The Ariel Helwani Show - Boots Ennis and Jazmyn Nyx in studio, Bo Nickal, Anthony Pettis, Andy Foster, On the Nose, more

Episode Date: October 21, 2025

Ariel Helwani starts the show by celebrating the Blue Jays’ ALCS win, before pivoting to some Tom Aspinall and Ciryl Gane talk (03:52).Next, The Boys in the Back and Petesy Carroll join Ariel to answer On The Nose questions, including thoughts on the likelihood of Conor McGregor fighting at the White House, Frankie Edgar’s false start with BKFC, the mysterious phone image at UFC Vancouver, and even the debut trailer for Uncrowned’s first film (12:43)Anthony Pettis honors coach Duke Roufus, who tragically died last week, opening up about their special relationship, dealing with the emotions, and reliving memories from their championship-winning partnership (42:56).Jade Gentile, formerly known as Jazmyn Nyx during her NXT tenure, joins Ariel in-studio to discuss her early soccer career, her WWE tryout, why she decided to turn down WWE’s offer after not getting a raise, receiving reality TV opportunities, controversial comments by her boyfriend that drew backlash from the wrestling community, being open to remaining in wrestling, and more (59:10).Bo Nickal is back to preview his UFC 322 matchup with Rodolfo Vieira, speaking about not having a game plan for Reinier de Ridder and being humbled by his first career loss, his analysis of de Ridder’s loss to Brendan Allen, and the potential of fighting Khamzat Chimaev at the White House (1:57:58).Jaron ‘Boots’ Ennis is in-studio following an impressive victory in his 154-pound debut, touching on the difficulty of the cut to 147 pounds, his love of Philadelphia and the city’s sports teams, eyeing the Vergil Ortiz Jr. fight next, believing he’s the best in the world, the proposed Ali Revival Act, wanting to fight in the UK, training and sparring with Canelo, and makes a prediction for Jake Paul vs. ‘Tank’ Davis (2:26:08).California State Athletic Commission Executive Director Andy Foster joins to discuss the Ali Revival Act, defending the bill from ‘negativity’ and explaining why it would help boxing, acknowledging the potential for creation of a league format in boxing, the loss of top end boxing broadcasters and its impact on the sport’s economics, addressing the lack of boxers and boxing promoters at the CSAC public hearing, before closing with a back-and-forth about recent officiating blunders (3:11:15).The show ends with Ariel answering your Super Chats (4:04:56).

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the Eri-A-R-I-D-Y show. Back in your life on this Tuesday, October 21st, 2000, and 25. Hello again, everyone. Frank, Frank, Frank, Frank, Frank. Okay, okay, blue jays, blue jays. Let's play ball. Okay, okay. Blue jay, sing with me, Frank.

Blue jays. Let's play ball. We got a diamond. We got a diamond. We got a bat, a hat, and that's not all. We're going to World Series. We're playing the L.A. Dodgers. Sing with me, Frank.

But the world wants to see us win it all. What do you want? Frankie, what do you want? Let's play. Okay, yes. Oh, my God. Did that on the spot, by the way. Not too shabby.

A little Barry H. The Toronto Blue Jays, your Toronto Blue Jays, the same Blue Jays that we sat in this chair speaking to the world about back in March when no one believed when all the pundits had them in the last place. Everyone remembers we crowned them the team of uncrowned HQ and wouldn't you know it on a beautiful Monday night in the six, game seven in the six, six seven. Oh my God, one of the all-time great comebacks. Actually, guys, guys, did you know this? Guys, did you know this? Wait, wait, wait for it. Should have had it ready wait wait for it just going into my little uh blue jays group chat here with jason mark

and phil which i cannot find it's a great stat it's well worth it there's so many texts oh dear how bad is this right here that's part of the start of the show and in rehearses you're like frankie man make make sure you let that music ride a little hey listen you got to keep them on their toes george springers hit he hit the first go-ahead home run trailing by multiple runs in the seventh inning or later in Game 7 history in the heistoir of Game 7. The vibes weren't great. I was sitting in my den and then I went upstairs

and I said I need to change the location. I watched in my room but not like lying in bed, not like the move that you do at 1230 when there's a boxing event going way too long. I went face first, like head first. So the TVs here face first and all the kitties are kind of sleeping and here we are in the seventh

and I say it's up to you, George. The George Springer, by the way, who they tried to take out, the dirty SOBs over on the Mariner's side of things, they tried to take him out beaning him

with a 98-mile-pourer fastball to the knee. And he hits the three-run, game-winning home run. It was, I mean, the vibes were great. I can't get enough. I mean, I haven't,

here's the bottom line for those wondering, yes, I'm a proud Montrealer. Yes, the Montreal Expos will always be my team. they don't exist from 2004 to 2015. I didn't watch a single inning of baseball. And then I fell in love with the 2015 Blue Jays

because of Anthopoulos, because of Josh Donaldson and David Price and Tulewitsky, and on and on it went. And when I heard they signed a 16-year-old Vladimir Guerrero Jr., one of my favorite players, his dad, senior expos, I said, all right, this is my team. Canada's the only team, this is my team.

And so to see Junior now become the star that he's become and not to see him go up against Shohei Otani, who I've always said is number two to Vladi, that Vladi is the face of baseball. baseball, that Vladi's the best player in baseball. It's really an amazing thing. I've never been able to really cheer for my team going to the World Series because in the 90s I was an Expos fan. Of course, you know, I had an affinity for the Jay's, but we were jealous of the Jays. And so, you know, here I am, always the bridesmaid, never the bride, we're on route, and everyone's

coming with, right? Everyone's coming with? Yep. Everyone's coming with. Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. PC you stayed up? Yeah. Peecee stayed up for the Seattle game.

Peecee. The Seattle Ceele's love of baseball is unparalleled. There is no chance. You were sleeping before Derek Moneyberg came into the studio yesterday. I was watching live. Yeah, right. You had to. I was hoping you were sleeping.

I was too much about it. And so everybody was getting on to me. I was like, here, just here's Ariel's number. We text him. A lot of reaction. A lot of reaction. We literally saw Pizzi sleeping before Derek came in because we saw it on.

He fell asleep right in the Did you stay up for Monday night football game number two Last night, Pete? Stay up for books lines, yeah. You're in, absolutely. Okay, Buck's lines, you didn't stay up for Texan C. 3 AM, I was like, you know, I had enough. And like, third quarter, it was like 1145 in the States.

I was like, if Pizzi's up for this, he's a sick, sick man. I was tempted. If I had any bets rolling into that game, I would have stayed up, no problem. But I'll eliminate it that. Pizzi, what did you think? What did you think of Dale Bouskowski? I thought, you know, I thought it was one of the great Helwani performances, to be fair. And so many people onto me today.

I was even speaking just moments ago to the great Andy Aspinall who was weighing in on the interview, who thoroughly enjoyed it, a pioneer of UK BJ. And he's over there in Abu Dhabit and he's taking some time out to watch me and Moneybird. Come on, you know, he loves you. He, those boys are having great fun over there. I'm getting that vibe like Aldo wearing the. the tux vibe uh i love spg 2015 in las vegas camp mode like this is uh this is a great vibe the aspirin seems to have this week i don't know have you been watching oh yes we actually saw a video

that was posted on the t and t sports account of uh i mean if i'm being honest i think they took some liberties with the captioning but it's it's of it's of tom and surreal sort of seeing each other in the hallway have you seen this one we have it i do believe and they make it seem like surreal was waiting for Tom. I mean, quite frankly, I think he was just on the other side of the hallway and then quite like literally turned around, as you can see, and walked away. What G.C. and I were noting, the aura surrounding Tom Aspinall right now, sunglasses inside, look at the back muscles, look at the oversized champion shirt.

The all white, too. The all white. The neck tat. Compare that to Tom Aspinall who made his debut a few years ago in the UFC. You know, it's one of the great trans formations, I think, as far as or. Or as good time. I just... Yikes.

No, no. Transformation. Stop this stuff. UFC posted all 12, or all eight of his wins and just like a big highlight reel. I mean, it takes about 20 minutes to watch. Anyway, I sat down and watched it. In his very first UFC debut, man, he looks like your run-of-the-mill heavy. How many debuts is one get, though?

What did I just say? In his very first UFC debut. In his very first UFC fight, I'm sorry. He thinks he's getting caught after this one. I'm talking like curly hair, soft body, doesn't have as many tattoos, like a little bit unsure of himself. The jump from fight one to fight two, like he gets a good haircut, he adds some tattoos. I've seen this.

And now, like, you go from fight one to now, it's like, it's the aura level up is wonderful. And it's not aura farming. It's like legit. Like, the guy is a superstar. He looks like a superstar. The back, I feel like the UK is starting to show him love. I see him doing stuff Man City. Like, this is great.

Hang on, he's been getting love in the UK. Ah, it's been a slow. He's got the British pants this week. You can't feel it. It's a slow drip. But you know what? In all fairness, his last fight was in July of 2024. Like,

well, this is it. I think about all the things that have happened. I think this is the feeling that I'm getting off the guy is, is they've just been dying to fight. Yeah. And it couldn't have been better. You get the sense like, I mean, I interviewed Andy today for 10 minutes,

but he was on the phone for about 45 after that, you know? And like, you don't get that. You don't get that if things aren't good. People won't. talk to you, they'll try and get you off the phone straight away. They're just living it up and they're feeling great about the situation. About T&T,

fair play to them. I love the lads over at T&T. They must have people just following these lads around when they're going to the toilet at this stage. I have seen them walking through the hall in 18 different social media clips, so fair play, but I think there's incredible tension that is not coming through

in these clips, and it's not because they don't like each other or anything like that. There's all this talk about Tom and the pressure that's on him. But you have to look at this from the other angle as well. Cyril Gan has had two title fights. Last chance. You know what I mean?

He's under tremendous pressure too. I think it makes for a fantastic fight. And it isn't John Jones. I'm not trying to say it is, but I think there's going to be a great contest on Saturday night. Can't wait. Incredible card too. Yeah, can't wait.

Main card is great. Watch party on Saturday. Post show on Saturday after the fight. I actually realized, Pizzi, by the way, when you, Chuck and I, three Pock, are doing the post show, I believe it's going to be at the exact same time that Joseph Parker is walking at the O2 to fight Fabio Wardley, so we could kind of watch that. Are you going to pull a sickie?

Is that what you're saying? No, no, but I'm going to have a second screen. I hate the fact that it's happening at around the same time, but I think because they're in London. Nah, no, we got to go. We got to go right after. But there in London, we'll react. It's kind of cool.

You know, it's the uncrowned heavyweight champion of the sweet science on the same night as for the longest time, the uncrowned MMA heavyweight champion. Yesterday was a great day, guys. Enjoyed it thoroughly. Appreciate all the feedback. Today is going to be even better back into the show. Andy Foster, the executive director of the California State Athletic Commission, is going to join us coming off of that hearing last week that everyone's been talking about from

Oscar Delahoya to a lot of people in the media, looking forward to getting his thoughts on everything that's going on with this Muhammad Ali Revival Boxing Act. It's a hot topic right now in the world of boxing and Zufa boxing and TKO. You know the stuff. Plus, I want to talk to them about some of the officiating stuff we spoke about yesterday. One of the best boxers on the planet, pound for pound, one of the very best soon, perhaps to become a number one pound fighter. Geron Boots Ennis, the pride of Philadelphia, who just a couple of weeks ago in Philly, was successful in his 154 pound debut on the interim WBA title. he is now on the collision course that we've all been waiting for going up against Virgil Ortiz. Ortiz has to win on November 8th, but then everyone has told us they're going to fight first quarter of 26, if in fact Ortiz wins.

So he'll be joining us in studio. Great privilege to have one of the best boxers on the planet in studio. That'll be at about 3.30, no, that will be at about what time? Yeah, 3.30. 3 o'clock, Boe Nickel, returning to action. Madison Square Garden, less than a month away, November 15th, to be exact, UFC 322. He's got a big fight against Adolfo Vieira. He's going to be a part of the broadcast team for the second Real American Freestyle

Wrestling event, which is happening this Saturday as well, October 25th, in Penn State. So where he resides, Happy Valley, big deal. We'll talk to him about all that. Jade Gentile, aka, or formerly known as Jasmine Nix of WWNXT fame, is going to be joining us in studio in her first chat since leaving the company. She was reportedly offered a new deal, turned it down, was a pretty accomplished soccer player, went to West Virginia, then played soccer in Iceland, and was recruited by WWE, had a three-year run over there, and decided to leave. And so we'll get the scoop as to why she decided to

leave, why she didn't take that new deal, and where she goes from here. And then Anthony Pennis will join us at about 140 to talk about the past of his mentor, the, you know, the guy who was by his side for all the big fights, his head coach over at Rufus Sport, the one and only, Jeffrey Duke Rufus, who, shockingly and tragically passed away on October 17th just four days ago, in his sleep, 55 years young. We spoke about him yesterday. Still can't believe that he was right there with Sergio Pettus in Dubai, that massive win, spinning back elbow. Vintage, vintage, Rufus. sport. Really appreciate Anthony stopping by. Looking forward to that chat, looking forward to the

whole show. But on Tuesdays, these days, we like to answer your questions time. Now, for everyone's favorite segment of the week, it is time. It's time for all the nose. Yeah. Yeah. G.C. This is from Newty Magazine Day. Blind rank these six UFC coaches. Oh, geez. Pat Barry. Six. Tough Connor McGregor. One.

Really? Wait, one? Greatest of all time? He didn't even show up on. He gets to do the rankings. Yeah, come on. He did do it twice. Opinia.

Ariel Helwani. Three. Kirby Smart. Two. Would have been my one. Who's Kirby Smart? Head coach of the Georgia World That's the time.

National Championship winning coach. Joshua Fabia. I wonder if G.C. knows Joshua Fabia? Four. You know Joshua? It would be my two if I was not blind ranking. Okay. Derek Moneybird.

Five. Someone wrote on the page yesterday, we haven't had a character this great in MMA since Joshua Fabia. And it actually made me laugh out loud at the takes surrounding Dale. I don't know who Josh. Comments are lit. Oh, you don't? Okay, probably for the best.

I have to Google him now. He said he would have been his two. Oh, you for sure know who he is, G.C. We did the whole thing with Moneyberg yesterday where he took the photo of me and then someone wrote like, you know he's going to post that on his website. I was like, yeah.

And then... You're going to be the next advertisement for Trinity as well. This fucking guy posts me with the damn t-shirt on his story. Fair play to put it on, man. He's just helping him out. You didn't chuckle at all. I was like, you know, fair play. I was like...

Fair play, man. I mean, you wanted to put on the t-shirt, but he helped you. He made me look a little bit buff. I appreciate it. A little bit buff. You had an ogre thumb, though. The thumb was looking crazy.

He has a weird thumb. It's fine. It's fine. Triple double. Is Feldman in question? This is David Feldman. After this whole Frankie situation, seems to be the first Feldman red flag.

What is your unbiased take? Well, I would say, look, if you want to separate Feldman from BKFC, fine. But I don't think it's the first BKFC red flag. I mean, certainly not from. from what I've heard. There have been some issues. I mean, he even said it on the show. There was an event that they had a massive event in Denver and he was rolling the dice. He said that if Connor didn't show up and if there wasn't that whole hull-balloo with Mike Perry, he may not

have had enough money to pay the fighters on that card. And there were big names on that card, including Mr. Mike Perry. That's an issue. Like that's a rolling of the dice. So what if Connor doesn't show up? You know what I mean? What happens? These guys just fought their asses off and got cut up and bloodied, broken hands, broken noses for free, that's a problem. It was the, remember not the early events? Of course, there was a death.

Here's the thing, here's the thing. What I have heard, and by the way, tomorrow, this is a good segue, our very first uncrowned film is going to come out. It is called, what is BKFC? It is going to premiere on the channel at 1 p.m. Eastern. Yes, that is usually when the show's live. I thought it would be good to air it when the show is usually live. And then our show will start

right after. So it's about 47 minutes. We'll probably start at like 155. And then we'll have a regular show with some big names and I'll tell you about them. But it's going to premiere. And it's a behind-the-scenes look at this company and what it is and what it's all about on that night in Newark a couple of weeks ago. And there is a moment where I do ask Connor about the Frankie Edgar situation because I had heard, and again, this was shot on the night. I had heard that it was a ticket issue. They did not say. sell as many tickets as they had hoped. I had asked around about it. I saw, I saw sections tarped off. And my understanding was Frankie was, you know, the agreement was that he was going to get

paid a pretty good amount of money. I heard seven figures. I heard it was the highest payday of his career. And that's why he took it. And it makes sense. And then they didn't sell the tickets and they didn't meet their marks. And so they offered him X amount, very low six figures, to just kind of walk away and he said no and then he pushed back and they came to another agreement for a higher number but nowhere near what he was going to make nowhere near what he was going to make and he passed everything what I was told and ultimately it just they had to make that financial decision I wish they would have just come out and said that they did not and they pinned it on his you know history medical all that stuff getting knocked out the truth is they knew all of this when they signed

them. And what I was told was he passed everything and there were no red flags and he is upset that they're pinning it on this. And I can understand that. And so, yeah, that's not great. That is not great. And they're still trying to figure things out. Look, their trailer ownership has been called into question. The future has been called into question. This is not a BKFC like puff piece propaganda. They didn't pay us to do this. This is going to be my look at like, what is this? And it was also my first time, my first time at a BKFC event. In fact, would you guys like to see the trailer? We have a trailer.

With the chat, hey, chat, would you like to see the trailer for the film? Chat, thumbs up if you'd like to see the trailer. I guess we're not in real time, right? I mean, there's a little bit of a delay. Hey, chat. Thumbs up. They have all their thumbs up

right now. They do? All of them. I don't see any thumbs up yet. I'm seeing it to the future. Oh, 24 inch of Yes 6 yeses and I air the trailer There's five right there I see them

Okay Here's the trailer For our first Uncrowned film Which premieres tomorrow At 1 p.m. Eastern 10 a.m. Pacific 6 p.m. in Eda

It is entitled What is BKFC An Uncrowned film? We'll see how violent it gets It's always different When I'm in the ring Expect some blood Yeah, a lot of blood

People who say this is too much violence. Grow us here, baby. Put out that growus here, yeah. Walk with your balls, yeah. Like, what do you feel right now? Pain. Pain? It's extremely aggressive.

Hey. Three seconds. We're done. Forty seconds. Let's finish the story right there, baby. Ah! Love here at BCHMTC. It's all love.

This is real fighting. This is real fighter. Go to bare knuckle. Go to bare knuckle. This real shit. Last time I'm going to say it, fight your fucking asses off tonight. So there you have it. Premiering tomorrow at 1 p.m., so excited about this, this is what I've wanted to do for a very long time.

Shout out to the newest member of the team, E.K. C. Leiden, who shot that and edited it as well. Shout out to Big Frank who worked on all the audio. Audio engineer, extraordinary. He's not just a producer. He's an engineer.

Shout out to Rick, who spearheaded the whole thing from a production standpoint as well. And I think that's all the shoutouts. What about you? It's going to be great. It's going to be great. Very excited.

And we already have a second one in the oven for next month. So hopefully you guys will enjoy. I'm very, uh, I'm very excited about the prospects here. Okay, um, let us go to some more questions. Shall we? Shall we? Shall we? Oh, this is a good one. Mack, mucous. Did any of you guys see the mysterious image on some gentleman's phone that made the broadcast during Brandon Allen's walkout on Saturday? Caught someone's attention on X at first because it appeared to be a dead body, which sent online MMA fans down on an investigative rabbit hole to figure out what

the image actually was. What do you go? I seen this, but I never, I saw it. We've got to be clear. When he says it appears to be a dead body, like, that is pure speculation. What is it? Zero. The only thing I saw was a guy holding a phone. Yeah. And there's a picture of somebody on the phone.

Can't tell if the person's alive, not alive, doing what? I don't even know if it's a girl or a guy. I took a few minutes to find out what was going on. Perfect. Frankie tell us. Reddit expert. Yeah, I got tagged in by GCC over here, and I went on Reddit to find out what was going on. And some people did speculate like, oh, this has to be some sort of prank where someone showed a,

image of their friend and maybe an unsavory position because the guy who actually showed the camera they later identified him he was wearing like a luchador mask so the like the mystery was getting deeper until someone you know enhanced the image and you can tell it's just someone laying on it like a lounge chair next to a pool and they have like their headphones next to them and everything so there's no there there okay there's nothing there's nothing at all you can put a text over an image that says anything and everybody will believe you now. Yeah. All right. I'm still not buying it. Who has, by the way, who has the presence of mind? Wait, still not buying it meaning you think that that's a dead body? Silence is loud. Are you the guy who held the phone? That's the question.

I didn't even notice it in real time. I just want to know who has the presence of mind before a UFC main event to do something like that, you know? Which part, hold the phone, that guy? Like, who's thinking to do this? It's so weird. The same guy who put the mask on. Have the picture. I mean, you know, Pablo Tori will be interviewing this guy in, you know, two weeks, and then we'll find out what the real story. Yeah, there's going to be a Netflix document about this. Can't wait.

So we have to go back to the night that Brendan Allen faced off with Rainier de Ritter in UFC Vancouver. I saw a great tweet. I don't know how these things pop up. It's like a guy with like four followers, but it was like, hey, at Pablo, now would be a good time for the Shohe Otani gambling investigation video to come out, you know, to a Blue J fan. Like everyone, everyone calls upon Pablo to unearth all the dirt.

Here's Moneyberg socks. Kevin Holland, not answering one time after five minutes expired and still being thrown back in there is absurd. Never seen it happen. Question is, which is worse? This blunder or the UL Romero versus Tim Kennedy? Stoolgate blunder. And just for the record, we're not talking about,

Frank, we're not talking about his stool. We're talking about Romero not getting off the stool. in an orderly fashion, a truly sliding door moment for Tim Kennedy. Yeah, that whole thing with Holland was weird. Look, as I said yesterday, I don't think, I don't think Mike Milott is a dirty guy. I mean, like, the guy is, I don't think he's that guy. I don't think he's trying to hit below the belt, but sometimes things happen in the heat of a match, in the heat of a fight. And just the way that was all handled to me was just very clumsy, very, very clumsy. So

Clockwork Orange says The BITB talked about top documentaries on pound for pound What about touching the void? Has anyone on the team seen or heard of this one?

Still to the day It's the best one I've ever seen Hasn't even been Close to being top Yes, this is about the guy who climbed Everest

I've seen it His leg off, is it That guy? Yeah Oh How'd you get that so fast Are we now In a era

Where we can get things This fast? No, no, no No, chill, chill, chill, chill, that had been a look ahead by it. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, shout out to Jordan.

Just in the Bid. I've never seen it, never heard of it. Same. Never seen it. Go to that. Kiss. Oh, actually, it's a great doc, so I highly recommend it. Rick Bad Take 2,578.

That's their name. Rick said there is no reason to doubt that Connor will be on the White House card. Did he mean there's no reason to believe he will be on the card? What is he on about? Connor has given us every reason to believe he won't be on the card. He's told us a hand to believe he won't be on the card. of time since 21 that he is coming back and Rick now believes we have no reason to doubt him.

What? Do you want to respond to that? Ultimately. Ultimately. Thank you, G.C. for the tee up. Yeah, he would be motivated to do this the same way he was going to come back before suffering an injury. Like, he, why would I, I will lob it out to the rest of you? Is your belief

higher now than previously that he would fight on this card? Um, I, I, like, this is like a hot tag for Beetsy. My, I'm sorry, I just want to say my, I'll say very quickly, my feeling is they are going to try to get him on the card and he is sincere in his desire. Does he ultimately make the walk? I don't know if any of us could guess this. Yeah, that's, that, inevitably there will be something that will happen where this could fall apart, but everybody is motivated to make this happen at the moment. I don't see why it wouldn't. What would prevent it from happening now sitting here in this moment? it. P.T.? Injury. Yeah, that's not now, though, right? He's not injured now.

No. But it's... Why would I doubt it now? I would doubt it because he hasn't fought and so long. And he hasn't been able to get through a fight camp and so long. So what happens, though? What is your speculation on what will happen? I'd say they'll try to make this fight. And I think the party will struggle with is getting through the fight camp, which has been what he's been struggling with for many years now. I do think, I do think you're right in terms of the motivation.

I think that what Connor is probably learning more and more is like fighting is the catalyst for everything else. And in his kind of all of these great businesses he has going, like he's made a lot of money outside of fighting too. But I think the catalyst for that is fighting. So I do agree with you that the motivation is there. I just think it's very difficult to get him into a camp the way he used to be when he was hungry, when he, when he still hadn't proven everything.

and I think honestly he hasn't treated his body very well for a long time and I think that's what catches up with him during a fight camp These are all completely fair points It's October 21st, 2025 Like there's no reason for me to doubt this now If in three months, four months, everybody's like Yeah, I don't think this is going to happen, X, Y, Z reason I'm there, I'm willing to change my stance on that

My point is right now on October 21st, 2025 The UFC wants it, he wants it, the White House wants it Why would I doubt it? What would be my reason to have reservations at this moment? You know? I think they're going to try. I don't know. I don't know.

It's impossible to guess, given how the last four years have gone, if he makes the walk, but I feel confident in saying that's the plan and hope. Let's see what happens. Interesting that he's kind of gone dark on social media. I guess if you're a fan who wants to believe. I think that's really positive. I think it's actually quite refreshing, right? like where it's just like, there's nothing out there.

What? You have no idea. During the political rallies and everything. Oh, yeah. Come on here and explain. I'm looking at it from the, I'm looking at it from the perspective, like a hardcore Connor fan who would love nothing more than to see him fight again. You have to take these as good signs, but ultimately we don't know. I mean, I thought he was going to fight Michael Chandler.

He was two weeks away or whatever it was, three weeks away at that point. Let's see, let's see, let's see. We continue. Crawford double leg. Oh, yes. This man knows about the history of one, Terrence Crawford on the wrestling mat. Two quick ones. Which talks.

Thank you. What was your thought on the way Mike Malott came off pertaining to the low blow? He seemed to come off as a little bit pretentious instead of just apologizing and accepting he was in the wrong. He doesn't believe he was in the wrong. I don't think, do you guys think he came off pretentious? Pretentious is not the right word, but unapologetic. Yeah.

He did not. He accused Kevin Holland of embellishing it. That is not necessarily the tact that most people would take in that scenario, right? A lot of people are going to go, hey, it was an accident. You know, I'm not a dirty fighter and move on. But he went a little bit further, which was to say Kevin Holland was embellishing, to which personally I don't believe to be true. Like Kevin Holland doesn't strike me as the type to really be looking for a way out that way. We've seen him in quite a few precarious situations and he tends to be a gamer. So I think unapologetic might be a better word. Yeah, I agree. I agree. I mean, look, I like the guy. I like the guy a lot, and I don't believe he's a dirty fighter, and I think that he probably feels, and he kind of alluded to this, that it's shadowing or overshadowing a great performance over the biggest name that he's ever fought.

So he's going to, you know, he's going to defend himself. Can't let you get close. What will come of the Vandrelay aftermath? By the way, speaking of that, speaking of that, Did you guys happen to see that van der Leigh and the guy who he brawled with, they're in a Burger King commercial? Like if that wasn't the telltale sign, what do you mean? Yeah.

Yes. They're eating a whopper beside each other. Now, is it possible this was recorded film before because Van der Leigh doesn't look like he has a scratch on his face? He does not. And also, it's a nod to how fucking big that fight was. Like, that's a blue chip sponsor. You know, like I think it's hard for us to understand.

