The Ariel Helwani Show - Chael Sonnen unfiltered on Conor McGregor, Bryce Mitchell, more. Plus, KSI x Danis breaking news, UFC-PFL trade ideas

Episode Date: February 4, 2025

Ariel Helwani kicks off the show by reacting to breaking news that KSI will box Dillon Danis (06:57), before addressing  Dana White's recent comments about hate speech (27:14). Then, Helwani and the Boys in the Back react to Canelo Alvarez vs. Terence Crawford being finalized and whether Jake Paul can play spoiler (47:26).Chael Sonnen goes off about Conor McGregor's decline and why the UFC can't book him, Bryce Mitchell's controversial comments, Israel Adesanya's losing streak, the WWE Royal Rumble, why Jon Jones can't retire, UFC's superstar shortage and much more in a classic unfiltered "American Gangster" conversation (01:02:34).Finally, the show closes with a discussion about Patchy Mix requesting his PFL release and proposed UFC-PFL trades for Mix (02:10:49).       

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R.R and 25. Hello again, everyone. I sure hope you're doing well. It's great to be back on a lovely Tuesday. And you know, we love Tuesdays around these parts. Why? Because we play two on Tuesdays. Yes, A8 show, usual time, 1 p.m. Eastern, 10 in the West, 6 across the pond. And then at 5 Eastern over on the DAZN Boxing channel, it's another episode of Ireland Adé. This time, the great Frank Warren joining Adé Oladipo and IS. Things are getting very spicy. Things are getting very interesting

in the world of boxing, my friends. I don't know why I'm leaning over like this. I'm just so excited, revved and ready to go. There's so much to discuss following a very interesting Monday program around these parts. How about Joe Hendry in studio? Yes, I believe in Joe Hendry. I believe in Joe Hendry.

I'm still lamenting the fact, if I'm being 100% honest, about why and how I screwed up the twist, the turn, the point, the look. I just, I feel like I botched it. I had an opportunity, as I said, to paint with Picasso and I feel like I botched it. And I've been watching the clip over and over and over again. I went to my son's basketball game after the show and I was just fixated on it. I was like, how did I screw this up? I believe in case you missed it, we do have the visual evidence of myself screwing things up with Joe Hendry. Joe Hendry, of course, as you know, the wrestling sensation, everyone's talking about him. Everyone has fallen in love with him.

He makes his debut in WWE at the Royal Rumble. He's the TNA champ. What a time in the wrestling biz. And I asked him at the very end can he do the the the turn point smile for us in person what a great honor he says do it with me and quite frankly i feel like i buckled under the pressure here it is in case you missed it we can watch it together we're here i mean okay first of all what's going on with my pants i mean i like to be cozy but look at the pants what's happening over here? I mean, it's a little too short. Why didn't anyone tell me this?

I mean, the De La Souls are cool, but look at me. I'm all. Are they riding up or are they just that short? No, they're riding up and short. You know, they're like those. Back of the shirt a little bit wrinkled. You've been sitting for a while. Why didn't anyone tell me this?

This is not exactly the most flattering. Look at him. He's crisp. He's clean. They look talked it looks like you have them talk to me yeah i might have i might have looks great joe looks great i mean joe looks fantastic and he i you know what in this moment can we just pause for a second in this moment okay first of all in this moment right here i'm worried about the only thing i'm thinking

about in this moment can i be honest with you guys, is Frank. Whoa, no, no, please keep it there. It's Frank. I'm worried that Frank is going to be mad. I'm worried that I'm going to get attitude from him. Oh, you weren't talking into the microphone. Oh, my God. We need to get, like, hanging mics. So I'm completely off my game. I'm thinking about something else.

Then, as you can tell, look at his legs. Look at his legs versus my legs. I'm completely off balance. I'm twisting and turning. He is as smooth, as upright as can be. Also, I'm way too excited. A little bit flamboyant, the mouth

agape. You also gunned it where he just pointed. Gunned it. Thank you. It's tough. It's a tough scene here. The back leg is almost like a bowler's stance. Why are the legs not moving? Why are the legs stationary? I don't know. It's a tough scene here. The back leg is almost like a bowler's stance. Why are the legs not moving? Why are the legs stationary? I don't know. He's turning, and you're just pivoting your upper body.

Why are the legs not moving? Honestly, I feel like I need another shot. I feel like I botched it so badly. Is there more, or was that it? Was that the one? There's more. Can we see the rest here? Also, we have to acknowledge you completely, your base completely folded.

I've got nothing. Okay, now look. Look at his feet compared to my feet. Look at his legs compared to my legs. I mean, you know, he does this on a weekly basis. I've never done it under the lights first time in BD. But look at this. Look at this.

Three, two, one. What the hell? Look at his legs. How does he? Gunned it again. Even on, two, one. What the hell? Look at his legs. Yeah, they turned. Gunned it again. Even on try two, you gave him the gun. Mouth completely open. A fly could have just gone right in there.

I mean, look, we're proud of you for even trying. We're proud of you for even giving it a go. GG? Yeah, GG, but that's about all we can say. What's GG? GG's a good game. It's just like an acknowledgement. It's a wrap, though. It's a wrap, though.

It's a wrap. Yeah, it also does. I noticed the pants. The pants. Yesterday, you posted one picture, and you were like, oh, look at my pants, and then there was a series of them.

Yeah, well, it was Carolina. The pants are a real issue. Well, here's the thing. I like those pants because I like to be toasty. In fact, we have now put in a heater in the studio because I want it to be extra toasty.

I'm still thinking about the time aljamain sterling walked into my studio and was his his mouth was like quivering because he said it was cold you know i feel like that's the the legend of that one has grown oh he was like it's like aljamain came in in a parka and and got and and that's not my studio yeah i feel like i feel like we've exaggerated that one historically peopleically, people talk about David Letterman's studio being too cold. I want the story of my studio to be that it's too hot. I like it hot. I like it.

Yeah, I went to Ariel's and I was just sweating my ass off. It was so hot in there. Yeah, that's what I want. I want that. I brought somebody in this morning to see it, and I can confirm it's a sweltering jungle That's what I want Shout out to Alan Murphy who stopped by Massive massive part of the team

Visiting us did have some interesting things to say About Blanchardstown We'll keep that between us He's from Lucan he's only 10 minutes down the road He said right by Beatsy I would never associate myself with Blanchardstown I think we're the exact same It's actually where Conor McGregor

moved to when he was tour dean as well, to Lucan. He said you'd say this. Yeah, yeah, he did say that. Anyway, back to the moment, fixated on it, botched it, fumbled, some might say, need another shot. But I am delighted with Joe Henry and everything he brought to the table.

And I just want to say, if you are wondering who I am blaming for Joe Henry and everything he brought to the table and I just want to say if you are wondering who I am blaming for this it is Frank I was completely Frank you were all I was thinking of that that's fucking bullshit and are the punts pajamas?

are they pajama buttons? no they're just no they're just good stuff I just want to remind you, when you do these things, you're representing all of us. Yeah. So they're actual just normal pants and they got stuck on the thing? Yeah, I'm very confused about the pants. Sometimes I'll rock the joggers and if I sit

for too long, they kind of ride up and like... Okay, enough of this, guys. Some breaking news. We have some breaking news. Oh my god. Sorry, sorry. I didn't mean to interrupt you there. That was a little bit rude. But breaking News just announced KSI versus Dylan Danis Is actually happening

Misfits Boxing 21, March 29th In Manchester They're running it back Remember two years ago they were supposed to do this? Actually, was it a year ago? No, no, no It was two now, right? It was early 2023 because it ended up being

Dennis, Paul. There it is. At the AO Arena in Manchester, they are making it happen. JJ versus DD. KSI versus Dylan. Dennis, unfinished business. Scarface kind of.

Yeah, I was thinking Scarface too. Do we think this actually happens? No The one we've all been waiting for man Alright Pizzi stamped it Wait who said no there? Was it Pizzi?

Me yeah You're calling cap? Well I mean There's always an issue Wasn't there Wasn't that what happened The first time? Like the

There was a There was a lot of people I remember when they announced it I think they were in Austin, Texas We were doing the show and I think I put the line at like I don't know Minus a thousand that it doesn't happen Right? And then remember he came in studio

That was our big reunion And then it was like a week later that It didn't happen I am going to go out and say I'm putting it at minus a thousand It does happen. And I'll tell you why. I'll tell you why.

It's quite simple. Dylan needs this. The, the, the Logan Paul fight was a disaster. It was a very poor showing. I don't think, look, I have a lot of respect for, for KSI. I have a lot of respect for MAMS. They don't go back to the well. You know, the first time it's fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice, shame on me, right?

They don't go back to the well unless they're 100% confident that this fight happens, in my opinion. And so I think they have all the assurances in the world. I think Dylan needs it. I think he doesn't think that his shit don't stink as much now as it did back then. And, yeah, I think it happens. My question is, let's just say it does happen Let's just let's not have the conversation About whether it happens or not

What is the level of interest Because you could make the case PT That after the showing against Logan Paul The interest Has dwindled right There was some type of intrigue in seeing him box Because he talked so much shit,

but because it didn't quite deliver, right? It was very one-sided. There was no activity. There was no offense on his end. I think a lot of that interest went out the window. It has been a year and a half since. Do you think this will be a big time show? Do you think this will be in high demand?

