The Ariel Helwani Show - Breaking News: Arman Tsarukyan injured, Islam Makhachev vs. Renato Moicano is new main event | The Craic

Episode Date: January 17, 2025

Petesy Carroll is joined by Chuck Mindenhall and Ben Fowlkes for an episode jam-packed with breaking news.Fowlkes speaks about the mystique surrounding Team Khabib and the Dagestan collective (04:06) after covering them for Uncrowned. Then, the lads react in real time to the breaking news that Arman Tsarukyan has withdrawn from the UFC 311 main event due to injury (13:46).Mindenhall gives insights on Merab Dvalishvili after spending time with the bantamweight champion at Syndicate ahead of his clash with Umar Nurmagomedov (27:22).News of Renato Moicano stepping up to face Islam Makhachev breaks (37:28), before the conversation returns to the co-main event (43:09) and Jiri Prochazka vs. Jamahal Hill (53:22).Reports surface about Tsarukyan's injury, leading to Ariel Helwani giving intel on the situation (57:55), before more news breaks, with Chris Weidman announcing his retirement on the UFC's weigh-in show (01:07:26).Finally, the lads react to Islam Makhachev's social media post regarding the eleventh hour change of opponent (01:11:56).  Join us on the bike: http://avironactive.com/uncrowned 

Welcome back to The Crack, everybody. It is the first pay-per-view weekend of 2025. It's UFC 311, and the lads are weighing in as we're speaking to you. It is pretty hectic over there in Los Angeles, and we have won at least one championship fight ready to go with Merab Develashvili and Umar Nurmagomedov weighing in successfully for their fight. Islam Makachev has also weighed in. But we are waiting for Armin Sorokin.

So you have all of this drama that we're going to be playing through on today's episode. But don't worry, you don't have to just listen to me, humble old Petezy here. I've got the Uncrowned Avengers with me. So let me welcome in the great Chuck Mendenhall, who you all know and love, and Mr. Ben Folks, who you all know and love. How are you boys? A bit of a hectic one today, waiting for the lads to weigh in, but i'm sure you'll bear with me throughout this process yeah i for one am looking forward to seeing arman get up there and see what kind of shape he looks like because i don't know if you guys saw the instagram pictures of arman looks like he knows where they keep the weights it's like oh my god arman was drinking his protein shakes during this one so you you kind of wonder, did we hit the weights too hard?

This is loaded already, man. I'm not saying nothing. Nah, you're not saying it. I'm saying maybe, you know what happened? I bet he did, he does the shrugs. He does dumbbell shrugs. He put on a little too much muscle in the traps and now he's heavy. That can happen to anybody.

Now he's sawing off a leg back there to try to get back down to weight. But we'll see how it works man i'm best to him i mean i hope i hope wouldn't that suck we haven't had one of these in a while where we're talking about somebody's weight pz when we did these shows before the weigh-in shows and it would really suck if somebody uh came in over to alter this thing wouldn't it oh i mean after all the brilliant features you guys have written as well which we'll get into later for for this not to happen. It actually reminds me, you saying that, of the great Hamzafi Diaz controversy when we had the attendance of Old Trafford in the Spotify Live app while we were doing that show that day.

And the great Ant Evans, who's manning the chat today, I'm sure, was there with us. But it's a crazy, crazy situation. So before we have to keep unraveling this way in, let me just give you a quick message from our sponsors, the great Averon, our partners, should I say. Your workout routine shouldn't feel like a grind. That's why Averon makes exercise more fun and easier to stick to using gamification. Yeah, you can play actual video games while you work out. Powered by their award-winning Averon World Software and paired with industry-leading hardware, Averon's rower, bike, and treadmill deliver some of the most fun and effective workouts ever. Jump into a session and before you know it, you're locked in, competing head-to-head, racing against the clock, or chasing your personal best. Averon's got everything from games and challenges to virtual rides, on-demand classes, and the most streaming options out there.

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And I'm sure we will see GC and New York Rick on these previously mentioned new technologies in the very near future. Boys, you guys, as I mentioned at the top there, did some serious writing this week. My, my, uh, you guys, as I mentioned at the top there did some serious writing this week. My, my, my, I have been, um, busying myself by reading all this stuff throughout the week. And it's really added to the sense of occasion we have going into this one. Um, Ben, I know you spoke at length with the lads yesterday about your piece on father's plan, Habib, Team Habib.

I was wondering, right? Like, I think this is one of the teams that has the most mystique around it at the moment. Like, everything we hear about it, it sounds like something from a movie, you know, Habib taking over where his father left. Having spoke to Mendez and Islam and other people involved with the camp,

like, do you still have that sense of mystique or have they like showed you how the sausage is made, so to speak? No, the mystique is still there. I mean, and I'll say Chuck is the one who really did some writing this week on these guys. My stories did not involve any full frontal male nudity. So Chuck's got me beat there. Don't bury the lead delete is that a touch of

sadness it's more than a touch my friend uh you know talking to those guys you hear the stuff about how disciplined everybody is in that team how how diligent they are about their training and and everybody being on the same page all that that kind of stuff, which I think we kind of knew about those guys already. The thing that is still the mystique for me is how are you that successful for that long? Because it's not like they're the only people who are disciplined in this game. It's not like the only people showing up to the gym on time and staying in the gym, working hard when they're in there. Even if you're the better fighter, there are so many ways to lose. We see that all the time. And so over this many years to be that successful, to go 91 and one between the four of them, it's really hard to do better than 91 and

one. We've talked all the time about some of the best gyms that we have ever seen and the champions to come out of those gyms, all those kinds of things. No one's ever done as good as those guys have done over this stretch. And all their guys are homegrown. It's not like a lot of the other gyms that we've gotten used to where, you know, you, you'll have some homegrown guys that helps raise your profile, but then that will also attract existing high level contenders to come over there in the hopes that you'll help push them over the edge. I mean, that's been the case with all the other gyms. Jackson's MMA, AKA ATT, they've all kind of had that situation. This is sort of the only one where you almost have to be born into this team. I don't know if it's possible to leave that team. And they've been so, so good for so

long. It's incredible. It just kind of defies the normal logic of how MMA works. It's particularly crazy. Like in Nurmagomedov, like you hear the name, right? And people keep asking me like, hey, is Murab, should he be a two to one underdog in this type of fight? And I'm like, well, it's really based on public, right? The public, where the public money is going to go. When people see that name, Nurmagomedov, and by extension, obviously, Makachev, Islam Makachev, like just being a 2.0 version of this whole thing. That's where they go, man.

They're just used to cashing tickets. Like, it's one of those things. I think a lot of people just see Nurmagomedov and they're like, that is the bet. And you just laid it out there. It's nearly impossible. It makes no sense i in your piece you mentioned like you know guys fall over the logo and the you know it can happen anyways look at john jones with his toe against chael son if that fight isn't stopped you know before the end of that round who knows if john jones takes that l

right then right like he probably does his toe was going the other way it's just you look at that kind of stuff and you're like it's it's nearly impossible to uh to actually go that and then the name Nurmagomedov I was pointing this out completely independently I know you were like doing the math on these numbers 91 and 1 as I was out there in uh in Vegas I was pointing this out that that Usman Umar and Habib are 65 0 and 1 like they're they don't have a loss you know and i'm like you could be the first guy to actually do that and you know you're asking about the motivation behind that that's insane i mean it's just insane that's the kind of thing that you you could never find in the sport especially as parody right like and people have been more well around gyms popping up

better and better competition better and better training partners. It feels literally impossible if it weren't for the Nurmagomedos kind of proving otherwise. Yeah. And that's the thing too is Chad Dundas and I were talking about this where we're going, when these guys are sitting around together in the gym, do you think they give Islam a hard time for having one loss? Do you think they pick on? I'm sure they do. i'm sure if we're all sitting around cracking on each other at some point it must come up with they're like well you have lost exactly one professional fight and nobody else here has what happened there you know the shame the shame that will follow you forever having lost one single fight as a ufc fighter what is it though, right? Like, obviously, you know, we used to hear about it back in the day, the

military fighting system. Is this just a system, do you think, that's been developed in Dagestan? You know, we know about the Dagestani handcuff. We know for the most part, Umar being a slight exception, right, with his striking skills, but we know for the most part what this modus operandi of this team is in terms of when they fight but then when when the father's plan element comes into it it feels like something bigger something metaphysical right like it's not something that they're like right we need to drill this we need to drill this and then we'll get to here that seems to have this overarching