And it nearly looks like a smoker in that footage you have, right? Where he's getting pulled across the ring. Yeah. The fact that Burger King are putting out ads about this, and please correct me very quickly, if it is, I'm starting to doubt that it may be. But it's a note that how big this was. And honestly, it makes it more of a disaster as far as I'm concerned. Okay, so AG fight Diego Rivas spoke to them.

It's after, and they just did not talk about it. The quote, here's a quote from Vanderlay. during the commercial shoot we sat together for practically eight hours I didn't talk to him and he didn't talk to me either he didn't say anything about what happened

and I didn't say anything either they said next to each other but do you see his face it doesn't look like to get a scratch on him and his face after the fight like he this is his eye stuff yeah

CGO maybe I'm getting I'm getting skeptical about what's happening here you know G.C's roommate. Hey, Ariel, I just watched the interview with Derek Moneyberg and I got to say a lot of red flags were going off from me. Am I the only one getting a shady vibe

or do you all see something I'm missing? What's the team's take on him? Because after listening to that, I feel like I need a mental shower. Major, quote, trust him as far as I can throw a wet noodle vibe. I think it's just him. Yeah, I think it's just you. I thought it was a great vibe, to be honest. I signed up for the Trinity of Wealth.

did you do it the Ten Commandments all jokes aside I feel exactly the same like I slept on it I feel exactly as the same way I felt yesterday which is like yeah clearly there is something going on here that like

the black belt thing I will never believe in a million years but he sat there and answered everything like you have to give him credit for that part of it but no I will never ever believe that he got a black belt that quickly MMAL says

on the nose gets such little love nowadays 30 questions answered best case you've changed bro by the way 30 questions is not that little just for the record like i try to get to as many as possible you change bro by the way we you remember when it average 20 that was i think it was 12 at one point i think i think we had a long time where it was 21 you remember when you were having me to curate them yeah that was fun mr mystery balls what's cooking unc aria what's cooking watching the first embedded for 321 got me thinking is mario bautista about to pull off a full on face turn with a win, potentially, yet people hated him not that long ago. If he beats

Umar, maybe people love him. If he does, he'll be undeniable and if the UFC still makes him fight again, instead of giving him a title shot, fans are going to turn on them and rally behind them. Yeah. I have seen Jedi post a few clips from Embedded. I will be honest, the last time I watched Embedded start to finish has been a while. I've seen some people question McKenzie Derns, not motivation, focus going into the fight gc i know you watch embedded quite religiously are you feeling the same way she says she was doing some recovery at the pool club manny petty recovery is this is this concerning she was out there with her training partner all right so much ado about nothing yeah i think so i

think so embedded embedded know what they were doing all right um white whale holy grail hi ariel it's been 21 days now 21 days of me lying on the shore shower floor, cold water, stabbing my ribs, replaying the moment you torch my question during your rant about what happened to On the Nose. Before I hand my gilded vote for M.A. Journalists of the year to either Ben Folks or Aaron Bronsteader, I'm giving you one last shot. So here it is, Mom Spaghetti. What in God's Green Earth could Iqram Aliscarav possibly do to the indestructible June Young Park? Tell me, have you or the team taken out loans, as I have, to put it all on the one the only, the often imitated, never duplicated, the inimitable Iron Turtle.

Plus 220. Plus 220? Plus 220. You going for it? Benbet. Benbet. Oh, you did it already. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I love it. I love it. It'll, yeah. It's insane disrespect to the greatest middle way walking the earth. This is from perennial. As I know you love evolving and avoiding complacency, what do you think about a new segment on one of the three days, this proposal being a segment where you react to current event MMA clips so we can laugh uncontrollably with you. You already do it occasionally, but more

of an allotted slot. Example, McGregor throwing shoulders while Perry and Stevens are facing off, Strickland falling off his scooter, McGregor walking across the highest bridge, UBank versus Eddie feud. It's not a bad shout. Someone in the comments, Matt Moe, threw one out there. Have either of you guys ever seen the Terrence Crawford on the roller coaster thingy video? No. I have. You have? Yeah.

I was hoping you would have said no. Pizzi. Okay. We've got to watch this together. This is maybe, I actually watched this recently, like before the Canella fight. This is Terrence Crawford on one of those, like, crazy roller coasters with a friend of his. Actually, you know what? There might be, there might be a lot of swearing on this.

Maybe it's not. I don't write to swear. Come on. What do you? Swearing is cool. Yeah. We need clarity on this. Are we not allowed to cuss anymore?

well i'm certainly not pushing the button or you should have got an email about this fall people i should have got a warning it's a great it's it's such a good video this is fine why are you what's with the audio what's going on without the audio it's not what is happening with the swearing i need to know every time i ask it's it's an initiative to you know better our lives by reducing our swearing all right yeah that's what it's part of our culture ptze uh uh rick you've seen this video i've seen this video yes isn't it the best it's It's incredible. He's on the amusement park with his good friend and the guy blacks out and he's on

the ride and he starts cracking up. He starts laughing at the guy because the guy is so scared and then he starts, he just goes to sleep and he starts snoring on the thing and somehow they attached a GoPro. No, no, no, these rides have it. So can I just say this genre of video of like people falling a, like passing out in the Slingshot is incredible. Oh, Slingshot. Yeah, yeah.

Anyway, it would be fun. But, you know, to be honest, I feel like we look at a lot of these sort of social clips, like on Mondays and whatnot. I feel like we... We're really not going to watch the video? No. What is happening with the swearing thing? Someone needs to explain to me in black and white here what is going on. It's a big part of the point.

I'm with you. I asked before the show off the air and I just got to... It's so close. I was told the STFU. Do you know what I mean? I'm loving this. I'm loving. I said I can't now.

I just want to... Hey, uh, Joe, Joe wants to know Ptt, tried my hand at Beamish over the weekend for the first time, whilst whilst Guinness still pisses all over it. I enjoyed it. If the Guinness tap is off, which of the following are you ordering? Murphy's. Beamish. Beamish. Forged Irish stouts. P.S. Up the F and Reds. And did. Um, don't know which reds they are. Yeah. Oh, I thought you censor it. I did. No, I did censor it. Because we don't swear. Look, these reds. We certainly flip and done. Don't. Did you see Sean Dites showing up today at the training ground? Do you know what? I was going to send your podcast here. Sweet track suit. So he did a big interview with the managers.

I'm going to send it to you. But Bameh should be my second one. Morphees and Bamish are Cork. Forger Stout was just Connor McGregor's one. He bought that off Porter House, which is a famous craft brew place here. But the Forger Stout thing, they were innovators of the can. In a can, it's really nice. But Bamish, Murphy's in Guinness.

I thought Killian's Irish Red did the cane. I always liked Killians. I always liked Killians. It is the best of the Irish. Speaking of Petey and the Irish stuff. Pintz's face. All the curse words coming out of his head right now. Yes, PT?

I was walking around my house all weekend, repeating the 30 million for kitchen scraps. And I repeated to myself. What do my mate just shout at me when he saw me on Sunday? That's the first thing he said. He just roared. 30 million for some kitchen scraps. I said it so many times. I was like, what the fuck was it?

What the heck it was he even talking about? Do you want me to tell you? What was the kitchen scraps part about it? So a kitchen scrap, it would be a scrap is a fight here. So I was talking about how. How you get like on these Russian tough shows, they keep fighting them in different areas of the house. Yes, we got that. So I was proposing that they got paid $30 million to fight a man in the kitchen.

Yeah, I could not remember after the longest time. I was like, man, what was he even talking about? Yeah, but I said that probably 180 times in my house. I feel like they have that on the citizenship. You have to say it. How much would you want for a kitchen scrub? I'm trying to get the more questions. Everyone's very upset.

Ariel, with Matchroom and PFL rights deals up next year. Do you think there is a world where they go to the same broadcaster and potentially link up slash work together and we see Eddie Herm promoting PFL? What do you guys reckon? That would be interesting. I feel like Eddie has to run his own thing. He doesn't strike me as someone who would be willing to work for someone else while running his own thing in the boxing world

but it's certainly an interesting it's an interesting thought Eddie Hearn would be great for anybody but the idea of Eddie Hearn just like parachuting into PFL of which he doesn't he knows nothing doesn't really like consume MMA like that feels like the criticism that

he would have of Dana White trying to drop into the world like I do this you don't it would kind of be the reverse of that I don't think I don't think it's a great idea Ooh fun one here from Kyle Grant fellas I'm on my way into Toronto for game seven of the ALCS standing room ticket but super excited. Hopefully it's one to remember what is each of your favorite sports game memories that you have ever attended?

How about that? Sick. How about that? That is sick. Also the standing room only flies. You gave me actual goosebumps. Kyle, I hope you had the time of your life. I don't know if I've ever been to anything as great as yesterday. Off the top of the dome, probably game six, Nick Celtics last year with my kids is probably my favorite sporting event that I've ever been to. That's got to be up there. I actually would go also a standing room only. The Beach Bowl, Georgia, Ohio State,

kick misses at midnight. We punch a ticket to the National Championship. Was that the COVID Bowl? No, that was the National Championship like 12 months prior. Oh, yeah, yeah. Definitely got COVID at that, brought it into the Wait, that wasn't the National Championship game? That was the semi-file. Oh, it was a semi- Yeah, yes, I remember. I had to ride the rail for like

six hours before the game even kicked off just to get a spot. It was great. What about you, PT? Was it the all-Ireland slitter match between Dublin and... How did you know? Oh, my God. It's incredible. Which one?

I think it was... I saw that legendary Barcelona team play around the city. And Messi scored two. Renaldo scored one. Oh, fuck. Is another Irishism? We lost your piece. She's yelling to his late.

This is all... Your thing got all frozen on us. Yeah, you have no idea what's going on. Kitchen Scrant. Yeah, charity million for the internet. Yeah. How much the internet go for those these days? Cherty million.

He's hearing everything like six seconds later. Please go ahead. Go ahead, PC. Elaine! Flip the router! I'm so lagging air. It's unbelievable. Actually, I'm watching myself.

I'm like, fucking 20, flip in 20 seconds behind. Sorry. All right, well, that's good stuff, Ptsey. Thank you. Thank you so much. Appreciate you stopping by. We're going to answer more questions.

How many did we get to? 16 in the first 25 or so minutes, so appreciate you guys very much, and we'll get to more back into the show. There's a lot more to get to. We'll get to our guests now. Very much, very much excited and very great lineup of guests. We have still to come, Boots Enis in the studio. We've got Jasmine Nix in the studio.

We've got Jasmine Nix in the studio. We've got Andy Foster joining us as well, Bo Nichols, so a lot to come. Very much appreciate the fact that Anthony Pettis is joining us. Can't imagine how he's feeling and what he's felt and what he's been going through. Over the last few days, we found out on October 17th that his head coach for his entire May career head coach over at Rufus Sport, head coach for his younger brother, Sergio Pettis, suddenly and tragically passed away. We're talking about Duke Rufus, of course, who we found that on Friday, passed away at the the very young age of 55.

Anthony's kind enough to join us for a few minutes to talk about Duke, his legacy and memories with him by his side. Let us go to Anthony right here now. Hey, Anthony, how are you? Really appreciate you doing this. What's up, brother? Can I ask just, how are you doing

in the simplest form? How have the last few days been for you? Not easy, man. You know, I lost my first father at 16 years old, and Duke became my second father and, you know, getting this tragic news, I was coming out to my house in Mexico, and, you know, I landed and I got all the text messages, you know, Duke passed away. I'm like, no way. Like, cannot be real. And yeah, man, it's all the emotions that I lived as a kid all over again. As I mentioned yesterday, we just saw him with your brother in Dubai, an incredible moment, vintage Rufus Sport striking on display. Did you, did you guys have any sort of indication, any sort of idea that he was battling anything, or is this just complete sudden as he was.

sleeping. Complete sudden, man, out of nowhere. I mean, our last conversation, you know, I was getting ready for a fight in Dubai, December 20th, and, you know, I was going to Milwaukee after I left my house in Mexico to start training camp with Duke. And, yeah, the news came, and it's complete sudden surprise that, you know, he passed away and his sleep. Damn.

And he wasn't dealing with anything. The word is a heart attack? We don't know. I mean, there still hasn't been an autopsy done yet. We haven't got the results back. I mean, I assume a heart attack just based on, like, the information I got from Scott Cushman, first person to find him. But, yeah, we don't know exactly what the cause of death was.

Okay. How's your brother doing? Same as me, man. You know, Serge lost his father at nine years old. I lost my father at 16. And then, you know, we knew Duke longer than our real dad. You know, he became a real father figured me and a mentor, a coach, a brother. You know, the way I lived my life was because of Duke.

you know like when i got when i came to his gym he told me a quote and uh you know my my father's murder was always unsolved and he said the uh the best success the best revenge is massive success and i literally lived my life by that you know and that's something he gave to me at 16 years old and together we've we've done some some amazing things and we spent so much time together you know i had 40 plus professional fights from tuesday to sunday sleeping in hotels room with him and hearing his life story, my life story. And it's just one of those things, man. It's just really hard to get over.

Do you remember the first time you met him? How were you introduced to him? How did you end up at his gym? Yeah, Rick Rufus. So his brother was, before UFC, you know, ESPN had kickboxing on it. Rick Rufus was the man when he came to the ISK kickboxing. And Duke was always in his corner.

When I was deciding to pursue mixed martial arts, Duke Roof, his gym was a no-brainer. You know, he had the jutsu, he had the kickboxing. He had the traditional martial arts background that I came from. So, you know, I signed up at his gym just as a regular student, walked in, met Duke, and me and him just, we share the same philosophies in life. You know, he didn't want to just be a guy that was in the UFC, a guy that was in the organization. He wanted to be the best of that organization.

And, man, like I said, that quote is how I lived my life by. He gave me that quote at 16 and even still now, you know, 30, years old. That's childhood my life. He had a great kickboxing career, 36, 8, and 1, 26 knockouts, undefeated as a pro boxer, had two fights in boxing as well. But really, he'll be remembered for being one of the all-time great MMA coaches in that gym in Milwaukee being the one of the all-time great MMA gyms developing champions like yourself, your brother, Tyron, Woodley, Ben Ascgren, etc. If someone were to ask you, what made him so great as a coach? Why was he such a

great coach? And why do so many fighters like yourself speak about him, not just as a coach, but as a mentor, as a father figure, what made him so special, in your opinion? I always tell my fighters there's three levels of coaches, a coach that studies the game and understands it from like just a philosophical sense of point, a coach that does a, A, what I just said, plus help somebody else do it,

and then a coach level three is a guy that's helped somebody else do it, did it themselves, and they study the game. And Duke was a level three coach. It's very hard to find that to mix martial arts. I was looking at a clip from back in I think it was in August of 2016 you beat Charles Olivera in Vancouver

you were on a three-fight losing streak you obviously remember this that was a huge win for you and he came on my show the Monday after the win and he said that it was hurting him so much to see you go through that tough time after being champion and whatnot that if you would have lost that fight to Charles which you want he was going to retire from coaching that he just he couldn't deal with it anymore did you did you do you that did you know that he was taking this so personally and and to me that just speaks to how much

he cared right you don't often hear that from coaches willing to walk away that's almost 10 years ago now look at all the success he's had since then did you know he took it so personally yeah we all knew i mean mixed martial arts is a roller coaster game man highest highs low as low is the weedies box behind you man like we are we're just coming off the leaves box and then we go into the uh eddie elver's fight uh who else did i lose i forget uh rdaa and then edson rda etzen barboza you know those three fights and um yeah we were the highest high we just like did did everything we could have done together and then you coming into that is uh you know what crazy thing is i wouldn't change it now that i look back at it i'm looking at all my old pictures with duke all the old memories we have all the hotel rooms

we had, the talks we had, you know, before the fights, after the fights, it all happens for reason, man. Everything is supposed to be exactly where it's at. I trust in God. I trust in his process for my life. And, you know, Duke played a huge role in that. Do you have any memories of UFC 164? I remember being there was the celebration of you and him and the gym. That was when you fought Benson Henderson in Milwaukee and it felt like you guys made it. Like, okay, the WC title was something, but this was a UFC title fight in your hometown, and it felt like a celebration of Milwaukee, in addition to a celebration of your family and his gym as well. When you think about that night and that win and that celebration, what comes to mind?

Man, honestly, just doing it in our hometown. I training in my hometown, going on my dad's grave, being going to do that with Duke, seeing all of our friends and family. Yeah, man, I just, that's one of the hardest. When I look back at those pictures, that hits me the most. Yeah, no, I can completely understand. Can you tell us a little bit about his family? Does he have kids?

He does. He has a daughter, Lulu Rufus. The crazy thing was, the first time I was able to teach Duke something. So I had my daughter first, and Duke had his daughter second. So I gave him just the, how it was going to work, just the meaning of having a kid,

the pressure puts up. now we may have lost him he's joining us from mexico and he did tell me beforehand that there were some connectivity issues so we're going to try to reconnect with anthony i don't want to keep him much longer because honestly i'm i'm really touched and impressed that he's here but it's one thing for me to talk about duke rufus who i obviously knew but didn't know on the you know i knew him as a guest on the show and someone that you would see at events cornering great fighters like Anthony and Ben Ascran had the two fights with C.M. Punk, Sergio Pettus, Ben Rothwell, trained Rosenomi Yunus for a bit as well. Alan Belcher, I mean, really just a who's who. Tyron Woodley developed

into the striker that he was in large part due to the work that he did with Duke Rufus. It's just a, it's a tragic loss. It's an immeasurable loss. And like I said, 36, 8, and 1 as a pro kickboxer, 26 knockouts. His brother who, Anthony referenced, Rick the Jet Rufus, had a 65-9 and 2 with one no contest record in the world of kickboxing. And it was really in 2006 that, you know, Duke transitioned over to, you know, starting up the team, starting up the gym, Rufus Sport. And, you know, almost 20 years later, it's still one of the very best gyms and teams in the world. You know, people come from all over the world to train at Rufus Sport. And that was actually one of the questions that I wanted to ask, Anthony, about what

becomes of Rufus Sport now. Sergio obviously just had that big win. He's vying for that PFL title. One suspects that he might be fighting for the PFL belt next, the 135 pound belt. No one thought Tyrone Woodley would turn into the striker that he became knocking out Robbie Lawler, defending that title four times, defeating Darren Till in in Dallas, which he said, as you can see right over here, the best fight of his career because a lot of people counted him out at UFC 218. Paul Felder, of course. I have to mention Paul Felder. Paul Felder gave an incredible impromptu eulogy, if you want to call it that on the broadcast on Saturday. Very well spoken,

very heartfelt. You can tell how much pain he was in sitting next to, I believe it was Brandon Fitzgerald and DC. And he was another great fighter that came out of that gym, Bilal Muhammad, another great fighter that came out of that gym. And so, yeah, it's, it's just a, it's an awful, awful, awful loss. And it feels like we've been having too many of these. If, if, if, if the Wi-Fi isn't working, maybe we could just get them on the phone just for a couple of minutes. I just, I don't want to keep it much longer, but I just want to be able to wrap this up in a proper way. Yep, appreciate it. So, yeah, if we could just get them on the phone, that's totally fine. And, uh, honestly, was very surprised that he was okay to come on and can't imagine if you know anything about the

pettus brothers and what they've been through losing their father at a very young age and how that shaped them to have someone like duke and to see the bond to see the friendship to see the loyalty uh to see the the connection that they had was beautiful was absolutely beautiful do we have anthony for a couple minutes yeah i can hear you uh sorry about that about that no it's good. I don't want to keep you much longer. I know how much is going on, and I really appreciate you being here. Can I ask, what do you think becomes, I know it's fresh, but what becomes of Rufus Sport now? Do you have any idea of what will become of the gym, which is still very much one of the best. Yeah, we have to keep the ready to going, man. Do so the more, nothing else

besides that. I had to come inside a bank because the Wi-Fi was a blackout. I appreciate it. Yeah, I mean, for me, it's still fresh, but I'm going back to Milwaukee on Friday. I'll be there for a week or two, and we'll figure out how do you keep his team going? How do you want people who maybe aren't as familiar with him, didn't know him on a personal level? How do you want people to remember your friend, your mentor, your head coach, Duke Rufus? He was a great guy, man. One of the guys that, you know, competition was his life. You know, he grew up, he's competing his whole life. And knowing that he's gone now is, you know, I've got to keep his legacy alive. Thank you, Anthony. Appreciate you coming on. I know

this is a stressful time for you and our heart breaks for you and my condolences to you and everyone who knew him, his family, his friends. Really, really appreciate it and so sorry to hear about this. Hang in there. Thank you, but I appreciate it. All right, there he is. Anthony Pat is kind enough to join us one of the greatest fighters of all time, former UFC lightweight champion who was there in Milwaukee, UFC 164, a great, great scene when he defeated. Of course, Benson and of course, we will never forget the great scene when he pulled off one of the greatest moves in MMA history, WEC 53 back in 2010, jumping off the cage and nailing Benson in the final in the final WEC title fight, in the final WEC fight, in the final WEC fight, in the final round

and in the final minute. You couldn't have scripted this. You could have scripted this. And yes, shortly thereafter, I forgot it was right here. There's the Wheaties box. I mean, this guy was on a, he was on a rocket ship. and in large part because of Duke Rufus being by his side so just heartbreaking stuff truly

and our condolences out to his family I'll probably squeeze in a question or two here let's do it um is there a short one Frank, you big fan of Halloween? Huge. Are you really?

Yeah, I love Halloween. I don't dress up, but I love Halloween. You give out candy? I did before moving to the city. There's not a lot of that. It seems like kids like to go to the stores to, like, trick and treat it's interesting. They don't come to your apartment? No, I don't allow them to do that.

That's not very nice. I do like Halloween. I like it more as a dad than I did as a kid. Like, as a kid, I loved it. I wasn't one of these people, I'm sure you were as well. Like, I didn't go to the parties. I wasn't, I'm like a 20-something-year-old man. I don't need to be dressing up.

One time I dressed up as Ali-G. Do you have pictures of that? I do, yes. We need these pictures. I actually thought it was a great Alley-G. It is very clever and believable. Your greatest costume? That's probably my greatest.

When I was 13, I dressed up as Fidel Castro. Wow! Bro. If you post that now... Oh, there'd be no more mysterious Frank. Canceled? There'd be missing Frank. Wow. Wow, wow, wow, wow, wow, wow, wow, wow, wow, wow, wow.

You know what? I'm actually a little bit uncomfortable that you said that. Good God. Now we've got some massive dirt on you. All right, thank you for that, Frank. I appreciate you getting me over the bridge to the other side. Okay, still to come. we have Boots Ennis in studio. Bo Neckle is going to be joining us in studio.

And Andy Foster is going to be joining us as well in a chat that I think a lot of you, including myself, are very much looking forward to. I'm just going to move this over here. Interesting question about Drake versus Kendrick in the World Series. I'm not sure about all of that. But we'll get to some more questions too. Oh, I have to turn this on, Frankie. I always forget to turn this on.

And then it sounds like I'm talking to no one. You can hear me? Yeah. deeper when I was like, we should just leave this on. Yeah, we should just leave it on. All right, looking forward to having our next guest on. She's joining us in studio. She signed with WWE back in 2022, was a part of the NXT scene for about three years. And then we found out somewhat abruptly that she was leaving. She posted on her social media that she was offered a new contract and chose to turn it down and to go her separate ways and see what else is out there.

He was a great soccer player at West Virginia. Actually, grew up in Syracuse, which is a part of the country that I know very much about. Went there for three years. It was a great time. And now we wonder why. We wonder where she goes from here. She was known as Jasmine Nix on WWNXT. In real life, she's just Jade Gentile.

You know her as Jasmine Nix, unless you were a big fan of the West Virginia soccer team or perhaps the Baldwinville High School, actually the Charles W. Baker High School, Baldwin's Will, New York. Anyway, without further ado, let us say hello to Jade, who is kind enough to join us right here and now in studio. There she is. Hello. Hello. How are you? Good. How are you? Nice to meet you. Thank you for joining us.

It's a pleasure. From Syracuse. Yeah, from Syracuse. That area? Yeah, Syracuse. I went to Syracuse. No way. I went to Syracuse University, yes.

That's awesome. Probably, well, I went there 0-1 to 04. Okay. So you were not... Yeah. I was born in 1998. Oh, my dear. That is crazy

That is crazy Baldwin'sville Is in Syracuse Or it's kind of next door It's like 15 minutes Outside of Syracuse Okay So why did you go to

West Virginia and not SU? Was that a big deal? Was that a controversial thing? Yeah I mean Obviously Syracuse would be nice Because I'm obviously right at home But I didn't want to be at home

Okay You didn't even apply No Okay But I trained there I trained at the facility Like my coaches worked there

So it was like You know I was already at home my whole life so i was like i'd rather get out and experience something else yes but um and also the offer for w u was the best offer i had so okay i had to take it it all worked out and uh life has been very interesting for you i would imagine very interesting is this your first chat since leaving i know you did the video okay it is so i appreciate you okay thank you for coming um and so let's get into it. So, 2022, you're actually in Nashville at the tryouts. I was at that tryout, by the way.

No way. Just watching as a media member, I think that was. Can I tell you, the only thing I remember is Dwight Howard being there? Yeah, he was. He was, right? Were you a part of that thing with Dwight Howard? I know, like, they had you guys separate and it was multiple days, but were you interacting with him at all? No, not really. I mean, he said hi to everyone, but we weren't really interactive. He just took pictures with some people after, but no, it was really cool, though. So you're a soccer player. You go to West Virginia. You have a great career there, and then you're playing over in Iceland. Yeah. So how do you end up in Nashville to be a part of this tryout in 2022? Yeah, that's honestly the craziest part is I obviously was in Iceland, did not

expect my career to end in any way. I was probably going to do it until I could, till I couldn't anymore. And I got reached out by a recruiter for WWE, and they actually, and they actually DM'd me. Wow. So I was like, okay, this is kind of sick. Just out of the blue. Just out the blue. Okay. Based off of my Instagram, I guess, the image I had. But they DM'd be like, hey, we'd love you to come out to Nashville and try out. And I was like, okay, like, is this a joke? I really thought it was like a prank. Someone's pranking me. But I ended up obviously telling my coach, I was like, hey, like I have to leave for this opportunity. Like, I'm sorry. Got to go. This is, this is like rounding the end of my season. Okay.

It's like I can't come back for another season. I've already had two seasons here, but this opportunity is too big to pass up. So I ended up leaving and literally dropped everything I had. Soccer has been my whole life, obviously, dropped everything and went to the tryout and made it. What was your, and here you are playing, this is over at West Virginia, right? Yeah, yep. What position, by the way?

Outside forward. Okay. How many goals? I had more goals at after Alding in Iceland. But I think I had, I can't remember my, that was a while ago. Okay, fair enough, fair enough. I can't even remember. I put you on the spot.

We actually have some great highlights of you in high school. Do you? Do we have these guys? Let's see, let's see. Dramatic, no, that's a picture, that's a picture. This is in Iceland. Yeah, freezing. It's freezing there.

Oh, here we go. Oh. Is that you? Yeah, that's a nice little goal. Baby me. This is high school right here, right? Yeah, I was definitely, yeah, I had a really good high school career. Look at that cross right there.

Wait, are you the one scoring? I'm right there you are. Number two. Okay. Why number two, any particular reason? I don't know. I just always been number two since I was little, so I just kind of kept it throughout my whole career.

