-na-da-na-da-da-na-na.

Aren't they remixing Groundball Rock? Didn't we? No, no, no, please don't touch that. Don't touch, what? I thought we said that on the show one week. I thought that was like one of the breaking news developments. No, no, no, please God no.

Just keep it as it is. Perfect. It's perfect just the way it is. What else? We got two more. Jason writes, Rico versus Alex would be good? Yes, perfect. It's perfect just the way it is. What else? We got two more. Jason writes, Rico versus Alex would be good. Ooh, wow. That would be good, but it's not gonna happen.

I mean, no, but listen, guys, what about the fact that I pulled that Rico versus Francis thing totally out of my back pocket? Like I just, that was not a thing at all. Like that was just pie in the sky and now they're actually talking about it. That's pretty fun. Glory 100? Yo, seems perfect. Seems a little too soon

for that. I mean, that's in three months. Road trip? To Rotterdam? Down. I mean, the last time this happened, you guys booked flights without me. So I don't know, I'm afraid to. Now we're saying it out

Good one Frankie What else what else finally Cito asks on the topic of Ariel's interview blunders? Oh wow, how about dropping the ball when Rico offered to break the opponent news on your show you no sold him. Oh By the way, I didn't I didn't like take it like that. I took it as He's gonna break the news at some press conference and then he's gonna come on to talk about it Well, maybe not so fast. The news isn't out yet, you know, yeah, maybe it does happen. Is he no a hater or what? Okay, you know taking the piss or whatever you call I think he thinks so highly of you. He saw an opportunity there. He's like, oh, you can just go, yeah, Rico,

please break it on our show. Because Rico said, how about I bring it to you? Guess what, Slito? Who knows? Could still be. Who's isn't out yet? Guess what, Slito? Yeah.

Who knows? Who knows? We'll see. And by the way, Rick. Down on Slito. Being the resident kickboxing expert here, who was he talking about? The opponent?

Yeah. Oh, I've got nothing. It, the only ones on the glory roster would be uninteresting to me just because like Rico has been around and literally beaten everybody. It has to be somebody outside of it. Otherwise I don't, I have no idea. Okay.

And I, I would love something kind of off, off the beaten path, but I, I, I don't have any insight into it. All right. Uh, that was the last one, right Frankie? That's correct. Uh, by the way, I wanted to mention, uh, we had a great show yesterday, uh, Adé and I,

that's on the Dazon Boxing YouTube channel. We had the towering Inferno, Sebastian Fandora on, who's a great fighter six foot five 154 pounds WBO and WBC 154 pound champion I mean he's a he's a sight to behold we've had a couple of those guys I'm not sure if we've ever had a six foot like Corey Hill was pretty may rest in peace I think he was six foot three six foot five 154 is incredible and then we got into this debate like who's the you know the the most talented brother sister

duo in in combat sports certainly in in in boxing it's got to be the fund or is or the Dubois Caroline Daniel Sebastian Gabriella anyway we also had sure Nika sugar nix Johnson who's competing on Caroline, Daniel, Sebastian, Gabriella. Anyway, we also had Shrnika Sugarnique Johnson, who's competing on that Sydney card this weekend on Saturday on Dazon, the matrim card. And you'll recall that there was that big controversy.

Her and Nina Hughes fought in May, and the ring announcer announced that Nina won the fight, and then he screwed up, and then he went back. Anyway, they're then he went back. Anyway, they're going to run it back. They've been putting out some really great content leading up to that fight card. The Cambos' faceoff yesterday, they had it in some sort of like fight club setting. Did you guys see this?

It sounds like I'm setting it up to show but I don't have the clip. I didn't send it earlier. But anyway, go check it out on the Matchroom socials. They, I think, did a great job with some of these. So I'm looking forward to that, go check that out. And there's a lot of stuff coming up this weekend. UFC London, that card in Sydney, the Fundora fight in the evening.

I feel like there might be one other thing that I'm forgetting about. But who knows? The beauty is there's much more content to come. What's on the bots in the basement tomorrow? We're going to deep dive on London. Oh yeah. I feel like that's the way to go.