Look, you have to, I'm not going to say you have to give him credit but dylan made a lot of noise before the logan paul fight he doesn't deserve credit for the way he went about attacking his missus i don't think but it did make it a spectacle it made people pay attention to it and i wouldn't put it past dylan to do something like that again the only issue i see is if he puts a performance up like that's like what do you do with him at that point you know if he has it lays another egg like that was a that wasn't a good contest to watch um you know he still gets dragged about online as far as i can see so if he was to put up another performance like that i don't expect to win the fight but i certainly think he needs to put a better foot forward if he wants to continue in this world because that seems to be the one that he's occupied by now rather

than mma or jujitsu where he was a brilliant talent at one stage gc what's the line what's the line i mean i don't see one out yet no no no i'm saying you're the you're the odds maker oh you'd have to say ksi is a favorite after after the performance he put up against Logan Paul. I mean, Logan Paul was a massive favorite in that one. I mean, KSI around the same, minus 400, minus 500. Yeah. I mean, just going off of the one appearance we've seen from Dylan, you'd have to think he's going to be a big favorite. And honestly, going back to the Logan one, you said credit to him for drumming up,

you know, a lot of excitement around him and talking all that shit. You can't argue the engagement numbers he was getting on Twitter, and it felt like every single day he was putting out stuff and was getting tens of thousands of likes. I don't know if he's going to be able to recreate it. I don't know if there's the storyline that he's going to be able to go after like he did with Logan with KSI. And so if he can't drum up as much excitement

and he puts on a similar performance, I don't know if anyone's going to have much interest in him boxing after that. There is also something to be said for the fact that he is still involved in this lawsuit. Another reason why he can't pull out probably, right? He can't pull out and probably isn't going to share the same tactics that he used to drum up the Logan Paul thing. You know what was the first thing I thought of when I heard about this? By the way, I'm actually embarrassed to say I don't remember the name of the football player that pulled out of the KSI. Wayne Bridge.

Wayne Bridge, yes. Got up. Wayne Bridge pulled out because it got too personal, right? Yeah. In that moment, like the first thing. Does Dylan then say, all right, let me hit you with your own kind of offense. Two could play that game and use that as the green light, so to speak, to then get personal as well. It would make sense.

And he probably should as long as he doesn't cross the line. What line? KSI was on the microphone. I think they want them to do it. Yeah, KSI was on the microphone in a packed arena talking about this guy's family history. No, sorry. By cross the line, I mean get yourself into a lawsuit because you've leaked. I should be very clear here.

When I say cross the line, I don't mean like, oh, that trash talk hurt my feelings. I mean, literally do things that are legally dubious that will get you into a lawsuit that you have to settle and then take a fight against KSI to pay for. That's what I mean by crossing the line.

As long as you don't cross that line and then the money that you're using from this fight to pay for that lawsuit then has to go toward the next lawsuit um then you're probably in okay shape i think he keeps it more uh legal with the trash talk but i i know dylan will talk a lot of trash leading up to this and build the fight 185 pounds by the way uh pro fight so uh so let's see march 29th that just uh that just came out literally minutes ago. I'd love to have a face-to-face. All right.

Bring them in. We've got some time. I mean, we don't actually. I mean, that's in a month and a half, a month and change, a month and 25 days. Yeah, it's like six weeks away. It's pretty quick, I would say. No, I mean.

Big time in the UK for combat sports. UFC London, then Danis Kinside. Oh, that's right. A week later, right? Yeah, it's big stuff. Might just have to go out for two weeks. Just cut the whole thing.

Just stay over there. Do the show for him out there. Why not? We'll talk to our friends at DAZN. I might just run a property in Manchester. Manchester's the beast,

man. It's such a great city. I love it. Manchester has become like the fight capital of the UK in many respects. They just had,

oh, well, they're going to have the Jack Hatterall fight over there next week. We had them on a couple of weeks ago. There was the other Misfits card. There's another one that just happened. Oh, I think Derek Chisora is there this weekend. Yep, against Otto Wallin. There's this one.

Obviously the Leon Edwards fight is in London. So a lot of things going on in the world of boxing. As I said at the top. Let me tell you about today's program. In about 45 minutes' time, we're going to be joined by Chael P. Sonnen. Yeah, too much fun. What's that sound? It got too much money. An old-school Ariel and the Bad Guy reunion on this choo-choo Tuesday afternoon.

Sometimes when you get some guests and you just need one. And after five and two in studio yesterday, we're rolling with one. But there's a lot that we need to talk about in between now and 2 o'clock when Chael joins us and in the aftermath of the Chael interview. Because a lot going on in the world of combat sports. And I felt like I had to wedge a lot into the first hour of yesterday's show before we got into all the guests uh first things first dylan danis ksi out of the way we could talk more about that in the days and weeks to come i have confirmed that jarzino rosenstreich has in fact been released from the ufc or by the ufc i believe this was first reported by Alex Buchainen. Did I get that right, GC?

You're the name guy now. Yeah, Beheunin. Beheunin, golly. I believe he first reported it, yes? Yeah, I saw the roster watch tweeted it and then he said he couldn't confirm it. That's right. And so I have done the same and a little bit of a surprise.

Obviously, it was very clear that Dana White was not a fan of that fight against Sergei Pavlovich. And you have to understand if you're coming off a loss, it's a lot easier to release someone, especially when it's just like performance based as opposed to coming off a win. So you may be asking yourself, why doesn't Sergei Pavlovich,

you know, get the, the pink slip when you're coming off a win, you can't be released unless you do something that would be deemed, I don't know, criminal or hate speech. No, I don't know. There's really nothing. There is no line. But the point is, that's why one guy gets the release and the other one doesn't. There you see the stats, nine and six in the UFC, three and four in his last seven fights. Obviously not a stellar record uh it is amazing and i i think it was jedi that tweeted this yesterday it is amazing was it jedi it was

someone i apologize for not remembering their name like the fact that we never got rose and strike versus derrick lewis is very surprising um now that he's now that he's out of the ufc but very very clearly dana White did not like that fight, and I understand that was part of the decision as well. Is anyone surprised that they actually released him? What do you guys think? Anyone shocked by this? I don't know.

He was like three and two in his last five, I think. I get it wasn't the best performance ever, but I kind of felt like he had been around the scene for a while. You would have just kept him around, especially in a division that's so shallow. Yeah. And a guy that, you know, he had won his last two going into this fight, beat Taitui Vassa, beat Shamil Gaziev via TKO. A beat down on Shamil. Yeah. He had to retire, meaning, you know, after the fourth round TKO via retirement, lost to Jelton Almeida on ABC, beat Chris Dacus, lost to Volkov and Blades, beat Augusto Sakai.

I mean, you're coming off two in a row and then you lose one bit of a stinker against Sergei Pavlovich and you get the boot. That's a tough pill to swallow. To me, it smells of maybe his purse was too high for the level of output that they feel like, the return on investment that they feel like they were getting, right? If you put somebody else in there who's a lower ranked, not as good fighter, but they cost one-tenth the amount,

then it's better business for the UFC. A lot of this is cost-related. You know, you're going to start, you know, we see them parting ways with Holly Holm, and there are others to come as well. The ones who don't necessarily move the needle but are, you know, known commodities, so to speak, who have been around for several years

and who cost a pretty penny, you're starting to see the UFC realize that, quite frankly, bringing in the contender series guys, populating the card. I mean, look at 312. Is there any greater example than that? Look at that card. Dana White used to say all the time, we're not boxing. We don't make top-heavy cards.

Are they making top-heavy cards now? I would say time, we're not boxing. We don't make top heavy cards. Are they making top heavy cards now? I would say so. For the most part. There are some that, you know, 300 is an anomaly. There are others that kind of, you know, international fight week an anomaly, but week in and week out, it's very top heavy. Does anyone disagree with that?

No, that's how this goes. It's contender series filling out all their cards at this point. If I'm not mistaken, seven debutantes on this card this weekend, pay-per-view. Wow. Yeah, no, it's, I mean, I said it somewhat jokingly on Saturday, low-key, the Saudi Arabia card better than the 312 pay-per-view card. I should have really said high-key, right? Yeah, there's nothing

low key about it. There are four ranked fighters on the card this weekend and all four are in the main income end. That's wild. DDP, Strickland, Zhang Weili, Tatiana Suarez, and then it goes down to Taliesin Teixeira and Justin Taffa. Taliesin debuting. Jimmy Crute against

Adolfo Bellato. Jake Matthews against Francisco Prado That's the pay-per-view It's tough The Contender Series And how prominent it is They've done a great job with it It's kind of taken away from the

Regional scenes as well I feel Like the feeder leagues where you used to have guys Growing considerable fan bases Before they get to the UFC I feel like they're rushed leagues where you used to have guys growing considerable fan bases before they get to the ufc i feel like they're rushed along the contender series a lot quicker than they used to be and um obviously you can you can stumble there and then you're you're back um on the regional scene but it does feel as though like we used to have a lot more buzzy kind of fighters around europe and there thereabouts who now don't really get to build a brand as much and just go

straight to contenders. They nearly, it feels like, I don't know. It's nearly the contender series has taken the place of, of, uh, the regional scene to some,

I think that was their plan, right? Like, um, I think they've made that the kind of the last dance of the regional scene for these guys. And I think that's had implications on the feeder leagues um and by the way in case you're wondering 313 at the moment which is really just a month

away uh march 8th remember uh february is a short month uh this year ends on the 28th perera on khalayev tremendous gaethje hooker tremendous but then lemos lucindo bruno fajera armin petrosian ozzy diaz jordan santos alex morono carlos leal myron santos francis marshall bruno silva joshua i mean this is tough this is this is a pay-per-view chris gutierrez against john matsumoto king green against mauricio huffy okay that one i'm wondering how they fill out that main card i think you could put King Green and Huffy But you need one more fight on that main card I mean the clock is ticking A month away

But yes so you know it seems like you're going to get Two maybe three really good ones And then the rest is you know a lot of up and comers And fighting In the UFC it's always cyclical There's always high moments and low moments And so yesterday on the program I'm talking talking about, is there a superstar shortage? And I saw some people agree, and I saw some people not agree.

And I saw some people say, like, did you forget about, you know, Ilya Teporia? Did you forget about Issam Makhachev? By the way, I didn't say there are no superstars. I just said there's a shortage. And I said that a lot of the guys who were superstars not that long ago two three four five years ago are no longer at the top of the bill are no longer in the mix are no longer champions are no longer able to headline pay-per-views um and i i stand by that ilias deporia is well on his way to becoming a superstar and certainly in spain a very very well-known

commodity in georgia in europe a well-known commodity but you know he's defended his title once so what happens if he slips and falls against alex volkanovsky or if he fights islam and slips and falls who knows and then you get into the prayers of the world he's up there in age 37 uh islam is islam great but you need more than one two or three uh usually there was a time where like one through eight in the top 10 pound for pound were superstars or one through five were superstars pt you you agree or disagree with my my take on on the quote-unquote shortage of superstars absolutely yeah and considering the amount of cards they're putting on like that that's what makes you feel that void a lot more um i don't know like i mean even i feel

like at the start of every year we're trying to forecast who's going to break through because not not because like it's a fun topic as much as because like they kind of need it and then you know we have peyton talbot i picked Benoit Saint-Denis last year. I've had a horrible run picking these new stars to break out. But yeah, it isn't impacting them right now, but it's something that could further down the line. Like the UFC is untouchable right now. They're absolutely killing it.