Look at these highlights right here. Is this what got you to West Virginia? Did you put this together? Yeah, it was definitely my high school, mostly my club, which obviously you don't really have highlights from club, but club soccer was obviously a big reason why I got recruited because college coaches will call. come and watch your games. And I actually got the opportunity to go to Germany, France, Italy to play when I was

like 14, 15. And it was basically just an Olympic developmental program. And they select a team. You go out for like a camp. And they select a team. And that team goes and travels and plays out there against other teams. So it was really cool. I think that kind of set me up for obviously where I am now.

when I went to W and then when I went to Iceland. Who got you into soccer? Well, I have three older brothers. So they played, yep, all through their whole childhood. They went to college as well for soccer, and they kind of got me into it. I've always played with the boys, grew up playing with the boys. So it was kind of just second nature to me. Travel soccer is a big part of my life now because I have three kids.

Oh, yeah. 13, 11, and 8 is the daughter, so she has two older brothers. and she's just getting into it now and sort of reluctantly, but everyone's forcing her to do it. So hopefully. That's kind of, yeah. I feel like I was kind of just forced into it. Obviously, I loved it, but like it was just, you had to do it.

Initially, you're like, what is going on here? Exactly. Repractuses a week. She's like, I just want to play with my friends. Yeah. So I understand this very much. So, okay, so you have a great career. You're in, you're in Iceland.

By the way, women's soccer in Iceland. Big deal? For Iceland, yeah. Yeah, for sure. What is life like over there? Well, when I went, it was COVID. Oh, wow. So it was a very interesting experience for me.

I actually lived in Tampa, Florida, before I went out there. So I lived there right after I graduated, couldn't walk because of COVID for my graduation. So it was kind of just a weird situation overall. I was just chilling. I graduated. I was like, okay, what do I do with my life? Soccer teams weren't really reaching out because of COVID because you can't travel during the time. So I was like, okay, like, what do I do?

now. And I got reached out by a recruiter again for Iceland. I was like, Iceland. I've never even heard of Iceland. I'm like, okay, are you sure? They're like, yeah, it's a great opportunity, whatever. So I went out there. And again, like I was the only American out there at the time. Obviously, they recruited some other Americans after that. But I went out there. I lived on a farm in someone's attic. Wow. Yeah. So, and obviously it was during COVID. So I had to quarantine in my house for like, two. weeks. Couldn't talk to anyone. Literally, I had horses to talk to. That's the only people I saw were horses and cows. But yeah, it was really cool. It was a really cool experience. Were you homesick?

Not really. I feel like I've always been away from my home. Like I went to W. I traveled as a kid. So it kind of was just normal for me. And obviously, I was living out my dream. I was playing professional soccer. So I was really okay with everything that happened and everything happens for reason. So it was fun. Did you have the sheep's head over there? The sheep, no. I know some people from Iceland. There's some fighters there and they tell us about the sheep's head that they eat. Yeah, no. I'm not, not for me. You didn't try the cuisine, the local cuisine? No. I mean, there's a lot of fresh fish, which got me into fish more. But there was like baby lambs crossing the road. Like I can't, you know, like you can't see that and then and then go eat it. But no, it was really cool. So in the end,

you were there for about two years? Yeah. Okay. So you get the call. Are you familiar with WWE when you are, you know, hit up? I obviously heard of it. Growing up, I've heard a lot of it. I watched clips here and there, obviously, through social media, but I wasn't familiar with, obviously, the whole concept. Like, I wasn't watching every single week. Obviously, I grew up with brothers, so they would have it on here and there. So it was definitely new to me in that aspect. And obviously, I grew a respect for it being in the industry. And obviously, all that I've learned so far, I'm like, wow. Like, I put it over. So every time someone asked me about it, like, I'm like, you don't understand. Like, it's

been the craziest experience, like, best experience of my life. Like, you really can't expect these things that have happened. Like, the experiences I've had have been what's made me who I am, basically. You even speak like a pro wrestler now. You say, I put it over. Yeah. That's very, yeah. Yeah. See, it's just natural. Yeah, yeah. Because you wouldn't say that five years ago. Exactly. Exactly. These are the, the terms. Okay, so you get there to Nashville. What do they, what do they put you through what do you have to do um so there was a lot of in-ring cardio so running the ropes that was a wake-up call to me i didn't even know i thought they were like springy and like you know soft no nope they're they're cables um so automatically i was like what people like hit these like every

single day um so that they we ran the ropes we did a lot of bumps which was new to you don't normally just fall backwards you know it's not a natural thing to do so i think i think just experiencing that, I was like, oh God, like I'm in for a wake-up call. And then we did three promos. There was like one as you had to be a baby face or a heel. And I got a baby face promo. So I had a promo. I had a cut in front of everyone. On the spot? Yeah. It was, well, that one, you got to, you got a script. And then you got home and, you know, you did it, or back at the hotel, you did it the next day. But on the spot was your intro promo. So, So they would call you up one by one and you had to do like a 60 second intro promo and

they were just like, yeah, just get up there and tell us about yourself. So that was like the scariest one for me because I'm like, okay, well, am I supposed to be saying like, what do I say, what do I say? How much do I say? Like I just didn't know yet at that time. But. Who you talking to? Like who is this in front of?

It was 60 people, I think, on the tryout. It was Paul Heyman. Oh wow. Triple H, Bianca Blair came for a little bit, and I'm trying to remember who else was there. Basically, you know, very important notable people, and I'm sitting there like shivering in my boots because I didn't, I didn't know what to expect. Were you super nervous? Yeah, just because I've never been in that environment before. Obviously, it's a huge culture shock. I grew up playing soccer. There's no speaking. You're just running. Like, there's nothing that you have to. kind of, I mean, it just came second nature to me. But now everything's brand new. New people,

new movements, new everything. So it was a lot to take in. But again, it was just the experience itself was amazing. So I think I was just trying to soak it in. I'm like, oh, whatever happens, happens. Like my parents were there. It was my birthday. Oh, wow. And it was on my birthday that they told us, they told like everyone who made it. So how many people made it from the tryout? I'm trying to think how many girls. I think it was six girls and five guys. That could be wrong. But I'm pretty sure it was around that number.

Do you say yes right away? Or did you have to think about it? No, I said yes. It was an automatic. I already went into it knowing that, like, I was expecting to make it because that's my mindset. I'm like, okay, I'm going to make it. Like, that's just how it is.

And that's kind of what happened. I kind of spoke into existence. But it was definitely. nerve-wracking. I actually cried in my, it was the table, it was Triple H, and they bring you in, and they sit you across from Triple H, and he's like, here's your contract. Like, do you accept it? And I'm just like, yeah. Oh, my God. It was so embarrassing, looking back at it, but it was a really cool experience. And, like, that just shows you how much I, like, I already had passion for it. And, you know, I've been there for three days, and I was already like, oh, my God, like, this is my life. Like,

that's my whole mindset changed. So I already. was preparing for it then and obviously now here I am and it's kind of crazy to remember those times because a lot has happened within the past three years but the team in Iceland when you tell them that you're out do they try to convince you to stay or yeah they were like oh are you sure like how do you know like whatever they're like oh john Cena I'm like yeah and um but obviously I am very happy that I made that decision because everything happens for a reason and you know I already I did that path. Now I did this path. You know, everything kind of came together. So how quickly does life change after you accept that contract? Are you moving to Orlando right away? What's happening?

After that, we had a couple months. I think my tryout was in July, my birthday. And then October, we moved out there. So you go and you look at apartments like a month before and do your physicals and stuff like that. And then after that, you know, you move out there and then you're there and then it's everyday performance center yep so that's i feel like a lot of people don't um realize how much goes into it because even before you're on tv like you're in there every single day training twice a day um you have promo class so like acting classes and you have lift every day and obviously coconut shows so like live events and stuff like that every weekend so it automatically like i it was natural for me because coming from a college professional like athlete standpoint you kind of already do those types of things

but this was not even not even comparable to what I've been through because now there's another dynamic into it it's not just putting your body on the line it's now like mentally like you have to mentally and emotionally be in it and promos and things that like you're not used to obviously so it was a lot but obviously the learning experience was worth it and And, yeah. Who are your coaches? Who are your mentors during this period? So I had, I mean, I had a lot.

Norman Smiley was my first coach, best coach ever. You like them, legend from WCW. You ever watch his old stuff? Yeah. Dancing stuff. Yes, oh my God, I love it. We would bring up videos and show him. He's like, no, stop it.

But, yeah, I think he was a big game changer for me, obviously just coming in having no wrestling experience and learning from the best technique technique technique everything that he taught me was just like crucial for where I am and where I was on TV so he was a big one I had Johnny Moss he eventually became my coach after after Norman and you know like just it was kind of like back and forth you kind of switch coaches here and this schedule changes and you go from which is nice because you get to learn from everyone. And then obviously our head coach, Matt Bloom, he was always there, you know, watching, giving us critiques from the side. So it was nice to have

basically all eyes on you at all times and just like help all around the board. You know what I mean? Who comes up with Jasmine Nix? So they basically, whenever you're ready, because it's not an automatic guarantee you're going to be on TV. There's a lot of people training like every single day to get on TV. Right. So I think whenever they realize, okay, like she's improving, she's, you know, working hard, whatever, I think she's ready for TV. So they reach out to you and they ask you like how many, what names would you want? Like give us a list. And some people, they'll give a list and they don't pick from the list. It just depends on what they want and what they see you as. So I put Jasmine on there. I had another name. I can't remember what it was, but Jasmine was like my top two. And they were like, okay, we like Jasmine, we're going to go with that, like, do you like it? And I was like, yeah. And that's how I happened. I'm like, all right. So there's like, you know, the brats dolls? There's like Barbie dolls and brats dolls. Okay. I always loved Bratstalls growing up. And there was a Bratstall, Yasmin. And I just really liked that name. And I was like, okay, well, I feel like Jasmine fits me

more than Yasmin. So I kind of just went with Jasmine. But everyone compares me to like a Bratstall. So I'm like, okay, this kind of works, you know, for my character and everything. But yeah. And how long do you start to feel like you've got this like you're figuring it out it's starting to become second nature it's starting to become easier you're comfortable how long does that take never never felt that way I mean I of course I felt like I just felt like I had so much to learn like I never felt content with where I was because I mean I've been doing it for three years like it's soccer it took me I still haven't like perfected my craft and it's been 15 years of playing so I feel like just being there and learning every day even being on TV I'm learning

like from my mistakes and I'm like okay I could have done this better I could have done that better um so I feel like obviously certain things came second nature just you know certain body movements that you do bumps things like that but in terms of like feeling like I was 100 percent like no no and I don't I don't mean 100 percent would mean you're like on the main roster right right I know you mean like more second nature yeah yeah because it's very it's very sort of foreign to you right early on that's kind of yeah that's what I mean it's just so foreign that it never felt like it was just like easy you know which I like I like I like a challenge I like to learn and I think being put in that uncomfortable environment every single day helps you grow and that's why

I always put myself in uncomfortable environments like even going to Iceland and like not many people like they spoke English but that was their second language so I had to kind of make my own you know so I feel like it was coming from that straight to this it was kind of like one uncomfortable situation to another but in the best way possible, you know what I mean? When you're over there and you're training, but you're not on NXT, do all of you still go to the shows and see what's going on backstage? Are you observing?

Is that what they make you do? Yep. So, like, live events, everyone goes to those. You watch from the back. Same thing with TV, NXT TVs, like you go in the back and you watch. So you're always learning from other people and like, oh, okay, like, you know, and also you have to know what other people do so you don't do that. Like you can't be trying to do the same thing as other people.

You have to be your own individual. And it's very important to watch and see like, okay, this person's doing that. Like, let me do this different or let me do that different. And obviously you're just learning from the best. So, you know, you're like, okay, well, they're very successful. How can I do that? You know what I mean? First time on TV.

What was that like? I feel like it was just exciting more than anything. I thought it was going to be really nervous. But I was just like, oh, my God, this is like I'm finally doing it because you work. so hard to get to that point. And finally, like, Jasmine was able to be presented how I wanted her to be presented. So I feel like it was really, really cool. And just, like, looking back at how that feeling felt to whenever I had my last match on NXT, I was like, wow, like, I grew so much, you know, like, I went out. I started off as, like, more of a manager role, just based

off of, obviously, like, I'm the rookie, and I had my vets, you know, like, they. were the vets, they're leading me through, they're teaching me, they're helping me. So, like, I kind of had to play, like, that role, which I was. So, like, it was very second nature to play that, you know, like, I'm like, okay, like, I'm just here, whatever. Um, but it was definitely scary, you know, like, you're like, okay, how do I, how do I get better next time? And, you know, obviously there's a lot of critiques, not only from other people, but like yourself, you know? So I think just learning from every, literally every single Tuesday I had, I was like, okay, now next time I'm going to do this, next time I'm going to do this. And like you just grow. And I was obviously, like I said, new. So if I'm going on TV and I'm new, I still, I'm not, things aren't second nature yet. Like I have to experience to learn. And the only way you learn is being on TV every Tuesday, which I was for two years straight. So. So listening to you right now, you seemed into it. You seemed passionate. about it.

Yeah. You seem willing to learn and grow. Yeah. Seem excited about it. Which leads me to the obvious question, why aren't you still a part of WWE? Why did you decide to leave? Yeah. I mean, I truthfully can say I was not expecting to leave.

Like I wholeheartedly felt like this was going to be my life. I was ready to put in the work and, you know, see where my journey took me. But it came down to like making a living. And everyone needs to make a living. some people's living looks different than others and for me it was like after my three years and being on TV for two years I expected there to be some sort of compensation just you know for the work that I put in and it didn't end up that way and that's okay and you know that's why I had to part ways but it was no like bad blood or anything it was just okay like I can't make a living on this

and and like I value myself in this way which you guys might not yet but But, you know, who knows in the future, Valley goes up. And, you know, if they want me back, I would love to go back. But it was just in that time, in that moment, it felt like the right decision for me. And, again, didn't want it to be, but, you know, you got to do what you got to do. How does that work? They come to you with, so your deal is up after three years? Yeah, so at my three year.

They come to you with a new offer. Yeah. You obviously aren't happy with the offer. Do you propose a new number? Yeah. So, it was honestly, like, kind of a lot. long process for me because it was like a back and forth situation but yeah basically they reach out they say you know here's here's what we are offering you for the next three years and you

either accept right then and there or you try to negotiate and I try to negotiate and the offer stood as it was went back a couple times like oh like what about this no offer stands I'm like okay and if no budging no budge and how far apart were you from from what you wanted and what they were offering i just wanted any compensation i felt like after three years um when you say competition they still want they wanted to pay you so that's compensation yeah so they wanted to raise right yeah like like how big was the gap like were you like you know miles apart or were you know you thought that they could meet you i felt like there yeah there definitely could have been like a meat in the middle but after I realized there was no budge I was like okay like

that's kind of where it stands like I couldn't there's nothing else I can do or say it just was like okay you know um you know any sort of raise will do and it was no raise was this the same number that you were making the previous three years yeah so it didn't go up right and you were hoping for something yeah higher just based off of you know like people who are coming in obviously me came in at that rate and um after three years of two years of being on TV every single Tuesday working for TNA as well um I felt like maybe you know a raise would be understandable and you know did you ask why um yeah but there I didn't speak to um like anyone I spoke to the mediator so me her, oh, why is that? Like, you know, she's not the one who's making, she's just the mediator.

She's the messenger. So, like, I couldn't really ask her why, if that makes sense. I just felt like I felt like that was kind of just the common answer going around with, with negotiation as everyone was getting paid, you know, that amount. So you asked around and was that the same for your colleagues? You know, it wasn't talking about much, but from what I, heard I felt like it was, but you know, like you never know. You don't really talk about those things with people. So I just figured like, you know, we're all at the same standpoint and that's just how it is, like whatever. Obviously some people make more, some people make less. That's just how business is. So I kind of accepted my fate. I felt like if they felt like that was my value

at that time, then I didn't see it changing much just because, you know, I've been on TV for two years. I've been doing the things I've been doing. I've been wrestling main, like, you know, main roster people. Just a lot. There's been a lot that's put into it. So I felt like if that wasn't enough for, like, a cost of living, at least, then I just didn't think that, you know, it was, I was valued much. So I was like, okay, like you have to be where you're valued.

Are you doing this on your own or is someone helping you? For the negotiations that talking on my own. On your own, okay. Do you think it would have been better had you had someone representing you? Maybe. Or is that not a thing? I honestly, like, I haven't heard much about people getting agents or anything. I thought, I was under the pressure whenever I first signed that you couldn't have an agent.

Oh. In WW, just, I don't know. I think things changed, like, over time. But whenever I first started, I felt like that was the case. But I think things have changed and some people have them. But again, like, no one really talks about that. So it's kind of just like, you're like, okay, every man for themselves, you know? Like, I only know what I know and I know what I've done.

So I, you know, I can only speak on my behalf. And the process from like the initial offer to the end, like you said, it dragged a little bit? I'm trying to think. I think it was a couple weeks in advance that they reached out. And yeah, it was kind of just a process of like going back and forth because, like I said, there's a mediator and a messenger. So she's going back and forth like, okay, let me see, whatever. and it came back to every time like no offer stands do you consider because at that point you're probably around them do you consider talking to one of your you know mentors or higher ups in person like

yeah and I did I spoke to uh higher up um and it was obviously helpful just to hear like insight of like okay um this is where they stand this is why this is what I need to do whatever but in terms of like cost of living and things like that like you know there's nothing you can really say like everyone costs a living goes up every year that's you have to make a living like if it doesn't if you don't get a raise you're losing money you know what I mean so that's kind of how I looked at it and um I just felt like at that time I had to make the decision for myself and so you were going to struggle you were saying like you couldn't live it felt like yes it felt like I was losing money I was not gaining in terms of, yeah, like I've already, I'm paying for my own rent. Like, I'm an

independent woman, you know what I mean? Like, I'm trying to do everything that you pay for gear, like you pay for hair, makeup, girls are different. Like, there's a lot of expenses, especially being in WWE outfits every single week. I was on TV every single Tuesday. So it was like constant, like back to back to back, like expenses that I felt like weren't being compensated. And so when you're in this situation and you're starting to get a sense that this isn't moving, are you just steadfast like, hey, if they don't mean, like, I'm out? Or were you having that internal struggle of like, I love this so much? Yes.

Should I just do it? Should I just kind of bite the bullet? There was 100% an internal struggle. And even like on the day where I said like, okay, you know, if the offer stands, like I have to leave, it was very hard for me. I was, you know, in tears. It was very uncomfortable conversation for me to have, and I didn't ever say it out loud. So, like, when I said it out loud, I was like, oh, like, it's just a pit in my stomach.

Like, am I making the right decision? Like, is this, like, I don't know what I should do. But like I said, after I came back and looked at it, I was like, okay, like, that was the right decision for me because you have to make a living. Right. And that's just how it was. Like, it was nothing to do with my passion or, like, obviously I had passion for it. Like, you can't be doing that every single day for three years straight. and not have passion.

Like, you would have quit a long time ago, you know what I mean? So it was like I didn't foresee myself ever quitting. I didn't foresee myself getting fired at it as well. And, like, that was kind of stated to me as well. Like, oh, like, well, you're not going to get fired. Like, you know, this is a great opportunity for you. And I'm like, yeah, like, 100% it is. Like, I do want to keep going.

I wish I could. Like, I really wish I could. But in terms of how I'm living right now, like, I will not be able to live, maintain this if, you know, the offer stands. In the video that you posted in your car when you announced this, you mentioned that you wanted to do some other things and you weren't allowed to do that. What did you mean by that? So during the process of training, whenever I was Jade, before Jasmine, I got reached out by Love Island.

And I don't know if you've watched Love Island. I'm aware of it. I'm aware of it. And it's not because I'm ashamed, but there's been some fighters on there, Tommy Fury and whatnot. So I know it's a big deal on Peacock. Yeah. So basically I got reached out by them and I heard of someone else going on a show. And I was like, oh, like, is this something that we can do? And I was under the impression that yes, it is. Like, especially if you want to build your brand, like, you know, get followers for your brand. Like, okay, now more people are watching Jasmine, whatever. So I thought that that was a thing. And this is before I had the name Jasmine. So I wasn't on TV yet. And I thought that that would be a good route if I went and then came back.

And they kind of shut that down. I was like, okay, that's fine. I understand like, and a couple shows reached out after that when I was Jasmine. And obviously I turned those down myself because I'm in a different position now. I'm on TV like this is my life. Like I want to succeed in what I'm doing now.

So I turned that kind of side of the world down for obviously better opportunities. And it turned out that like, you know, after now, after quitting, I still have these opportunities, you know, like here for me. So I think that was something that I'm happy. I didn't go do those opportunities,

but I knew I had other opportunities, if that makes sense. So that's why I like, I put that in the video. I didn't expect the video to flow up like that. I didn't know. I was just saying my side. I wasn't trying to. to be like controversial. I was like, no, this is exactly what happened. This is what happened. And I, there was nothing that was like negative, you know, behind what I was saying. So that's why I was

so, like, confused. I'm like, wait, no, take it back. The reason, did you regret posting it? No, I didn't, I didn't regret it. But I guess I regret not saying more to explain. And that's why I'm happy I get to do it on here because, like, a lot of things were taken out of context, like they always are on social media, which it is what I, I know, just, by being in the industry I know that's how it is so I just kind of wanted to save my side without you know going on social media again and saying another thing for it to be taken wrong and I think because it was such a short stint for you yeah and then a lot of people just you know they just kind of get released or part ways and you actually gave a reason and then when you say

it's not what I was hoping as far as the money then people try to pin it on them being the bad guys how dare they although we don't know what these numbers are and then you talk about things, you know, being presented to you and you can't do them and people are then wondering like, well, what opportunity? So there's a lot that's sort of left to the imagination. Exactly. You mentioned, though, you now have these opportunities. So are you going on these shows now? Is that the plan? So there's been a couple shows who have reached out to me and I'm still kind of in the process of seeing that out and what I want to do in terms of if I want to go that route or wrestling or both. But I'm definitely open to all opportunities and

And I'm kind of just seeing them. Well, you can't go on Love Island because a quick look at your social media would suggest you are taken. Yes, I'm not going on. Unless Love Island is a work. Is it a work, Love Island? No. Do people go on there? Probably, actually.

Yeah, it probably is a work. But no, in my case, it wouldn't have been a work. But in terms of shows now, I want to go on more challenge-based shows, more what's it called, like sports-related. Oh, I see. Okay. Um, so... Which ones would fall under that category? The challenge.

Oh, MTV? Oh, my gosh. We have on our, on our, uh, on our production team, a couple guys who are like hardcore, they can't get you in. I'm just saying they're hardcore fans. They talk about it all the time. Yeah. I didn't know this was still a thing, really, this show. I remember the real world back in the day.

Yep. Now it's like real world Road Rules Challenge. You want to be on that? Yeah. I feel like, yeah, for sure. I mean, we've, I've been in contact with them. That was one of the shows. that reached out while I was in

WWW. And obviously I was like, hey, like, can't, you know, I'm Jasmine. How many of these shows reached out? I think like four. Okay, and they're all just DMing you. Yeah, so obviously my boyfriend's in the reality world. Okay. So he did two Netflix shows.

So that played a big role into it. Obviously, like, they see me through his social media and vice versa. So it kind of is just a world of connections. Once you get in that public eye, then you're kind of just up for other shows. And, like, they put you on the list for another show. And we got asked to do, like, a couple show and things like that. But we're definitely more sticking to the challenge side of it, like more sports-related fitness type of shows, game shows.

So we'll see where that goes. I mentioned that you know the wrestling jargon put over. So you probably know the word heat like someone has. your boyfriend has has drew some heat in the wrestling world you guys did a video one time where you're like showing him some moves and then he he mentions repeatedly that it's fake and this pissed off a lot of people Mark Henry on his radio show busted open he was very upset about this

what is what is your response to this he felt like it was disrespectful so my response is the whole point of the video and if you watch the video you can see that it was satire like him saying and he knows i come home with bruises and scratches broken nose split open nose like obviously he knows it's not fake and we have this conversation every single day like you know like he if anyone he's like oh my god like how do you do this every day like he's the first person to put it over and his character just like how there's heels on uh w w there's villains in reality tv and he's a villain okay and so i think that's kind of how people have to look at it in terms of that but when he says

it's fake he says it's fake and then goes on in the video to come like show basically the opposite yeah he's hitting the ropes like oh my god this hurts like my back how do you do this like he's taking bumps he's getting his butt beat by me so obviously he knows like that's the whole point of the video is like basically putting it over you know i wish he wouldn't have said that you know why because i did watch the whole thing and he does say my back's hurting like this wow and then he ends it and then he says it i know i know he ends it with because he's doing a promo for like a betting thing and so he tried to find I know what he was trying to do yes to wrap it back in which he could have used obviously a different word yes from start to finish but in terms of

this is scripted but you know what that football game is not scripted exactly just that word yeah yeah yeah is a sensitive word but um and I completely understand and that's why I already knew like I didn't I wasn't like mad that people were taking like that because obviously I don't think that I'm the first person to say like I think I posted a TikTok a couple weeks before that video and I was like, when people say wrestling's fake, which is so funny, because obviously here we are, but I knew from, one, the video and from two, knowing what he feels about wrestling,

he was a fan growing up, like, his whole childhood. So he already knows it's not. So I think, like, obviously better choice of words for sure, but in terms of how I felt like the video was viewed, like how I saw it and how I was doing it, was like he was obviously, like, putting it over. But yeah, like wrong choice of words at the end. You had a lot of injuries, right?

Yeah, but mostly before, wrestling and I think that's something I also didn't clarify in my video because a lot of people thought that I was saying oh I had these four knee surgeries in WWE so like obviously you're not going to continue if you have four knee surgeries I'm like no these were before okay so I had four knee surgeries prior just from soccer obviously came back kept going came back um played my four years in college and then went and played pro even after having those I had one knee surgery after playing one year of pro. And so when I came in, obviously, in Iceland, it's a little different. They don't have the facilities we have for rehab and stuff like that. And so my leg was a little weaker,

just, you know, because I didn't rehab it that good. And so when I came in, they were like, oh, let's rehab you for a couple months just so you're like completely fresh, ready to go whenever you get in the ring. So that's what I meant by like being held back in the beginning. So it was just a couple months of rehab, which already we're doing the basics, you know what I mean? Like we're locking up. We're doing running the ropes, things like that. So it wasn't, I didn't feel like I missed a lot in terms of the training aspect of it. But again, I was sitting there watching, taking notes from the outside of the ring. That word held back can be misconstrued as well.

For sure. You know, see, now that I'm saying things, it's just everything I say. I'm like, why did I say that? It's tough. Did you break your nose as well? So I broke, first I split open my nose, which I'm pretty sure it fractured during that. It was actually at Stand and Deliver. And I, it's funny because you couldn't even see it. But there was basically like someone's arm came down and accidentally hit me in the nose. And I was just gushing blood everywhere.

And I had to like kind of crawl to the side because I'm like, I'm not going to be on camera with this. So I crawled to the side. No one even knew it happened. I split open my nose at stand and the liver, which probably ended up being fractured. And then later on, I was in a match and same type of thing, catching a dive, and I split it open. Oh. And broke it. And then I had to wear that mask.