team with all the uh throughout these guys careers like is it a combination of both they have a fighting system but they also have this vision quest in a way due to abdul namah and his plan for those guys yeah i think that that's part of it i think also stylistically if you're gonna have a team that's gonna be super successful over a long term their style lends itself to that more than others because if you were a gym where our thing is that we're great kickboxers we stand and bang and we knock people out yeah yeah exactly like shoot a box is a good example where there's their style is so kickboxing based and aggression based one of those nights you're going to walk into somebody's

right hand that's just you're you're flipping the coin too many times. Even if you're really, really good at it, if you go out and get into a firefight every single time, you're going to get clipped. And those guys, they don't. Or you just get taken down, right? Right. And just pounded out for. And those guys, it's so based on control, wrestling, and such a high pace and also it's worth pointing out that they are super successful but they are super successful across a relatively limited number of weight classes

so the the dagastani approach really works best from like 135 pounds to like 155 maybe 170 you don't see a whole lot of great light heavyweights coming out so it's like these sort of where's that big like the gracies have like a heavyweight version where's the uh where's the heavyweight normaga made of wouldn't that be interesting yeah i mean the heavyweight normaga made off it sounds like the stuff of nightmares just in general but i do think it makes a difference that those guys are fighting that kind of specific way to where it decreases the chances of just getting caught. And the one loss that Islam Mahachev has, I mean, there's video of Abdulmanap out there saying that Islam wanted to throw more hands in that fight, felt like he was ready for it, felt like his striking had progressed and that he was against it. And that he advised against doing that.

And that was how they ended up with that one loss. So I do think if you're playing that kind of a game, you do have a better chance to win all the fights you should win. The thing that's impressive to me about it though, is that those are the kind of guys where there's no secret about what they're going to do. Not unlike Marab in that way, but you know what those guys are going to do every single time they show up to fight.

It's not a lot of mystery. They're not catching you by surprise. At least somebody like Jon Jones, he can keep you guessing because he does so many things well that he can tailor his approach to where you're weak. Or he can tailor his approach to where you're strong if he just feels like making a point. But those guys, they're going to do the same thing every time and it's they're like a you know blood and guts running team in football who's just going to tell you like here we come try to stop it yeah we're going to run it down your throats but they do they they dare you to stop it that's literally what they do the i was pointing this out too you know in the history of Nurmagomedovs, like you could kind

of go through them. There's, it's almost like whenever you see that name booked, you kind of already know what to expect in that fight. There's going to be, you know, I remember watching, um, Habib take down Abel Trujillo. Like it felt like a thousand times in that fight, you know, just taking, dumping them down, dumping them down. And you're like, this dude's like this muscle bound. If you saw the two guys squaring off in a bowling alley, you'd be like, Abel Trujillo looks like a monster, right? Like you'd probably put your money on him to see him just get trampled for that whole fight. And that's what they do. I mean, that's, that's the approach I think. And sometimes when you look at the training, like you were mentioning the training, like that, they just know that that's

how they're got to be right. Like a lot of gy gyms that's a reluctant kind of training oh we got to do takedown defense today this sucks you know or now we're going to work on you know the wrestling or you know whatever it is pummeling whatever like they're going to work on those things that's a that's a necessary evil for some gyms to have to do whereas these guys are all built of the exact same metal the exact same mindset and that's what they do that's what they do so they're doing it against each other all the time and like according to you ben i haven't actually spent too much time with them i don't think khabib goes as a coach i don't think he goes too lightly you know what i mean so i feel like it's yeah so it's i feel like they're just they're the true definition of that iron sharpens iron type of gym, I think.

That's, I'm afraid, our worst fears have been realized. According to Red Corner MMA, which is run by Dennis Gako, a guy I consistently rely on for Russian intel on MMA, Red Corner MMA has put out on social media, Armin Sarukyan is out of his UFC 3-1-1 fight with Islam Makachev due to injury. According to our sources, the UFC is working on a replacement fight for Makachev with Hanato Moikano among the options.

Oh my Lord. My word. Talk about dropping an atom bomb in the middle of a live show. Jesus. Good Lord, man. Injury. We're going to find out about an injury on the morning of a live show jesus good lord man injury we're gonna find out about an injury on the morning of the weigh-ins i can't imagine dana and the lads are gonna take too

kindly to this i like as soon as i hear injury this late i'm thinking he's in a bad cutting way and unfortunately slipped or something like that i have no idea it's pure speculation on my part um at this point but that is pretty devastating um in terms of what islam was walking into in this fight lads like he was going to at least attempt to surpass habib in terms of title defenses um had he kept his winning ways going i think if he had made it till october he would have surpassed his lightweight reign, which is currently the longest in the division's history. So Moicano,

I can't imagine Moicano will turn it down. He's all about money if they can sweeten the pie for him. But reacting to this immediately, Ben, this is a pretty devastating knock to UFC 311.

Yeah, and I got to say, this is how it goes down. Pretty devastating for Armand Sorokin because, as you said, the UFC doesn't love it when fighters let them down in this particular way. Obviously, you got to think it's something serious. If he could fight, he would definitely want to get in there and fight. But the UFC can sometimes be a little bit unforgiving about stuff like that.

And it's not like Armand is a Justin Gaethje, somebody who's going to get, you know, maybe more opportunities at the title because he's exciting and fans love him. Armin got the opportunity the old fashioned way by just winning the fights until you couldn't deny him anymore. It wasn't necessarily a mandate from the fans who demanded to see Armin Sarukian in there and so if you miss this opportunity if the ufc gets a little bit upset at you will there be another one will i don't see them hurrying really to rebook you into this exact same title fight after this they might just be like all right who's the next guy on the list and move past you and it could take a lot to get back there so that's that's a tough blow for arman

it's a major blow too because this whole card has been crafted in this like uh i guess as the meritocracy right like it feels like a meritocracy type of card you don't even have um american presence in the first in the two title fights you have just straight dominance and so it's kind of like a diehard's delight and i think that they've done a very good job of kind of marketing it and building um you know it's kind of compelling storylines around all of that and that honestly kind of really throws that out of balance man i uh it's just one of those things too because a lot of us i'm sure you guys have done this too you kind of go back to the first fight between Armand.

You start building the case. What's going to be different? We're just talking about Armand looking super jacked up. You get a lot of different vibes going into it. And this late hour, Friday afternoon on the East Coast here, it just kind of throws everything out of whack. And I hate when cards have this happen because what whatever's originally designed is blown up forever and i agree with ben that's the one who's going to probably suffer the biggest from this is going to be arm on

maybe moicano like you know sometimes if you do step up into a situation and you lose he goes back into and i'm you know who knows how this. He's kind of broke out to become like a cult figure in the UFC, but we know what happens, man. It's not like we're carrying Dan Ige on our shoulders still, and we're like walking around because he stepped up. If you lose, you know what I mean? It's like you're kind of, just the way it works, you kind of disappear again for a while.

It doesn't matter that you're doing the UFC of solid. So it's going to be a domino effect down this card, so it's going to be a domino effect down this card and it's going to be a domino effect in that division and that's very unfortunate man yeah but the thing for for uh moicano i mean i'll say one thing from the ufc side if you do have to last minute go and stick a camera in somebody's face and trust them to make a sales pitch for why this last minute switch up is as good if not better than the original plan. Moikano can do that for you and he will do that for you. He's enthusiastic. True.

But the other thing is he's 35. He's a 35 year old lightweight. What are you waiting for at this point? Like what are you saving it for? If you don't think you can go out there and win the title now, it's not like your chances. He's waiting until he's 36. I mean, we've seen the numbers in UFC title fights, 170 and below. You get up there in age, you get to your mid thirties and beyond, and the success rate isn't that high. So you might as well take your shot now. It's not like you weren't preparing for a lightweight fight on this date.

It's going to be a different kind of matchup, surely, but they're handing you a lottery ticket. You might as well take it. Doesn't it throw the... The balance of these things goes so wacky when these things happen. But if you're talking about it, let's just presume they salvage this thing.