But you'd think that would kind of start affecting pay-per-view numbers, things like that, when, as you say, it's three or four guys and you have to pack out, you know, however many, 14, 15 a year, that's when it becomes difficult. If the pay-per-view model has a floor where a broadcast partner is willing to pay for it, you're not really incentivized to have superstars anymore. Like, the same way they're incentivized

to fill out the card with replacement filler talent off Contender Series, whether they win, lose, look good. It seems like every time there's a Contender Series episode, Dana White's signing everybody at this point just so they have people to fill out the rest of these cards. minimum guarantee anyway. You're incentivized just to continue to do shows and fill it out with just enough for people to be interested and intrigued to buy the pay-per-view, but not too much, in fact, because you need to save the rest of that talent for the rest of the year with this very aggressive schedule. I actually think I'd point to something that you've said many times and you point to the words of Joe Silva in terms of creating contenders and challengers for the champions. That's where I think the UFC has its biggest hole is the reason that these guys became superstars and girls.

The reason that these guys and gals became superstars is because there's matchups that we wanted to see them in. There were matchups that we went, I absolutely need to see this champion defend their belt against this challenger, or I absolutely need to see these two fight. And I feel like we're at a low point for that. There's not a lot of matchups that I'm going, okay, I need to see this person. I need to see them defend against the number two guy and the number three guy. And that lack of credible opponents is what I think is preventing people from becoming superstars. If there were five guys lined up for Ilya Teporya to face, then you would, we would have a kind of magical run for him to go through the gauntlet and then become this long reigning champion. I actually feel it's, I actually feel it's not the, the,

the fighters at the top. It's actually the contenders that I think are lacking and we're not building them properly anymore, uh, due to the like aggressive schedule, the flimsy nature of how these fights get made and kind of being based on the ufc's travel schedule on where the the uh fighters are uh located or where the fights uh where they're getting the biggest site fees and things like that so it's an issue but i think it actually comes from there's just not people that are proper foils to make these people into superstars. Here's, in my opinion, the brilliance of it all. The brilliance of it all is the UFC as a brand

couldn't be hotter. You can make a very strong case that Dana White has never been more popular and we all lived and we're covering the sport when he's showing up in the t-shirt and the ripped jeans in in 07 08 09 and and he's dropping f-bombs and he's so fresh and different than what you would see from other heads of sport i've always said that this analogy is is is inaccurate comparing him to goodell or silver he's not a commissioner but he is viewed and treated as such. But now he is so popular, he has been able to use whatever happened and the decision to go forward during the pandemic to his benefit, his relationship with Donald Trump. All these factors have made him into a cult-like figure. And I would argue he's never been more popular. I would argue the UFC has never been more popular. And they are showing that they don't necessarily need to rely on these stars and draws

because I'm talking to kids younger than ever asking me questions about the UFC, asking me questions about Murab, another name that we should mention as a potential star down the line, the Yeries, the Pereiras, et cetera, et cetera. And it's a fascinating thing to watch because you see him there doing mainstream press, Tucker Carlson, Piers Morgan, these clips coming out yesterday, he did these interviews in Riyadh. And I'm still not quite sure why Piers and Tucker were in Riyadh doing these interviews with Dana, but whatever, it doesn't really matter. The point is, you know, he's not going on these quote unquote mainstream shows, if you want to call those that, defending his company, talking about his ideas, his growth plans, their expansion, all this stuff. He's out there as Dana White, bastion of free speech, thought leader, moral compass, all this stuff. He has expanded outside

of the typical role of promoter that a Frank Warren or an Eddie Hearn or a Bob Arum or a Vince McMahon back in the day, no one would have these people on to talk about these things for the most part. He is now there sitting there as these journalists are coming up to him and asking him these questions and being like please tell us like impart your wisdom on us how should we live how should we run our lives how should we run our companies how should we treat others how should we treat our employees etc etc etc which just goes to show that this is the bat signal to everyone who believes in these ideologies everyone who believes in this type of thinking and living to be like, this is the place for you. These other places aren't the place for you. And so he has been able to turn A, himself into a superstar, which was always the plan,

and which they've done consistently very well since, you know, the early 2000s, turn the brand into this symbol for all these things that he preaches and stands for. And in turn, these people out there, and Lord knows there's a lot of them, a vast majority of them who say, this is the place for me. This is the sport for me. This is the outlet for me. This is where I feel most comfortable. This is where I feel most aligned. And it's brilliant because you don't have to pay millions and millions and millions of dollars to put on fights. Just say, just put out the bat signal and say, this is the place where you can be welcome. This is the place where, where, where like-minded people can come and, and, and, and celebrate and watch sport without these,

these restrictions and shackles and things like that. And it's, it's, it's a wild thing to watch. It's a fascinating thing to watch because that's exactly what he's doing. He's not sitting there talking about the sport, the business. he's sitting there talking about everything except the sport and then when when asked about things you know that don't really pertain to politics or or you know these outside things he always brings it back he starts talking about covid and how the media tried to stop him and i'll try he overcame the odds and all this stuff and it's an amazing package that gets people to rally who don't know the truth, who are just kind of being conned in front of their eyes, you know, drinking this all up.

This is the place to be. And so it actually ties into the superstar shortage discussion because you don't have to invest as much. What Rick said about the pay-per-views is 100% right. But you don't have to invest as much into these stars, into these people, because the brand is the star. He is the star. What they represent is the selling point.

Now, they're about to get a new contract, and it's going to be worth billions and billions of dollars. There is no doubt in my mind that they are going to take a massive step up, not a step back. They are going to crush it with this new contract, because they have done a great job of packaging it all. The one I'm curious about is the next one, not this one coming up, the one after that, because this formula could only last for so long. It's going to last now and it's going to prove to be right and it's going to be fantastic. But I'm curious about the next one because if you stay on this trajectory, if you stay on this path of not

necessarily building stars, the next time around, the next go around, and maybe that's in 10 years and maybe that's, maybe we're all dead by the time it happens. I don't know. It's going to get, in my opinion, interesting because at some point you do need superstars. At some point you do need draws.

I don't know. I find, I find all of this to be fascinating. So this is basically a consequence. This is a plan they put in place. Like, I mean, for years we talked about Jaron McGregor's ascent. They're never going to let someone get this big again. Mayweather, all this stuff, even though it was great business for them, they made a lot of money. They kind of lost McGregor as a star at that point. So we kind of said, so you're saying basically they probably put this plan kind of revved it up a bit around then maybe, Ariel, because they were like, we can't let a guy like McGregor get bigger than the brand, which definitely happened.

I don't think they're suppressing stardom. I think they have created a model in which stardom is not the main thing. That is not the goal, right? In the previous era, the UFC had to scrape and claw for relevance. They had to go, okay, we've got Ronda Rousey. Please pay attention to Ronda Rousey. We've got Conor McGregor. Please pay attention to Conor McGregor. We need you to pay attention to this. And then it can elevate the rest of the brand. It can elevate the UFC. It can take MMA into the mainstream. They no longer need that. And the model now is how many hours of television can they churn out that ESPN is interested in? Potentially Netflix, Amazon, all these broadcast partners. They don't particularly care about who's in that main event as long as the UFC tells them it's a good fight. We see this with ESPN, right? How many times do we go, is this a good card? Do you ever hear ESPN publicly come out and and be like we didn't think that card was good this card was good it as long as they're getting their hours of television as long as they're meeting their thresholds as long as they're putting on events and the viewers are turning up i don't think they're particularly motivated or interested uh in and how that sausage gets made

as long as the ufc keeps churning it out and so the model is different i don't think it's like a suppression of we don't want another Connor. They would love another Connor. They would love another star like that because it would mean more hours of television and more viewers. But the model is not geared toward creating that person anymore. Alex Pereira is kind of like an example of somebody who did it just by hook or crook and like found way to break through by continuing to win and continuing to knock people out. But it was not in the era of McGregor where he had the force of the promotion behind him because they were scratching and clawing for that relevance. He just arose through the system. They certainly learned lessons from the McGregor era. And I agree with you, Rick, they're not trying to suppress anyone. But again, you see

Teporia say like, I'm done with 155, or sorry, 45, I'm going up to 55, which is the exact playbook that Conor did. He beat Aldo, and they did it. Now, Conor had incredible timing because in 2016, they were selling the company, and they needed big bucks. They needed blockbusters. And so, oh, what's the first pay-per-view? The first major pay-per-view post-sale is Conor Diaz. A few months later, it's New York.

Conor's back on that one. A few months after that, it's Mayweather. Conor's involved in that one. It is going to take a huge, like a seismic shift in their business or something to happen to where they give someone else that type of leeway, that kind of rope. And so I agree they're not trying to suppress, but they're just not going to give in as easily because quite frankly, they don't have to because they're killing it right now. And so several things had to happen to be successful. You have to be lucky and you have to be good.

And they have always been good promoters, but they were also lucky. The pandemic was the greatest thing to ever happen to them. But the timing of the pandemic happening with their arrival on ESPN, with the rise of online betting, all these things coming together, put them on a rocket ship. 2020, 2021, everything changed after that. And so now they've realized that,

A, the UFC is the star. The UFC is the brand. This is what they've always wanted. Dana White is bigger and better than ever think it's a way of him promoting the ufc or the sport but it's again it's that bat signal to people that hey come here because this is you know this is what we believe in while everyone is going that way while while roger goodell is is backing dei at the super bowl press conference i'm calling out the woke mind virus as he put it uh that is spreading through society it's very calculated it's very smart um and and and we're watching it unfold and and and i get calls and i get texts from people being like what happened to mma what changed guess what if you feel that way it's only going to keep changing it's we're not going back to 2012 where he got mad about Fallon Fox, or he got mad about Miguel Torres, or he got mad

about Frank Mir. We may never go back to that, to be honest. It's only going, I don't want to say worse, because I'm not trying to offend anyone here, but it's only going to go more that way. And with regards to like the thing that I read at the end of the show yesterday, where he said the thing that we have to protect the most is hate speech again it's just so fascinating to me because freedom of speech is a is a is a is a is an amendment that says the government can't come to your house and arrest you essentially punish you for saying things for for showing things for talking about certain things and everyone i, I think, understands that. But to say that the most important free speech

to protect is hate speech is just, it's absurd. Now, hate speech as well, unless you aren't, you know, unless you're like not hurting someone, you don't get arrested for that either. But as, but again, who are we talking to here? Are we talking to the president? Are we talking to an elected official? Are we talking to the government?