Yeah. Surgery? No surgery. Okay. I do have a deviated septum, so I can go get surgery, but I chose not to. Okay. I just can't really breathe. Was that the worst injury that you had? Yeah.

okay yeah so that's why like it wasn't crazy things it was just like obviously you know it wasn't anything that held me out of tv because even with the mask i could still wrestle and be out there so nothing held me back in terms of that aspect um it was just my knee surgeries prior the other one that i wanted to get your take on when you guys went to uh disney and and your boyfriend drew some heat for that video too so here you are having to sort of yes you know uh you know get You're the more famous one in this world, you're the known one, and he's doing some things that are questionable or that are controversial speaking in a certain way. How did you handle that situation? Did it all come your way? Did you have to answer for it? Yeah, a lot came my way. But obviously, like I said, like I don't really answer things on social media. So I never came back and said my side of my story for any of these things because I know how they're taken and misconstrued. Obviously, words hold a lot of weight. And actions do too. so I kind of have been waiting for an opportunity like this to say like I guess my side or my piece

but yeah no I think that a lot of things in social media are one construed misconstrued taken different ways clipped like a lot of things are clipped and me knowing also like obviously if I if I knew if there were certain things that questioned my boyfriend's character and like what he did I wouldn't be with him and that's what i think obviously people not knowing who i am they're like oh well why would she stay with this person if he's doing all these bad things like i already know his character and i already know certain things he's done do look bad and have been taken bad obviously but they're not what they seem if that makes sense so for example that that situation you know he he actually like that was a truthfully like going out of his way to be nice situation

It was. Yes. Really? And that's why it's so crazy. I saw the sort of highlight version. Yes. And there's like insensitive things. It struck me like he's making fun of people, different nationalities.

So how is he being nice? So in terms of like the, um, him going up and giving a high five to the little boy, he was genuinely going up and giving a high five to him and like, no, nothing like bad. Like he wasn't like making fun of him. Like it was just clipped. So like things that he was saying were clipped right after that was happening. and things that I like people were like oh she's laughing at him absolutely not I would never do that in a million years I've never made fun of anyone I'm not that type of person and neither is he it's just clip like that and he's an outgoing like social person so whenever he's talking about things he comes off like that but it's not what it's seemed to be I guess um and like he he's worked with autistic kids like he's not he has no nothing bad to say about anyone so that's why I knew like Like, it was just bad, bad things were taken, one, taken out of context, two, like things that were said, just like how I'm learning, like words that are said are taken completely different ways that you don't mean them to be said.

So, like, actions that he's done, words he said obviously could have been changed. He could have said different things, done different things. But in terms of, like, his character, that's not, that's not him. So obviously, I mean, he has to answer for these things, but do they come up to you and say, yo, what's up? like what's going on. Do you have to hear from anyone about it? I'm not talking about fans. I'm talking about at your place of work. Yeah. No, not really. I mean. You didn't get any sort of, you know, no. No. I think it's because again, like everyone knows how things are misconstrued. So I think also people, all these people who would come up to me, they know me already. So like,

they know that what was said or done wasn't a take on my character or like what I did wrong, I guess. like you said, yeah, that's something that like you kind of separate work life from at home life and he doesn't work there. That's not like they're, you know, place to say, I guess. And, you know, that's, that's it. That last day where you get written off, you're kind of just like beaten up and tossed to the side. What was that like for you knowing that this is the end, at least for now? People have come back. It's happened a million times, but of this journey, of this character. That's it for you. How did you process all that that day? It was like, definitely very upsetting, just knowing that it was my last day. But, you know, in terms of how

I was written off, you know, I can't really control or have a say in that. And I think, you know, everything, the, what storyline I was already headed in and what direction I was already headed in makes sense of how they writ me off. Like I was in the storyline. We were kind of already having, you know, beef. We were going back and forth. Like we had arguments every week, me, Jason and Fallon. So it was kind of, you know, it was coming. It felt like it was already coming. You know what I mean? Like it was kind of written in the story. Anyone talked to you that day? Anyone offer any words of wisdom, advice? Yeah. Johnny Russo, he spoke to me. And, you know, he was really encouraging and just said, keep doing what you're doing. And like, you know, you never know. You can come back one day. And I was

like, yeah, that's exactly what I would love to do. And obviously, you know, everyone, we said our goodbyes and I truthfully have, there's not one person there that I can say like I had bad blood with or beef with or like we had issues. Like I feel like I kind of got along with everyone and kept good connections with everyone. So, you know, I left with my head held high other than the fact, like, you know, obviously it's a big culture shock leaving and knowing that I'm done for now but I guess it's always been in the back of my head that like you know you can always come back you know it's not it's not there's not an end to everything like you can you can continue this journey if you know it comes back down the road so do you want to stay in the

wrestling business yeah I mean I would like I said I'm still trying to weigh out my opportunities and see what I'm going to do where I'm going to head but I'm not sure in terms of like where yet but I'm keeping the options open and you know deciding from there it's have you talked to other organizations, other promotions? Not yet. Okay. Are you allowed to or how does that work? Yeah, I'm pretty sure I am because I just didn't resign. Got it. So I think it's different when like non-compete or anything like that. Yeah, no, it was just, you know, I'm free. Yeah. But I've been taking these past couple weeks just to figure out, you know, where my mind's at, what I want to do and figure out my life from here. What do you think you do? What do you, what do you

think becomes your profession? I feel like I've always kind of been like a reality TV girl. Okay. I feel like that's kind of how I've been perceived. Like even growing up, people are always like, oh, you're definitely going to be on like one of those shows and whatever. But I think I want to do both. Like I want to go do these shows if it, if it presents themselves. I don't know. I don't know yet. You never know in that world. But I want to continue doing social media influencing. and then obviously, you know, take up other wrestling opportunities if they come my way. Are you interested in being an indie wrestler and going across the country in some of these small locations?

I've always loved traveling. Okay, okay. You don't feel like you're above that or anything like that? No, of course not. Like I, I mean, like I said from the beginning, I'm still learning. Like, I'm still trying to perfect my craft and I don't feel like I perfected it. I wish I had more time to perfect it. So I obviously would continue wrestling if, you know, there's other opportunities there,

and I probably will. I just don't know where and when and how. So I'm just still making my way. Have you talked to any of the other people who have left about what life is like on the other side? There's been a few people who reached out to me and, you know, just have put out connections and opportunities that I can do. But same thing I'm telling you, same thing I'm telling them, like, thank you so much. I appreciate it. I'm still trying to figure out what I'm going to do. But yeah, I mean, there's definitely been a lot of help and positive feedback for me. So do you watch other wrestling organizations? Are you a fan? I know you did stuff with TNA as you mentioned. Yeah, mostly TNA and WW. Okay. Yeah. But I feel like, I mean, a lot of people are like, oh, you're going to AEW? Yeah. That's the obvious question. Yeah. I knew you're getting there. Well, I mean, there's two big ones and there's obviously some other great ones. Is that of interest to you? I mean.

I don't know. You don't know. You haven't talked to them? No, I haven't. Okay, they haven't reached out. No. Okay. But like I said, I'm still keeping everything open.

I really have no clue. I'm just kind of, I feel like I'm a very good with the flow person, so whatever comes my way, you know, that's probably what I'll end up doing. Since you're getting an opportunity to answer some stuff, I wanted to ask you about a statement from Bully Ray on his radio show. Do you know what I'm talking about here? So I saw, I think, a clip of it. I can read it for you.

Here's a recap, courtesy of. wrestle talk. If Jasmine Nix would have trained at a wrestling school, wrestling would have been her passion and her dream. She most likely would have stayed put and grinded it out. One thing about wrestlers, they will accept the grind to chase the dream. But when you get pulled in from soccer and made football, whatever, it's not the same. You don't have that burning sensation in you, that burning passion. Like a Stephanie Vakir who told me that wrestling was her nourishment when she didn't have enough food to eat. That doesn't burn in Jasmine Nix. It's not the same mental state, not that same pit of your stomach grind where you need to do it. You need to make it. That's his

assessment what is your response to that have you ever met bully have you ever talked to him yeah okay um i really respect him i think that there's nothing wrong with what he's saying like every everyone's entitled to their own opinions and if that's the opinion he got on me then that's totally fine like i can't is that fair i think that for him like it's not like we know each other on a personal level so i'm not sure if he would know necessarily if that passion does burn inside me but when it comes from like obviously yes I played soccer and I had a passion for soccer and I think training and doing those things like I had to put myself through a lot to be successful in that and the same thing with WWE you have to work hard to get where you're at so I think just because

my journey was a little different doesn't mean that I don't have passion or building passion for the future of WWE like making on main roster things like that I of course had passion so I think that was a little of like a hard take but like I said everyone's entitled to their own opinions and if that's how he perceives me then you know that's how it is and that's usually what people do say especially if they don't know um athletes journeys like they're like oh they're just athletes they're just coming here for a paycheck or they're they're just here for the name and like that's I've never been like that I've always been about like you can't do something and put your all into something if you don't have passion and again if I

The stuff that I've already done and the matches I've had and the work I've put in and outside of TV, I personally don't think it's possible to do all of that and not have passion or, you know, like love for what I'm doing. Is it hard to butt your tongue and not respond when you hear people questioning your passion, your motives, your work ethic? I've just never been like that. That's why like a lot of things have been said about me and my intentions. and I've never came back and said anything because I just don't think it's worth it. I already know who I am.

I know what my intentions are. I know my character. So when people question it, I'm like, well, they don't know me. So there's nothing that it doesn't put me down because I'm like, well, these are just assumptions. These are speculations. And again, like everyone's entitled to their own opinion.

So if they feel that way, go ahead, feel that way. But I already know how I feel about myself. I know how I feel about the company. I know how I felt about my journey and how hard I pushed myself and how hard I work to get here. And honestly, just to get where I am now as a person through my whole soccer career and all the things I had to overcome. So I think, like, the things that I've been through,

you can't question my passion based off of that. But, you know, obviously. I respect that because when people talk shit about me, I want to defend myself and respond. So to just let a roll off. natural thing to do. Especially someone that you had some kind of relationship, friendship, you knew him at least, right, to a certain degree.

So for him to call you out like that, I was wondering. And I don't know if he's right, he's wrong. I mean, it sounds like you had passion we've just met. That to me feels like a tough one, a tough pill to swallow. And I know that's a thing that people talk about with WWW right now because they're recruiting from sort of non-traditional. It used to be you work through the Indies. the territories and then you make it to the big show. Now it's like, oh, this gymnastics person,

this soccer player. And so people sometimes feel like some can't cut it and they haven't gone through the routes. I haven't paid their dues. And I hear this a lot. Yeah, which I completely understand. And I've, trust me, like I have so much respect for the people who have paid their dues, but that's not my fault that I didn't go that route. Like I can't go back and change how I grew up in like the journey that I've been on. I can't go back and be like, oh, please don't DM me and reach out to me about WW because like that's just the journey I had and of course some people don't cut it some people maybe don't have passion but in my case that's not who I am as a person and again since I don't speak up for myself and I don't put out responses and go deep into that stuff

like not a lot of people know who I am so I kind of just am like well I'll leave it at that you guys can make your own assumptions of me however you want but like I said I think the best thing for anyone, especially in this industry, is to know who they are. And negative comments aren't going to put you down or make you feel some type of way because you already know who you are. So no regrets. You're happy with your decision. You're excited about the future. Very excited. You still watch wrestling? Yeah. Okay. Yeah, yeah. You're still kind of up to speed. Yeah, I'm up to speed. But I just feel like I, in terms of where I'm going to go in my journey and, like, for the Indies, I guess, I am trying to figure out, you know, my path. I'm trying to

figure out, like, how long do I need? Do I need a break? Do I need? Like, you know what I mean? I'm just taking these next couple months, weeks, whatever, to figure everything out and kind of going to go from there. Is there anything that we didn't touch on that you wanted to clear up? Do you feel like we hit it all? You really hit it all. You did hit it all. Is that a good thing or bad thing? I can't tell. No, I'm happy because like I said, like I've been wanting to speak about certain things that like have been dying inside. I mean, like, that's not true. or like that's not how it was or that's not but also another thing is I guess not everything you see online is true not everything that is put out is accurate or like I mean obviously in this industry

people are meant to love and hate wrestlers like WW Superstars that's how that's how it's made up like that's how you you basically you have to be a character and I think based off of my character, I'm okay with that. Like, you guys have a negative opinion on me. I'm, yep, that's exactly who I was playing. It worked. Yeah, it worked. So it's not like I'm going to go back and be like, no, guys, don't think this way of me. Like, that's not who I am. I wouldn't, you don't do that. You know what I mean? You play your part and that's how it is. Are you, are you hopeful that you end up back there? Or would you be at peace if your WWE journey is a three-year? No, I'm definitely hopeful. I feel like I put in a lot of effort

already on time and I dedicated my three years and honestly more that I thought was going to happen to this company so I would love to end up back there if I could if the opportunity presents itself but you know you never know where the future is going to take you so so what do we do now we hang out in the 315 yeah yeah that's what we're doing carousel I don't mean me and you I just mean you the figure to carousel centers it's still there yeah it is it is Yeah, I don't know how, but it is. Why, why? That used to be my spot.

Yeah, but it went from like, it's definitely upgraded. Okay. Do they still have the carousel at the top? I don't think they have that anymore. But it's called the carousel? I know. Is it not called the carousel? It is.

It is the whole thing. Wait, is it still called that? Oh, they changed it? See, that's what I mean. Everything's changed. I don't live there. I'm from. I know, I know.

But you have no ties anymore? No, no. I don't speak to any one. I have two friends from Syracuse that I speak to. It's called Destiny USA. Destiny. What the hell? See, you brought up Carousel and it, yeah.

Now I remember it is. No family there? Yeah, my family's there, but I'll go home with my family and that's it. But we don't, I mean, I go home for the holidays. That was like the big spot for me. It was Carousel. See, but that's what I mean. You got me confused.

Why? Because when you were a kid. It was Carousel. But going back, it is Destiny and I should have known that. But an awful name, by the way. I know. Destiny USA. Tarcell Center was iconic.

It was iconic. Did you go to Q's games? Yeah, of course. Yeah. Yeah. My parents have season tickets. Okay. I'm always there.

Always. Amazing. Well, congratulations. Thank you. On a great run. Congratulations on a great three years, on a great, you know, athletic career as well. And looking forward. So maybe we'll see you on the challenge.

Maybe Love Island. Maybe not Love Island. Okay. Maybe the challenge. Okay. One of those. One of those. You never know.

Game shows. Okay. Nice little tease there. Thank you very much for coming in. All the best. You appreciate you coming to us first. We really do appreciate that. And wish you nothing but the best.

Thank you so much. moving forward. We'll take a quick break, say goodbye to Jade, and then we'll be back with Booneckle, Boots Ennis still to come as well in studio, and of course, Andy Foster, don't go anywhere. Okay, that was a nice chat from the crack last week. The boys talking about UFC 321.

Much to discuss there. Looking forward to that this weekend. They'll have another great show on Friday, three puck on Saturday, and then the next biggie, U.S.C. 3.2. 322. Madison Square Garden, New York City. That is a big one. That is a massive one. Main event is Samhachia versus Jack Dalmatelena at the world's most famous arena at the Mecca. It's an incredible card. Valentina Shepchenko against Zhang Wei Li for the flyway title,

strawway title, vacant strawway title on the line this Saturday. Of course, brianajanjiroba against McKenzie Dern. We've talked about Sean Brady versus Michael Morales. We've talked about Carlos Prachis against Leon Edwards. We haven't really talked much about Bo Neckle versus Hadovo Vieer, which is a fascinating fight on this card. There's a lot at stake. It's a fascinating style matchup as well. And quite frankly, it's a big one for Bo coming off his last fight. So there's a lot to talk to him about. And of course, he's a part of the RAF team. They've got their second show. And that, of course, is Real American Freestyle Wrestling. They had their first show in August in Cleveland. Second one,

in his backyard at Penn State. So much to discuss with the one and only Bo Nicol. He's kind enough to join us right here and now on the program. Hello, Bo. How are you? Doing well, Ariel. Thanks for having me on, brother. Oh, yeah, we're always changing the look. The hair is a little different, the glasses. What does this look?

Wow, even the side is a little different. It's usually like a bit of a fade there. Yeah, what are we doing? What's going on? I've just been training hard. No time for a haircut. Okay. Are we keeping this for the fight? I don't know. We'll see. We'll see how much time I have between media and training and weight cut. So if I have a second, I might trim it up.

You're so big time, like, you're the guys that, like, the barber comes to their house, right? Like, you don't go to a barber shop. No, no, no, no. You're not that guy? I go in, my barber, Josh, is my main man, walk-ins only. Wow. Takes care of me. He's a good dude. Walkins only?

So sometimes you have to wait there for, like, an hour for Josh? Sometimes, yeah Bo-Nickel ain't waiting an hour in Happy Valley, there's no way. I don't mind. You Walt's right in there, I know it. It's all good. You're a man of the people.

Okay, we'll get your fight in a moment, but let's quickly talk about Real American Freestyle Wrestling. You're part of the broadcast team for this one. So you competed on the first one, part of the broadcast team for this one. What's your role in particular?

What are you doing over there on Saturday? Yeah, I'm super pumped. I'm going to be on the mic doing some, you know, color, some play-by-play, and really just, you know, trying to bring a perspective to the audience of an athlete that's been there and competed and stuff. So I'm pumped. I've done some commentary in the past with Big Ten Network and some Penn State matches and different things. But, you know, this is really exciting for me just because I love the sport.

And what the RAF is doing is really, really special. You know, the first event went amazing. It was streamed on Fox Nation. It's going to be streamed there again. and it did some really, really big numbers in that first show. So we're looking to build some momentum and keep it going. And there's a lot of exciting matchups. And I'm just excited to watch some good wrestling and commentate on it a little bit.

Okay, so you, like we just said, you were a part of that first show. I believe you're featured right over there. Why did it go amazing, in your opinion? First show, you know, always a tricky one. Why did it go so well? Yeah, you know, I think having my experience in the UFC and seeing the professionalism and how they handle events. And then being able to compare and relate that to the RAF,

it was like very professional, top-notch, dialed in. For the first show, you expect a lot of hiccups, a lot of bugs and things to be worked out. And to be honest, it went very smoothly. Everybody there is, again, super professional. And I think the action and the highlights of the event spoke for themselves. You know, there were some amazing matches and some big-time stuff that was happening in the sport of wrestling.

And, you know, I think that the RIF is continuing to build momentum and signing the best wrestlers in the world and getting the best guys to compete against each other. So, you know, a lot of exciting stuff. And, you know, it's just exciting to see what I think is the world's, you know, most challenging, most difficult sport be highlighted in a way that it deserves. Okay. So this one's, I mean, you are Penn State Wrestling. This is happening at the Bryce Jordan Center, right? which is the venue in which the team will compete in, the Penn State wrestling team will compete in, right?

So you're a natural fit. Was there any talk of you competing on this card as well, or was it too close to MSG? Yeah, you know, obviously would have loved to compete in my hometown, Homorina, and, you know, of course, the RIF wanted me to be able to compete there, but three weeks until the fight was a little tight. I considered it, but, you know, I figured it's best,

It's best to, you know, chase one rabbit at a time. So, you know, for me, the focus is MSG. It's, you know, this next fight. And I'm really pumped about that as well. But, you know, excited to be part of the broadcast team nonetheless. Will you compete down the line? Are there plans already in place? Yeah, 100%. I'll be competing, you know, again. We'll see. Maybe before the year ends. Oh, wow. That's soon. So you really enjoyed it. I love it. Yeah, it was fun. It was fun just to compete. That's what I love doing. So, you know, for me, that's the most exciting part about what I get to do is going out there and putting it all in the line. So I felt like, I felt, to be honest, a little slow, a little sluggish, my first match in four and a half years. But it was fun. And I enjoyed it. And I enjoyed being around the whole team at RAF. Everybody was a joy to be around. So, you know, it definitely motivated me to get back in there again. and yeah, just and have fun. Any idea how big of a deal this will be on Saturday, how many people they're expecting to attend the event?

Yeah, you know, there's going to be, for sure, you know, thousands of people at the event. The viewership, as I mentioned on the first show was phenomenal. It was not only a lot of new subscribers for Fox Nation, but as the event went on, the viewership kept increasing. So, you know, that's something that, you love to see that more and more people were tuning in as the event continued. So, you know, building on that momentum is going to be huge.

And what we have, you know, competitively is a lot of the top-level guys in the world. And they introduced, you know, a lot of names to this card that are interesting matchups. The one that I'm most excited about is Jake Varner, who is 2016 Olympic gold medalist and a teammate coach of mine at Penn State. And he's going to be wrestling Pat Downey. So it's a little bit of a little bit of bad blood there between Pat and Penn State. And Varner's very accomplished, but he hasn't competed in a long time. So it's going to be interesting. My prediction, Jake Varner by Smash however he wants.

But it's going to be a fun match. What I really want is you at Iowa. That's the scene that I want to see. Are there any plans in place? I want you back over there. I haven't heard about any events in Iowa, but, you know, of course we, you know, did the first one in Ohio, this next one in Pennsylvania, there's been talks of, you know, Illinois, Oklahoma. So, you know, we're going to hit all the major wrestling areas. And yeah, I mean, I don't know if Iowa has anybody for me to compete against, but maybe we can go put the Brands Brothers two against one. I'll take the coaches out. Oh, yes. Okay, okay. So we spoke to you after the Iowa fight. the UFC fight back in May, and again, you handled it so well. Like you said all the right things, you handled it so well.

I think everyone wanted to, like, you know, rain on your parade, and you were just like, I've been here before and I'll be back. Can you describe, you know, so that was, what, five or so months ago now, what have the last five months been like for you? And how have you changed as a fighter in light of what transpired in Des Moines? I mean, a lot of massive changes. I think that, you know, my foundation of my mentality remains the same. You know, it's about continuing to improve and get better and just perfect my craft as best I can.

So, you know, that foundation remains the same. But I think on a technical level, I learned so much from that fight and was able to, I think that the main thing is like understanding, you know, what does damage in a fight, what is like opportunity costs, like how that works in a fight. And really just shifted my mindset and perspective of, you know, how I'm going to approach. the actual competition and the action. So I felt like I learned more in that fight than I had my entire career combined previous to that. So I'm really grateful for it. And I think that at the same time,

it was good for me to be humbled a little bit. Of course, like, I always try to remain humble on my own, but I think God has a way of humbling us as well. So for me, just getting back on the grind and locking in and staying humble, staying committed, It's just been a lot of training and really, you know, using that as motivation, using that as something to springboard me into the future rather than something that's going to be a roadblock. So I look at that as for me, the best thing in my career that's happened to me so far. In retrospect, do you think you need it to be humbled?

I guess, you know, at the end of the day, things work out the way they're supposed to. I believe that. I feel like maybe it wasn't necessarily like a humbling in a like an internal way, but it was more of like a reality check of like, hey, I felt like I lost the fight because I didn't prepare well enough. And I thought I was prepared going in. So, you know, I got beat up. So obviously wasn't as prepared as I thought.

And for me, that's a great thing. it just gives me opportunity to see what I need to work on and what I need to improve on. And so I feel I feel grateful for it. And I feel like I approach every training session in a humble way where, you know, I want to work and get better and learn. And I'm open to, you know, whatever I have to do to do to make that work. Did you change anything as far as training, coaches, where you trained, like any radical changes in that respect? No, no radical changes on the, on like, the coaching or training end.

I would say it's more so with my mindset, more so with, like, what I'm trying to accomplish in a fight. I feel like I was kind of going in there without a really strong game plan and without a really strong, like, idea of what I was trying to do. And I feel like after that fight, it's really helped me dial in exactly what I'm trying to do within a fight. You know, within wrestling, I had what I call, like, a system, right? So it was like there's a game plan and steps that I have that, you know, I remind myself throughout the match and this is what I'm trying to do. This is what I'm trying to accomplish. And I felt like going into that fight, I was just kind of like, all right, I'll figure it out, which was a little bit due to lack of experience. But, you know, getting that experience has helped me just dial things into like understanding and knowing what I'm trying to do in a fight, which it sounds like very basic and obvious.

but I guess that's what I needed to learn because I've been making big improvements. I saw when the announcement came out that Islam was fighting Jack and Valentina's fighting Jean, we put out a tweet, I put out a tweet, and you quote tweeted it and said something to the effect of

get me on the early prelims, which was striking, obviously, because there was once a time where I remember us talking about you not being a prelim fighter, you wanting to be a main card fight, And so can I ask why you wrote that? And is this part of the humbling process that you're talking about? Yeah, I mean, a little bit of a joke.

Yes, yes. Of course, I feel at the same time, like, I do feel humbled where coming in, I remember the specific instance, you asked me, you know, if I was going to be on the prelims. And I kind of scoffed at it, like, you know, and that was a little bit in my mind. I think I was maybe, I was definitely arrogant, but, you know, There was a little bit of truth, truth to that coming in in my position, but at the same time, it was arrogant. So I feel like, yeah, I mean, I don't really care where I fight. The UFC wants to put me first fight on the card, then I'm happy to do that.

And, yeah, it's definitely part of this, you know, humbling, as I've said. So, you know, I don't feel like I, I don't feel like I should get anything that I don't deserve and that I didn't earn. And I want to earn everything I have. So, you know, if I'm on the prelims, then that's great. I'm pumped about it. Where exactly are you on the card? Do you know yet? No, I have no idea. No idea. So. Do you think you'll be on the prelims? I could be. I mean, I think that it's probably 50-50. I'll either be, you know, a prelim slot, maybe first fight on the main, but wherever I'm at, I don't really, it's all good.

Yeah. How did we end up with Hedolfo Vieira? Were there other names discussed, or was it just him and then you were in? no i mean this was a fight that i had talked about for a while with uh with the ufc and with different people and i felt like it was a exciting matchup given his credibility and um his name his accomplishments and jiu jitsu so you know they brought it to me and i i felt like after having lost the fight i'm not really in a position that oh i got a you know pick and choose this or that like the first name they gave me i said yes to so um it was a fight again i'd already talked about it and discussed and said yes right away. By the way, according to Tapology,

they have you listed as the third fight of the night. So I guess that is early prethums. Let's do it. No problems. No problem. I don't care. I got to get out of there early, you know. I'll get to watch a few, you know,

amazing fights after me and get some dinner and call it a good night. I kind of love this fight against Adelpho because, you know, rester versus grappler, sometimes that leads to some striking, you know, your ground games, albeit different ground games, cancel each other out. I think it's a fast, and he's obviously, you know, accomplished in his world, you're accomplished in your world. I think it's a really fun matchup. I think a lot of people are into it. Do you share that sentiment? Yeah, definitely. I feel excited about it. I think that, you know, from my view, he's a guy that presents a lot of interesting challenges. He's, I think,

rounded out his game quite a bit in his last couple fights from what I've seen. So, you know, I'm definitely feeling like I'm going to get the best version of him out there, which I I think all my opponents bring the best version of themselves to compete against me because I do have that big name and bring a lot of excitement. So, you know, I'm looking forward to just a great fight. And I'm, again, worked on a lot of things. So I want to showcase all of them. Do you think that will happen?

Often when we see a great wrestler go up against a great BJJ practitioner, I know he's getting up there in age a little bit and he's had some losses. But often when we see this type of matchup, the ground games cancel each other out and it becomes a striking match for the most part, like almost like a kickboxing match. Do you think that's going to happen this time around? No, I don't think that's going to happen personally. I feel like, you know, I definitely think I learned from my fights with Derritter and Paul Craig, who are both jujitsu-based guys. And, you know, I feel that for me, getting takedowns, getting on top, that's going to be a great position regardless of what this guy's skill set is of anybody that I fight.