Islam, a lot of the questions are like, legacy, where does he fit against habib like in terms of lightweight goats all that stuff but let's say that now like so beating arman was going to move him as you know a motivated arman who's been working nine and one this whole time trying to come back and get this shot you know blah blah this is going to put islam if he dominates this fight into a sphere that we were getting familiar with that we were getting familiar With It's weird because now you're going against Moikano in a last minute thing and I'm not saying Moikano has no shot but I think that most

Guys once they get in there with Islam Find out their limitations pretty quick But It hurts Islam too In the sense of like you're going to look at this like ah but that was The asterisky type of situation And that wasn't The tough you know the the absolute toughest guy he could be facing that would have been arm on or something like that that's what sucks about it you know because you

can't even now start to distinguish what we want to start to call a greatness a present-day greatness we started off talking about the 91 and one record with these guys it could go on but there you want the true threats to that right like you want the true threats and i'm not trying to discount moicano i just think that the situation it's just the situation is it's going to be very difficult they may salvage the fight but that situation that's a daunting task to go from uh uh who's moicano fighting man i'm like i'm all benil darush yeah i mean darush is no slouch but like going from darush to islam that's a big difference yeah it's a big it's a big style switch up too but also i mean i go you're saying about islam like here we were sitting here talking

about is this the fight that he wins could he start to supplant habib as the better lightweight champion all that kind of stuff and yeah you're right it's a little bit of an asterisk situation if you were to go in there and fight a last minute replacement. But I would point out, does anybody remember how Habib won the vacant UFC lightweight title? Ali Aquanto, right? It was, he fought Ali Aquanto, who stepped up.

I still had Al on the scorecards, by the way. One, three, five, Al Aquanto, according to Chuck Mendenhall's Scorecard It's funny He was supposed to Fight Tony Ferguson Got pulled out Last minute

Iaquinta stepped up And that's how He won the title That's how he started That title reign Was by beating A last minute And it's like

A little bit of An asterisk situation there How much do we Remember it now True Due to everything That came after Yeah you almost like

Patted Habib on the back. Because remember, they went through multiple, who could he fight? This guy, this guy, you know. And it ended up being Al Iaquinta. You almost patted him on the back for just being willing to fight anybody that they were going to throw in there against him. You do have to kind of take that aspect and say, this affects Islam. You know, he's got a different stylistic matchup now, too. And he's got to like wrap his mind around a different opponent immediately too.

So you should give him the kudos if this happens, if that's what happens. And we're kind of speculating here, but if they throw somebody else in there, you got to give him his credit the same way we did Habib. Yeah. Don't forget that to put himself in total contention as well, Islam ended up fighting Bobby Green.

Remember that? That was a weird, was that not a withdrawal situation too? Yeah, it was meant to be Darius. That's so funny. I think it was meant to be Darius, and then he fought Bobby Green, and then people were like, well, what does that actually tell us? You know, he's beating Bobby Green. I mean, is this guy championship material or what?

We didn't say it at the top of the show, but Moikano was already weighed in, 155. Darius had weighed weighed in 155 dar you should weigh in 155 um you mentioned and both of uh both of you guys have mentioned this during the week through various writings and that whole idea of islam surpassing habib um that become like i don't think this helps that situation as we've all just discussed there, like the, the, the opponent switch not being the threat that Arman may present.

Um, but I also wanted to ask, is that even possible? Because when me and Chuck were doing the round table, um, and I think you, which is obsolete by the way now, yeah,

yeah. A completely obsolete, but I was kind of citing like he can surpass him on paper but is he ever going to surpass what he means um to to the ufc what he means to the sport when he came along like we're talking about can he surpass habib in terms of islam but like don't forget that habib had to take the place of the biggest superstar the sport had ever seen. They stripped Conor McGregor of the title so he could compete for this title

and we all know what happened in Brooklyn and all that kind of stuff. But he went on to open up new markets for these guys. I think he was a big part of the Abu Dhabi deal. I think he created fandom in a part of the world that we didn't even know were tuned into the sport the way it was. Even in your piece, Ben, this whole father's plan thing this metaphysical idea this uh this

philosophy this this came through habib's ascent so am i crazy to think that he will never quite surpass habib in terms of how profound his impact was on the sport then? You know, never is a long time because the thing is Habib's legacy and his kind of time is it's set, right? It's over. And he, I think Habib's legacy itself is going to change over time, especially because if Islam Mahachev continues on to be a dominant, lightweight champion for the next few years, don't you have to also put that in Habib's legacy? run this team and coach this team the way his father did and carry on you know in that mold that will also be part of his legacy that it to be not only a great fighter but then a great coach and a guy who helped his teammates and in some cases family members reach those same heights

it'll add to it in that sense but islam mahajiv who knows we could be sitting here a year from now talking about hislam mahajiv went up to welterweight and won the title and if he does stuff like that i mean the one knock really against habib and i agree with you that habib is important to the ufc into the sports history in a lot of ways beyond just winning the fights that he had some kind of personal quality uh even when his english wasn't that good he had a personal personal quality. It actually added to it. Yeah. When he was out there talking about how he doesn't watch romantic comedies because too much movie make your heart weak.

And you were just like, this is awesome. You really felt like you were getting a sense of this guy. I mean, he has so many quips that became part of just the MMA lexicon. Send location. You have Martin Zuckerberg out here talking about send location when he's beefing with Elon Musk. Habib had a lot of those kind of moments that sort of transcended the sport or that were beyond just what he was doing in the cage.

And so that stuff is important. But also the downside to retiring undefeated with the belt and not overstaying your welcome in the sport is that we do sort of feel like we suspect he could have done more we wonder what it would have been like to see him in different weight classes against different opponents all that kind of stuff and we never got to see it and we never will and islam could be the guy who sticks around a little longer and does take on some of those challenges i think like that that will also potentially play a role in the legacy.

We had Diego Ferreira just weighing in there, guys. I just want to let you know, he had to use the box of shame. It should be noted. He looked pretty bad, to be honest. He is waiting at 156 for his fight with Grant Dawson. We're just waiting on one more fighter now that

we know that, well, now that reports are out there that Sorokin is not fighting. We're just waiting on Rinyan Akimura's opponent, Muin Gaffaroff, which are definitely more of the pronunciation of, but there we go, boys. What I wanted to ask, lads, is, Chuck, if you had to, if you had to, right, lose one of the guys in

the top four fights, it's a horrible question to ask. But like, I was- Yeah, I didn't know we were going to be talking like this when the show began. All right, go ahead. No, but what I was thinking about before we did the show today, I was like, I feel like Armin has been the forgotten man of these top two fights.

I mean, there's so much talk about Islam, as we've already discussed, surpassing Habib. There's so much talk between Rab and Umar and this beef they have. Armin seemed to kind of disappear into the background for me this week, which I don't mean to be an insult, but just these other stories seem far more prominent. Like,

is he the best casualty out of these championship fights that we could have had? We're quick to find silver linings. Yes, I think that that is true. If you hit, like if you, if you lose Islam, right, like, that's a huge blow. That'd be a huge blow.

Like, obviously, he holds the belt. If you lose Murab, it's the same thing. If you lose Umar, I think that, just given how they've built this, and again, we've done pieces, you know, basically focused on these figures. Nobody did anything on Armand. You know, I think that

if you're looking at it like that, yes. This is probably out of the worst case scenario, this is the best case scenario of the worst case. He said it, not me. He said it, not me. That's all I'm saying. I just posed a question to the mind. I mean, they can salvage, like you said. The Moikano thing is not...

I mean, straight up speculation, but let's see if they do something like that um but moicano would be there's a fascination to the dude has been completely resurrected you know he beat uh uh you know saint denis and no i don't think too many people thought he would be able to do that there is some compelling nature to this and he'll he'll help sell it too i see people raising their hands on twitter i saw diego lopez it's like you know a little phone emoji on on twitter and uh where's danie gay yeah where's danie gay so it'd be interesting to see honestly like where this heads but if you're going to lose one yes i guess that's the one that you would take right like

i have to say though with me ben look i'm just looking at ben's face and he's disgusted with that question Look at him You're a sick piece No I mean I appreciate the optimism That Like Chuck said

Quick to find silver linings I mean There's a part of me That almost hopes As we're wrapping up This discussion At the last minute Armand comes strolling out

Onto the stage Oh yeah I know Looking immaculate Just being like Sorry guys I overslept Let let me raise my watch to lose some weight 154.5 real quick and this will all this discussion will be for nothing oh but i mean you are right that just looking at the fact who did we all write about who were y'all focused

on yeah he was the one guy we didn't so that that, you're a disgrace, the two of you. You're an absolute disgrace. I would have wrote about him. They just did not. Oh, man. Oh, it's a tough man. That is so tough. Can I return real quick?