Hell yeah. There's a lot of meat on that. Should we reveal the pound for pound? Oh, what do we got? What do we got? Oh, Jordan says no. Let me guess. Jordan says no. Why? Don't tell me the pound for pound. Oh, what do we got? What do we got? Oh, Jordan says no. Let me guess. Jordan says no.

Why? No, don't tell me the pound for pound. Just tell me what the topic is. It's a good old fashioned tease. No, Jordan said no. Why? You just said it right there. Good old fashioned tease.

Top five tees. Is that it? The top five tees-es? No, no, no, not tees-es, tease. Tees. In honor of UFC London, the best tease. Oh, tease. Tees. That's not actually it. Oh, wow. Like pepp UFC London, the best tease. Oh, cheese! Tease. Yeah, that's not actually it.

Oh, wow. Like Peppermint, I would feel like Madra. This is my sense, and he's gonna confirm for me in a second, we had an idea, I think he now has a better idea that he wants to pitch us, and he was like, no, no, no, don't say it until I get it back. Is it London-inspired? For sure. Yeah, yeah, we're doing something. Is it England inspired or specific to London? No, we'll do England. We'll do England. UK inspired. Best movie set in London. Best movie set.

Exactly. In London. Movie set in London. The best movies that were set in London. Oh Jesus. I thought you were talking about like movie sets. Like, oh yeah, there's sound stages over. Yeah, that's true.

The best movie sets. Best sound stages found in London. Yeah, over in Essex, there's a great one. It's 60,000 square feet. Um, all right. And then of course, uh, the crack will take us home on Friday evening. I do have some exciting news for, uh, the

loyal OG audience out there. A lot of you asking about, you remember we used to do the, uh, the three pock post show, right? Myself, Pizzi and Chuck over at the Ringer. Ah, we need more, we need more, we need more. Well, part of the problem is it's like six in the morning when the pay-perock post show right myself pete see and Chuck over at the ringer we need more we need more we need more well part of the problem is it's like six in the morning when the pay-per-views end we don't want to kill poor Pete C Pete C but I can't tell you because it's a London card in the afternoon on Saturday right here on the channel will be myself pete see and Chuck

the man in the hat the mayor of themeg State, recapping it all as we, uh, we'll say goodbye to that card and then be back here. At least I will be back here on Monday to do it all over again. And, and, and some guests already coming, uh, coming to fruition for next week already. So it should be a fun one. Uh, time to go. Hey, I'm doing that, uh, Randy Brown tiny desk thing later today.

Oh, that's exciting. Yeah. I'm looking forward to that. So we gotta go. I'm done. Enjoy your, uh, real quick, your bracketology. Yes? To the chat, because I don't know if you know this, we have closed captioning turned on for most of our streams. Okay. Earlier today, according to the chat, it referred to Pizzi as pizza. Oh, wow. His name is not pizza for those who are watching on mute. He is actually Pizzi, not Pizzi as you just call him, Pizzi not pizza. Thank you very much. I appreciate you cleaning that up. No that's good stuff. That is that is good stuff. Thank you Frankie. Yes it is Pizzi. That's good stuff. When I when I get my um when I'm in my car you guys ever have that thing where like the text pops up when you're in your car? Which by the way I think is a very bad function and I wish it wouldn't happen when the car play is active.

And so when I click on it to hear the text, because I don't want to text and drive, The voice refers to him as Pettisie. Oh, gosh. Yeah, I've gotten a Pettisie or two as well. Pettisie says, so my kids always say, who's this Pettisie? You know, P.T. came to my house one time, and my daughter wouldn't stop crying. So she's like, oh, is that the guy? Listen, devil.

We heard about P.T. Is that the guy? What were you so afraid of? I guess they're just not used to me having friends, so it was a very foreign concept to them for just a friend of mine. It's all about them. It's all about them, their friends or their parents' friends. Can't have my own life. Anyway, what about that Bill Goldberg? What a time it was. Thank you very much to him. Thank you to Corey Sanhagen.

Thank you to Rico Verhoeven. Thank you to Marshall Zelasnik. Congrats on the Dzone deal. Thanks to all of you. Thanks to all of them. Back on Thursday, same time, same place, same pieces. I'm out of here.