So, you know, I feel like it's an MMA fight, right? So I want to make it an MMA fight. And that's something that I'm not going to shy away from in this one for sure. I feel like, you know, I would like to challenge myself on the ground a little bit. You know, it's interesting throughout your MMA career and even your UFC career, I feel like there was so much attention on you. You know, the placement on the card, your opponent, you're undefeated, you're finishing guys in seconds. do you kind of feel like you're flying under the radar this time around and if so do you like

that is that refreshing yeah you know honestly like the the media stuff and really you know a lot of it was brought on by myself so no there's no complaints on my end but i think that i was getting a little bit um a little bit burnt out by it uh just because it was like the same things over and over and it's like the same conversation every time and it's just a lot and uh of course like with the situation that i was in again like a lot of it brought on by myself it was a lot of negativity and so you know kind of like separating from that a little bit over the past five months has been really nice and i feel like i've gotten back to the root of like why i do this and just the love for the game and the sport is definitely been ignited in me so that's something that has been

refreshing and exciting and I think that yeah definitely feel like less a little bit less attention and excitement for this fight but um that's totally okay and uh it ebbs and flows right like you know that's just the way the world works and the way anything works you're gonna have moments that are that are you know you're on the up and moments that you're on the down moments that you're neutral and it's just part of riding riding the wave of life and I think that it's honestly been nice To that end, I do believe there hasn't been an episode of the critically acclaimed Nichols and Dimes podcast in the last few months, right? Did you shut all that down to be 100% focused on this fight? I'm glad you've been noticing. You've been watching. Well, I'm a former guest,

you know, I enjoyed it. You're one of my favorite guests. Thank you. Top of all time. But yeah, yeah, that's part of it, you know, spending less time on that aspect, which, you know, I enjoyed it. I enjoyed the interviews and podcasting and being able to have interesting conversations with people and put out content that was hopefully helpful to the audience and help them learn and grow. But yeah, I think that my main motivator and thing that I'm excited about right now is fighting. And so, you know, really just been spending as much time and energy on that as I can. And it's, like I said, been refreshing because it just feels a lot more pure and a lot more genuine for me. I'd be remiss if I don't ask you about this Saturday,

this past Saturday, what did you think of RDR losing the way in which he did to Brendan Allen? That was rough. I mean, the first seven and a half minutes, he looked like amazing, looked like, you know, world, top level, world championship caliber fighter. And, you know, obviously I think after the first seven-half minutes went downhill a little bit with the conditioning but I had heard a few things prior to the fight you know maybe maybe bad weight cut maybe some illnesses so you know one fight doesn't really reflect how good you are as a person or excuse me as a fighter and uh all that to be said you know I'm sure he was disappointed in his performance it wasn't his best performance I think Brennan Allen looked okay you know he did a good job

controlling him from top position, had a couple nice reversals, a nice double leg in the fourth round. But yeah, I mean, overall, like, kind of a little bit of a lackluster fight, but it happens. It's the way the game works, and, you know, he's a big, obviously

has a big weight cut. He's fought a lot in the past year, so things happen that are, you know, affect, that affect the result of the fight. Is there any part of you all watching that saying to yourself, like, man, that should have been me? I should have done that to him? a little bit i think that you know i look at my fight and there's tons of mistakes that i made of

things that i would do differently um if i could go back but you know i didn't know that going in so i needed to learn those lessons and uh you know you can't you can't change it but you can learn from it so yeah i mean that was a great example to to learn from i feel like a lot of fights lately have been great examples for me you know that being one of them hums out versus trickus being one of them. You know, so there's a lot of fights that I always try to learn as much as I can, you know, whether it's myself in there or other people. What did you learn from Hamza Drikas? I think wrestling, you know, wrestling works. Yeah. So it's effective, it's effective, you know, I think that, yeah, if you're going to be a world champion, you probably should know how to

wrestle. We did have Chail on not that long ago, and he predicted that Bo Nicol versus Hamza would be on the White House card. What do you think? Is that possible? Maybe. I don't know. I got to win some fights. So, you know, he's the champ.

He's number one. And I'm not even in the ranking. So, you know, I got to win some fights. And we'll see. Do you, do you can see that perhaps you were a bit wrong on Chamsat? In some of the comments that you made about him, it suggests that you thought you were going to rag doll him and all this stuff. Do you could see that or do you still feel the same way?

Well, all the comments that I made about Ragdoll and him were in a wrestling match. I still feel like, yeah, we were to do a freestyle or a collegiate style wrestling match. It's not competitive. It's not close. And, you know, a lot of the comments that get taken out of context, it's like, I don't know how you can really argue with that. You know, I'm a three-time national champ world champion, beat the best guys in the world. So I don't feel like I would take any of that back. But I've always said in an MMA fight, that's a dog fight.

That's an absolute scrap war. And so I feel like, you know, me and him would be a great matchup. I don't know what his plans are if he's going to go to 205, go to 70, who he's going to fight. Like, what's his situation? But all I know is I'm focused on Rodolfo Vieira, November 15th, and then, you know, we'll move from there. But at this point, it's like, yeah, I mean, I'm motivated and I'm excited and I want to get better and improve. There's a long way to go before we get there. And, and, you know, maybe given what happened in May, you're not fighting for the belt next summer.

But I would imagine, given your relationship with the president, given your feelings towards the country, that White House card has to be something that, like, you want to win a couple of fights, maybe just one or maybe two before we get to June and you're in strong consideration for that fight card, right? That has to be a big deal for you, I would imagine. Yeah, I'm planning on being on that card. That's like, that's history. That's exciting. That's something that I feel like I would just be absolutely ecstatic and grateful to be a part of.

So, you know, I got to take care of business. And, yeah, I mean, I've talked with President Trump. He wants me on the card. So I'm sure that if things line up will make it happen. You're actually talking to the president about your involvement on this card. Is he reaching out to you saying, hey, we want, is he matchmaking the card? How's that going? No, so what ended up happening in, I was on,

on Fox promoting the RAF event and he's you know obviously watches that I was on Fox and friends and he called me up and you know just sent me some encouragement and we talked about the card for a second but I told him that you know I wanted to get on it and he said done deal so I'm sure you know him and Dana obviously very close he puts a good word in with uh on my behalf then it's probably putting me in a good position so you're on Fox and he's just watching and casually just calls you up you didn't hit him up first yep i guess that you know like friends call each other up i guess it's not that big a deal anymore right is he coming to the fight on november 15th at msg we'll see okay loves the loves the

fights and uh he loves you know the environment and the ufc loves him so we'll see seems like a good are you coming um i uh no i'm not coming wow i thought for a second you were in there no no no you're back though right i thought you were back uh i don't know what back back means. I don't know if I ever left, but are you referring to the Logan clip with Dana? No, I didn't see that. Okay. I just heard, I just heard

through the grapevine that You know something I don't? You know something I don't? You got breaking news? Dude, I'm like, I'm so not on social right now that I don't know anything, but that's just, just, you know, as all hearsay. It's for the best. It's for the best. My social media now, the last five months

has been go to the gym and got fighters teammates coaches asked me if i saw what happened that's it that's that's it you feel better do you feel better for it i feel better i feel i feel good it's it's it's fun to like get news straight from people and not like see it online first yeah yeah yeah so i kind of like it's kind of refreshing and enjoyable and i feel like i don't worry about stuff you know i just like somebody tells me something crazy that happened and i'm like what yeah you know like that's it's kind of a cool feeling. I guess that's how people always felt back the old fashion way right yeah before cell phones and

all that it was like you've got news from other people did you feel like you needed that break yeah I definitely needed it it was like it was a lot you know um and you know not just like it wasn't like oh I was just put in the situation where it was a lot it was also like I did it to myself so you know I'm not complaining about it but I did want to make adjustments how does it end on November 15th what are you feeling what do you sense say I feel like we got a y'all must have forgot moment. A y'all must have forgot. We'll see.

I'm pumped. I'm fired up. Let's just put it that way. All right. In the meantime, we'll see you this Saturday, October 25th, R.A.F.2, as they're referring to it, as at Penn State, Bryce Jordan Center. I believe the action begins at 7 p.m. Eastern on Fox Nation. Looking at the line up here, as you mentioned, the likes of Pat Downey and Kyle Dakes on there, I do believe. Roman Bravo Young, another guy who's got a great background.

And there's a nice mix of, you know, people that we know from the world of wrestling. Holly Holmes showed up at the last one as a surprise competitor. So who knows what they have in store for us. I enjoyed the first one a lot, looking forward to this one. And I think it's great that you're on the call as well. So good luck to you, Bo. Thanks, as always, for the time. and, of course, good luck on November 15th.

Can't wait for the return. Thanks, Ariel. Appreciate you having me on. You're the man. There he is. The great Bo Nickel, returning to action at Madison Square Garden. Tapology says third. Are they usually right?

I don't know. Do they get the bout order? I don't know. And I'm hearing, by the way, that R.F, they're talking to some big names. I'm hearing that they're talking to some big recognizable names. So stay tuned for all of that. All right. Still to come.

still to come is the one and only Andy Foster. I think a lot of people are looking forward to that interview. He is the executive director of the California State Athletic Commission and has been in the news as of late. And I've called him on many occasions the gold standard as far as regulation is concerned, leadership is concerned in the world of combat sports. That's MMA, that's boxing.

That's any form of combat. California, in my opinion, the gold standard. So I'm looking forward to having that conversation at about 420. Back into that, we'll answer some. more questions just so that you guys don't kill us. Reminder that tomorrow debut of our first uncrowned filmed, what is BKFC? That is the question and that is the title of the film. But right here and now, we have the great honor of saying hello to the WBA Interim Super Walterway Champion. He won that belt just a little over a week ago in Philadelphia at the Xfinity Mobile

Arena. Another fight for him. Three of his last four have taken place in Philly. So Eddie and the gang have certainly held true to their word having him fight there, Wells Fargo Center, all that and more, and he looked great. I mean, the fight just lasted what is it? 72 seconds. And so now it seems as though he's on a collision

course with Virgil Ortiz and some of the other big names at 154 pounds. We are talking to the one and only Geron Boots Ennis and I do believe he is here right here and now. Yes, there he is. Hello, Boots. My man, how are you?

Good to see you. How's everything? I'm doing well. It's good to have you in studio. It's a great honor for us. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You know what I always like about you? You always got the backpack on.

Yeah. That's your thing, right? Yeah, it's my thing. Why is that your thing? Trendsetter. Okay. What is it? Like, what is it about the back?

You just like having it? No, I got some personal things in there. Okay. That's about it. Just like books and stuff? Just personal thing. Okay, okay. But you always have like a different cool one on.

Yeah, yeah. How long have you been doing that for? I've been doing it for a while now. maybe probably like three, four years. Okay. It's kind of like a fashion trend, too. Yeah, yeah. Are you sponsored by a good backpack company?

No, not yet. Come on, not yet, not yet. You know, whatever I got on, you know, I just try to, you know, match it up or just, like a style of thing. How many do you have? I got a lot. Like over 100? No, I don't know. Probably, maybe like four or five.

The annoying thing is that you have to take stuff out of each one and, like, you know, and then it gets left behind. Oh, shit, I left my favorite. Left something in the other one. Yeah, yeah, yeah. For sure, definitely get like that for sure. Well, life seems to be good for you. Congratulations on the win.

You're doing a bit of a media tour here. Yes. Life, I mean, as a 154 pounder, it's been a short run. But I can't imagine like that. That couldn't have gone any better, right? 72 seconds, your first stoppage, quick stoppage like that in the first round in four or five years. I think 2021 was the last time. At home, was that the dream scenario?

I mean, it wasn't exactly how I was supposed to. You know, I got one in there, you know, hit on my business, then played with my food. But it's on the bigger and better things. When you say play with your food, is that something that you have felt, or at least your coaches have said, hey, stop doing that? Is this something you've tried to work on? It's like to get rid of people? No, I mean, typically, you know, I go into the fights and I go in there, you know, try

put on a show and have fun, you know, but I just, this camp, I just was like, this switch came on, and I just was like, and like, he got a go move. And then once I got to the arena and then my dad, right before we walked out, my dad, like, don't play with him. And once he said that, my switch was already on. but now he just like turned me up even more so i'm like oh yeah it's that time so i'm gonna go and get him get him up out of here so yeah okay now as far as the camp goes uh as a 154 pounder how how different was it how much should you you know feel better uh camp was 10 times better

you know you know i could eat a little more you know um i felt way stronger throughout the whole camp even during like fight week you know how sometimes on fight week when you kind of week uh some fire is gonna they'll understand what i'm saying like when you at 47 at 147 when I was like coming up and cutting weight and stuff like that during fight week I you get you get those times and points where you don't want to do anything like your last training day or like during fight we you just don't want to do now you just be on some lazy stuff he's just ready to get it over it but me more at the 154 and there's training camp that I had I had a phenomenal training camp but the last week of training

camp I feel like I could have just I had a bunch of energy I could have spar all you up till fight day like I just like real like energized and things like that so I felt great you know having a 154 camp and I'm glad I think I did the right thing at the right time you know I feel great feel tremendous considering how great you felt was there any part of you that felt like man I wish I did this like two or three fights ago uh I mean for sure I would always head in the back of my mind but being at one for yourself and I feel like I couldn't leave their division without you know conquering what I wanted and that's at least being a unified or you know leniential champion which I did become you know i couldn't leave the division just being a you know quote-unquote email champ you know

so you know now that i made my mark at 147 in a in a in a history books basically so yeah i feel i'm i think i think i did the right thing at the right time did you know the night you beat stanionis did you know that that was it for you at 47 did you make your decision already uh basically like i just like i i don't know if i you know i got another 147 can't bit me you How bad was it? It wasn't bad. It just was like, it's stressful on the body. You know, I've been fighting at 147 for 10 years.

And before that, even in the amortes, I was fighting at 141. So I've been in the 40s for, you can say, 15 years, basically. And I feel like my body just needed to open up and grow a little bit more and be able to have room to, like, wiggle. So, you know, I'm glad I did it, you know, I feel great. Are you bothered, annoyed, upset that you couldn't become undisputed at 147? Um, for sure. You know, it was a lot of playing around going down at 47, 147. This guy fighting that guy. This guy fighting that guy. I was trying to get straight to business.

I was trying, you know, run through all the champions and then move up. You know, that was my ultimate goal, you know, but at the end of the day, you know, it's in guys' hands and I'm, you know, I'm just following a path, you know. I feel like everything going on how it's supposed to be going. Was there any talk once you made the decision to do the Ortiz? You know the Ortiz fight is the one that everyone wants to see of doing it right off the bat, or was the plan always, like not a tune-up fight if you will but there's no doubt you know Ortiz is in Lima there there's a difference there was there any talk of doing the Ortiz fight first or doing a fight against someone of that caliber first or did you always want that sort of first step and then onto the

big dogs when we when I decided to make the decision to go to 154 they got it out for it on a couple several series ago that's not the original guy we was we had I think we I think we had Boychuk, I think they said something about Madrimov, but I think Madrimov was injured. And it was a bunch of guys. Okay. Those are bigger names. Yeah, it was bigger names, but the Lima guy was the only one that accepted it. Interesting.

Why did the others? And I don't know you had to ask, you know, Eddie and things like that. But, you know, people will say the business part, but, you know, we reached out to those guys and a lot of the guys turned us down. So, you know, at the end of the day, you know, you got a fight who was in front of you. And then make a statement like how I did. and I'm glad I did it how I did it. You know, like I said, it's one of the bigger and better things. It's that time now, you know, it's time to share everybody up, you know.

Speaking of which, when that fight was announced, I remember a lot of people saying, like, this is not the fight we want to see boots in or the not, not the kind of fights that we want to see boots in. Did that annoy you? Did you feel like you were getting the heat from, you know, you sit here and say like, hey, Boychuk and guys like that, Madrimov are turning down fights. It's not your fault. I mean, it's not your problem, but yet you're getting the heat. Yeah.

I mean, I don't think Madriman will tear them. I think Mademont was injured. Oh, okay, got it. It was no way he was unavailable. Yeah, he was unavailable. And it was a couple other guys that I'm missing. But we tried to get the Ramos thing, too. I don't know what happened there.

But, you know, that would have been, you know, good for boxing. You know, so I feel like people wouldn't see me at Ramos, you know, but I think he moved up to 160. So, so, yeah, but I don't pay attention to those, you know, that stuff they, everybody was saying, talking about some, he shouldn't have fight this guy. I mean, I fought a top tank. I moved up and waiting for him.

for a top 10 guy and he was ranked in each sanctioned in body so it's not like I just for like anybody that I just handpicked somebody that's the only guy that accepted the fight he had a good record and he was actually a bigger guy he fight at 60 so I mean it's not really like I said it's nothing I really could do you know I could just fight who are they playing in front of me but like I said I'm glad I did how I did it and uh yeah it's that time you know time to shut them up yeah and it was a good win for Philly too because that week like uh the Eagles lost to the Giants, the Phillies got bound. So it was nice to see Philly get a win of some kind, you know? For sure. You did it for the city. That's just me as a New York guy sticking it to Philly

sports fans. It's cool. We see our Sunday. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh, that's right. Who do you guys have? Oh, the Giants again? Damn. I'm a Bill's fan. I'm a fan of the only New York football team. Because they play in Jersey. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. You know what I'm saying? Buffalo, you know, I like to stick it to them also. But I hope you kick their ass because I don't like Giants fans. Although I don't like you guys either. Because I think we were supposed to play you in the Super Bowl last year, but then we choked. Although I think we would have got our ass whipped by you to be frank because you guys were on a different level. Eagles was locked in, you know, last year for sure. Who is your favorite team, by the way?

Eagles. Number one? Like, no, no, of all the sports. What, out of basketball, football? Everything, yeah. I just support all the, any, any Philly, you know, Philly teams. It's going to be tough for the Sixers this year, you know? I think they're going to be cool.

You think so? Yeah, I think they're going to be cool. As long as everybody stay healthy, I think you're... Well, that's a big as long as. Yeah. I mean, yo, Joel looks pretty slim. Yeah, he looked good. He looked good.

I said, once Paul George come back and off his injury, you know, I think we got a solid, you know, a solid team and I think we're going to go for, you know. Yeah? I like the new kid that we got to. VJ. Edgecombe, yeah. He reminds me like Anthony Edwards, like Jimmy Butler.

Yeah, so, yeah. You're friends with Maxie, right? Yeah, yeah, that's my guy. I hate Maxx. I'm a Knicks. I hate this freaking guy. I hate this guy when he played us in the playoffs two years ago, he shot those threes. God.

He's so good. He's so fast. He makes you a monster, you know, and I feel like he going to keep getting better and better, you know, each year, you know, he might, you know, he might be an MVP candidate this year. He's good. Yeah, for sure. You ever bring him to the gym? Yeah, he came to the gym and he walked me out when I for San Jonas. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, but you ever try to show him? Because basketball players for some reason, they're so awkward when you bring them into the body. You ever

noticed that? Like, you see them hit the heavy bag into it, like they don't know what they're doing. Yeah, you know, for sure. We were supposed to set it up for him to come to gym and work out and stuff with us. But we didn't get to do it yet, you know, because he's focusing on, you know, basketball side, but in the off-season, I'll make sure he come down in the summertime and get right, get him some boxing lessons. By the way, speaking of Philly, Danny Garcia this past weekend, did you see that?

Yeah, I seen like the guy on like the fourth round. Yeah, nice little left hook there? He still got it. He still got it. You know, if that was his last fight, you know, that's a great way to go out, you know, in your career as a, you know, I feel like he's going to be a future Hall of Famer. in my eyes, you know, he, he ran through a lot of people, you know, at 140. So I think,

I think he's for the top guys at 47, so I think he'll haul the fever to me. Okay, going back to you, I've talked to now Eddie and Oscar about this meeting with DeZone and everyone where they talked about you versus Virgil. And essentially what was said, and I want to get your take on it now, that, hey, we're going to do this fight a couple weeks ago, the one that you won. You're going to do your fight. And if everything goes well, these two guys are going to fight each other in 2026 that's the agreement what eddie said was they went back to you you sign you said you were in i signed like that in no problems no questions nothing they went back to virgil this is what he said and they were like we're going to do our fight and then

we're going to revisit this is that what you're hearing as well that's that's what i heard as well you know um that's understandable though you know um you got you got you i keep you got to stay on test or what's in front of you you know and i look over overlooking nobody you agreed before you're Yeah, I did, but I still was locked in on Lima. You know, even when guys, people was asking about the Ortiz situation, I wouldn't even, I wouldn't even say nothing about it. I'd be like, October 11, we were focusing on Lima, and that's it. You know, that's our main focus right now.

I said, I'm victorious. He said, and I was like, then we could talk about these other guys and Archie's and things like that. And so I stayed on, I stayed focused on Tascan Hand, even though I signed before, but I stayed focused on Tascan Hand, and, yeah, and now we're here, you know, just hear weight. if you had the pick of the litter is he at the top of the list is he the top guy for you want why

it's too much going back and forth a lot of talking and uh I just I can't wait you know I'm gonna make they're gonna see I'm gonna say too much I'm gonna see it personal between you two

no it's not personal but it's just I just I see all the little talking that they've been doing you know and um and uh like I said let him get through it this is his fight you know and um

and uh we'll see take it from there will you go to his fight hopefully we try to see now You know, I'm going to talk to Eddie and them. Actually, when I leave here and see what we're going to do. You know, you sitting in the front row there would be something. Yeah, if I don't go, I'm going to watch it.

But if I do go, you know, I'm going to be there locked in watching it as well. So, you know, hopefully, you know, I'm getting there. You know, I'll be able to get in the ring. And whoever won, you know, I fight the winner or the champions. But hopefully it's Ortiz. You want him to win, obviously. Definitely. That's the way, I mean, gigantic fight.

I definitely want him to win, but you can't overlook it. You know, he's a crafty guy. You know, he's been around for a while. You know, he fought Charleau. He fought Ramos. And he's for the couple top guys. So you can't overlook him. And it's not like he's a bad fighter or anything.

He's sharp. You know, he's, he crafty. You know, it's not a guy you can just overlook. So I think it's a 50-50 fight, you know, for me. Or 60, 40, maybe, you know, maybe leaning more towards Ortiz. Wow, that close, huh? Yeah. It's a good fight.

It's a good fight for. box and um and i i like it you know like i say you know i'm beat her if i go you know i'm beat her you know watching you know key my eyes on on both of them no disrespect to lubin but the fight that i want to see is you versus ortees for sure and i think i think this is one of the best like american fights that can be made sure and and with all due respect to everyone else around the world i think it has to be in america for sure right got to be it got to be i feel like you got to do this one in the states because everybody want to see everybody going i think it I think it's a pay-per-view fight for, you know,

and I think everybody will pay to see it or everybody would come out to come see it wherever is it, whether it's in Vegas, you know, Madison Square Garden, wherever is it? What's your, you're, obviously you love it in Philly, but I don't think it'll be Philly, right? No, absolutely. It's not a bit of Philly, yeah. So where is the ideal spot for it?

What deserves to host this fight? Which venue, in your opinion? To me, either anywhere in Vegas, like a T-Mobile arena, or maybe go old-school MGM. Oh, man, I love the M-G. Or we can go to Madison, Great Garden. I think Madison's Great Garden

it'd be crazy as well. You know, that'd be, you know, historic as well. So, either one. There aren't enough big fights at the big MSG. I'm not talking about the theater. No, I'm not the big one. Yes, yes. That's why I want to, I want to, I feel like I want to, I always wanted to fight the MSG anyway. So, you know, I like

I like how it looks in there. It's really nice. You know, when they have fights and stuff in there. So for me, it would be either Team Mobile Arena or take it back, you can go old MGM or we can do, you know, Man, it's a square guard. Do you think he would say yes to MSG because that's kind of a home game for you, right?

That's so close to Philly. I mean, I feel like he has a deep fan base, you know. I feel like his, all his things and stuff will come. If it was to be in New Year, I feel like they all would come. You know, he got a good fan base. I got a good fan base. I feel like, yeah, make for a great fight. Who don't want to come to New York?

Oh, my God. There was a time where MSG was holding all these big fights. And now I feel like, you know, every couple years we get. When we got Taylor Serrano, prior to that, it was, you know, Brooklyn's cool and all. but we've got to go back to the Mecca. The Mecca is the best. I would absolutely love that. In your perfect world as well, he fights November 8th.

How soon could we get this fight? You obviously didn't get hurt in your fight, I would imagine, right? 72 seconds, unless something happened. I mean, it depends on how his fight go. If he's in a war, we'll see, maybe March, April. If not, if he make quick work of it, who knows, we could be begging there sooner. you know so it's all for if it was all up to to how him right now because he's he the one that has a fight you know hopefully he doesn't get no no cuts no broken you know hands and anything or anything hurt on them so you got it's dependent on him at the moment the other two options of course sebastian fundora and i think zander zayas yeah what i'm hearing is uh there is some interest from msg to have you versus zander zayas at msg are you hearing this as well i'm with whatever that's what i'm i can't wait you want all these guys yeah i'm going to I like these options for you.

I'm really about to show y'all, like, I'm about to go. I'm about to run through these guys. I'm going to run through these guys and show you all one by one. Like, this 154 really mine and I'm going to shut everybody up. I just, I can't wait. I see you, I hear the little chatters and all the little. What do you hear? What's bothering you?

What are people saying? It's just a little thing. They're questioning you? They're questioning it. It's cool, you know, and I love it. You know, it ain't doing that, but, like, air and feel to the fire. Yeah. And it's going to make it worse each and every time for whoever, whoever stepping in the room with me.

seeing what Terrence did not that long ago did that give you motivation because it feels like for the longest time people were questioning him doubting him he wasn't getting the big opportunities the big fights do you see yourself in his journey a little bit as well I mean I got my own my own journey you know I just you know and we just getting started you know I accomplished good things at 147 I was lenio champion you know undisputed I mean undefined unified lenient at 147 and now we at 54 you know I have the WBA you know interim right now now at the moment, but I'm looking to be a two-weight division world champion, and that's what we're going to do. We're going to collect all these belts, too, as well. I feel like the pot of gold at the end of that rainbow is the Terrence fight. Do you think he sticks around long enough to fight you? I mean, I heard after his last fight, he did like an interview. Somebody asked him a question about him, about him fighting me, and I heard him say he's not going to fight me. Why? Why? I guess he said not coming back down the 154, so let that mean the joy is victory you know he just beat canello you know uh the face of boxing so which that that makes

canela i mean that makes uh crawford the face of boxing at the moment and um he he earned a right to fight whoever he want to fight you know and um yeah were you surprised he looked that good against canela were you expecting that i didn't get to see it you know you didn't watch it no i didn't see it i was in the middle of camp you know i know netflix you're eating breakfast that you put it on no no i didn't get to see i was in the middle of camp and um i think the fight came like one in the morning. Yeah, I did. And, uh, I had two workouts that day. So I was trying, I tried to stay up, but I could. I was just, I was tired. And, uh, but I mean, like I said, I think, I think he did a great thing for boxing. And I seen, he, he looked good from what I seen from the highlights

and saying like, he looked good. And, uh, and you got to respect, you know what I'm saying? He, he, he, he, he was like three week division. Yeah. Yeah. He jumped from 54. We really, he really could say 47 to 68 you know nobody has done that and uh he did a great thing for his team you know for him and his team you know do you think he retires uh like i just said i feel like he he could do whatever he want you know he why do you think he doesn't want to fight you uh i mean i can't really say that would be a huge fight too i'm not him it definitely would be a huge fight for boxing everybody always said they want to see it you know and um i don't know but like i said he do he could do whatever he want he picked whoever you want and i think

I don't know. I just think he, like I said, he just do whatever he want. Would you go up if you said, I'll do it at 160 or 168? Would you consider that, or is that too big? If I go up, I can come back there. I'm trying to accomplish my goals at 154 for sure. And like I said, let me run through these guys. I just want to shut all y'all up and just make sure, like, stay in my eyes. Don't say, oh, y'all, by the way.