Like Ben was talking about, I think that, and we were talking about like, can he still become like, you know, can he become bigger than habib and the kind of impact habib is that i just don't think it helps when you start off in the shadow of the guy you're trying to supplant you know what i mean like if you're trying to supplant if you're you know in the general like he's been in the shadow of habib the whole way he's been um compared the whole way he's been kind of the evolution of whatever that was, or, you know, the continuation, the baton pad, whatever you want to say from that gym,

the whole way. And every time he's getting his hand raised, you know, there's Habib right behind him smiling. Like, it's just, it's going to be difficult when you're a kind of continuation from the thing that you, you know, that you're trying to one day, like the poor is the pupil who doesn't surpass his master type thing. Like you're not going to be able to do that with the guy just kind of hovering over everything either. I just, so in the, in the, in the sense that Ben was talking about, I think that's the only way that we start to see Islam maybe meaning something bigger. If he goes and wins a belt, you know, at 170 pounds or something like that, that changes the dynamic between those two guys. Just fighting in the same weight class, kind of continuing, I think it's always going to weigh, because of the bigger impact Habib made on the game, will always kind of go in his favor. But if Islam goes and does stuff that Habib didn't, I have to say, that is his route to kind of carving out his own identity in that way.

Do either of you guys think he's a better fighter than Habib? I don't know. That is so tough. I feel like it's the only question we don't talk about here. You know, who thinks he's better than Habib? Can you imagine them fighting? I think that he has a couple things he does better than Habib did. Like his,

his striking. I think he, he has a little bit more confidence in it and he has that power that he can hurt you on the feet. But I also think that if you were to ask me who gets tirade first doing this stuff, it's Islam. I think he's gotten a little better at that.

You see him, you know, in the Dustin Poirier fight, like I think he came through's gotten a little better at that you see him you know in the dustin poirier fight like i think he came through that with a little more poise than we had seen in some of the other fights but uh we've definitely seen him look tired we've definitely seen him kind of like limp across the finish line at times and we never saw that from habib so i do think if you add it all up, Habib is still better. Yeah. That would be my take, too. I think it's still telling that, you know, remember when we took the round off against McGregor,

and he was like, he lost a round, you know. And we made such a big. That's all McGregor's team said after. I know. Do you remember that round we won? I know. They needed something. That's the kind of thing you cling to when a guy's that dominant, and there's a huge gulf between you and the next guy.

I mean, like that's, it's going to be tough, you know, but Islam would be the guy, right? Like he's right now we have him, I think pound for pound number one. If you're going to have a guy who could compete with him, it would be, it'd be Islam. Yeah. Yeah. Well, for those of you who are just tuning in now, Arman Sarukin is reportedly out of UFC 31111 we have not got official confirmation on that yet red corner have reported that he suffered an injury and they

are looking at replacements for makarjev with hanato moicano being one of the front runners to take that position very disappointing news the day before the first pay-per-view of the year of course um but we will continue to update you as we get the information. We are trying. We're putting feelers out left, right, and center to a certain man who has a show name after him. That's a common converse. But we'll move on and talk about this Comine event because it's an interesting one as well. It just fell through.

I'm kidding. I'm kidding. Don't say that. Both guys have retired. Oh my God, Chuck. Perfect timing. What I was going to ask is, Ben, do you think that Umar is in this position if he has any other second name?

Not this soon. I think that Murabab i saw in your piece chuck made this point several different ways where he he would point out other people in the division like mario batista he doesn't have a famous cousin that's the difference and i do think that there's something to that i also think there's something to that in terms of the betting odds aspect of it that we talked about, right? That I was surprised to see Merab as not only an underdog, but that sizable of an underdog in this fight. Just because he's been so good. He, and he's seemed so in charge in so many of these fights. And you'd have to think you put them up against kind of anybody who is still this relatively early into their UFC career and he would be the favorite.

And so I got to think the last name is playing a role in that. Now being undefeated obviously helps because as far as we know, we don't know for sure you can be beaten. We have not seen it yet. So yeah, obviously he's a good fighter, but I don't, especially if you look at the fight that gets him the title shot, right? Like that win over Corey Sandhagen. If anybody else got that win over Corey Sandhagen at that moment with that performance, I don't think the UFC goes, well, obviously a title shot is next. I think that it does help that they're looking for another Habib with Habib gone. And so they can look to this guy with the same name. And that's not to say that he doesn't deserve the shot or that he won't be able to capitalize on the shot. He's super good. But I think that if he was just some other dude, he would have had to win at least a couple more.

Well, you kind of knew it. I mean, he had, Umar had really not fought anybody when they booked him into the sandhagen fight and not only that but there was like an abc kind of a big card um so you knew you know you knew they were positioning him and that name into like a place where it could be expedited towards this title so So I think that if he's just fighting, you're not going from, who did he fight? It was like Barcellos, he fought somebody else, and then he fought Sandhagen.

It was like he was going through, the progression was not the kind of thing that was heading toward a title fight. But because he is who he is, that's why he's there. The truth of the matter is, though, if you really look at his stats and things like that, and if you've watched his fights, you're like, it's hard to deny that, you know, he can't go in there and win. It's hard to deny that he doesn't belong in a title fight. You know, like maybe he's a fight.

Maybe they could have had him fight somebody else in between, but his record is good enough where he could have been placed into a title fight. I just think that there might have been better options. That's where Marab probably does have a point. He fought, the fight in between Barcelos and Sandhagen that you were looking for was Bexat-Almacon. Oh, right.

See, these aren't exactly catapults, you know what I mean? Yeah, sorry about that. How could I forget? Household name. Does not have a Wikipedia page. It's always, it's always a telling sign. Just to let you guys know,

sources are telling us. Oh. Sources are telling us that Moicano is the out now front runner for this. It is not 100% yet, but it is trending in that direction. As Ben said earlier, no better man in terms of stick a mic in this guy's face let him say something to get us all on board um i think it's probably the best

choice they have uh which we already discussed earlier um just talk to him about bitcoin and uh yeah local government and let him let him get him all pissed off pissed off. Do any of you think he could pull off an upset here? I feel like that's the only thing, right? The element Diamond brought to the table was this guy is a threat. Dana White has just confirmed it now

thanks to GC for updating. Official Dana just confirmed the tweet says Makachev will now be facing Moikano for the lightweight title. UFC 311 is live updating uh official dana just confirmed the tweet says makashef will now be facing moicano for the lightweight title usc 311 is live tomorrow that's all capitals by the way tomorrow just of course live tomorrow on espn plus pay-per-view exclamation mark um yeah so as i was saying the threat that arman posed i honestly and i love moicano i love what he's about i love uh getting educated on all things

economics by him but I don't think he has a hope against the Islam lads I'm sorry well I mean he shouldn't can you imagine I mean this is always one of those because it's so fresh like you throw this in there just the kind of wrench this throws into everything like say Moicano goes in there and wins

like he just slides I don't even know where he's ranked in the like official UFC rankings or anything he's definitely not on the pound for pound list um he's had a nice run but let's say he goes in there springs this upset all those guys vying for position just got leapfrogged and now you have an obvious rematch right that you would have to do because i don't think that given the circumstances you could be oh well that was definitive enough and you know moikana won it just it's chaos if he wins it throws that division into straight chaos yeah but wouldn't it be great to see moikana win and get on the mic as the new usc lightweight champion and be like i think of some words adam smith would say that would relate to this current moment also though can we show

that that dana white tweet again because it's honestly this is a work of lord this is a marvel of this let me see dana white he manages to phrase it as if it's good news or as if like it's just exciting like it's not just like hey guys bummer alert stone Cold's music just hit. Yeah. He's not like, I'm sorry to have to tell you guys this. Refunds will be offered due to the change in the main event. He's not doing any of that. It's all just enthusiasm, energy, and excitement. Like, guess what? Something super exciting just happened, you guys.