Or are we talking to the president are we talking to an elected official are we talking to the government or are we talking to the owner of a company because if he's if he's the former then yes he's right we cannot punish that but if he's the latter and i don't even know if the interviewers know who they're talking to at this point if he's the latter as as the the boss of a company of a of a company that you know it's it doesn't say bryce it says UFC fighter Bryce Mitchell, you have to ask yourself, do you want to be associated with this? Not should you protect it, not should you send a message to the public as to whether or not you're going to punish this type of thing. Do you want as a company to be associated with this type of rhetoric. I was having a conversation with someone about this earlier today and they said, ah, you know, you know, then, then do you punish Colby Covington for what he said about Leon Edwards? And, uh, you know, do you, do you, do you get mad at him for

the, the MAGA stuff? And I was like, wait a second, Leon Edwards, that is, that is pointed, that is trash talk about a man's personal life. You, like, that's all fair and love and and promotion when you start talking about like offending a religion when you start talking about offending a people and trying to rewrite history and stuff like that those are two very very different things and you have to just ask yourself do you want to be you know do you want to be affiliated with this do you want this to represent who you are and and what they have told us time and again is they're okay with that. They're okay with that. They don't mind that. Can I just say though, not a counterpoint, not a devil's advocate, but what is going to motivate them to not be okay with that? If there are no repercussions, if no sponsor goes,

I don't like this. If nobody goes, I don't want to be associated with this, the message I believe that is being sent is, this is okay. They are receiving the message. Let me be very clear. This is what they want. This is the message that they want, that this is okay, that this is going to go unpunished, unchecked. Because to your point, sponsors aren't pulling out. ESPN certainly isn't putting any pressure on them they want to be the place where it's free speech and it's the second amendment and all this stuff even though it makes no sense what he is saying because someone needs to ask him what do you want to be affiliated with what you want to be associated with i'm not sitting here saying

that bryce mitchell should how many more times i have to say i don't think he should be punished stupid people say stupid things he didn't murder anyone he didn't run anyone over he didn't do anything like that i i just want the answer to the question and i know the answer to the question do you want to be affiliated associated with this type of rhetoric do you want articles to be written as ufc fighter so and so who is fighting this weekend believes in so and so and clearly the answer is yes you don't mind and so and and so people just have to come to terms with that what i'm i agree with you but what i'm saying is they haven't been slapped on the wrist there have been no repercussions for them right when this happens when something like

this happens no sponsor goes did you hear what this bryce mitchell guy from the ufc did and withdraws their funds from the uf. And so therefore their motivation to do anything is weakened, is lessened, right? Because if there are no consequences from the people that they have to answer to, whether it be shareholders, whether it be sponsors, partners, is silence, then they're in a great position to just have the stance that you're describing where it's like, eh, we don't care either. We don't seem to care either. Everybody's kind of complicit in this, in what is happening here

in terms of how this system is being developed where clearly the people that do business with the UFC and even are above the UFC at TKO don't particularly care that this is happening. And so therefore they are free to have that stance to protect hate speech and whatever other nonsense. Yeah. What a weird time.

Yeah. Bizarre. It's a weird time in the sport. It's a weird time to be a fan of the sport. Cause you either have to like lean into it or, or ignore it. You know what I mean? You either have to say like,

I don't really love all of this. Trust me. I don't really love having to talk about all of this. We've been doing, we've been doing this show since 2009. And, and like, you know,

every third comment is about my religion is about, you know, what I believe in and all this stuff. And, and now we're talking about the Holocaust and, and like, I'm, I'm seeing comments about like the Holocaust not being real and the numbers

not being real. I freaking went, I went to the concentration camps. I was there. I touched the thing. I was in the gas chambers and, and, and I've met survivors and some of my best friends' families died in the Holocaust. And like, why, why are we talking about this? Why does this have any place in our sport?

There's a part of me that just wishes, hey, believe in what you want. Can we just not, like, there's a reason why you don't hear this type of talk in the nba or nfl and if it does happen it gets squashed not because they're trying to stifle free speech it's just like can this just be the place where we like talk about sports and stupid stuff like miles garrett getting you know getting released like i look at the other sports shows and i'm like damn it must be nice to just talk about sports and i guess you could say at like, you guys could choose to not talk about this, but it's such a massive cloud hanging over us. It's hard to ignore.

Every single day I open Twitter and there's another sort of uncomfortable controversy in front of, you know, in front of our eyes regarding either the biggest names in the sport, mid-level names in the sport, mid-level names in the sport. There was a great tweet yesterday from Sadiq Youssef. Yes. I don't know if we have it, but I thought he kind of nailed it. Do we have the Sadiq Youssef tweet?

I will read it. I had it somewhere here. I think Rick sent it yesterday. really really great tweet i don't know if someone could pull it up and read it for me it is in slack okay here it is at a certain point we got to want to be taken seriously the people outside of the mma echo chamber think it's a bunch of racist and mentally challenged people in here. Every week, someone goes outside and adds onto the stereotype. What are we doing? This is a UFC fighter saying this, and kudos to him because I think his sentiment is the minority right now. I would just like to say this, and especially if I could say this to Conor himself. Conor, in my opinion, is still the face of MMA. When people

think of MMA and the UFC as far as active participants, they still think of him, regardless of the fact that he hasn't fought since 2021. Every day, there's something else on social media. I saw something else today insulting towards Muslim people. There's all the incidents over the past couple months and on and on it goes. There was a time where, you know, 2015, 2016, 2014

was the best time ever to cover this sport. And there was nothing like covering that magic carpet ride known as the McGregor era. And he was such a light. He was such a light, not only for his home country, but for fans. Everyone was trying to emulate him, copy him, walk like him, talk like him.

It was so much fun. And in addition to all of that, he was such an inspiration. He was an inspiration as far as his story, as far as being on welfare. And he's sitting there with the dickie bow and you see the thing grow and grow and grow. And people are holding up the Irish flag. They're not even Irish.

They have no connections, but they just want to be like him and act like him and talk like him and walk like him and dress like him. And it was all so fun and fresh and uplifting. And I wish, you know, and maybe this is silly of me, but like, I wish he could go back to being that light. Be that light, Connor. Be that role model again.

These comments on Instagram and on Twitter, you know, offending people, insulting people. Forget about that past. Forget about that rivalry. Forget about all that other shit. Be that light again for people. You are an inspiration. You can be a role model.

Whether you like it or not, you are a role model to people. Stop with the insults. Stop with the comments that offend a large part of your fan base. You have Muslim fans. You have black fans. Stop with this stuff. You know exactly what these words mean, and I know that they are words. Be that guy back in 2014 and 13 and 16 that people fell in love with. Turn the page. Family man, father, there is good in there i believe that but

this stuff every day when you wake up and you see this and you're like man everything is getting ruined everything and it may have been ruined already and and may there may be no turning back and and certainly back home i can't speak to a pizzi can better than i but please try to be that light again try to be that guy because this is not the way. This is not the way. This is not good for you. This is not good for your legacy. This isn't good for people who backed you.

This isn't good for your fan base. Be that guy again. There's so much that you can do good as being this ambassador, this face of the sport. And it's all getting ruined now with this stuff there's no need for it there's no need for it whatsoever well it's directly to sadiq's point you know um the problem like the i think it's way worse here uk and ireland because of mcgregor being the main frame of reference for most people when it comes to MMA.

The stuff he's putting out has ramifications on the sport. And you're dead right about everything you said. We used to say, this guy had the Midas touch. He let everything he touched turn to gold. You often reference the shot at Madison Square Garden, zero technique. He's nearly half court. He drains the thing.

Um, it's just the opposite of that now. And look, maybe he will never be embraced in the way he was because that was meteor, meteoric. We've never seen anything like it, but he can certainly improve what he's putting out right now.

And that, that is, I knew, knew the guy back then. And he was magic to be around. And he, that is, I knew, knew the guy back then and he was magic to be around and he, and he had, he wanted to be a representative of the people somewhere. He's in there somewhere.

I don't know. I haven't seen him a long time, but I know he's in there somewhere. And even an improvement at this stage would, would be great. I think. Let's talk about some good news. Uh, yesterday evening, um, we, we got from, we got from The Ring some exciting news.

And I love The Ring. God bless The Ring. God bless Michael Benson and everyone over there. You got the big story. I love what they did. The Ring has learned. I mean, they are owned by Turkey, so I would imagine the information. I'm not even verifying this one.

I'm just going off of them unless they've been hacked. The Ring reporting, the Ring magazine, reporting that September 13th is set for Allegiant Stadium, which is the home of the Raiders. Canelo Alvarez against Terrence Crawford. It is going down. At 168 pounds, Mexican Independence Day weekend, this is a gigantic fight.

This is a dream fight. And yes, Terrence moving up from 154 and he had a cup of coffee at 154 against Madrimov in August. The last few fights obviously had 47 beats Errol Spence almost two years ago now at 47 in an incredible fight in Las Vegas. And now moving up to 68, a fight by the way that Canelo had always said he had no interest in because he didn't want to be seen as a weight bully. Now it's happening because, of course, there aren't a ton of big fights out there for him. I would argue Benavidez is a maybe tougher challenge, if you will see many of these here in the United States. They're old hat over in the UK, but there are only so many fighters and so many fights that can sell out or at least fill up football stadiums. I would argue strongly this is one of them. And so it's very cool that it's not going to be at T-Mobile, that it's going to be at Allegiant. And I'm very excited about it. I mean,

it just feels like two superstars coming together. I'm happy for Terrence Crawford that he's getting a superstar fight because he's been searching for this. Spence was a big one. Madrimov wasn't, but I'm very happy for him that he's getting this opportunity. I do wonder ultimately how many tickets

they will sell and if they can actually fill it up because I think Canelo is a massive draw Crawford a huge draw you know for arenas in Nebraska I don't know if he can if he could do it on his own I mean that that show in LA wasn't a sellout but this feels like a really big deal now where it gets interesting is there are some reports now coming out that Canelo Jake Paul is a thing in May as well which by the way what a freaking year for canelo alvarez holy shit those are two gigantic paydays and he's the one

who coined the phrase payday payday payday so these are two massive things my my question to you guys is a do you have an appetite for jake paulelo? And B, and don't laugh at me for saying this or for asking it. Don't ask it. Is it a risk? Don't ask it. Is it a risk? What are you about to ask? Is it a risk?