You know, we're not hating on you. No, no, no, I'm saying. I don't know. I just want to share everybody up. Yeah. And letting everybody know that this is really my division. And I'm sure everybody that I'm really the best. in the world. Do you feel like there's a little bit like

you need to put some respect on my name here? Like, do you feel like people, the last few fights have gotten away with questioning you, questioning you are, your ceiling and all this stuff, and now it's time to, you know, as the great Roy Jones once said, you all must have forgotten. Now prove to them who you really are. Roy said, what do you say? He said, he said, he said, I ain't fight nobody. I just make him look like nobody.

That's a real rip. Yeah. I for San Jonas. And leading up to that fight, everybody was like, oh, man, I don't know about, I don't know about this. like, Stan Yon is going to do this. Stan Yon is going to do that. He's too tough.

He does, see that. And then when I beat him and I made it easy, everybody was like, he was supposed to do that. So with me, I feel like, it don't matter. No matter who I fight, they're always going to say something. He was supposed to do that or we already knew he could do this. But it's just they always, like, kind of like, downplaying what I do. And then I got used to it, you know. And now I just don't really care.

I'm just here to shut everybody up and, like, run through the division and do what's best for me and my team and my family. How has it been with Eddie? I believe it's been four fights with him, right? Yeah, it's been Greek. Yeah, when he gets on the microphone in the ring afterwards, because you're kind of a soft-spoken guy, man of a few words, and he cuts those promos.

You're a WWE fan, right? Yeah, well, I haven't watched in a while, but... But, like, he's like you're Paul Heyman. You know what I mean? If you get what I'm saying? Like, he'll do the work for you. Do you like that? Yeah, for sure.

All I got to do is getting the ring. I do the easy part. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And knock whoever out or look good doing it. I do the easy part. He got the hard part with the talk. Yeah, but I feel like he does, for someone with your personality,

he does a great job because he'll talk the smack on your behalf. And it's not like unwarranted smack, but he's calling everyone out because you don't want to do it, whatever, that's not your style. You're a perfect match, in my opinion. But on the surface,

you would think like, oh man, dude from Philly, a guy from Essex, he's a little bit posh, he's got the accent. Like maybe this wouldn't be a match, but for some reason it seems to work. Why does it work between you two?

I don't know. I feel like, like you just said, like he, I do talk, but I don't talk as much because that's not my thing. You know, I do my talking to the ring. I do more so my talking in the ring, you know, I'm glad that I have, you know, Eddie to be around to, like, talk and say this and say that. So I can back him up and then he backed me up. Yeah. Yeah, it's like, it go hand-to-hand. Like, it all work, you know, hand-to-hand. Do you like him at first or at first you were like, I don't know about this dude? Eddie was cool. Yeah. It's always cool. Yeah. Funny guy. I love working with him, you know, whatever I extra, you know, they do, you know, or he do. And then, like I said, it's that time.

We're about to take over this boxing game. Not only of the division, but the boxing game. Okay. Like I said, I'm about to prove and show everybody that's the best in the world. I sense the motivation, like, oozing out of you here, like a bit of a chip on your shoulder. I can feel it. I can see it. Yeah, I can't wait.

I'm ready to show everybody up. And once I do, everybody going, everybody that was seeing this and seeing that, They're going to be real set over these next couple years. And clearly, the belts mean something to you, right? You want to be undisputed champion, unified champion. Can I ask you, because this has been a hot topic as of late, the belts? You know, Zufa's coming in, and they want to create their own belt and make amendments to the Ali Act, trying to get away from the WBCs and the WBAs.

How do you feel about that? Eddie been very outspoken about, like, you know, we have to keep the belts. There's history. Ali held these belts. How do you feel about that? You got to keep the belts, for sure. you know um it's definitely history and uh without the boats which you like without those certain boats but like you can't really say you have legacy and things like that so i feel like you got to

keep the boats and uh yeah they're trying to make it like ufc where they have a promotional belt yeah just one boat yeah how do you feel about that at first back in the day well not back in day but when i was like coming up i'm like it should only be like one or two belts but now now like actually being in it it's actually butter because then you got some something to look forward to or look for or something to say like i'd be this champion that champion that champion that champion all back to back when you just fight one person and just beat them for the belt and that's it it's kind of like corny it don't it make it like less fun right i feel like it's more fun when you got multiple champions and in the rankings and what

yeah yeah and you got different varieties of different people you can fight so yeah i think it's keep the belts and it's going it'll make better for like legacy for sure these uh amendments to the LE Act. It's a very hot topic right now. How do you feel about this? Do you think it should stay as it is, or are you, are you interested? Are you open to changing it? No, you got to keep that. You got to keep that. And that's what's protecting us. So, you got to keep it. You know, they had a hearing last week, California State Athletic Commission, and there were no notable boxing people on it to fight on behalf of the boxers, to speak up

on behalf of the boxers. And this was alarming to some people. And now so it's moving to the next step, and it might actually get amended. Oh, yeah, I never even knew nothing about that. I say, that's crazy. That's crazy that we didn't have nobody from, like, the boxing community there. It was a lot of MMA people speaking. Yeah, that's not right. They should redo it or just leave it alone, you know.

You don't see any sort of issues with it. You say keep it status quo. There's full transparency. You get to see the books, right? You get to see what's going on. A lot of these things are potentially going to go away. No, no, they need to keep it the right way, you know. Keep the Aliak, you know.

do you think that their model could work the ufc model could work in boxing no why not i just i just don't think so you know boxing and ufc two different things and in boxing you make boxing boxers make more money than ufc so you can't really like put them to like hand-to-hand like that i don't think that's a good idea what about that model where it's just like one promotion and you just kind of fight the guys in that promotion there's no co-promoting um i like the i like the Co-promoting because like I said you got multiple different people you can fight and right and that's for example like in UFC you could be a champion of UFC but you can't fight the champion in Belator yeah I don't like that yeah well perfect example you couldn't fight Virgil Ortiz yeah right

yeah so that's the fight that everybody wants to see right right right so yeah so yeah I don't like that they should definitely have you know do the co-promoter thing yeah co-promotion thing it's gonna be interesting i don't know how much you're probably i know you got blinders on and you're focused on your career i don't really like child pay too much yeah so like do you watch the media do you read the stuff do you look at things or you stay out of it not really but sometimes when i'm on instagram or twitter you can't you can't do nothing but hope to see it because it's in your face like yeah so sometimes i do see the little things here and there but all that stuff just be yeah you signed with eddie around the same time that chakur signed with him why do you think

it didn't work with chakur and eddie uh i'm not sure you know i can't really say I'm not I'm not sure career no I know yeah I don't know I don't know what they had going on it just seemed like those were two big signings American guys East Coast guys like it felt like a huge deal for match room to get two guys of your stature and it seemed to have worked out great with you but not so much with him for some reason I'm not sure I can't really like I said I can't speak when I don't know what they had type of business they had going on or or how they you know much together you know but I mean Eddie you know we we we we're happy yeah I'm good Have you guys ever talked about fighting in the UK?

Boxing is so popular over there. That's crazy. We just were talking about it right after my fight. Okay. That Sunday morning, we had a little meeting. And we was actually talking about, I said, I told him I wanted to fight in London. Oh, yeah. I mean, the fans there are insane.

Have you been to London? No, not yet. Not yet. You know, like over there, you're in the car listening to the radio, just sports talk radio, and they talk about soccer and boxing. Like midday, that would never happen here. You would never put on ESPN radio here and they're talking about boxing or MMA. There, it's like 12 o'clock in the afternoon,

and they're talking about, like, mid-tier boxing as though we talk about NFL, NBA, MLB here. Right. It's crazy. So I think it would be great for you. I think you would get mad love over there. Yeah, he said that he was like, he said, you come to the UK,

he said you probably get mobbed. He said he loves you over there. So, you know, one day, you know, hopefully I'll go over there this year. You'd be open to it. Yeah. I think I'm actually, I'm tripping. My dad has Jack fighting.

Oh, Jack Caterall? Yeah. Yeah, it's coming up. On the Ben-U-Bank card. Yep, and I think I'm going to go. I think I'm going to go, yeah, yeah. How did that happen, Jack coming? To be honest, I don't know.

I just, one day I just walked in the gym. He was in a gym. He was like, but he was. Did you know who he was? Yeah, I know who he was. Before he came, he came, I'm going to say maybe like six months, five or six months prior to him, like, coming, like, recently. And he came, and I guess he came and trained a couple times with us. And I don't know, I guess maybe he liked what he saw.

with my dad and around us and I guess he was like maybe he wanted to push trainers not sure but you know it's actually fun to have in a minute you know he's a he's a great fighter nice guy kind of a mild manner due to quiet guy great guy you know actually i watched him spar yesterday he he's looking good yeah he's looking real good that's a big time card yeah he's picking up that defense okay real fast you know he looking good looking strong too so you think you'll go out for that one yeah I'm thinking about I'm gonna talk to Eddie as well you know about that's gonna be at a soccer stadium that's a huge year 60,000 people I heard yeah yeah that's why I want to fight

it yeah is that Watspur Stadium oh no Hotspur Stadium yeah we're Wembley Wembley is also in London but bigger so that one's like 90,000 Hotspur is like 60,000 I want I gotta do Wembley one time you want the 90,000 yeah yeah for sure what's the fight what's the fight I don't know whoever

we need like a good British foil I feel like I feel like you need like a British guy don't matter a big name I love to fight in the UK for sure though and uh I I think that'd be it. That's when I know I hit, like, mega superstar, like, for sure. Do you want to fight in Riyadh, too? We'll see.

Okay. Yeah, we'll see. Not at the top of the list. No, yeah. I like London, though, for sure. Okay, okay. How did you end up with Canello? That kind of, that was big news when we saw you training with him.

How did that happen? Just our teams reaching out to each other. Did he reach out to you? We reached out to him But I actually used that camp To start my camp So when I was out there I was out there for maybe like 10 days

So basically say two weeks So my first two weeks at camp Was out there And I was just I really was out there Getting in shape for my own fight And because we was in Truckee California

You know the elevation It was like 5,800 Or something like it up there So I was actually out there Getting in shape You know for my own fight And why not go out there And why not go train

with, you know, Canelo and me move up and wait, you know, go hand to hand. Yeah. How long were you there for? Like 10 days. And how was it? It was great. You know, I enjoyed the, I enjoyed the truck, yeah. I enjoyed the weather, the evolution.

I didn't really, like, feel it. I guess because maybe I was already in, like, some type of shape or something like that, but I didn't feel it. But when I came back home, everything I did was super easy. I'm like, it's crazy. I was running five miles in like 30 minutes. I'm like, this crazy. Like, I feel like amazing.

And that's something that I think I might do. I think I might take my camp, like my next camp. I might go to, like, Truckee or, like, Colorado Springs or somewhere high altitude. Do you think that you'll continue to train with them, or was it just specific to this fight? No, that just was just for this fight, you know. And like I said, I used that training camp to, you know, prepare myself for the 154 division. Why not, you know, train with a 68-pounder, you know, and get ready and get right. Did you ask spar?

Yeah, we spar like four times. Wow. How many rounds? We did the first time we did five, the first two times we did five, and I think the last two times we did eight. Wow. Yeah, something like that, yeah, eight. Man, I wish I could have seen that.

Yeah, yeah. How'd that go? It was good. It was great work, you know. Yeah, it was great work. I appreciate them, you know, let me come down and use their facilities to get in shape for my fight. And it was definitely great work. Is that something that you like to do, see what other people are doing, you know, link up with other guys, or is that unique?

Is that just a thing that kind of happened and you prefer staying at home? I know you said that you think you might do this or want to do this, but historically in your career, is that something you've liked to do or now? Like you just said, I just wanted to get all my comfort zone. You know, I always train at home. I was like, I'm going to do something different. And I wanted to do something different. So I went out there and trained out there for, you know, like 10 days. and it was great

and I didn't want to be home the first two weeks of camp I just wanted I just want to do something different yeah switch it up and just see different things I was out there doing stuff that I never did

before I'm out there fishing I don't know I want to fish when I'm here like when I'm home like it's just enjoying myself it was like

very like relaxing and were you fishing with Canello no I was fishing with my brother okay in my camera man oh wow

your brother came out too yeah my brother that's who went with me Farah went with me and um and my cameraman okay it came out there with me and uh yeah it was it was i drum myself it was very relaxing just all you do is eat train russ and uh that's about it so it was it was cool no distractions yeah uh i'm happy you're wearing shades by the way because the ice is just it's unbelievable i mean golly we have never had anyone with this kind of eyes out how many

necklace is that two or three it's just two just two geez louise how much does that way you think I don't know. Man, oh, man. How many diamonds we got on there? How many carrots is that? A lot. Yo, the bottom one? Oh, yeah, there's the, okay, look at this.

Yo, that is something. Did you get this after the fight? No, I've been, I had this for like. You had this for a while? I had this stuff for like five years. Oh, for real? Time for an upgrade then. Yeah, for sure.

As long as it's free, though. Oh, those are free? No, I said, long as it's free. Oh, yeah, yeah, but those aren't free, are they? It wasn't free. But people, I mean, they probably do want a gift. you this stuff right it will now you know because i'm a i'm a now you're a star i'm at a yeah i'm at a big level now so moses the jeweler what's that guy's name is that his name the guy on like 42nd street

here in new york you know this guy you don't go to the the the spots here i go i'm i go in philly okay yeah yeah you can't be messing with those new york guys they're going to give you fake stuff and people are going to call you out i don't know this new york philly thing i don't know do you like getting jewelry do you have a lot i mean once you once you get the jury you just don't really care for anymore oh wow yeah so i mean i got changed i got braces watches and stuff like that but i don't really care for it anymore you know because i i've done it so i mean it is time for a new piece but am i going to get one probably not i rather like invested with some invested in like a house or something like that you know by the way for those that don't know where did boots come from boots um my

my original nickname was boops b-o-o-p-s and my mom gave me their nickname but when i was in the gym like running around you know my and my dad was calling me they thought he was saying boots like the shoes and it just stuck we just stuck with me and i just kept it as boots so well they my dad just kept it as boot yeah and it kind of like stuck with it's cool though it's a cool nickname and uh yeah and did you get into boxing because of your dad yeah um my dad was a former boxer professional boxer and then derrick poo on us and ferrida quiet storm those are my brothers they was former boxers as well they was ranked high and the w bc and and the i bc and and the i b off and they were like one and two and uh yeah you know so that's how that's how i became you know

this fighter that i am today i was i was always seeing my brother's fight and they fought on ESPN they for on showtime uh they fur on they fought on a lot of platforms and they for a lot at home too as well so me seeing them fight as much uh like that you know i just i wanted to be like then when i got older and now i'm here did you ever consider something else or was it always boxing for as long as you can remember as a kid? It was always boxing, but my mom wanted me to play basketball, so... Were you good? Yeah, I was better back then.

Now, I just... Yeah, yeah. That's over. But, like, what position were you? Guard? Back then, I was playing a shooting guard. Okay. I was a lot bigger, though.

Okay. And the kids, you know, growing up back then. So I played basketball from 9 to, like, I'm going to say, like, 13, 13, 14, and I just stopped playing. I told my mom, I said, Mom, I can't do this no more. I'm like, it's not as fun. as boxing is for me you know and she understood that and then from 14 all the way to to now I just took off with it you know and uh she she she she really be like wow you really like

you're like you're really nice to boxing like yeah yeah did she not want you to go into boxing because she didn't want to see her her baby boy get beat up no she I mean she she's been around it right yeah my dad was a boxer yeah both my brothers was a boxer she was like all right it's like basically like it's time of something else like okay I'm like like like I'm like like She don't really, like, care for boxing. But now, like, my mom be locked in with boxing now because where I met today. And she loved watching me fight, and I love her.

She go to all your fights. Yeah, she'd be front row. Okay. Every time I come back to the corner, I see her. Does she say anything? No, she'd be sitting there and chilling. Okay. She don't be nervous than that, because she know that I put the work in.

Same thing with my brothers or anybody that's around me. They don't be nervous because they know I put the work again. I don't cut no corners. I don't, none of that. You know, I lock in, and I'd be full throttle on just. just, you know, trying to be as focused as possible and making the job having, and that's winning, and coming all victorious.

By the way, you mentioned Showtime. I feel like, like, we got introduced to you really on Showtime. You miss Showtime? I mean, showtime, going, right? Yeah, it's gone, yeah. Yeah, I mean, I was happy to be able to fight on, you know, that platform before it went away. I always wanted to fight on HBO, but HBO going, too.

Yeah. A different time. It's a different time now, yeah, everything on the app now. but I'm grateful for, you know, for the zone. I'm in a metro, and I'm glad to, you know, have them back in me, and it's time to make these big fights. Yeah, and do you feel like right now, Terrence is obviously, you could say, the face of boxing,

certainly the face of American boxing, right? Is that a goal of yours? Do you want to be viewed as the guy in America? Do you want everyone to say, like, that's the face of American boxing? Do you think of those things? I'm definitely going to be the face of boxing. I already know I'm the face of boxing. It's just a matter of time.

You know, like I said, y'all going to see. I'm going to pluck them off one by one. What do you think? Next year, how many fights? Next year. What's the goal? Probably two. So Virgil, first half?

Yeah, and then one of them belts. And then... Who do you think? Who do you think? Who would be next? Whoever is going to accept this to fight me? Yeah, yeah. That's what I'm on right now.

Like I said, I'm going to knock them down one by one, and they're going to see. And I'm going to slowly take over this boxing game and show the world that I'm the best in the world, and I'm the face of boxing. Just want one fighter at a time. Do you think when it's all said and done, you remain at 154? No.

Okay. Wow, you said that fast. Where do you think you end up? I'm going to probably end up maybe 68. Wow. Yeah, maybe. Wow, if only there was a really big-name fighter at 68, do you think you get there in time?

That would be something. I will see. 68 is a big jump. It's a big jump, but like I said, I'm going to handle business at 54. You know, run through these guys and then 60. and then maybe 68 you know okay how long do you want to go for like have you thought about i want to be done at x year like x age do you think about that sort of thing right now i'm just

going you're going i'm just going i'm locked in i mean i feel like i'm in my problem so i feel like there's a different energy about you right now yeah i'm ready yeah but you know also like we i don't know if you remember we've talked once before on the show but you were on via zoom yeah it was sort of around the time that you were going to fight and you weren't smiling and stuff and i know that you're locked in you're cutting weight but like now there's a whole different aura about you right now I'm feeling you know what I'm saying this yeah stick to something about less weight maybe you know being cut more weight on you and and I feel like you've had enough of all the shit talking yeah it's over it's over for everybody that's it wow I'm just

just tired of talking and they're going to see how does it go you and Virgil how does it go however I want what do you think well like how long do you think it goes however I want that's how I feel I yeah y'all everybody going to see that I'm really like one of the ones and And are everybody really going to see that I'm one of the ones and I'm going to show you. Like, you know, I just like, I can't wait. I can't even be like explain it. I'm just going to have to show you.

I don't even really want to talk about it. I got you, I got you. I got you. I just want to show you all because it's just. One more I want to ask you about Jake Paul Giovante Davis. Everyone has a take on this, on this fight happening. How do you feel about it? I mean, I feel like it's good for boxing.

Okay. At first, I thought Jake was like kind of like, like trying to like play the sport or whatever, but I feel like Jake really be taking boxing serious. He goes through full camps and things like that. And he has a big following. So I feel like he bringing different eyes to boxing and things like that. So I feel like it's good for boxing.

And then with the tank situation, why not? I feel like tank one of the faces of boxing too as well. So, you know, so why not, why not? You know, why not make a – why not have a money grab? And I know that tank won't retire. So if you want to retire that way, you know, making millions, so it would be it. The retort would be there's such a big weight discrepancy there, right? That's what some people.

Yeah, but I'm pretty sure it probably exparer, like, heavyweights or light heavyweights and things like that. Damn, really. It's probably nothing that he never seen before. I'm pretty sure Jake never fought nobody that little. No, no. That's the fascinating part about it. I feel like it's more so harder for Jake to fight a smaller guy like that because he's going to be a lot faster and he's not

fought anyone as skilled as him like weight aside right yeah yeah who do you think wins uh I mean tank should should win tank should probably probably should knock him up oh wow really I don't know he knocks out a guy that big that'd be insane

does that end the Jake Paul thing in your opinion if he knocks him out no no he's gonna continue to keep boxing and keep fighting these he gonna keep keep fighting either older fighters or or like MMA fighters or or like something around those lines. And he, I don't know, he possibly could win, like, a little, like, small title later on down the line. Yeah, he was ranked. I think in the WBA and everyone got mad about it, you know, in the top 15.

I didn't even know that. Yeah, as a cruiserweight, though. Oh, yeah, yeah. Cruise rate's kind of the more, you know, shallow division, but everyone got pissed about it. I mean, I mean, he's going to bring eyes to the Cruiserweight division. You know, you don't really hear too many people talk about the cruise rate division, so why not? You know, and I know people probably think, like, how he just come in and just take over, like, not take over boxing, but how he just come in and jump in and make all this money. But I feel like it's pros and cons to it.

You know, yeah, he came in here. Yeah, we all been boxing since we've been little and we've been doing it since we've been with babies and forth through the amortures and all that stuff. And things like that. But I feel like, like I said, I feel like he bringing eyes to the boxing game and having like the younger kids that follow him. Yeah. He brings any, bringing their eyes to the boxing game, for sure. So I'm wooded, I'm off for it, you know. At first I wasn't, but I am now.

Okay, okay. I love it. Well, this has been great. By the way, what's the McDonald's order? I heard you have a very unique order that you want, you think could blow up. Maybe getting a McDonald's endorsement. Yeah, I need McDonald's. It comes fine to me for sure.

What is the order? The CBG order. You got to get two McChickens with cheese, add the Mac sauce. You got to get a large fry and a large cook or a sprite. Two of them. Yeah. Two McChicons. Yeah.

That's out of camp. That's out of camp. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Right? Yeah. Or maybe it's a 154 poundage you can do it from time to time. Who knows? Wow, wow, wow.

I might sneak one here and there. Man, but that would be something. Boots with the McDonald's sponsorship? Yeah, McDonald's, come on at me. Okay, all right. Well, maybe now that we put it out there. Thank you so much for coming in. I really appreciate it.

And congrats on the big win. Thank you. And I would love to see you there in November 8. That would be great. Front Road just looking at Virgil and his team over there. just kind of stalking your prey. That would be a scene. For sure.

So hopefully, hopefully we're there, hopefully getting the ring too as well. Oh, afterwards. Yeah, yeah. That would be something. You and Eddie pulling up over there? Yeah, me and Eddie. Yeah, I would love that.

I'm going to talk to Eddie when I get off when I'm here. So, yeah. All right, cool. Well, thank you so much. Congrats. We're going to take a quick break. Say goodbye to Boots. Be back with Andy Foster.

A lot to get in with him about. So don't go anywhere. We'll be back right after this. All right. That was our conversation with Derek Moneyberg, aka Dale Buskowski. go check it out in its entirety on the YouTube channel. Boots was a delight.

I'm looking forward to seeing if he gets that Virgil Ortiz fight. That's the fight to make. That would be if you are unfamiliar with the world of the sweet science. It would be one of the biggest fights that can be made in 2026. Certainly one of the biggest fights that could be made here in America. It would be amazing at MSG or in Las Vegas. I would love it. I would love to witness it.

So hopefully Virgil does his job and we get that fight in 2020. Now, of course, as we discussed with him and many others, one of the big stories over the past couple months has been the Muhammad Ali American Boxing Revival Act. This is a story that isn't going away anytime soon, but certainly came into focus last week when the California State Athletic Commission unanimously passed a motion to formally endorse said act. All six voting members voted in support. A lot of talk going into it, a lot of talk coming out of it. Here to talk about it is the California State Athletic Commission Executive Director, also the chairman of the Rules Committee of the Association of Boxing Commissions, and a Hall of Famer in his own right, the one and only Andy Foster,

is kind enough to join us on this Tuesday afternoon. Hello, Andy. How are you? Hi, Ariel. Good to be with you. Thanks for having it. It's great to have you. It's a great privilege, and I really appreciate it. And this is obviously a huge, huge topic. And just in the interest of full disclosure, I appreciate you reaching out wanting to maybe clear the air and talk about this as best as you could. And so thank you for that. Could I ask why?

Why did you feel the need to perhaps have this opportunity to talk about it on the show? There's a tremendous amount of misinformation about what the bill does. And there's a tremendous amount of negativity around a bill. bill that will absolutely help boxing in this country. And so I think it's important to explain to the public exactly what the bill does and what the bill doesn't do because the current system of boxing is not going away. This provides fighters just a choice, another alternative for them. But the biggest thing for me that this bill does,

why it's so important that this bill is this bill addresses the four, six, and eight ground fighters that were not addressed the first time in the sense that there is a minimum purse requirement and a minimum insurance requirement, minimum medical requirements for every boxer in this country. Now, California exceeds these standards, but many, many states do not. And many states don't even have a minimum purse. So these are, these are important. When you're talking about the number of boxers just cumulatively that this bill will help, it's important to have insurance. It's important to have some, even if it's a small check, even from the, from the fight. And it's important to be reasonably medically cleared before you compete. These are,

these are important things that are in the in the bill. Do you believe, Andy, that that is the genuine motivation behind the bill? Do you think that that is the reason why we are here today talking about it? Because obviously, there was no great push to amend or, you know, introduce any type of changes to it. And obviously what has been brought up time and again is that here comes TKO, here comes, you know, Zufa boxing, and they want to change it to make boxing seem a lot more, like the UFC, and we could get into what exactly that means. Do you think that that is the genuine motivation, or do you think that there are other reasons why they are so, you know, firmly behind this new bill? Well, I mean, I think that obviously that they're wanting to

create a league system, looks like a league, more or less. Like the UFC, right? Like the UFC, where the biggest thing that I think that they're wanting to do is get away from the sanctioning organization so they don't have to go through the rating system. And the four belt system, we can get into that if you'd like to. Yeah, that's a huge part of it. Well, I mean, that's the, that's the part of it. Okay. It's not the huge part. That is the part of it. Okay. So that's what the bill does. That's the big difference. The other piece, and I guess the other side of it is the controlling of both sides of the card, like having both sides of the card. By that, I mean, right now in the thing is the promoter will control,

like, we'll have the A side, and the B side fighter is being brought in to lose, okay? That's what's happening in boxing almost every weekend is the promoter's fighter will be, and you'll have an opponent. That's what they're called in boxing the opponent, or however you want to say it. They're usually an unsigned fighter that just shows up, and it's pretty good, can compete, gives the fighter rounds, they call it, and whatever, but then they move them up the ladder, and hopefully they move up the rankings until they get to the pinnacle, and then they fight a big championship fight at the end. That's what the current four-belt system, that's what we see.

the financial incentive in a league type format would be that since you have both sides of the card you want to have the most competitive fights possible it's a financial incentive is to bring the public back to watch it because the idea is to have good fights the idea is to make sure the fights are most competitive because you don't really care who loses because you've got both both fighters under under contract under your league type system and that's that's probably the biggest difference and you know the ratings organizations um you know there's four tracks that you can go um there's four tracks that you can go uh with with the with the current sanction organizations you can do b a wbo i bf or wbc and they're

all very similar top tracks and you will move up the rankings depending on who you fight and the promoters, different promoters really associate with different, all times with different sanctioned organizations, but a lot of times everybody works with everybody and you will move up that way. But once a year you have mandatories in that organization if you're the champion. So you'll often see big fighters being stripped of their belt because they just can't fight. If they have multiple belts, you can't fight that many times because another fight might make more financial sense or whatever.