We just sweetened the deal. Yeah. What happened to Darius? He just off? We got at least seven exclamation points in that tweet overall. And just being like, hey, can you believe it? You never know what will happen next. I mean, that's why Dana White was kind of born to do this job.

Yes, it is. Just that. And you know what? There's 50% of UFC fans who are just going to be enthusiastic with him. They're going to be like, yeah. This is a better fight. Better, way better. I'll pay more.

Well, and it gives you at least a story. And the UFC has always been pretty good at that, at immediately leaning into, look, what's the story you can tell here? And like you said, it's not as if we were super invested in Armand's personal story to begin with. We were just like, we must admit he deserves it because of all the fights he's won.

And if you can switch here and be like, but Renato Moicano, economic iconoclast and guy kind of at this turning point in his UFC career at the age of 35 now gets a Rocky Balboa-esque chance, a shot at the title. We're giving him the chance of a lifetime. Let's see if he can capitalize on it. Like, you can honestly do some business with that. Hair's coming up on my arms right now. He's doing the cold open.

This is the cold open. Dude, imagine the production nightmare. Seriously, though, you bring that up, imagine the production nightmare seriously though you bring that up like the production nightmare of every time this happens i'm like man all of your promo material everything that's going on you have to switch it up you guys are late tonight yeah yeah that's gotta be the big the who's taking the biggest blow in this is the production team yeah you know dana white's poking his head into a room somewhere and be like, no, no, no. Leave the power slap highlights for Sunday. Right now we need you to get on this.

And somebody there is just like heaving a sigh and just being like, okay, boss. I was just getting to the big Hawaiians KO. You know what I mean? Forrest Griffin's about to catch his opponent. I mean, come on. Talk about a tumultuous week too. They had to kind of live through a few days where they're like, are we moving this full event to Vegas?

I mean, you kind of sometimes it's an unenviable task to be Dana White because a lot of times that's what he's dealing with, is just straight up repackaging bad news into something exciting is kind of, I think you know his whole life right kind of like taking taking this and making something out of it um but that's a lot to be dealing in on the fly all the time i know uh we've been a bit all over the place here lads given the breaking news as we are alive and we were beginning to talk about the co-main event there before we got the update that hanato moicano is officially replacing armin sarukian in the lightweight title fight against islam makashef but moving back to

that co-main event uh for a second lads um chuck should like you spent some time in syndicate with john wood who i love talking to what a great lad he is um yeah but he has this culture there and he spoke to me about it before and murab fought sean o'malley and then khalil roundtree went in against alex perera like they really like you mentioned the chip on murab's shoulder here he kind of plays with things like that like if he can see his fighter under stress it nearly becomes an overall culture of the gym these guys don't want us to win a great headline is pissed off um tell me like i mean reading your article it's pungent the aroma of uh disrespect like should marab feel disrespected like you mentioned the pi stuff he's going to train the pi the champion of the ufc being turned away because umar and amaga madoff is in there like do you think he's justified in the way

he's feeling at the moment yes in the sense that generally speaking the challenger is the one that's asked to make concessions or like to um you know to meet the champion on his terms a little more so but this one feels way more skewed the other way. Just given that Merab, he's dealing with injuries. He doesn't really talk about it. He's very cryptic with it, but I believe him. I think he's probably dealing with stuff he probably would prefer to have more time off between fights. He was trying to point out that other champions get five, six months between fights. They're asking him to turn around in four. I thinkuary is a

big month for him because his birthday falls in january all the georgian holidays kind of fall in january so he's he feels like he's being compromised at least he won't be jumping into a frozen lake though as part of that ritual because i think that that was part of one of the uh you're supposed to like go into some cold water for uh the epiphany holiday that happens on the 19th at least he won't be doing that um but you see what i'm saying like all of the compromise went to his side and i think that he uses that man like i've tried to point out in the piece that i you can almost see him kind of polishing that chip on his shoulder like just so they constantly and i think it kind of fuels him um to do something about it like it just fuels him to a level. And you're mentioning John Wood fully plays up this stuff, man.

I mean, like, I was watching them do their sparring session and all the comments, you know, he has a lot of commentary in between. And one of the things was the underdog thing. He's like, oh, they have an underdog? Oh, let him. Let him have him the underdog. You know, like, he mentions this stuff. They know what they're doing.

I think that is part of the culture. I think they know his mentality. John was probably very good at kind of uh motivating guys based on what motivates them and i think that this is definitely this whole situation has motivated marab in the way that he's supposed to be right absolutely do you think uh ben that he that he is becoming a more lovable guy to the fan base? Because it seems so obvious to us, right? I mean, we're talking about Umar, the second name benefits, all this kind of stuff. I was watching the press conference last night,

and there was obviously heated exchanges between the two lads again, and it was hard to kind of get a feel of who they're rooting for here like i mean umar had a lot of guys there but do you feel like this is the kind of story that if murab came through this it would put him over in a completely new way like he's fighting the machine essentially yeah i do think it would i i think already he's done a good job of connecting with fans he's out here making his own videos videos. Clearly they're being done on a budget, but I think that that makes them in a way a little more lovable. He's for a while now, he has been one of the UFC's silliest little guys. And we enjoy that because he can give you a good time. He seems to

have a good sense of humor. I was surprised, Chuck, when I read your story where you said something about him not loving to do these interviews because he was kind of self-conscious about his English. But I felt like he's getting his points across very well to us. Right. I never have a feeling where I feel like I'm not getting to know Merab because of the language barrier. That has never crossed my mind. And I mean, it's very similar to Habib, right? Like it was sort of like, well, this is all part of the experience, right, of Merab.

Like you can imagine his voice. If you if you're reading a quote you can imagine him saying it so you try to keep it within the way he's talking um but yes i agree with you 100 he gets his points across clearly there's no there's not i don't think too much is lost in translation there yeah and i think that if he is to go into this fight as kind of a sizable underdog against an undefeated Nurmagomedov, uh, who everybody's talking to is like, Hey, we, we put him in this title shot. Cause we think he's the heir apparent at the weight class. And it could be, uh, a y'all must've forgot type performance for Murab where he could come out of it being like, listen, I won this title for a reason. It's not an accident that I became the champion.

You can try to turn me around and throw me right back into another tough fight. I will win that one and show you that I deserve to be here. I also think maybe a missed opportunity a little bit. I saw a meme that somebody posted, and some of this is on me for not knowing my Eastern European geography, perhaps as well as I should. But somebody posted the meme where they show you where Georgia is on a map, where Dagestan is, and you're just like- It's all the Caucasus, yeah.

This is just two of the baddest dudes on either side of the Caucasus mountain range going at it, which that's the kind of fight that you imagine the ancients making for themselves being like, hey, have you heard about these guys on the other side of the mountain everybody says they're pretty tough let's take our toughest guy from this side of the mountains have a meet at the very top battle it out and see see which side has the tougher dudes like i love it love everything about it class there actually has been a lot of warfare there between the in the caucuses regions like i think between the 17th and 19th century i think there was uh raiders from dagestan would come into georgia when that was dispersed as a as a as a a nation i believe or whatever it may have been then dagestan were coming in and

raiding so there's all this historical significance and you can you can feel that in their interactions there is way more than meets the eye as far as i'm concerned with what's been said marab mentions that he keeps mentioning he's using a georgian expression when he was talking to him and i think that kind of thing added added to all of the stuff that with the pi and with the the dates not reading being what marab wanted i think there's something very visceral going on here that maybe guys like us who aren't from that neck of the woods, we don't understand. That all kind of plays into it, right?

Can I ask you guys something? It's kind of repackaging what I was talking about, but is this the, like in terms of Nurmagomedov, and you could, I guess, throw, maybe not Makachev, leave him out, but just Nurmagomedovs, is there ever a situation where you're like, okay, there's real doubt heading into this fight?

I've never seen, this is the craziest part about it, where you're like, most times, every time that I can recall of a Nurmagomedov fight, talking about the big three Nurmagomedovs that are all thriving right now, but there's never a moment where you're like, oh,

Brett Brimis is going to beat Usman or whatever. Like where you're, you're like, this is, he's heading toward the buzzsaw. This, this is the greatest part of this fight. It's like Nurmagomedov might be the guy heading to the buzzsaw this time,

you know? And that's fun. Like that's, that's just, it's unusual. I love that aspect of this. Do you guys like, can you think of it?