Please don't ask. We've seen this. You take that fight first. You slip. We've seen this. We've seen this with who? With who? We've seen this with who?

What's the comp for this? Give me a comp for it. I'll tell you right now. Yeah. They said that they were going to do Deontay Wilder. Deontay Wilder slips, right? They said they were going to do Deontay versus AJ. They said they were going to do Hergovich versus AJ.

Hergovich loses to Dubois. Which one of those was... Who did he slip to? Deontay Wilder lost to... What's his name? To Joseph Parker. Which one of those was YouTube influencer versus pound for pound? Oh, Zhelei Zhang. Sorry, Zhelei Zhang.

Okay, what's the question? Which one of those was YouTube influencer versus pound for pound great being the hang-up in the fight? Being the one that stops the momentum. Because I just, it's not happening. There is no world. Okay, then let me ask you this. May I be struck

by lightning right now if this is possible? Wow, lightning bet me ask you this. May I be struck by lightning right now if this is possible? Wow, a lightning bet. If this happens. If this happens. There's just no way. There is no way. Wait, wait, wait.

If what happens? If the fight happens or if the upset of the century happens? If Jake Paul derails Terrence Crawford versus Canelo by beating Canelo, there's no chance. Then you burn Jake Paul versus Terrence Crawford. Zero. Okay, let me ask you this. If that fight ends up being close,

a lot of people are going to watch that fight, right? A lot. A lot because I think a lot of people are going to want to see Jake Paul lose. 100%. Canelo's going to do this. Canelo would do this. Let's backtrack to your first question,

which is interest. I'm very interested because, as I've long said, I'm on this corner. I only care about Jake Paul in spectacles. It would be an absolute spectacle to see a pound for pound. First he did Mike Tyson, which, and I'm not going all the way back, but I'm saying in his most recent outing, Mike Tyson, an all time legend, a pop culture icon versus Jake Paul is a spectacle. Now you're going the opposite direction to nearly in his prime. We'll say maybe he's on the back nine, but he's still close to his prime.

He's still a top five pound for pound on pretty much anybody's list fighter going against Jake Paul. I'm in for the spectacle. I'm in. I don't think Jake Paul has a chance in hell, but I'm in for the spectacle. And how long has he been beating the drum on this?

He's been saying he's going to do this forever. Let's see what happens. Yeah, so like credit to him if it happens. If it happens. But here's my question. If it's a close fight, does it diminish the gigantic fight in September or does it make you more interested?

Because I think now, I mean, David Benavidez offered a deferring point, but I think a lot of people think Canelo is just going to be too big for Terrence Crawford. If it's a, if it's a big fight, close fight that a lot of people will watch in May, would it make the,

basically, I'm going to give you a spoiler. If you're Turkey and you're, you got this gigantic fight at Allegiant stadium in, in, in September, are you like, man,

what are we doing here? The booking of that fight tells you exactly the answer to that question. There ain't a chance on God's green earth that Jake Paul is going to be competitive with Canelo Alvarez. None. Zero. Less than zero. You think he's skunking? Oh, they're going to play this. They're going to play this, Rick. This is like a Dana White video they're going to make in the aftermath.

There is no way this is competitive. You know what? I'm willing. I'll roll the dice on this one. I like my odds. There ain't no way. There is no chance in hell that Jake Paul is competitive with Canelo Alvarez. It's not possible. I'm sorry. Go full on Eric here.

Go full on Eric. We need the full. We need the black and white. Say it again. I respect what Jake Paul has done in a very short time in boxing. He is not a boxer the caliber of Canelo Alvarez. He will never be a boxer the caliber of Canelo Alvarez. There is not a chance in hell he's going to be competitive. And Canelo will, after dominating him, will roll on to fight Ter haunting me. Will roll on to... Oh, wait a minute. What the... Will roll

on to fight Terrence Crawford in a fight that... I'm also like... I'll be honest. I don't love Terrence's fight. I don't love Terrence's odds in that fight. I actually have Terrence number one pound for pound still. I don't love his chances. I just think he's going to be too small. Ultimately, I know he's going to be too big.

But he's got a hell of a better chance than Jake Paul does. I'll tell you that much. Because it's zero. What a world. By the way, if this happens, both have yet to be officially announced. If it happens, what a freaking world we're living in.

What a world. It's crazy. By the way, I have some insight into the world of boxing these days because of uncrowned.com. When I say insight i mean from like an interest level uh very much courtesy of our good friend shaheen the interest in in in boxing like we we think of it as this niche thing and that it's not as you know like when i was talking about you know it's at an all-time high and all these actual boxing people were shitting on me for saying that which was bizarre in my opinion The fan base maybe because they're underserved

I don't know what it is But there is such great interest when you compare it to the interest In MMA on the website Or even pro wrestling It's crazy to witness Even I wasn't really expecting this And this is only going to make it bigger Go ahead

Do you think Jake Paul versus Canelo is bigger than Canelo Crawford? Gosh. What a question. It depends on what we're measuring. I was going to say, what's the metric? Are they going to do it on pay-per-view if it happens? If it's like mentions

of people talking about it, I'd say probably. I guess, where do you think they would do it? Because obviously they're doing at Allegiant for Crawford Canelo. Would they also do a stadium for Paul Canelo as well? Imagine Canelo goes back-to-back I was going to say.

Oh my God. Could you imagine? Boss move. I see all these reports that are like Canelo Crawford first ever fight at Allegiant. What if it's actually Canelo Paul?

Or you could go back to Cowboy Stadium. Serious question. Is it Netflix worthy? Netflix worthy, that's the... I think so. I mean, it's pretty business, man.

Canelo is pound for pound, massive superstar. Also, the fact that Canelo, one of the true faces of boxing over the past 10 years

is the guy like, you beat up Mike Tyson and now come to me. Come to me, Daddy. Serious question, though. You know what I mean? It's a great fucking story. I mean, everyone always rips on Jake Paul and his selection of opponents.

You can't really rip on this one. Well, you can't because you'll say he's a weight bully. He's a weight bully. Weight bully. A weight bully to a pound-for-pound rate of this generation. Irrelevant. He ain't doing a damn thing. Serious question, though.

You mentioned if Jake Paul keeps it close, would that tarnish Canelo and tarnish the fight against Crawford? That's not happening, so we'll eliminate that option. But is not fighting like a Benavidez instead of Terrence Crawford and instead of Jake Paul potentially something that a boxing fan would look at and go, Canelo doesn't want to smoke, honestly? I do feel like a lot of the boxing fans have sort of moved on from that fight. I haven't, I want that shit. I mean, I want it too, but like, I don't, I don't feel like it's being held over his head as much.

Yeah, I agree with you. He's moved up to 75. And also the fact that there's a potential better be a Bivel fight out there. I think what people were annoyed about was the fact that like, here's Benavidez incredible and he can't get his payday yeah you know like canelo fought floyd like you gotta you gotta you gotta return the favor and there's benavidez with his hands in his pocket now here he is headlining a show in vegas seems to have done well he's going

out to read i think i think the idea of him fighting better be a verbival is so mouthwatering that people have kind of moved on. Would they sign up for it yesterday? Absolutely. But I think the fact that he has something else now to get people excited about has allowed people to, to kind of, you know. Good fortune there for Earl Canelo.

Oh, it's great. Canelo. A little side quest over here with Jake Paul and then Darren Scrofford is three-way classes smaller. It's great. The heat is off. He was getting smoke. Turkey was giving Canelo smoke and everything about that.

The Benavidez, if I remember correctly, right? I mean, there was a time where they weren't even like buds at all. They were talking a little bit of smack about each other. But Turkey's been on the Canelo Crawford thing for a bit now. He definitely diverted the attention. Yeah. Like a long time. Can I just say this about Jake and Chael's going to join us

hopefully in a couple of minutes here. You know, last week around this time we were talking about this thing with Logan Paul and, you know, it ended up being

this reality show, right? It's coming out in late March, I think the 27th on Max about the family, about him, about Logan

and whatnot. And I have sat here on this show show on other shows and and defended the validity of his fights what's the first thing that everyone wants to say after his fights they're at work they're fixed all this stuff and i have sat here and said no i'm sitting there ringside no one's pulling punches these punches are hitting like none of this is scripted you could go to jail if you get caught scripting a pro boxing bout, one that is sanctioned by an athletic commission here in the United States. And ultimately in life, and I think in the fight

game as well, your credibility is your greatest currency. If the audience believes in you and trusts you, that could take you a very, very long way. And if they feel like you're tricking them, if they feel like you're pulling a fast one on them, it's going to come and bite you in the ass, bite you in the wallet, bite you in the pocket, if you get what I'm saying. And so I would say that last week was a major misstep in this quest to be taken seriously, in this quest to be trusted, because very clearly what the message that they wanted to put out was Logan and Jake are fighting. Now, I do think one day they will fight, but very clearly they are not fighting on March 27th on Max. And for a couple of days, they let people kind of run with this and they knew exactly what they were doing by the way this was promoted the poster the the initial clip of them facing off all this stuff and so i would say that you can't for lack of a better word cry in the aftermath of your fights and say why do people try to take away

from what i'm doing why do people question the legitimacy of my fights why do people try to put it down why do haters come out make youtube videos tiktok videos all this stuff when you pull stunts like this because you were you were very clearly trying to trick people last week and so thus the currency that you're trying to develop the currency that you're trying to build up the credibility currency took a massive hit and so the next time someone asks one of these questions or makes one of these YouTube videos, the next time a Carl Frotch takes a shot at you in this regard, you can only just look back to last week and say, look, you played into this. And I think that that's a shame. There was a very easy and clean way to promote what they wanted to promote last

week without hurting their credibility. And Logan is in the pro wrestling world. He deals with a different type of currency. Jake is in the world of trying to become a champion, of trying to beat the likes of Canelo and God knows who else. That's a major hit to him. And so the next time this happens, and I can assure you it will happen again, look no further than last week. Last week, I think, was a major, major misstep. You cannot trick people, especially when you're in that business, especially when you're in the fight business, when all you're trying to do, like, you know, the UFC doesn't put out like April Fool's jokes. They don't trick people with fake announcements because you don't want the next time there's a questionable call or a controversial scorecard or something like that. People to be like, you're, you're in the business of working us. You can't do that. That was, that was a major

misstep. And, and, and I would also say that it was, it was unnecessary. It was unnecessary in the sense that like, it didn't lead to views. It didn't lead to clicks the next day. This thing's coming out in a month and a half. It's coming out in a month and a half. No one's even going to remember that you did this. You know what I mean? Like, no one's even going to say like, oh yeah, that's the thing. Oh, in a month and a half, I need to click on this. No, you want to do something like that? You do it usually when something's coming out that day or the next day. Month and a half later, you just hurt your credibility. And it didn't even lead to anything. It didn't even lead to more viewership. It didn't lead to more people subscribing to Max or tuning in. So I thought that that was a misstep. And I would ask him that question. I would love to hear his take on that.