So really just having a system where the best fighter will fight the best fighter and then they will rise without having to ask permission from a different group on the ratings or in some cases four different groups is beneficial to boxing because we're not seeing always the best fights that could be made. Pachial Maeweather, I felt like happened too late. There's fight after fight that I think the public would like to see. And then there's been a proliferation of titles. There's been a 404% increase in the number of titles.

issues since 1996. That has created confusion among the public. The public doesn't know who the champion is in many of the weight classes, and there are 17 weight classes, or 18 in the WBC, but 17 weight classes. So it's difficult for the public to follow exactly who the champion is. Because often the champion is different. Sometimes it's not, but often the champion's different in each track. One thing that has been brought up is like we're going to clean it up. It's going to be, you know, one system where the best are fighting the best. But is it not true, Andy, that in essence, boxing would be introducing a new belt.

It would actually be introducing a fifth belt because this Zoufa belt, they have said they're going to bring in this Zufa belt and we're going to have this belt be defended on our shows and we're not going to play with others. We're not going to have co-promotions. We're not going to have a WBC slash Zufa. unification bout, which would then introduce another belt. And look, I just had Boots Ennis on the program. Boots Ennis is vying for a fight against Virgil Ortiz. If Boots Ennis is a Zufa fighter, he can't even think of a Virgil Ortiz fight because he's a golden boy fighter. So doesn't that

restrict everything even more? Because this is not news to you. Every notable boxing person that I've spoken to from the likes of Boots, from the likes of Danny Garcia last week, Eddie Hearn, Oscar Delahuea, they have all said, we're not going to play by these rules. We like the old way. like being able to co-promote. Am I saying that boxing or am I believing them that boxing is perfect? Absolutely not. But wouldn't this actually make it more restrictive than this, you know, sort of like utopic system that everyone's going to be playing under one umbrella with one belt on the line? It seems like the sport is too, you know, is too old. It's been going on for over a hundred years. It seems to me like, you know, the train has already left that station.

it's going to be very hard to reverse course and making more of an MMA model, if you will, a UFC model specifically. You're right that this has been going on for 100 years. You're right about that and really since we saw a proliferation of the titles.

But this is an option. No boxer has to do that, do this track. But I think it's fair to say that the UFC is clearly the most successful MMA promoter that's ever been and if the people

over there at TKO or whoever decide to get into this space they're going to bring the same degree of promotion to boxing and I believe that the fighters will be able to choose. Nobody's making

the people do this and I don't think somebody like Boots Ennis is really who the way I view this at the beginning would be more like a developmentally, probably something like the contender series or something to start with. Not, I don't think that they're going to jump in feet first with a UBO system into the four belt system. I don't think they're trying to, I don't know what they're exactly. I mean, I've not asked them, but that's not the way I envision it.

I envision it being, you know, building up, signing good fighters. they want to come over there, and the other groups in the four belt system will be just fine. I don't think this changes boxing that much. So how does it work? I do believe that the best fighting the best or the people, and with the media that they're bringing, with Paramount and the whole thing, I believe that it will put boxing back on TV. Errol, I'd be remiss to say, I mean, in California and across this country, really, in the period of seven years, we've lost five.

of the major broadcasters that funded boxing. We've lost HBO, we lost Showtime, we lost Fox, and we lost the SPN. Broadcasting money is really what finance is boxing. And without that investment in the product, the boxers are not going to have the exposure or the dollars to fight and be seen and to be paid. And by the way, for the audience, UBO stands for a unified boxing organization. so a more unified front. How would it work?

Because I've heard Dana say this as well. Like, hey, you can go with this one or you could go with the old Ali Act, if you will. Is that even possible? Like, how could a fighter choose under sort of like what legislation they're fighting under? Like, isn't there just one set and that's it? Like, you make an amendment to it and that's what it is. How could there be too? And wouldn't that make things even more confusing, more muddying of the waters?

I don't think so. I mean, it's, you use your under. How would you, how would that work? You would just sign the contract that you're going to be under the UBO. And there's limits to these contracts. They're not indefinite. But you would sign, you would sign that you're going to, you're going to work with the UBO. And you're guaranteed insurance at that point.

You're guaranteed all the medicals paid for. These are things that are required. And this isn't just sufa, it's any UBO. So, or the, or the four belt system, you can go do that. and you have to move up the rankings. And one of the things that I've been, one of the big stark differences because I regulate both sports and you look at

is if you're a championship or near championship level in boxing and you take a loss, your earning potential and your pay is dramatically lowered the next five. I mean, it's just so much lower. If you take a loss in, When UFC was doing, we did a lot of the Bellator's also, when you take a loss, you don't see the earnings of the next fight often dramatically reduced. They don't penalize like that.

And part of that, I think, is in boxing, you lose the rankings, you go down the rankings, and you have to work your way back up. And the UFC, they just will put you back in if you fought good. It's just the way it is. I mean, I think of people like Jim Miller and people like that. I mean, always fight good. Everybody's excited to watch them. They just keep fighting.

Would you agree with the sentiment that the Ali Act, you know, over the last 25 or so years, one of its benefits has been stopping a sort of monopoly of boxing, a promoter from coming in, you know, there was talk of PBC wanting to come in and they want to control the whole thing. They want to be on every single network. They're going to time by. and it has it has precluded any promoter, any businessman from monopolizing boxing. And wouldn't that be a benefit? Wouldn't that be a good thing?

As opposed to what we've seen in the sport of MMA, which, you know, I'm not going to say that the UFC is a monopoly. They're the big dog. They created the sport for all intensive purposes here in North America. But there was just a, you know, a class action lawsuit that was settled. They sort of acknowledgement that perhaps the fighters weren't getting paid what they were owed. and here's a model that is trying to be replicated in another sport when that model was just, you know, taken to court in a class action lawsuit, and there are other pending, you know, lawsuits.

And so wouldn't we want that? What do we want a system that would preclude any type of monopolization of promotions for the boxers' benefits? Well, I mean, boxing is not going to be monopolized. There's way too many fighters under contract with PBC. with Golden Boy's got a bunch, matchroom's got a bunch, top rank has a bunch. There's just a lot of talent that spread out. And I think that the fact that this UBO model can be used by anybody,

it's not exclusive to Zupa boxing, would also prohibit the idea of some kind of monopoly or whatever. with the monopoly, the fact of the matter is, we have lost four networks in the last seven years. The number of titles issued is up 404%. It's 1996. And the public does not know who the champions are in many of these weight classes.

It's hard to make unification fights. The sanction fees, in my view, are, I would like to see them, I would like to see the sanction fees lowered on the fighters, if possible. I would like to see the belt fee waived on the fighters, if possible. There are a lot of things that are, and I would like to see the promoter fee also reduced by the sanctioned bodies on the promoters, so that we could have more of these promotions done. Without the broadcast money, Ariel, we are seeing more and more perspidates,

more and more, okay, and I've got a fight that's coming up in December. It's a cruiserweight fight. I think it's the bo-to-jack fight, I think. I think it's what it is. But it's Steve Bash got that. I believe it was $301,000. It's cumulative for that fight. It's a world title fight.

We just had one. Sean Gibbons bidded on it and got it. He's not going to put it here, but he got it. And it's a world title fight, Ariel, $30,000. $19.5 for the champion, $8,500, I think, and then you've got to pay the sanctions. I tell you this to let you know that this idea that, and hear me when I tell you,

because absent the very, very elite Crawford and Canellos, there's a few. Absent that, the idea that boxers are now making a lot more than MMA fighters or UFC fighters in particular is false. That is a fairy tale. It's a fable. It's being told, and it's being told and told and told. It's not true. It's just not true. I've got the numbers. I looked at them. You've got the numbers. I sent you some of it. What about the breakdown of the pie, though? Well, I don't have that information, Ariel. You're talking about total revenue? Is that what you're talking about? Yeah. The total revenue? The breakdown of the pie. Every single

boxer that I've talked to, every single promoter that I've talked to said, hey, like, we're giving them 80%, 70%. Now, obviously, the top dog is going to get more of that and it trickles down, as opposed to in MMA, let's be kind and say it's 30-70 the other way, right? I mean, that's a fact as well. So what about that breakdown? Why would anyone want it to go the other way? Well, I'm not suggesting. Look, when you talk about that, when you're talking about the promotion piece of it, it costs money to promote the athletes. Now, that group in Las Vegas, the UFC, if we're talking about Zupa boxing or the UFC,

they're very good at promoting. They can promote their athletes. They can take people that nobody's ever heard of and make them stars. That's what they do. Now, when it comes to the purses, I would agree that years ago, that probably a decade ago, maybe a little less, probably boxers were making more than UFC fighters, at least for the most part. But there has been a continual rise in MMA purses, specifically from the UFC,

specifically over the last about eight years, you keep seeing them go up and up and up. Last one I had, by the way, this doesn't even count the bonuses that they give out or the pay-per-view points or how all that works. I'm talking about just the persons that are disclosed to the state athletic commissions. And, you know, I obviously don't have the total revenue piece

of all of all of their revenue versus their expenses or whatever. That's easily available. they're a publicly traded company. It's an SEC filing. John Nash always does a good job throwing that stuff out, and I read that sometimes. But I don't have that right in front of me, but I do know that this idea that, just from what I see, this idea that MMA fighters or UFC fighters in particular make less than boxers is not true. That's not true, with the exception of the big ones.

In the September hearing where you guys talked about this, California State Athletic Commission, I remember the conclusion being there was going to be a fact-finding mission, and you would reconvene in December to vote on it. That got moved up to last week's vote, October 15th, and that seemed to have caught a lot of people by surprise. Why did that happen? The chairman moved that piece up because the subcommittee was actively seeking out people that had so many meetings, and I think the subcommittee was ready to submit its findings.

do you understand why people would say from an optic standpoint that seemed a little bit out of the ordinary it seemed a little bit strange that it got moved up and I think it was on seven days notice no it's on it was on 12 or 14 days notice area it's okay and they requirement California okay anyway for a notice regardless that's like items get moved up all the time if people don't know we've been I mean we've been you got to pay attention of the meetings. Things get moved around, get pushed back. The agenda changes all the time from meeting to meeting. Even where we're having our next meeting got changed just the other day. So these things happen all the time. Were you surprised that it didn't seem like any prominent

boxers of today or yesterday year, prominent promoters of today or yesterday. I understand that Tom Loughler was there. You know, he was in favor of it. I know that he is a promoter. I don't know if anyone would say prominent, you know the ones that I'm talking about, that none of them were on the call? Was that surprising at all to you? Were you expecting, you know, a lot of the people that were for it and opposed to it, let's be honest, were either MMA fighters or people who are affiliated with TKO slash Sufa? Well, Tom Loffler, I would say he is very prominent. He promoted the Klitschko brothers. He promoted Triple G. Currently right now, he's also the guy who has promoted, you know, fights on UFC fight pass. Obviously, he's in a business relationship with

them. Let's not kid ourselves. There was no, there was no Delaware, there was no Hearn, there was no Demetri Salida, there was no Nikisa Baderian, or any of those guys. Notice they weren't there, Ariel, they weren't there. I'm asking you, yes. I'm saying, why, why do you think that is? I think, well, I don't know. I think that if they wanted to voice their opinion, they had two opportunities to do so. Why do you think that is? Because I'm sure you've seen the clips of people. talking about it. I asked Oscar about it. Did you see Oscar talking about it in my interview with him? I saw parts of it. I sure did. Somebody, they actually sent it to me. That's why I texted

you. Yeah. They sent it to me. Yeah, I don't know why they, I mean, look, the commissioners, we see these guys pretty much every weekend. I don't know why they didn't show up to the meeting and support or oppose it. You know, I noticed that there was no really, I didn't recall any prominent boxers that are active showing up either. I can't recall that, but I did recall a lot of MFA fighters that had been in the past. I recall some of them.

And there were several promoters. I wouldn't call them, I think, to use your term, I don't think they would be prominent promoters, but several promoters who I'd had no idea who they were before that call showed up to support that, support the thing. What I thought was interesting were the MMA fighters who were opposed it,

because initially I was like, well, why do they care so much? You know, this is essentially a boxing story, but then as I began to think in research, my sense is that, and I think you know this, MMA fighters have long wanted a sort of Ali act to come to MMA so that they could fight for other belts and that there could be a Francis Inganu versus a John Jones or a Tom Aspinall where organizations could co-promote.

And so they're trying to, you know, they're trying to stop this from happening. I thought that that was a really interesting development. Did you see it the same way? When you have a guy like Matt Brown, who has no real skin in the game at this point, he's retired, be so passionate about a bill that would only really affect boxers at this point. To me, I thought that that was really interesting. And it reminded me that MMA has long wanted a version of the Ali Act. to come over to this side of the fence, and it has never happened, thus stopping certain things

from happening that boxers are able to enjoy? Well, I know what you're talking about. I'm also passionate about trying to help the boxers, and I believe that this bill will do that. Ariel, I believe I'm right on this. I believe the commission's right on this. We've evaluated this bill for hours and hours. We lost, I keep talking about, we lost four networks. I don't think that we can, I don't think that should be discounted.

That's big because we used to have HBO boxing or Showtime Boxing or ESPN or Fox almost every Friday or Saturday night. It used to be just a common thing here in California. We still have tons and tons of club shows, but the broadcast numbers are down. They're not in boxing anymore. And without that money that they're being brought to boxing by the broadcasters, by the way, the broadcaster provisions in the Professional Boxing Act of 1996. That's how entrenched they were into boxing, 25, 30 years ago in that prohibition. So when you talk about losing those networks and that streaming along with the splintering of the thing,

I sent you the chart, and I don't know if you read it, but we went from almost an entirely linear system in 2018 to an almost entirely, I guess now, totally, totally streaming system in 2025. That's a big shift in the way the entertainment is received by the public. But isn't that a sign of the times, Andy? That's a sign of the times. I mean, Netflix is the biggest platform in the world, and they just had a boxing event in September, and they'll have another one in November. DeZone is an app that has a lot of boxing on it and let's be honest

I don't think that HBO and Showtime got out of the boxing business because they weren't interested in boxing they got out of the sports business Showtime Sports doesn't exist HBO Sports doesn't exist anymore I know I used to work for them I worked on a show called Real Sports

with Brian Gumble that show doesn't exist sports doesn't exist there anymore you know a couple of documentaries here and there there was a time where ESPN got out of the boxing business they got back into it with Top Rank who's to say they don't get back into it now and there's new players as you said

Paramount is in it. Netflix is in it. The Zone is in it. And so, you know, I don't, I don't think it's necessarily an indictment on the boxing business that these players are out of it. It sucks. It hurts. But the fact that we're on streaming in apps, I think is more of a sign of the times, no? I mean, the NBA is about to debut tonight on Peacock, for goodness sakes. You're 100% correct. I couldn't agree with you more that it is a sign of the times. So you're right about that. But the amount of investment in the sport has not and has not caught up, if that makes sense. So there's not as much money as there used to be to spread around to the fighters.

And the fighters are being forced to take lower purses than they're used to have. Like I said, we just did that the purse bid. It's coming here and you're seeing more and more purse bids that are happening than before. We were just at lunch and I think the IBF was doing one and it got canceled because I think they're close to come into an agreement. So it got pushed back for a week. But I don't know if that makes sense to you, but there's not the same amount of investment in boxing as there was 10 years ago from the networks. Without beating around the bush, your straight shooter, I'd like to treat you that way.

I think one of the big concerns is that this bill seems so closely aligned with TKO, with the lobbyists, with the stakeholders involved. Do you have any concerns about that? Do you have any concerns about how close it seems to be aligned? Everyone in support is an ally. Everyone who is not in support is not an ally. Everyone who's talking on the call in support are major power players. It does ring some alarms, I would say, in a lot of people's minds, where the organization wants to get into the world of boxing and all of a sudden wants to make these changes.

Does that not feel like a fair assessment in your opinion? This is a TKO-backed amendment, right? This is a T-K-O-backed bill. Yes, I think that's correct. I don't think that's any kind. I don't think anybody's trying to, I think they're supportive of this bill. Yes, I absolutely think that they are. Does that lead you to ask some questions, does that lead you to wonder about what the motives are behind it?

No, because I've told you already on this call. to avoid the ratings organizations. That's what I believe is the paramount reason. They don't want to ask permission from one of the sanctioned organizations to make a fight. They're not used to doing business that way. They want to be able to make this guy who's going to fight this guy without asking permission. You can't wait around for 60 days and wait for this stuff to ask these things. Now look, the four belt system has worked.

Some people would say well. Some people would say less well. I wish there was less belts because the public would probably, maybe some less belts because the public would probably know who the champion was better. But as we move along, I think that the reason was the ratings, I think that they want to be able to rate their own fighters and give their own belts and make their own matches because they'll have both sides of the car. That's what I believe. Do you agree with that? Do you like that? Yeah, I do.

Really, but Andy, you come from MMA. I mean, we can't see Francis and Ghanu fight Tom Aspinall. We can't see these co-promoted fights in MMA. You know that, right? So why would you want that system in boxing? You very rarely, I mean, it takes the stars to align for it to happen in boxing. Not these days. Not since Turkey got involved.

Let's be honest. I mean, all the big, what big fight hasn't been made in the last two years? Well, Ariel, when we talk about policy for California, which is what I care about, okay, We've lost four networks. I can't base the decisions, and I don't believe I feel like the commissioners can base the decisions on what his excellency, Mr. Turkey, Alice Sheik, wants to do with boxing. No, my point is, he clearly has been able to make the big fights because he has, you know, incredible funds backing him. And so big fights can be made. It doesn't seem like any of these sanctioning bodies are standing in the way of any of these big fights from being made.

Ussick and Fury fought twice over the past year. That's right. That's right, but like I said. Better Beavin Bivel couldn't get made for 10 years, and then all of a sudden he came along and they fought twice in the span of four or five months. So I don't think it was necessarily that. I think it was just money that wasn't being thrown enough money

for these fighters. I don't know if it was necessarily the sanctioning bodies. Well, then wasn't BVall supposed to fight? Didn't that get ordered that he was going to fight Benavides? didn't that get ordered? After the two fights? Yeah, right.

And didn't he have the belt at that time? But then when he didn't take it, he's out of the ratings now. Oh, yeah. All this is kind of a mess. I'm just saying, at least we got those two fights. If we're going under the UBO model, a guy who fights under top rank and a guy who fights under matchroom isn't fighting each other. It's not even a question.

Like, I would never sit here and talk about, you know, I don't know, a guy in PFL fighting a guy in the UFC because there's just no point. It's not happening. It's not even going to be discussed. Okay. Well, I mean, nobody's, nobody, Ariel is making the public watch this. Okay. I believe that this system will attract the public to watch it. I believe that UFC and ZUFA are good at promoting. They've already showed that they're good at promoting. And if people want to watch their product, people will watch their product. I believe that they will will do a good job for the fighters, and I believe that this bill, look, it raises the floor across the whole country for poor people. We should talk about that because I was one of those

lower income people there for a while fighting, and it's not, it's no good. You go up to them, them bars in Tennessee where they've got boxing rings set up and there's smoke all in the air and you fight, you know, there's them four-round boxing matches that you're in the corner, or four, and you walk out of there with the 50 or 100 bucks, that's happening. The dollar contracts are happening in this country. They're absolutely happening. We passed regulation, and I sent you the initial statement of reasons about that, that showed that, where we moved the purse up to $100 and $16,

and then Governor Newsom moved it up to $200 through legislation that the commission endorsed in 24. So there's a lot of, there's a lot of pros to, to the bill, a lot of pros. And the biggest pro is, fighters are able to choose. They're able to choose this. It's a choice. You can choose whether you want to work with this group. And if you do, you're going to get a lot of benefits. But if you, if you don't, you can stay in the, in the current system. And, you know, if, get signed to one of the major promoters, and you'll move up the rankings that way. I think that's probably the most important thing that people need to recognize, because I believe it when you say it, you say that these two bills will exist, and if you want to

be Boots Ennis 10 years ago and say, I want to hold the WBC title because that's the belt Muhammad Ali once held. You can go down that path, and there'll be nothing that will stop you from doing that. And this won't abolish that system, but there'll be this other model that will make things a lot more unified and won't have to adhere to those rankings or those belts and will be able to create their own belt. Is that a fair way to break it down? It is, Ariel. And remember, this bill only applies to this country. I'm talking about the United States. Yeah, of course. So does the L.E. And so, but the World Boxing Council and the world boxing organization, the IBF and the WBA, those are legitimate worldwide organizations.

They have boxers from all around the world, okay? So I view this bill and this belt real similar to like the NABF in the sense that, but it's even, it's not, it doesn't include Canada, Mexico, it's the United States. And this bill applies to the United States. And if a boxer decides they want to go, they want to take, you know, they want to move up the rankings, they absolutely can, just like you said. and if they want to go down this route, they can go down this route. But the boxers are able to be given a choice.

And choices are good. Investment in boxing is good. TV is good. And like, you know, Nick Conn is on TKO, on the board of TKO, and I don't know Nick Con. I made him one time for like three minutes. I don't know him, but I know a lot of people in boxing that know it. And he's one of those guys I've never heard. Like, nobody I've ever talked to had a bad thing to say.

about the guy. And he's involved in this boxing venture. And so you've got like real pros that are coming in that are going to be doing this. Now obviously they're in a business. They have an obligation to make money for their shareholders. But while they do it, they're going to raise the sport of boxing up and they're going to make fighters money as well. That's what's going to happen if the bill passes. And every boxer, in this country, whether they're in Iowa, Mississippi, wherever the places are that are fighting those smaller fights right now are going to get benefited by having insurance in a minimum purse.

John McCarthy on the call last week said anyone who opposes the bill has a financial reason to do so. Do you agree with that? Well, I think that some people have a financial interest to oppose the bill. I think that, but I think some people are just not educated as to what the bill does. This bill is not repealing the Muhammad Ali Boxing Reform Act of 2000. If you want to go down that path, you can. That bill did not, didn't really impact the four, sixes, and eights like this bill is going to.

Like this bill, if it's signed into law, this bill automatically raises the floor across this whole country. And just that reason alone, just that reason alone, because I don't know, Ariel, if you know, boxing can be exploitive. It can be exploitive, especially to really, really low-income people. We've had the, like I kept mentioning it to you, we had the dollar contracts going on here. And I kept looking at those and we'd see a dollar come across, a dollar, a dollar. It's like, what is happening? What was happening was the promoters were giving the fighters. tickets to sell, and that's how they would make their purse, and if they would get so much

and they'd turn the rest in. And I know club shows do that all across this country. I promoted a bunch of shows. I did that myself, but, and I sold tickets as a fighter. I surely did that a bunch of times. I'm not opposed to fighters being able to sell tickets. I'm not opposed to that at all, but you should have some kind of minimum as well. You shouldn't rely on just the tickets that you sell is your purse. You should be focused mainly on fighting and less on selling tickets. I wanted to ask you about a tweet from Chris Cyborg. Chris Cyborg tweeted last week, if the Muhammad Ali Act was applied to MMA, I would be undisputed world champion at 145, or I would have earned my rematch with Amanda Nunes. Promoters owning championship belts

and being able to leverage them to force fighters into long-term contracts below market value is not in the fighter's best interest. What do you make of that statement? Well, I mean, promoters, boxing is the only, only sport that has a separate ratings organization. Okay. Well, I mean, I guess kickboxing does in some respects with ISKA and ICAF. I would argue MMA is the only sport that doesn't have one. Well, bare knuckle doesn't have one. Kickboxing really doesn't have one to speak of.

And I sent you the sanction fees. I've sent that to you. You've seen them, okay? If, if, you know, I'm not sure that, that people know exactly what these fighters are paying for that. But, like, you had that fight that I sent you, it was a million fine. That wasn't unification. So that was, that was a bit odd. But what was it, like $280,000 in fees, something like that, or a million five purse cumulative?

That's a, that's not insignificant. That's a good bit. Of course, that's across the promoter. and the fighter. But I think that the, yeah, I don't, I don't know if I agree with that, that statement. I think that you've got to have all the information and I sit here day in, day out with it. And I'm telling you, Ariel, this bill's good. This bills good.

It's good for boxing. It's going to bring investment to boxing, and it's not going to do anything to the four belt system. and there's nothing going to harm Golden Boy or top rank or none of the rest of them, but it's going to bring another group into boxing. Yeah, no, that is the top line thing. I think what everyone is wondering is why does a new group want to, you know, exact these changes? I did want to ask you about, and I understand you don't have your whole day to speak to us, and I know you're a very busy man, so I'm going to let you go very quickly, I promise.

Just this one tweet from Nico Ali Walsh, the grandson of Muhammad Ali, because Lonnie Ali, the widow of Muhammad Ali, has been quoted in press releases and on these calls. This is what the grandson of Muhammad Ali had to say. Anyone who truly knew my grandfather knows he'd never support this Revival Act. Legacy isn't about last name. It's about principles. I stand with my grandfather's principles. If you're not a fighter, don't speak for us.

It's disappointing the CSAC is backing this. Yeah, I don't, I mean, look, I'm, I mean, he's entitled to his opinion. is entitled to your opinions when we live where we live. By the way, congratulations on the Toronto Blue Jays. Oh, yes. You're rooting for us? To take down those dastardly Dodgers? I was rooting for you. Oh, I appreciate that. I'm a baseball guy, but I was rooting for you. You can't say that you're rooting for the Jays, I understand, considering where you live. It would be a faux pa. Yeah. This is David versus Goliath. Well, yeah, but I thought of you last night. I appreciate that. Thank you. Yeah, yeah. I understand. I'm asking you about

a relationship between a grandfather and a grandson and obviously one of the biggest names in the history of sport. But it is, to me, again, it's interesting when these types of sentiments come about. Can I ask you about one thing that has been brought to my attention? And again, you're a straight shooter and you're the only one in the business that comes on here and talks about these things. And you can't, you know, it's impossible for me to truly say how much we appreciate it. We really, really do. What has been suggested to me is, I'm not going to beat around the bush when asking this. At some point, Mark Ratner is going to retire from the UFC, and the UFC wants Andy Foster to take over that job, and that's why he is backing this. Can you address that?

Is that a real thing? Have you talked to them about this? I've not, I've had a total of zero conversations about that. Zero, none, none whatsoever. So I don't, look, I'm back in this bill because this bill is good for boxing. We've lost four networks in the last seven years. I agree with you that there is a transition happening in the industry. It'll probably catch up, but this bill is not going to harm Golden Boy, our biggest promoter. It's not going to harm top rank. It's not going to harm the other ones, but it's going to bring another place in the industry that will give California boxers a place to fight.