No, I think you're right. And I really, I really want this fight to go late. Like that, that is my want for this fight. Like I want to see rounds four and five. You're talking about Wood saying he's got to be heated with him and Rab in a training session. And around round four, he was like mentally gone, physically gone. I can't stay in here. And he said at one point, like, you you know at one point he turns and he goes if this fight if umar doesn't finish

him but in the first two rounds he's fucked you know he's like i mean he's like he's saying stuff like that but it's kind of true in a weird way you're like you know if you're imagining the fight and you know he's a cardio freak and you know that his pressure never wanes like he's gonna keep coming he's gonna keep coming that becomes know, that his pressure never wanes, like he's going to keep coming. He's going to keep coming. That becomes sort of fascinating if it makes it into the third round. Certainly if it goes into the championship rounds, it seems like it would favor Marab.

Yeah. And that's the thing that I'm curious to see is can you force Marab to take a backward step? Can you plant him on his back? Can you, can you turn it around on him? Cause it always in his fights, he just seems like a snowball rolling downhill. And he's constantly coming at you. It feels like everybody is forced to dance to his tune, kind of trying to fend off his attacks.

We haven't seen many people able to turn that around and put Marab on the defensive. And that's, you know, especially you think style-wise, that is what Umar would have to do. It's kind of who is going to be able to seize that initiative and keep it. And we haven't seen anybody be able to do it to Marab yet. So that's the part. I also agree. You get into the fourth and the fifth,

and that's when you'll really see something if we make it that far. You know, it was the Cejudo fight, right? Cejudo kind of clipped him in that first round. I remember it looked like he was, okay, here's the end of this. That response, you know, just his response at the second round that he was just basically the exact same guy just kept coming. I was like, that's the telling stuff. So, I mean, I could see why people, you know, some people might be like, they see a little bit of a vulnerability with Merab maybe in situations like that. But it's really the response that I looked at that I'm like, man, this guy, I think you're going to have to kill him. You know, if you don't kill him, like, if you don't put him away, if you don't put him out of his wits, I just feel like he is just going to keep coming.

Like he's never going to do what Ben says. He's never going to start going backwards in a fight. It's really, really interesting. Again, if you're just tuning in now, Armin Sorokin is out of UFC 311. He is being replaced by Hanato Moikano, according to Dana White. He is the official replacement.

He will now fight Islam Makachev for the 155 pound title. Looking at the rest of the card lads. Very quickly. Because we're running out of time here. Yuri Prohaska. Beautiful gesture. Shaves his head in solidarity. One of his fans who is undergoing cancer treatment.

As far as I know. He's the underdog for this fight. With Jamal Hill. Quite shocked about that Ben. Am I alone in this? I feel like Yuri came in here as a great destroyer, obviously end up being destroyed by Pereira as Jamal was. Um, but I think I was surprised to see Hill being the underdog. What do you think?

You know, I'm, I mean, sorry, Provaska being the underdog, should I say? I'm picking Jamal Hill in this one with the caveat that Yuri can, he can win any fight because he believes so hard. Nobody believes in themselves quite like Yuri Prohaska does, but physically and athletically, he should lose this. He's too slow to, to, for his game plan. He is too slow to beat a guy like Jamal Hill. Jamal Hill should beat him. Jamal Hill should piece him up and, and put him away.

Then again, you watch that fight at UFC 300 that year he had with Alexander Rakich. Yeah. And the first round of that, he's getting pieced up. He's, he's swinging hard, but he's coming up short every time. Every time he steps in to try to take a shot, he's getting clipped in response. You're looking at it. And if you had 20 bucks, you never wanted to see again on Yuri in that fight. You come out of that first round going, well, we're probably not going to Sizzler tonight.

It's probably going to lose this one. And then he just finds a way to get it done. Because he never stops believing. Even against Alex Pereira, you've got the sense in that second fight where he was just getting kind of dominated it. He was the last person to realize it, that he wasn't going to win that fight.

So he can win fights just with that. He should not win this fight though. If, if, if Jamal Hill does what he can do, he should beat him. But, uh, Yuri, you know, he, he always has that little bit of an X factor. That's what comes with being like a certain kind of crazy and a certain kind of delusional in this sport is you're not going to break that guy mentally and get him to give up hope. That's why I took Yuri. I took Yuri for these reasons.

I looked at the thing and i was like am i the only one taking jamal hill everybody else took but the head the head definitely says this especially when you uh there's tape now right like you can look at these you can you can see yuri getting beat um which you couldn't see before like perera came along and all this stuff like you couldn't really see it but now there's there's plenty of tape and I think that Jamal like given his style given his length given like uh you know his youth and all that stuff like our relative youth like all that stuff I I think that he does what you're saying if he doesn't put him away I guess that's kind of where I'm leaning Yuri like it's like one of those things I almost I imagine somebody's going to get

put out in this fight. It feels like a coin flip, but it should go in Hill's favor. But there's something about the Yuri, maybe I'm just buying into it one last time, that kind of warrior mystique that he carries that feels like he might

prevail in this fight. I love it in that sense. Either guy, if you go beyond alex perera like you it takes you a while to find guys they've lost to i mean it's it's a really high-end fight in the end i will say though that one of the points that yuri brought up that i do think is a potential variable in this fight is that you really get the sense that jamal hill is looking ahead to a rematch with alex. He's become so obsessed with it. And I've heard, you know, I did a story on this a few weeks ago, a couple months ago,

it all blends together. But where the guys who had had UFC titles lost it, we're trying to get it back. We're talking about how it can be a detriment to you when you become so obsessed with the belt and you start looking at every other fight as if this is just one I got to get through to get back to that title fight. And he does kind of have that air. He has for ever since he lost that fight at UFC 300. He has always kind of had that feeling where he, he feels like the rest of this stuff, I I'm in the semis, but it's just prelude to me being in the finals. And that if you, if you mess around and you look

past a guy like yuri because you've been thinking so hard about alex prayer whether it's just like subconscious or or more overt for you you could mess around and pay for that it's uh just come through here from ariel uh thank you ariel uh that armin sarukian hurt his back last night and was pulled this morning, which is even more mysterious, like during the, in the depths of a weight cut to maybe he was getting a sweat on, purely speculation at this point.

Crazy, crazy situation. I'm looking forward to hearing that one being unpacked at the post-fight press conference, I'll tell you that much. Before we go, Chuck, I need to ask you about paint and tal but we mentioned the malignity that you witnessed um in this situation you said on ariel's show that you thought they

were fucking with you like that can't be the only thing right like because i was when you said that i was like you and ariel went on to have this conversation about you know not a lot of people are doing this kind of thing anymore like showing up on people's doorsteps to to do these kind of things but as weird as it is for you it must be even weirder for this kid who probably doesn't know what a feature article is at this point you know like he's like are we doing a tiktok dance like why are you here and then you're like no i'm gonna write several thousand words about you yeah um that must be weird for him but tell me was there any other fuckery going on in terms of what those boys did to you and are you okay i'm okay i came

out of that okay no he was like uh i think he did understand like he was one of those rare guys i he's way more thoughtful than you might understand like he's uh like i told him you know maybe we'll focus it more on like a magazine type feature you know and he was like oh you know perfect he understood he understood the situation i appreciated him letting me come in there but yes 100 he even told me at the end he was like you know we were thinking like how can we fuck with him how can we uh you know blah blah but the thing was so i'm guessing that his his uh i think his name is jack foley that's one of his roommates he was like i'm guessing that he was like i'm just gonna come out naked you know at some point and that's going to be the the icebreaker because i was there maybe two minutes three minutes he's playing uh guitar

clone hero that game that's like guitar hero his roommate comes strolling through and honestly ben you've done this you used to write for fight magazine and stuff when you're doing a piece like this you're like anything like this you're like okay now we're now we're now we're talking now i know that we're gonna get a good piece so i was not opposed like whatever you guys want to do to fuck with me go ahead you know oh yeah i loved it when you think the guy comes strolling out naked in some kind of animal house scenario where you just be like yes well there's the lead taken care of yeah exactly exactly was he packing that's that's what peyton asked he packing? That's what Peyton asked. He's like, how's his size?