All right, let's put a pin on this discussion. And let's go to our first and only guest. It's very rare, by the way. It's extremely rare that we only have one guest on this program, but there are certain people who can carry their own weight. There are certain draws in this business who are A-plus listers, who you just need one name on the marquee. That's it. And so we are being honored on this lovely Tuesday, February 4th, by the one and only, the inimitable, the bad guy himself,

my old friend, my old co-host, one half of the coaching staff of the Ultimate Fighter Season 33. Chael P., it's good to see you again. How are you? That was the most beautiful and sincere welcome I think you've ever given me. I was doing good when I got here. I'm

better now. And thank you. Hey, I do need a favor today. Before we get going, can I talk to you about something? Yeah, yeah, please. There's so much. I'm doing the Ultimate Fighter. Yeah. I'm doing it with DC. Yes. And that has confused so many people. So DC stands for Daniel Cormier. Yes. And this guy was a fighter.

This guy was good, too. You go back and watch him. He was good with the takedowns and he beat Pat Cummings one time. I can't believe that more people don't remember him. And I will admit, I also shared in the confusion. When they asked me to come and do the open fight with Daniel Cormier, I thought they were asking me to come out and coach Daniel Cormier.

I was as surprised as anybody when he was also given a jersey. But if Bersari and Zach and the crew, if they edit this thing just right, we can have success in spite of Daniel. Okay, so you thought that you were actually being brought in to coach him? Yes. I assumed it was written that way.

The thing was a text message, you know, will you do tough? And then Daniel Cormier's name was in there. Maybe they call him like these initials. People sometimes they call him DC and it's weird. He's one of a big show on ESPN called The Bad Guy with the other guy. He's the other guy. But because of that, I really feel like he's been

getting disrespected a lot through this process. They were showing us the set. They walked us through virtually and they said, okay, here's where the mat is and here's where the cage is and here's the locker room. They said, do you have any questions?

I said, well, yeah. Is there a place I can stash a couple of roast beef sandwiches in case daniel gets hungry like i'm not saying we're gonna need them i'm saying it's it's it's better to not need it and have it than to not have it when you need it that's a good point i can't can i be honest with you i thought you were just about to ask me when you said can i ask you a favor and and i was ready to say yes i was ready to jump and say how high um is everything okay absolutely miss britney's here miss britney just went and got a drink but she didn't know if she could bring it oh what a great honor oh there she is this girl is a bomb raw you ever seen how hot miss britney is can i ask miss britney a question yeah um does she still pack your bags when you go on trips

does she lay it all out and absolutely and what's the thought everything i'm wearing now socks and underwear was laid out this morning wow oh yes i have even on non-road trips it's on regular days every single day it gets she just yelled of course in the background every single day i don't even know where the luggage is i'm not attempting to be funny right now i don't know where i don't know where we store the luggage i wouldn't even know where to where to get the thing to wow and then begin to pack it and you know that and by the way i do not expect that i am saying this from a perspective of gratitude like that is a very kind thing to start to do for somebody. She started at 13 years ago. I don't even know.

I'm jealous. If I'm being honest. Now, my question is, do you ever get mad? Do you ever say like, ah, you know what?

I didn't want that shirt. Ms. Brittany, why did you have to pack that one? Don't you know? I don't like this one. Do you, do you ever,

do you ever offer critique? And if so, how does that land? Yeah. Okay. So here's the thing, Aaron. Yeah.

I am very rich. I should, should i should but really i should not have days where my socks don't match okay yeah they should always match and i should not have days where i go to the underwear drawer and they're where i'm out of underwear oh we got to go do some laundry we got to buy i have like seven pairs of underwear and they're all the same brand. So like they look cool in the drawer, but if you don't have more underwear, it's easy to run out. And that does upset me. I do not think a rich man should have to run out of underwear and socks. Okay.

And are you implying that you do sometimes? Yes. Wow. I did not go fight all those men so that I can't have clean underwear and socks. I did not go rob those banks. I didn't break those rules. I didn't cheat those commissions to not have socks and underwear. In fact, I even thought to myself, before I go make these decisions and I sell my soul,

can I get socks and underwear out of the deal? And when the answer was yes, I proceeded, Ariel. And is this the first she's hearing about it? Like, will this cause a rift? No, she's shaking her head. Oh, she looks so pretty right now. You should see her. She looks so pretty. No, she's shaking her head no. It is true that my socks don't always match and my underwear goes

empty. She just doesn't feel that that is her fault. She does not see how if I go through three pairs of underwear a day, if I do a workout or I go and run the kids practice, then when the drawer is empty, that should be expected. I think you go online and you order Chael a few more pairs of Tom Fords.

Yeah. No, I agree. I agree. I agree 100% with her on this one. Can I also just say that, you know, it's amazing to see her in this presence. And I'm wondering, is she there to sort of police you? Because sometimes it goes off the rails with you and I and it's been, a lot of people got hurt, a lot of you know, there's been a lot of hurt

feelings, so is she here to make sure that you keep it professional? Yes, she actually is she's a massive aerial supporter, much like my mom is, when you got, you know, I get a tip her and my mom get mad at me instead of sharing my anger with you, uh uh yeah that's

that might be exactly why she's here by the way and something i was going to tell you what we oh yeah i wanted to tell you something too go ahead yeah can i go first because it's about the royal rumble oh my gosh oh wait wait first person before we get off the tough thing i thought you were going to ask me to be one of your coaches. And so I've been waiting here for the text. I would love it. Okay. So like, am I in or what? I would love, I will definitely make a day. I think that you're trying to, I think that you're being funny right now.

Come to town and you wanted to come in and probably just talk to the guys. Probably have you like come in and talk to them about being a professional and, you know, discipline and keeping your eye on the ball. Cause Ariel, they do a great job. Yeah. Dana does a great job of capturing the physical tryingness of this process. You know, you're going to weigh in three times. You're going to fight three men.

He could be the guy sleeping across the hall. He could be your best friend through the process. And you've got to go out and compete with him, making weight, being in the saunas. Like, he does a great job of showing that. But, Errol, there is a whole battle that I think is bigger and it's the mental battle. The fact that you're going to have breakfast with somebody, you might even help him cook his eggs and he makes your baby make a little trade like that. Then you get in a car, you drive to the arena, you fight each other. You try to damage and hurt one another, not to mention taking the other guy's dream and

aspirations away. Then you're supposed to get back in the van. His head is hanging. He can't even call his mom or his wife. You can't celebrate. You'd be a jerk, even though you feel good about yourself for what you just did. Then you go back to the house. You sit down at another table known as the dinner table and you break bread again before you go upstairs to go to sleep i mean it is so the ultimate fighter is so incredibly difficult and the true veterans of it really do deserve uh credit and respect and all you got to do to be a veteran i don't mean to win it i'm talking about you start on the first day you make it through the process because it's most guys want to quit at some point this is so good this is so amazing how did they how did they come to you with this?

How did it, like, what are the embryonic stages of this? How did this happen? Sure. I got a phone call and it was actually from Daniel. And Daniel had talked with Shelby. And somehow Daniel got tasked with being the one that presents it to Uncle Chael. And I think they thought there was going to be a level of resistance. I was actually very much for it. Uh, I got to check with Clayton real fast, make sure the dates worked out. And then we just went from there. Don't forget Clayton lives in Nevada now. So this wasn't a problem at all. He's got to miss the 14th.

That's his birthday and Valentine's day. They got a little thing going. Uh, but other than that, no, we're ready to go. And, and grandpa got ahold of Colby. Benny's always, always there no, we're ready to go. Grandpa got a hold of Colby. Benny's always there. Now we're ready to go. And how did the family feel? I mean, it's a big commitment, right? It's like five weeks, six weeks, right? Six weeks and they're coming with me. Oh, wow. Yeah, I must tell you, my wife and I were very torn on this because if you take kids out of school,

I can remember parents that would do that. They didn't take school in each day seriously, but those kids turned out a certain way. Like it's very important that your kid is in school. And now we're talking about removing them for 38 days. And we were very torn on that, but we worked with the school, the principal specifically, we found a tutor. There's going to be some, some online stuff. So we're going to do it.

We're going to take them. And we got the new, with the laptops and the Google Hangout, it's called. And so we'll be communicating with the school. But that was probably the hardest part. I got to take my dogs. I got to take both my cats. Like 38 days, that's a meaningful amount of time to be gone. So I literally, we're driving out there

because i gotta take duke and rosa and i gotta take uh hulk and lily so there's the answer to your question i'm moving to las vegas i'm moving to vegas for 38 days was there any discussion just floated even like thrown out hey when this is over you and daniel compete oh that is still being discussed because they've started this new grappling they're doing this grappling so it's just being discussed and it's supposed to be a little bit friendly it's like dana dana please do not make that audience stare at that man with his shirt off stop and i kept talking to him about this. I said, please, this guy was once a fighter. This guy fought for you. And Dan said, who did? I said, he fought for you. He was in your organization. He did it under the name, Daniel Cormier. He goes, are you talking about that

Cormier guy? I said, man, ignore the R. Pretend the R is an A. Trust me. That's the guy that beat Pat Cummins. Okay. So it's off the table. Well, I would hope. I me, that's the guy that beat Pat Cummins. Okay, so it's off the table. Well, I would hope. I mean, I would hope. I just think that would be very terrible. I don't think the audience would do that. I think you do with a rash guard. Hey, can I ask you another question?