I have two California babies. I'm from Georgia. They were born here. They go to school here. I'm very happy in California, and I've had no talks about that whatsoever. Thank you. This bill is a good bill, Ariel. Would you be interested in that role?

Well, it's not been, it's, it's, it's never been, it's never been, uh, brought to my attention. And I hope Mark Ratner stays there another 10 years. Okay. Um, and, and lastly, for those that want to understand, this is dense stuff. This, we usually talk about the fun stuff. What are the next steps here? And how soon, you know, could we see these next steps and potentially see this bill, you know, get passed over in Washington.

Buddy, I don't really know exactly the legislative process with this government shut down. Oh, right, right, right. Yeah, I don't, yeah, I would be speculative as I think in the bill, doesn't it say the bill would take effect 30 days after the president's signature, though? So, I mean, that's what I think. I think it says that. Do you think it could be a thing that comes into play come January? that's when Zufa boxing is going to kick off on Paramount, it seems.

Ariel, I really, I mean, if I knew, I would tell you, I don't know. I'll tell you what I know, but I want to comment on one thing. Please. You tweeted, and somebody sent it to me because I don't do the Twitter thing, but it's for the best. I tweeted that the officiating is not approved in last 20 years. Oh, I'm so happy you brought this up. I'm so happy you brought this up.

I really wanted to talk to you about this, but I understand I've taken up so much of your time. But please, if we can't for just a few minutes, because I think it's been abhorrent as of late. Well, it's been bad. No doubt about it. Okay. I mean, I don't know what to tell you. I'm not under sugar-coded. We've had some issues.

Did you watch the card this past weekend? Yeah. Yeah. There's been some issues. Okay. But, Ariel, there's no doubt it's improved from 20 years ago. There's no doubt about that. It's the same people.

It's the same people. I mean, and look, we had three people, or, let's see, we mean, I'm talking about the industry, but there's three people in Vancouver that you guys had never seen before, okay, that engage in the training. I'm talking about referees. So that's part of it. But I agree with you that we have to expand the pool. We've got to expand the pool. Sal and Derek cannot judge every single fight in the world.

Right. I agree with you about the pool. Is the issue that they just don't get paid enough? Should they get paid more? What's the incentive? It's the worst job in the world. You would have to agree with that because it's a thankless job. If you do a great job, if you have a great night at the office,

not a single person knows who you are. If you mess up, the world is coming for your neck because of gambling and all this stuff and fighters are losing out on half their purse. And so it's thankless in the sense that you get all that heat and you're walking away with what? Can I ask for a top-level UFC 322 card? What is the top guy making for the main event as far as the referee is concerned?

1,800, 1,800, yeah. Maybe 3 or 4,000, something like that. That's the top of the top, right? Yeah, that's the top. What is the prelim guy getting? I pay my guys the same here in California, but a lot of people pay them differently. So maybe 1500 to 2,000, something like that.

And when you say the same, everyone gets the same top to bottom? Yeah, I've stopped trying to separate that. I just take the top one and I just move it down. So what is it, like three for the whole card? Three each? Oh, the judges make less. The referees, I seem like maybe $2,800 last time and then $2,400 for the judges, something like that. Okay.

Do you think they should get more? Well, you know, you have to, the way I view it is you have to look at it kind of close to a boxing card. And boxing pays a little more than that, but frankly, we've not had any boxing cards near the size of a UFC in recent years because of what we've just talked about for 30 minutes or an hour or long. So, but yeah, I think that they, you know, it wouldn't, it wouldn't hurt my feelings to see the officials get a little bit more money. But I don't think that's, I don't think that's the driving thing on, on what, on the stakes or whatever. I mean, look, I had Pat Russell, he had Bradley in August, but I can't remember. He had the same exact issue that Dan did in the World Championship fight here, probably in 2015, something like that.

He thought he heard the bell. He got in. Carl Morady from top rank. I've never seen somebody get the ring so fast. He jumped up. And Pat just made a mistake. But that fight should have been stopped, right? The Kyle Nelson fight?

Yeah, I mean, look, there was no problem with the stop. I mean, I think that's what, I think that was part of the confusion. you agree absolutely it was a good stoppage yeah yeah so why did it continue yeah that that part it shouldn't have happened when it happened over here it did happen in around 12 like 10 seconds left or whatever so it was bizarre and then a couple weeks ago we had a jake matthews fight against neil magni where the referee stops it and then he continues to fight because he's like oh the guy wasn't out yeah and then what about the low blows in the mike malott fight i mean should a point be Well, you can't, like, so they get five minutes, up to five minutes, up to five, not five, up to five, up, yep, yep.

And if you're not ready at the five minute mark, that should be it. That should be the end. Right. But should, like, he was ready. He continued a second shot below the belt, intentional or not. I hate this intentional, unintentional thing. I hate this. How are we supposed to know? Every shot, look, if a football player, has a pass interference. He's not trying, but he's going to get penalized. He's going to get the 15 yards, and it's going to be where the play happened. Face Mask, same thing. No one's trying to foul their opponent, but you kick at the same time as your opponent,

you hit them below the belt. How many more warnings can we have? It's like... I agree with you. I'm going to bring this up in the rules. I do. I do. We've been talking about this for... Enough of this. It's never intentional. I agree with you. So he continues to say to him, I know it's not intentional. Of course, Mike's a good guy. But still,

shop below the belt is to shop below the belt. Yeah, yeah, you've got no argument here. I agree with you. Yeah. And then, and then, you know, like with the inconsistencies about sometimes there's a point deduction, sometimes there's not, I don't know, it just seems like a lot of the top dogs, I don't know if you saw this fight over in Dubai with Keith Peterson, not trying to pick on anyone, Paul Hughes, Usman, or Maga Madov. There were multiple shots below the belt. There was no, you know, there was a headbut at the end of the first round. It just seems like there's a lot of mistakes being made. And I get it. I would never want that job. I'm not saying I'm volunteering myself. it just doesn't feel like it's getting any better. Well, Ariel, it's a hard job. You mentioned that piece of it. You know, and then, you know, I mean, John McCarthy is coming back. Yeah, I mean, and, you know, I don't know.

He's probably going to have to have a lot of rotations and stuff, but, I mean, the good thing about him is he's able to, like, he's a really good referee. He's arguably the greatest of all time. I think, yeah, I mean, I think everybody would agree with that statement. Yeah. And, you know, and he'll be able to help the newer referees coming up and the whole thing like that. So, no, I'm excited about the whole thing, but look, it's a hard job. We keep training, we keep doing it, we keep working at it. I know, you guys are the best.

It's a hard job for these guys. That's why I always say you're the gold standard. I wish all the commissioners and commissions were like you guys. And truthfully, that's why I was really looking forward to this conversation and why some of the things discussed on the call last week were of note to me and somewhat alarming. And then when I hear every single prominent guy in my show speak against it, I'm starting to wonder like what's going on here.

And so I hope you feel that this was fair and that we were able to clear up some things. And I really do appreciate the time and the transparency. see. Yeah, well, thank you, Ariel. Thank you, Andy. All the best to you. Thank you. All the best and we'll talk to you soon. There he is. The great Andy Foster of the California State Athletic Commission Executive Director and yeah, a guy who I think came on and tried my best to ask all the pertinent questions. I know there's probably a million more that we can ask, but I didn't want to monopolize all of his time.

And really, I would love to have, I always want to showcase. and spotlight, all sides of the equation. We don't have a dog in the race. I promise you. I promise you. I am not rooting against anyone here. I mean, I didn't want to interrupt him there. But again, I've said this a million times.

I used to work with Nick Con. Nick Con was my agent. I'm not rooting against him. I'm rooting for him, if anything. This is a man who helped me realize a dream of getting to ESPN. Obviously, we don't work together. We haven't worked together since 2020. So there's no malice in the fact that I'm trying to have him on and talk about these things and ask certain questions.

But I will admit just like a lot of other people and I talk to prominent people in the boxing world and they all have issues. That leads me to have some questions. And then you kind of see some of the things that were said and how that all went down last week. You can't help but have issues. And obviously we know about the UFC and we know about the history and we know about the settlement and the class action lawsuits. And like I think you would be rather naive not to put two and two together. The times they have changed, people have long said that boxing needs some sort of change. I would argue that boxing is doing pretty well right now, and I don't think that it is an indictment on the sport of boxing, the fact that HBO and Showtime and even, to be honest, ESPN is not in it.

You know, entities come and go. Is it an indictment on the UFC that ESPN is out of the UFC business? I don't think so. You know, it's just business. So in any event. fascinating chat. I appreciate his time very much. I really do appreciate his, his candor and transparency, and I hope you guys enjoyed that as much as I did. I love these chats. Can I sneak in a couple more questions, or do we have to go? Why would we have to go,

man? Oh, amazing. How about we do some super chats? What do we got, Frank? I'm so glad you asked. We have a few super chats that I will be reading now. The first one says, you ready for round ball rock tonight? Hello NBC. Da-da-na-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da. Can I tell you, I am starting to hear my boys, not the boys in the back, like my sons, Oliver and Walter, humming that song, humming that song, around the house. That means the world to me. Because the reason I wanted to become a broadcaster was because of the NB on NBC. Like my first introduction

into the thought of doing this for a living, and obviously it's taking me down a different path with a show like this and with Uncrowned and all that. Thank you, God. Was the NB.N.N. NBC. I used to watch the NB.B. on NBC and I used to be enamored with Marv Albert and Bob Costas in particular.

Bob, how he would host, Marv, how he would do play by play. In the end, I ended up becoming neither of those guys in terms of like their skill set. I would never even be anywhere near them if I even tried. But there was something about those broadcasts, obviously the 90s, obviously the Knicks were a part of big games, Michael Jordan, Sunday afternoon, nothing like it. And I went to Syracuse because of Costas and Marv Albert. Like they really did shape what I wanted to be and who I wanted to be. And when it left in 01, Pacers-Lakers series, I do believe, when it left, might have been 0-2 max,

I thought it was a huge void. And that's no knock on ABC and ESPN, but there was something about that logo, those intros, the music, just the whole thing, the era, I felt it was a void. And so to see it back and to see it back like on national TV, plus Peacock and all that stuff. I can't wait. I cannot wait. And you know what?

I have said this for the last couple years before I even knew they were coming back. I found inside the NBA to be incredibly stale. I know everyone's going Gaga over them going to ESPN. I think that Amazon and NBC's presentation is going to feel like a breath of fresh air. I love the people that they brought on. I think Mello's going to be an absolute superstar.

I think he's unbelievable on camera. And I think it was time for some fresh blood. some fresh voices, some new faces. And obviously these aren't new faces. Blake Griffin, Dirk Novitsky, Jamal Crawford. I just think it was time. I think it was time.

So I can't wait. I'm so excited. Two games tonight. Nick's Cavs tomorrow rematch Nick Celtic. I saw Tom Tibido out there with the Celtics at their training facility. It kind of felt some sort of way. I felt some sort of way about it.

I understand he was fired. But like is he out there telling them how we beat them five months ago? I hope so. I felt some sort of way about that. That's good shit right there. It is good shit,

but I felt some sort of way. And then I saw a press conference where Kat was like, hey, what do you think about the office? Did you see this? And he's like, I don't know. It's different. We've got to get used to it.

You know, the vibes couldn't be worse. That interview was awful or that press conference was awful. Tomorrow should be fun. I believe in Mike. Yes. I think it's you guys and us. I think the whole way is going to be Nick's Cavs.

I think it's going to be great. Hawks. Hawks and Magic. By the way, I was literally going to say? I think there are players. Hawks, Magic, Pistons, I think, I think you can't. No, I think Pistons are great. Without Malik Beasley, they're not that good. Kate Cunningham, man, they're good. He's fine. He's not that good.

T-Wolf? That's, that's the West. That's, no, no, no, I'm saying for my team. I know they're in the West. Oh, okay. What do you mean? You just threw out a Western Conference team as we were talking about the Top Dogs in the East? I'm just saying, that's my team in the West. That's your team? Anthony Edwards. Okay.

Uh, Georgia. I got a support. We've only had one good player. I got you. Havis Caldwell Pope. I got you. I got you. I think, no, not, who went there way back in the day? Who was from Georgia? Shandon Anderson. Oh, yeah. It's not a good history. Shout out. 2003, Sweet 16. I got that taken away because we cheated. By the way, it appears NBC, NBA left NBC in 0-1-2 season. Yeah, okay. Lakers and Nets. Lakers and Nets. Lakers, yep. And then it was Lakers, Sixers, Lakers, Lakers, Lakers, and the next one was Nets. Reverse the Pacers. Chances, okay, see, just repeat. Oh, got it, got it.

Sixers was 01, the legendary stepover. Of course. What did I say? The other way. Okay, my best. Yes, yes, yes. O one. Then Sixers, then Nets.

The sexy pick seems to be Denver. Everyone's on Denver. Okay, see. Is that sexy? Well, everyone's picking. I thought... Wouldn't they win? 2023?

No, but they revamped their whole... Their whole bench. Yeah. They traded Michael Porter Jr. They got Camp Johnson. They added Jonas Valchunus. They added Tim Hardaway Jr. Their bench is infinitely better.

Yeah. Still got the big dog, though. They got Yokic, they got Jamal Murray, they got Aaron Gordon. I think it's going to be OKC Nix. And I'm very biased. That's not a... But I don't see how you... OKC is only better.

They didn't lose anyone and they just got the whole experience of winning the chip. Plus they're going to trade for Yonis mid-season, so... You think so? If I was OKC and I had the chips, I'd bring... Push them all in the middle. They're like plus 200 to win. Okay, see? Yeah.

Is that the favorite? Yeah. Who's the second one? Who's the top eastern? It's got to be, it's got to be, oh, calves. Caves. Caves, then, Nix. Do they have that winning DNA?

Do the NICS? Jalen, National Chair. Donovan Mitchell's better? Like, you got plus 200 for NBA. The favorite in the NHL is like plus 800. I'm sorry. Oh, wow. The top dog favorite.

Yeah. Wow. All to say, I can't wait. I can't wait. I think it's great for the league. And I saw people complaining that every single day, it's like, one day is this, one day's NBC, one day's Amazon, one day's ESPN. No, by the way, guys, like, that's just better for you. That's just better for you. Now every single day, there's a game available nationally. There were some days where there were no games available. That's better for you. There was no Monday night basketball. There was no Sunday night basketball. This is better

for us. You don't have to get league pass. Obviously, I would imagine most people have ESPN who are watching the NBA. Most people have NBC. Most people have Prime. I think this is better. This is better. No, it's a lot of money. I mean, we have to pay this money already. I don't want to pay all that money for all those apps plus get league pass. Now you just, you'll have a game, you know, and oftentimes like tonight, it's a double header. What else, Frank? What else? Let me parse through this one. Oh, God. Hamzaa versus Imov. Sean versus Flores. Fluffy, number one contender. Cayao versus Costa, Brazil Civil War, DDP versus RDR, Whitaker versus Page, Pfeer

versus Vittori, Allen versus Izzy, Geri versus Delizzee, how'd I do? Tell Uncle Dana I'm open for work. Okay, keep it up there, keep it up there. Hamsat Imov, agree, Sean Fluffy, agree. Kyle Costa, agree. You know what? We didn't say that yesterday, and I'm all about it. There is beef there.

DDP, RDR, agree. Whitaker Page, agree. Piper, Vastah. Tori agree. Alan Izzy. Agreed. Jared DeLita. Nah, come on. Alan Izzy's the weakest one of this bunch. Okay, but I got to admit.

The rest are pretty good. This is great. This is great. I don't think Izzy's coming back for a burning out. Yeah, that ain't. Fair. But I don't hate anything here. There's nothing egregious here. No, these are good. Yeah.

Good job. All right, what else? On the way down to Jared versus DeLitza. He went all the way down. What else? What else? As of today, who has had more accomplished MMA career? Rob or Alex Pereira? that's such a tough one

because Marab has the winning streak I would say thank you, Terrence wow, a double whammy I lean Pereira two-way classes it's Perreira yeah just be I mean he's headlined

the biggest shows in the UFC's last three years like he is the man yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah I lean Perre it's a good question but I lean Pereer just because of the two-way classes what else what else as an Irish man

you can't be censoring my boy PT what a load of bollocks don't be a can of piss okay let me be honest you cover you guys oh no no because I saw this one and it pissed me off no one had my back

no one had my back what were just confused are we cursing or are we not cursing no it wasn't the cursing he says the end word in the video there are some bad words that you should say I thought corporate Rick would have my back on this one and I even wrote it in the slack

actually told me, I didn't even know what we're talking about. As you guys were killing me, oh, come on, just play it. There are bad words, and then there are just like, unspeakable words. There's the N-word in it, and you guys are like, come on. I don't think I was even in there. I didn't see the slack. Yeah, no, clearly you didn't see on being on the air. Maybe don't call the N-word

a bad word. I'm just saying, oh, it's not woke enough way. Oh, geez. I was trying to help us by not have, it's a thank God, by the way, I saw that video very recently, and it's one of my favorite videos, and obviously. Oh, I wonder why.

It's not said in a malicious. I'm going to play it without sound. Oh, stop it, Frank. I wonder why. That's what I was thinking. I was thinking we just run it without sound. No, it's not the same because the way he's laughing is making. Yeah, but it's sort of been, you know, an upgrade from like the, so there's this

slingshot ride and his friend and, oh boy. Listen, we, Frank, go through all the, go through all the drops right now. Go through all the drops. Go through all. You did it before. Go through them. Last time we had this interaction, it was good. No, no, go ahead.

I'd like for you to go with them. Go ahead. I'm alpha. No, no, no, not that. That's fucking bullshit. What else we got? Yep. Those fighting wars.

No. That's fucking illegal. Yep. What the fuck is that? Yep. Who the fuck is we? Yep. Peace and love.

Peace and love. Nope. Keep pinging the kind of. Kind of. What do you mean? Kind of? That's the worst one. Is anybody really interested?

Keep my fucking name out your mouth? Yeah. Okay. What else? What else? What else? Frank curses more than anybody I'm discovering. You know what? I found that the Darren Till one sounds so crystal clear, huh? That one is a top three. That one's a top three for me.

Which one, though? No, no, no. The second one. Those are all good. Keep my fucking name on my job. So good. What else, Frank? What else? New York, Rick. get on Pop Quiz on Boys in the Back

at a week Epex week question mark Prop pop What is that currency there next to the six I think those

New Jersey dollars Oh yeah It makes a little NJ transit look Okay Is it really No it's not a shekel Is it?

No what is it actually though That's anti-Semitic Jordan No I have no idea Did Jordan say that to air Or just to me? No just to me I don't know

But what is Prop quiz is what No that is already, right? What is it? That actually is a Sheckle. Oh, wow, shout out. Oh, wow. Yo. Who's anti-Semitic now? What country currency is that? Shekel's Israel, bro. Oh, okay. Yeah, yeah. Shut up. Are you going on a prop quiz?

Yes. Actually, I just randomly, not randomly. I spoke to Luke yesterday, so it'll happen. Okay. What else, Frank? What else? Shout out New York, Rick, for continuously circling back for transparency and how the poopie reached the Snoopy. Thank you. This has haunted me for a while. Sorry, Ariel. No problem. Listen. Ariel is normally the one asking the tough questions. I think I had to do that.

What else? What else? Ariel, a deep discussion needed of this interview. Shitshow from Andy. He seems to not even be well researched after he starts by saying there is a lot of them misinformation. P.S. Let the boys swear on air. Oh.

Oh. They starts by saying. Okay, okay. All right, I mean, that's on, that's, that's, that's, that's, that's, that's, that's, that's, that's, that's, that's, that's, um, yeah. Can I say I was actually compelled and swayed a bit by Andy Foster? Okay. Why? He has a, a duty to align things for what he believes will be best for the sport of boxing. Some, sometimes it is not going to be perfect, right? Sometimes it is not going to be ideal. And when he talks about the money drying up in the sport of boxing, um, some, sometimes, sometimes it is not going to be ideal. And, and when he talks about the money, sport in general with the broadcast partners going away, the ones that do ultimately fund a lot of these events, he's in a tough spot. And what's interesting about this whole thing is it's not really like a sport discussion. At a certain point, it's just a political thing. And that's the reason

why it's going through Congress. That's the reason why it's going through the commissions and all this stuff. There's always going to be agendas on the politics side. But ultimately, if he believes this bill to be good and we take him at his word on that obviously you know that that's the part that's that's imperative i do understand why he would be advocating for it as opposed to kind of passive in that in that conversation i don't agree with this person who said he didn't see him research like as he stated to you he's read this thing a bunch of times thousands of pages of documents um so i'm i'm i'm compelled by the idea that i believe he believes this is best Now, is it ultimately best is the question that I think you were asking and is so important?

Because if there are all these fighters that are coming out and saying, I don't believe this is best, you have to kind of give credence to that. You have to give stock to that. But I do believe after hearing him speak on it and your questions to him that he does believe this is best ultimately. Yeah. So let us see. Let us see. It's going to be a fascinating story. I think there's one more. There is one more super chat.

Yeah. Last week, someone mentioned wanting an uncrowned app. I'm a full-time software engineer and would love to help. I can build a minimum value product if all you all ever want to stand-alone app. Actually, MVP is minimum viable product. Rick, please reach out to GVK on the app idea. That would be great. No problem, mate.

Let me get to two very quick on the nose questions and then we'll call it a day. Shooter McGavin says, Ola Ariel and the BITB, thoughts on Max Kellerman calling Ussick's heavyweight resume thin. I mean, I don't know. You know what? I chalked that up to him just being out of the game for quite some time and maybe wanting to draw some attention for his new program because I don't know. I mean, look, he is a cruiserweight who moved up to heavyweight. He had great success in the Olympic Games as a cruiserweight.

He had great success as a pro as a cruiserweight. Yes, his time as a heavyweight has not been as low. lengthy as some other great heavyweights, but to beat Tyson Fury twice, to beat Anthony Joshua twice, to beat Daniel Dubois twice with, you know, I know Tyson Fury seems to think that he won at least one of those fights. I don't think there was much controversy in any of them. The only controversy really was whether or not, you know, the shot in the first Dubois fight was truly below the belt is to me one of the all-time great runs as a heavyweight and it's one of the all-time great careers. And so to call any of that thin or to, I don't know, to like who else should he

have fought in this era? In the heavyweight area. I mean, yeah, Parker, great. Let's see. If Parker wins this weekend, I pray to God that that fight happens. Atama still has a couple of, I would watch that fight tomorrow, still has a couple steps left to make before he's in that discussion. And then the rest are, you know, the Deonté Wilders of the world, the Gilles-Jang's of the world, the Gilles Zhangs of the world, the Joe Joyce's of the world, you know, like he fought the best of the best. I would argue he fought the top three guys and he fought them all twice, each, six times.

I mean, it's an unbelievable run. How many fights total this guy have at, this guy had at heavyweight so far? Let me count, let me count, let me count, let me count, let me count, let me count, let me count, scroll, scroll, I mean, to me, in the discussion for one of the greatest careers in the history, in the history of boxing. Chazora, Joshua, Joshua, Dubois, Fury, Dubois. I mean, golly. Fucking out. Yeah.

What the hell? You can't, you can't ding him for, if you determine that you think this heavyweight crop is thinner than another crop. You can't ding him. It ain't that thin, by the way. Dubois, Fury, and Joshua is not that thin. I don't think it is. I think, you know, we're looking fondly. Like, there's nostalgia at play, if you want to call this thin.

But ultimately, he can only fight who's in front of him, and he's looked damn good doing it. I don't agree with the sentiment. Last one. Last one before we go, and it's from our old friend, Adub. Hey, Ariel, Jeff Perlman interview was fascinating and really made me interested in his work. I appreciate the level he goes to get all the details. It's unbelievable journalism. Would you ever consider a book of that type?

What would be a topic that would get you up? for the task. Don't say 2016 UFC. Well, I was just about to say 2016 UFC's 2016 in the greatest year of all time, but I guess I can't. What about Highway to Hawaiian? I guess it's about me. It would be fun, but I think it takes a lot of work, a lot, a lot of work, and I think it would be hard to do my current duties and do that. That's his main gig. So he's able to be all in, obsessive over it, and that's why he's so great. But, you know, I do think that, He's the best at it right now, and I do think that you have to be all in to do something like that. I really do.

He also adds, why when Dana says boxing is the one thing that generated billions of dollars, and there's nothing to show for it, why does nobody respond with the obvious reason, quote, because the money goes to the fighters? That is a good retort. But, you know, I would also argue that matchroom is worth a pretty penny as is Queensberry, as is Golden Boy, to a degree, not as much as the UFC or some of the other entities, but it is not a bad point. By the way, a favorite moment of the last 24 hours other than George Springer's home run,

which helped the Blue Jays punch their ticket to the World Series. I don't know if anyone saw it. Nate Diaz at Monday Night Raw was amazing. Go look that up. Amazing, amazing, amazing. Shout out to Nathan. And shout out to the two. All right, tomorrow on the program, we will be premiering our very first uncrowned film live

at 1 p.m. Eastern right here and now on this channel. Well, not now, but like right here on this channel. Anyway, the legendary. It's true. It's true. Olympic gold medalist, W.W.L.T.A. legend, the one and only, the inimitable of the incomparable, Kurt Engel will be appearing on the program. And can I just say it is. unbelievable that he's appearing on the show tomorrow. It actually blows my mind. Blows my mind. And I will explain why tomorrow. Tomorrow. Peyton Talbot is going to join us as well. Frank Warren going to join us. Perhaps one other guess. It's a loaded day. It's a loaded week. The best of the business. The number one, unbiased. Combat sports I love on the planet.

Uncrowned HQ for all your con. Where else? Where else do you get lineups like this? Where else do you see a show go from NXT former star to Andy Foster to Boots Ennis to Anthony Pettus to Boe Nickel? Where else do you get Derek Moneyberg and all the other people that you had on the show yesterday? This guy's, he's posting the picture on his page.

He posted it again. You're wearing the Choose the Cocker shirt? He now posted it and asked me to collab. It is, I mean, I appreciate the chutzpah, but he's testing me now. He's testing me. Shout out. All right, it's time to go.

You know, a lot of people said that we are bandwagon jumpers, although if you actually search Ariel Hwani and Blue Jays, you can find tweets dating back to 2015. And I've been very honest. 2015 is when I jumped on the Blue Jays train because I felt like life was too short. But even here on the desk, you have Mr. Blue Jay right over there. Vladdy is right over there.

I got Boba Chet right over here. My friend. What is the name of this company again? McFarland. Boba Chet. Boba Chet coming back, guys. Boba Chet coming back for the World Series. He said he's back.

So it's very exciting. It's all very exciting. What a day. What a time. NBA season starts today. In earnest. as they say. I should put this right here.

Canada's on fire. The Six is on fire. Oh, actually, the new documentary on Netflix. Who Killed the Montreal Expos is out today? And also, by the way, speaking of Jeff Perlman, his book is out today. So now you could order it. No more pre-ordering.

You could just order it. So that's very exciting. Tomorrow's a very big day. Can't wait for you all to see the film. We worked very hard on it. Thank you to Casey, of course, Rick, Frank, the whole team. And it's the dawn of a new era right here on Uncrowned. Thank you very much, Anthony Pettis, J. Gentile, Boeh, Booneckle, Boots, Ennis, Andy Foster.

Thanks to all of you. Thanks to all of you. Back tomorrow, same time, please. I'm out of here.