They're doing this type of stuff, and I'm like, dude, I mean, how do you even respond? Congratulations. But yeah, no, he's in doubt. But it was just a crazy thing, but it was fun, man. It was almost like a throwback to 10, 12 years ago when that kind of piece was what you did. You know, you went to people's homes, you met them in some weird situation where you could frame it around something and they were good at their craziest.

It's almost like those guys, they feel like they're the guys from jackass, you know, like they're, um, they're willing to do all kinds of crazy extremes, but there's this other side to him that was completely, you know, thoughtful, well-read, very thought out, um, which kind of bounced it out and it made it kind of a fun story to tell,

you know, he's a, he's a very compelling figure in our game. Yeah. It's a brilliant article. Uh, everyone should get over and read everything Ben and Chuck have done to lead up to this point.

I thought I'd just finish off just going through our picks here. I don't know. Oh, boy. Okay. Let me just have a look. Because, Chuck, you're in the lead. You were 16-1, right? Yeah.

Well, the sample size, come on. It's way too small a sample size in 2024. At least that is my position since I did not win. But 16-1 is pretty impressive. I got to admit that. Yeah. How was I 14 and three? I thought it was Rittrich at 15 and two.

This is bullshit. Anyway. Right. So, Derrida. Chuck, you've gone for Derrida in the Kevin Holland v. Derrida fight.

I see that Ben is with me in picking Mr. Holland. We can just completely rule out Dariusz V. McConnell for it now. Oh my God. I mean, is this absolutely pointless? Actually, what am I doing? Like this is, well, we'll say that everyone picked Brohaska as we mentioned earlier,

apart from Ben. We're going to have to run a new graphic now. I am with you on the Holland-Derrida one though, just because the last time we saw Derrida, I was not impressed with his performance, even though he figured out a way to win it. And Kevin Holland, as much as he's a guy who seems like he's kind of screwing around a lot of the time and how he has come into some fights where you sort of wonder, like, are you going to take this seriously at any point? But he is still good he can still surprise you in a lot of ways and if you can't kind of chop away at him and break him down

he he can show you that there are levels to this game okay um sorry lads i'm just getting updated with messages here. I believe we have a message from the great Ariel Hawane here. Jordan, is that correct? Can we run a video from Mr. Ariel Hawane to update us on this situation? Jordan just confirmed that yes, we can, in fact, roll the video. So please, go. All right, friends. So breaking news. UFC 311's main event has dramatically changed. The new main event is Islam Khacha versus Hinato Manimoikano. How the hell did we get here? Well, of course, the original main event was Islam versus Armin too. Armin was at the press conference yesterday.

All was good. Left the press conference. That was at around 7 p.m. local time. Was cutting weight and had no issues. No issues all camp. Healthy, no problem. Was like eight or pounds, eight or so pounds over. Was en route to making weight and then injured his back while making weight. Was in a lot of pain. UFC medical staff went to check him out. He was not in good shape, couldn't move, I'm told, was not in a good spot to fight. They agreed to obviously wait it out, see what would happen. In the morning, the weigh-in started at 9 a.m. local time, 12 on the east,

and then at around 6, 7 a.m. local time, the plug was pulled. Couldn't move, got worse, was in worse shape. And late last night, a couple hours after they went to check him out, you know, calls started to go to Moikano's team about stepping in on short notice, weighing in at 155. Worth noting that one of Moikano's head coaches, Pahumpa of ATT fame, is also a coach of Armin Tsurukin so he was obviously aware not suggesting that it's a bad thing but just that Moikano knew you got to make 155 you may be fighting for the belt Moikano was the right choice obviously he's on the winning streak he's got all the momentum right now he took a short notice fight against RDA many moons ago

not quite 24 hours notice but of course he was supposed to fight on this card. Now here he is getting to fight for the belt on a little over 24 hours notice. And then, you know, today there's a very good chance when Moikano stepped on the scale this morning to make 155 that he knew he was going to fight for the belt because the word came down a couple hours before the official weigh-ins. Dana White has officially announced the news. It is in fact 1000% official. It's Islam Makhachev against Renato Moicano for the UFC lightweight title. Armin or his team haven't been told that they are guaranteed a title shot. Obviously gutted, obviously disappointed. It would make a lot of sense the winning streak speaks for itself he has earned it but of course if Moikana wins tomorrow and Islam loses

he's going to get an immediate rematch so you never know this game is a crazy one people have gotten title shots and have lost them and haven't gotten them back you would hope that the universe would correct itself and that he would get it

but that's a different topic for a different day for now though Armin Saruki and out Islam akhachev in breaking news uh did i say armin surukian out this is how crazy it is armin surukian out henato moicano in ufc lightweight title going down in a little over 24 hours first ufc pay-per-view of the year into a dome and we start with massive massive drama marab and umar they are good to go they have made weight no problems there um but hey not so money moicano everyone's favorite financial advisor fighter is getting a title shot on a little over 24 hours notice sending our best

to armitsuruki and hopefully he gets a title shot later this year but 311 has just dramatically changed and dare I say in the words of one Jim Ross business has just picked up thank you so much to Mr. Ariel Awani for that update we were trying to contact him feverishly through this show so I'm glad that he was like your guy better, man, because Ariel's the one I usually wait for on this type of situation. He'll blame GC. He was the one who sent me the tweet, but thankfully it was all correct. Lads, more news. During the break there from Ariel, Chris Weidman has announced his retirement on the UFC weigh-in show.

Obviously, he's coming off that TKO loss to Eric Anders um it was one win and five outings that Bruno Silva win quite controversial at the time uh since 2021 but um a legend of the sport a man who suffered a horrific injury came back and fought still got that win as we just mentioned what a newsy day it's been on the crack and any reaction to that man you know i guess i'm my reaction is i'm glad to hear it i think it was time for chris weidman to retire i i like chris weidman and every time i've interviewed him i found him to be an interesting and pretty thoughtful guy and so you don't want to see somebody hang around too long in the sport and start taking bad beatings. And it also, it makes me always more likely to believe a guy's retirement when it comes a little while after a fight. If he does it right there in the cage, takes off the gloves, put them down. I know we like to give people that moment and that makes sense but i also think sometimes they're just disappointed they're upset with the loss and you know you talk to fighters they'll tell you about the the feeling of fighting is often like every time you go through a breakup and you just tell yourself

like screw this i'm never doing this again this is terrible why do i put myself through this and then you know some months go by and you think like i still got one more in me but taking some time off thinking about it and deciding to retire. I think that that is the right move. And, uh, you know, I, I guess my question is, is Chris Weidman a hall of famer? I mean, not in the sense of like the UFC will put somebody in the hall of fame if they like them, but just in terms of like, think of the concept of a hall of fame in MMA. Uh, do you guys think of Chris Weidman's career as a hall of fame in mma uh do you guys think of chris weidman's career as a hall of fame career um i think oh man that is so tough because what he did was so historic

and honestly at the time it was one of the most shocking uh events that we'd seen in mma by beating anderson silva who at that point was 16 and 0, I think, in the UFC. So it was a ridiculous accomplishment. And obviously, we saw what happened in the next fight. And we saw him kind of have a run there. But would it go down as a Hall of Fame type thing? I'm guessing by the UFC standards, yes, just given the significance of what he did. But if you were talking like an independent Hall of Fame, I think that it would be like, it's almost like the Eli Manning thing in football.

You're like, I don't know, he won the Super Bowls, but he was kind of pedestrian in a lot of other situations. You know what I mean? So I think that you could make the case, but I'm not sure I'd give him the nod. I'm not trying to be, you know, as he's freshly retired, but I'm not trying to be harsh on him, but I'm not sure I'd give him the nod. I'm not trying to be, as he freshly retired, but I'm not trying to be harsh on him. But I'm not sure I'd give him the nod

because you can see a lot of other careers that had a lot more bang for the buck as they went on. Him coming back, though, from that injury, it's the same thing with Conor. Look how long it's taken Conor McGregor. And I know that just getting him into a training camp is so ridiculous. But to come back from that injury,

same thing with Anderson Silva, which links them to forever. Whenever we talk about rivals and stuff like that, you're always going to be talking about these two guys. But to come back from that injury at all is just an accomplishment in itself. It kind of transcends in a weird way the wins and losses that came in. But I do think it was time for him to step away. I don't know where it was going to head from the, you know, the times we've seen him in

the last, in the last couple of fights, it didn't seem like it was going any place good. So I think that at this point it was time for him to walk away. I agree with what you said. I think the Anderson Silva thing was scraping my jaw off the floor for quite some time after that one, two great fights after that.