Yeah, let's stop. Because you see through the performance. But do you see how well the performance is done? I mean, when Daniel thought he and Sean were going to team up against me, that they were going to team up to get me so that they have a show. Do you really think he thought that through? Like, does he know what he's getting into? Really?

Does he have any idea what 38 days with Chael P can be like if Chael wants it to be a certain way? No, I mean, I think it's a phenomenal idea. I love everything about it. I would love to see some sort of wrestling, grappling, I don't know, something at the end. Just old school, like we need a payoff because remember, we didn't get the payoff with Chandler and McGregor.

Like we need to go old school. No? Gotta have a payoff. You gotta have the payoff. Yes. There has to be something. What are we coaching for here? What are we doing?

But I want to get to your Royal Rumble thing. What did you want to ask me? Because I saw you were tweeting up a storm about the Royal Rumble. And, you know, we had a guy yesterday on the program. I don't know if you saw this, shouting you out. Did you see this? I saw Joe. I loved it.

I thought Joe has been a gentleman to me, though. That's not Joe's first time treating me that way. I do appreciate that. And I do return that. He came out number 15, and my son and i popped yes he popped when his when he popped through the curtains he was wearing the belt man he looked cool he looked fantastic but he told me about a story of him dming you way back in the day i have to say it reminded me very much of you and obon elliott people know you as the bad guy chale

but in reality you give back to the business you put guys over you give them the blueprint and so how many Joes And how many Obans Are there out there Because now they're They're all They're all All the guys that were

Teenagers Kids When you were Doing your thing Against Anderson And cutting promos UFC 136 And all this stuff

Now they're all Becoming pros Themselves So now all these stories There's a thing Let me educate you If I can for a moment. There's a great documentary on Netflix called The Carter Effect.

It's about how Vince Carter, the basketball player, changed the way young Canadians feel about basketball. And all these little kids who saw Vince Carter come to Canada in 1998, 1999 are now pros and have now transformed basketball in Canada. What we are seeing now is the sun in effect. We're seeing all these people who looked up to you as kids now become professionals and stories are coming out

of the woodwork about how you helped them and showed them the blueprint. So my question is, how many more of these are out there? Well, I will tell you, that was very nice to hear.

If you can reach me, I'm not the world's easiest guy to get. I'm sure you can relate. But if somebody could, if they can circumvent the game or they can do the DM the right way or whatever it is, if you can reach me, the answer will be yes. Whatever it is you're going to ask me for, you are going to get. And so in Joe's situation or in Oban's situation,

it was just a little advice, just a little time. And for somebody young and inspiring, they asked me, do I got some got some time Absolutely I got time for you I love it by the way speaking of Because I don't find time Errol I make time Yeah no that's what You hear earlier when I said roast beef Sandwich for Daniel I said a couple By the way that was the brilliance I said yeah

Is there somewhere to stash a couple of roast beef sandwiches For Daniel like That's brilliant work right there That's G rated That's brilliant work right there. That's G rated. That's simple kinds of stuff. That's like the, the Will Smith of rap music. He doesn't have to curse to sell albums. You've shared some dudes.

So F him and F you too. I mean, right? Like this is brilliant. Wow. You almost dropped an F bomb right there in front of your wife. No, that's, you know, who said that was, it was Eminem. He said, Will Smith doesn't have to curse to sell albums But I do so F him and F you That's just a great line

By the way your finest hour I think At least of the last 4 or 5 years Was that I've never laughed so hard You answering your phone After the whole Gilbert Burns situation I mean that might have been Honestly because I've had this happen to me Chael and for you to do that

It was I passed it off to everyone, to Leah, to Zeus, to all our old colleagues. I said, this might be Chael's finest hour. This might be his greatest piece of work of all time. How did you turn such a negative into a positive? And did you clear the air with Gilbert? That wasn't a very nice thing to do. If you ask me, I thought that that was crossing the line. I don't think Gilbert knows what an inconvenience he put me through. I, I, I felt cause Gilbert's one of the nicest guys you're going to like, that's an expression. Here's the nicest guy you'll ever meet. It actually might be Gilbert Burns.

He might actually be number one on, on that expression. I do not think he would have done that. And it wasn't equitable. Like his response, he shut me down for weeks. He shut me down. I got locked out of this phone. I stashed the phone. Then it turns out there was Bitcoin on the phone. I forgot what the codes are. And I got it. I mean, this has been, no, I got it. Everything worked out, but I'm just saying like this took weeks to rectify. And there was a little bit of a confusion though. And Gilbert Burns was genuinely hurt. I hurt his feelings. I had disrespected him. And what I had said was, Gilbert's retired. I was talking with Daniel and Daniel was trying to like find an opponent. It might've even been Colby for Gilbert. And then I just stopped him and said,

oh, Gilbert's ranked number seven, but he actually retired. I thought he had, I was backing him up. I mean, that was my point. I was just backing him up. Like, hey, don't go put him in a fight. Then he's going to say he doesn't want to do the fight. I was trying to get in front of it to help him. I was wrong. Whatever it was that he said, where I thought that was a walkaway speech, I was wrong, but yeah, it was, it was a big payback. You know, I did that to, uh, I did that to Chad Mendez one time. He hurt my feelings And I warned him. I said, you have five minutes to get back to me. And then a minute later, I text him the number four. And a minute later, I text him the number three. Then I text him the number two. And then I tweeted out his phone

number. The next day he gets announced, he's going to fight Connor in place of Aldo for the world title. There was never a more important time in Chad's life to have his telephone. And I screwed him. He had to go to, he was so busy. He had to go down to the, like they were following around the cameras and they had to follow him to

the Verizon store because he had to get a new telephone. Oh God. I felt so bad. I have tried to make that up to Chad for like 15 years. I go out of my way to be overly nice to Chad because I did that to him. So I kind of had it coming. Why did you do that? I vaguely remember this, but why did you do it?

I was trying to get him on the podcast. I was trying to line him up. And, you know, his star was kind of bright right then. And I thought I should have an inside track because I, you know, I knew him way back when. Like one of these things, he hurt my feeling. That's what it was. He didn't come on. I've only had one person tell me no.

Now, I've had people where the answer is no, but they will say nothing at all. Kevin Nash took the time to write me back to let me know that he was not interested in being a guest on my show. I just always appreciated it. Like, why? Why didn't you just delete it and move on with your life? What was his reason? He didn't give one.

He said, no, man, I'm good. I'm going to pass. Wow. And then he wrote KN. He didn't even sign it. He just put his initials, KN, which was pretty badass, quite frankly. Evan Nash is a cool big guy. And there's not a lot of cool big guys.

Really big guys are generally awkward. Yeah. But if you go back and you want to watch a killer face-off, it's when Goldberg does his whole thing. Oh, yeah. And then Kevin Nash, they throw the camera to Nash, and he simply does this, and the crowd goes crazy. The crowd goes crazy.

That's the night he beat Goldberg. He beat Goldberg. One, two, three. Goldberg's still upset about that. With the taser. So's the night he beat Goldberg. He beat Goldberg one, two, three. Goldberg's still upset about that. With the taser. So what did you think of the rumble? Okay. Tell me. I have a lot of thoughts on the rumble. First off, first off, it's very sad for me when Dominic Mysterio has to go through everything that he has to go through and then he doesn't get a little bit of shine. And the number that he drew, I thought it was an outside chance, but I thought maybe there would be some rectification. Maybe there's proof that there's a God in heaven above that will smile down and finally give Dominic the opportunity. It didn't happen. But when Logan Paul came out number 30,

there is so much on that decision from an artistic standpoint, Ariel. There is so much on that decision from an artistic standpoint Ariel there is so much interpretation if you're gonna have Logan you're gonna have the guy that's been spoon-fed everything you're gonna have the guy that's this mega superstar and nobody even knows if he's trained the damn sport before and he's over and you're gonna let him come to the Royal Rumble to start with I mean let's just start with how the hell he even got into the Royal Rumble. But once you're there, you're going to walk him number 30. You're going to give him the greatest opportunity of all the boys. Like, there is such a message in that placement, and I was so impressed by it.

I was so impressed by the fact that they took the guy that likely doesn't belong and not only put him in, put him in the absolute best spot. I was so impressed by the fact that they took the guy that likely doesn't belong and not only put him in, put him in the absolute best spot. I was getting worried. Towards the end of the night, I thought that there was a good chance Cena was going over and that would have been a very big mistake, but it's a mistake that would have been made prior

to the match. They didn't know he was going to get out there and have a bald spot. They didn't know he was going to get out there and hadn't been to the tanning beds and he was a little bit bent over. it was one of these things you don't know. So if you give that order back in gorilla, they go out there and start working. He comes out on top. You got to figure out how do I go to mania with this old man? Yeah. So do you like the decision of going with Jay? It surprised me. Which is great, right? Isn't that what you want? Yeah. Yes. I did. I did. I did like it. It surprised me. And I great, right? Isn't that what you want? Yes. I did

like it. It surprised me. And I know that he's ultimately going to draw on to Cody, even though that's not officially stated yet, but I just think that match needs a lot of work. And they'll do it. They'll make it work. But generally speaking, in WrestleMania's

past, we're further along with the storyline than we are right we are nowhere with this storyline this dude's got no business with cody whatsoever so i i think that part of it is is interesting you don't think there's you don't think there's any way that he goes for gunther and and they have cody go up against cena yeah yeah you yeah, you know, yeah, maybe. Well, you got Roman and Seth, and there was something very big that happened there. I even talked to CM Punk about it. There was something very big, and it was the spot that they recorded the most, aside from

the actual match, which is the guys outside. I'm talking about Seth Rollins. CM Punk ends up in some kind of a street fight. He even was slipping some potatoes there when he was kicking a guy. Roman Reigns, I mean, that dude can't sneeze and have it not work. He's so damn handsome, and he just looks this part, right? So the three of them get into something, but I didn't think that story was told completely. We, the audience, were supposed to gather something from those three fighting, but we didn't. We somehow missed it or the announcers

didn't get us there, but there was for sure a story. Yes, there's a story right here that's being told, evident of the fact that this is the longest that the cameras filmed action aside from what was inside the ring. And I think that ties in though, partner. I'm letting you know because you asked me about Gunther. Yes, there is a chance that it's Gunther, and there is a chance that Cody goes with one of those three, which to my point about being a further along proposition, I think we'd agree that it would be. Did you see the crowd crapping on Charlotte yesterday? Yes.