I was actually there when he lost to, uh, was it Luke Rockhold eventually? Was it Luke Rock there when he lost to uh was it luke rockhold eventually was it luke rockhold that he lost yeah i think i think it was i am yep but yeah yeah a story great i think he will be a hall of famer i know that doesn't exactly answer your question ben i think the ufc will give him uh that nod i don't think there's any doubt about that and for the for the moment alone for that silver thing yeah i don't think i'll put it uh against him but i just wanted to let people who might be tuning in now um i'm sure you all are aware that armin sarukian is out of ufc 311 uh according to ariel wani who we just

heard from uh five minutes ago he hurt his back last night and was was withdrawn from the fight this morning uh hanato moicano according to Dana White, is officially taking his place. And we have had a reaction from Islam Makachev. I believe On Air Jordan has it there. He says, what does this title represent? It means you're the best in the world. And if you're the best in the world, it doesn't matter who's going to be standing across from you. What do I say?

No, never. Let's do this. Interesting. The quotes, the quotes around it. Is that, is that an actual quote? Is that just him saying, is he quoting himself? He's quoting a thought that he has. Are we just, are we acknowledging that maybe he has a manager running his Twitter account?

What are you insinuating here, Ben? Just slash Ali Abdelaziz. Oh my God. I mean, pretty gangster, let's be honest. I mean. That's true. As much as we're saying like. It gets lost in translation.

It gets lost in this when this thing's happening. Oh, look at this chance for my client. There's natural things that jump into your head. But the guy who has to take that from the other side is equally laudable right like to be like oh okay fine bring him on i'll fight him no problem i mean it's that's a thankless thing that he's doing and we've seen what happens uh if you decline to do that uh you get that's what i was thinking sport killer that's true i was thinking like... Greg Jackson. Was there any hesitation?

I was going to ask you guys at the top of the show, if you're Moikano's manager, is there any hesitation in taking this? And we know, as Ben mentioned when we were first hearing about this, the report initially, that you will be heralded. You mentioned Igeichuk.

You will be heralded and put on a pedestal for this fight now, definitely. But is there any reward for losing to Islam Makachev in this main event? Are you putting yourself behind the eight ball in terms of future title shots because you're stepping up and saving the day, essentially, here? I mean, this was the goal, right, is to win some fights and get a title shot maybe you don't get a chance to prepare explicitly for islam mahatia but you were in training camp you knew you were going to fight on this date so you're you should be ready to fight uh the tricky thing is you were preparing for a three-round fight now you're looking at a five-round

title fight so that part does make a difference i mean people tell you you were preparing for a three round fight. Now you're looking at a five round title fight. So that part does make a difference. I mean, people will tell you, you train differently for a five round fight than you do for a three round fight. But this, if you're Moicano at this age and this stage of his career, you got to say yes. You got to take the chance here. Not only because the UFC will not appreciate you if you don't, but also if you sit there and you say, no, I would rather fight Benil Dariush, after they hang up with you, they're calling Benil Dariush. That's true. They're going to be like, hey, we offered this to Moicano.

He didn't want it. It's yours now. And if he takes it. Or they just say like, we thought of you first. Yeah. That's absolutely what they would say. Yeah. But yeah, you got to go ahead and step up and take this.

And that is one benefit though, of having the champion be a guy who's been champion for a while is everybody in the division has looked at him. They've watched his fights. They've, even if they haven't sat there with their coaches for the last six weeks, studying tape on them, they know his game. They know what he does. And again, what he does is not a big surprise. there with their coaches for the last six weeks studying tape on him they know his game they know what he does and again what he does is not a big surprise he's going to come out and do the same stuff and so uh when he's been the champion for a while you've probably had your eye on him you've

probably had some thoughts as you're falling asleep at night about what you would do if you were like how you would solve the islam mahajif. So why not step up and take it here? I also got to think that for Islam, well, you're not wrong to say like, hey, it's laudable for him to say, sure, I'll accept any opponent too. But don't you think that when Islam heard this, he's probably bummed out

about losing Armand, they prepared for this opponent and everything. But then when they say, how about Moikano, don't you think he goes, oh, sure, I'll run through Moikanoicano i'm not worried about it yes 100 100 man i mean it's it's a change of opponent it's a change of style but it's it's very much um i would guess and you know i don't want to i'm not trying to discount but it's a very i'm sure that you're like okay i know how to beat this guy like, I'm sure that you're like, okay, I know how to beat this guy.

Like you, I'm sure that you can come to that conclusion pretty quickly. I'm guessing too, that the pot is sweetened, you know, through this whole process. I never know like how he handles this stuff. I don't know if Darius is getting his wind money.

I don't know. Like these are all the things that you kind of wonder about when they, when they shuffle everything up, because some people are really getting, uh, screwed in this deal, you you know no matter what but but i'm pretty sure that makachev though is like yeah i mean you can take my foot off the gas a little bit arm on is a beast and i think that he i'm not saying moicano's not but i think that between the two you might want to fight Moikano, right? Yeah. Yeah. It's like we're talking about how this might impact Moikano. We did reference at the start how it could impact Armin.

Would you be shocked if he fought for a title before the end of the year, Chuck, after this? I know we haven't got Dana's full address on this, and that will tell us pretty much exactly how the ufc feel about this but right now like what are you anticipating that we'll hear from diana hoyt on sunday when you go speak to the media i'm as anxious to find out as you are but i'm like i your original question i'm like i i don't think this bodes well for arm on like you know this is it's the type of thing where there's certain guys they don't just

ooze charisma they don't have like some uh they don't have something that kind of like moikana at least has that right like he's got like a kind of cultish vibe going on right now like i just don't see sometimes the the meritocracy wins out they let these guys go because it makes sense it's going to be tough for them to to put him back in that position you know what i mean first of all you've already bottlenecked it by booking him into this. So now to keep things rolling, I don't think that they're going to automatically look to him. It hasn't traditionally been the case.

Somebody screws up a card. You know what I mean? Like if something happens like this, it hasn't traditionally been the case that they end up right back in the same situation or the same circumstance and all that stuff. So I would be surprised if Armand actually gets a title shot this year now. Yeah, I agree with that, especially because there's so much stuff that can happen. Somebody else wins a big fight, looks really great, steps up.

Somebody could have just a confrontation backstage, throw some water bottles, stuff like that the ufc can go okay we can build on that this person has enough wins that's good enough arman doesn't really have a whole lot of that plus you know the ufc is already not gonna look all that favorably on him even if they're like hey nothing you could have done injuries happen you know they've been known to hold a little bit of grudge about that. So I would be surprised if he ends up fighting for a title this year. Basically, but what you're saying there is, and Adam O'Connell somehow wins the title against Islam, and next opponent is Paddy Pimblitt for the lightweight title. That's the way we're thinking here.

What's going to put asses in seats, babies? It's in Liverpool. Oh, my Lord. You know what I mean? But listen, we got through quite a bit there, lads. And thank you for staying on later because it was a wild one. I mean, can we, just a message to the UFC and MMA in general. Friday's not the day, okay?

We're already dealing with the weigh-in. We didn't need any of this. We did not need any of this. But thank you all so much for joining us. Thank you to Ariel Helwani for blessing us with that info on Armin Soroukian's pullout. I mean, as I said, I know it's terrible, but if you're going to lose one

guy out of the top four, no disrespect, Armin. Probably would be him, based on how the narratives of fight would have gone. Chuck Mendenhall, you have been fantastic as always. Ben Folks, you have been fantastic as always. On Air Jordan, you've been fantastic. Mysterious Frank, you have been fantastic as always On Air Jordan, you've been fantastic Mysterious Frank, you've been fantastic

Crackheads always fantastic, what a beautiful bunch of people you are enjoy the fights, remember the lads are going to be doing the watch along tomorrow, it's always brilliant make sure you check it out, and here thank you to the lads for updating me throughout this phone has been hopping, I would have just been talking

about still, Armin Soroukian v. Islam Makachev. Hadn't they told me about all this stuff? So thank you to GC, Rick, Frank, all the boys. Jordan, love yous. Thank you so much. Enjoy UFC 311. We love you so much.

Mwah!