Yes. They deserved it. Why? That was bad. Why? It was bad. What was bad? Well,

I don't really want to pile on. I, I would have happily cut the promo on, on Charlotte and told you the things that were wrong with it. Had everybody else not noticed it. Like, like if it was just me. So,

so, so I don't want to give her, you know, there, there's a great moment here and, you know, we're great moment here and you know we're off to wrestlemania and you know the one company that won't go woke is gone we got these women are in the main event yeah this is great i mean i can i can play along to an extent but uh

she was out for a minute and she made a comeback and that's hard to do and i think maybe that part should be celebrated. Maybe I'll word it like that today. Sure. I appreciate you doing that. I will say you saw the difference between the men and women's rumble. They got the women's rumble so wrong. They got the men's rumble so right because the men's rumble was a surprise. It came out of nowhere.

It was unpredictable. It's everything we want out of wrestling, right? We want to suspend disbelief and think that on any given night, especially in the Rumble, someone who needs it gets the rub from the Rumble and now they're viewed in a main event light, right? Cena doesn't need that. Punk doesn't even need it. Charlotte doesn't need it. And everyone saw it coming a million miles away. She didn't look great out there in terms of her technique, in terms of how she wrestled. There are at least five other people who

deserve that more and who would have benefited from it more. And so, as much as I thought they got the men's rumble right, they got the women's rumble wrong. I fully agree with that. It's hard to get them both right, and it's a little bit long as a whole, but whoever came up

with the rumble, that really is one of the greats. Every one minute, the crowd's waiting to hear that music. It is awesome, man. They do such a good job. What a basic spot, too, when Cena's got him up. Cena's got him up, and all he's got to do is drop him forward, but he goes back over. They just barely push his jaw in the back, and John just plops down, lands on both feet. That was the most simple exit that we saw all night, without question. I mean, he touched his back, and he fell to both feet.

It was, again, from an artistic standpoint, this was brilliant stuff. John does not take any kind of a bump. This is his final time. John passes the torch in an appropriate way. This was such a cool moment because of how basic they let him go. I mean, John lands on both feet. He lands on both feet. He's just like, oh my gosh, what just happened? That's very realistic, Ariel. That's what would realistically happen if people were doing it. That was a great spot, man. They did such a good job. They really did. 70,000 people?

Yeah. They got 70,000 people there. They usually have been playing on Sundays, these pay-per-views. So they play it Saturday in front of 70,000. TKO, which owns the UFC, I got to get up at 5 o'clock my time to watch that product, which was ending by the time my family was having our lunch. And I'm just saying for one day, there are two different continents. They're doing two different sold out pieces of business. They've got network deals and sponsorship deals. That is fascinating

to me. But I did not think Ari could pull this off if you really want the truth. When Ari came in and put a valuation of $11 billion on the UFC, and this is years after he's already put $4 billion on the UFC, Ari came out publicly and said that he values TKO, which only owns the WWE and the UFC, at $22 billion. Ariel, you cannot exaggerate in that position. If you come out and exaggerate in that position somebody can end up in handcuffs and i remember being worried when ari made that claim now errol it's only been a year and a half they're up they're 50 billion their stock price

was 70 dollars when when uh ari manuel made that claim they're $157 as I sit here right now. That's just a little over a year later. That is amazing. And more to come with the TV deals and whatnot. Can I ask, when are you going to cross over? When are you going to cross over? I appreciate you saying that. There's more to come.

Like, we don't know where this is going to go or if some of the bosses are going to get their way. Dana was very big. Dana did not want that broken up. He believed we really need to focus and the audience knows where to go and find us. But now they are talking like the football and the baseball, you know, you can put some over here and some over here. And that is just where the world's at. And if they succeed and they do break it up, I mean, yes, then this $157 valuation, you know,

me saying that it's worth a50 billion based on those numbers. Come on, Errol. It could be $100 billion. And I would not have predicted that for this industry. What the UFC is doing right now to be able to sell out arenas that are non-paper views, to go and do something like they did this weekend, or I got to be part of

a Colby show that was in December. That was the biggest fight that we had in December. They had more people and the live gate was slightly under the pay-per-view, but I mean, they're doing multi-million dollar for just their Saturday shows. And that's old school Vince McMahon. Vince used to do that. Whether it was Saturday night's main event, but each Saturday, there'd be something somewhere. And so this business model has been out there. It's a matter of having your company catch up. It's a very interesting time to really study the inner workings of what is now known as TKO. Yes.

And both worlds coming together makes it even more interesting for longtime fans like you and I. When are we going to see you cross over? It's never been easier for a UFC guy to cross over. We've seen other people do it. Like, I feel like it's high time. Chill P on WWE programming. This has to be in the works. You know what I would like it's high time. Chill P on WWE programming. This has to be in the works. You know what I would like an opportunity for?

If Dana and this boxing, if this gets going, I would like an opportunity to call boxing. In fact, I would like to call boxing with you, but I would like an opportunity to call boxing, and that's a very hard thing to break into, and they don't see me that way. They say I'm the MMA guy, and they keep me in this box. If I could just get that opportunity once, I really think I would entertain you.

Boxing more than wrestling. And a right-hand dar, but you know what? I don't know. That's just really never happened. Look at Pat McAfee, by the way. He's doing such a great job. I went and got a haircut, Ariel, and I told the woman, I said, can you do it a little shorter on the sides? But I'm trying to grow the top out.

It's a little longer on top. I'm trying to grow it out. Those were my exact words. And she says to me, oh, the Pat McAfee. Yeah, that's how we're getting those requests all the time. And I thought, no, no, not the Pat McAfee. And then she did my haircut and it was exactly how I wanted it. It was the Pat McAfee. And then she did my haircut and it was exactly how I wanted it. It was the Pat McAfee.

Wow. Little shorter on the side, little longer on top. And it embarrassed me. And now I got to get a new hairdo. I got to go find a new hair. No, I think you look fantastic. The glasses are great. I think you would be a perfect match.

You'd be virtuoso in the world of pro wrestling in some sort of capacity. Manager, commentator, behind the scenes, producer, agent producer agent booker i would love to see it happen i want to i want to ask you something very very serious now uh bryce mitchell the bryce mr situation how do we how do we break this down in the aftermath of it all this is big time stuff and everyone breathe chill breathe uh this is this is a big one but this is one this is one that i think perhaps on i don't know some other shows that you do you maybe can't get into and so i want to i want to have an actual frank discussion with you on this one because i'm obviously this is a topic that is near and dear to my heart and i think i think you may be surprised by my stance but i would love to a get

your opinion on how bryce handled it and how how the UFC, in particular Dana White, has handled it. And I personally had to go through it twice. So it is – World War II, Hitler, it is required learning for all high school kids. But when I went to the University of Oregon, it was required learning there too. So I went through this twice. It is so hard when you get to the part of the story that Hitler died. It is one of the biggest letdowns of the story era because he got, I wanted to get him. I wanted him to have him. I want him tried. I want him in a box. I want him, you know, I don't like how he

escaped. I don't like that he got away with this, to this regard, right? And I wanted him to have him so bad. I wanted that piece of the story to be redone. Now, I must tell you, I have never heard anybody say, except in satire, what Bryce said. Like, I've seen actors that were on TV, Ed Norton in American History X, where he's playing a white supremacist with hate in his heart. He's pretending. That's the only time I've even heard words like this said. I was so pulled back, and I don't really see myself as the guy that's like, oh, I was surprised, or I was disappointed. I don't really see myself that way. Errol, I couldn't believe it. I couldn't believe what he said. You want to know what was interesting?

I don't believe... No, no, I don't believe. There was no hate in his heart. When you say words like that, even in fiction, even where it's written script for performance, the guy, he's got the eyes and he's got the hate in his heart. Bryce did not say it like that. That was just, it used to be given, when I was growing up, there was always an option. They would say, he's racist or he's ignorant. Always. You would never, a guy would never just get called racist. They would say, well, he's either racist or he's ignorant.

And it was important that you had the ignorance because sometimes you will meet a stupid person. And when a stupid person says something stupid, it doesn't necessarily make them the other option. Sometimes they're just stupid. And so what do you. I'd love to hear your take. On him in particular, just the first part, because there's like multiple chapters to this story, right? He had a quote-unquote apology. I do think there is hate in his heart.

When he says that... 100%. I'm sorry. No, no, no. That would be hard to hear as a Jewish person in your spot. If you felt that, I'm sorry. No, no, it's fine. Go ahead. I won't interrupt. Go ahead. The interpretation is part of the discussion. I'm not offended by what he says because I don't put any value on his opinion. So I don't look to Bryce Mitchell to be my sort of guiding light and moral compass. I know the history. I know

who we are. I know what happened. I visited Auschwitz, I've been to Poland, I went to Treblinka, I went to Dachau, I know exactly what it is, I've met survivors, etc. And so when I hear him say things like, you know, the only thing that Hitler wanted to do was rid the Jews of Germany or rid Germany of the Jews because Jews were turning everyone gay, I mean, it's a nonsensical, stupid thing. And to me, it's evil evil because you are siding with evil and so i can't give him that pass but what i would say is i don't want bryce mitchell to get fired i don't want him to get you know in trouble or released or anything like that i just find i was surprised that dana came out so forceful with his response because over the last couple of years he hasn't done that. You can tell that he was somewhat bothered by this rhetoric. What I'm curious about is the decision

to not do anything past that, because ultimately Dana likes to talk about freedom of speech. And he likes to say that in America, you should be allowed to say whatever you want, including hate speech. And he's right. That is the second amendment. You cannot be arrested for saying stuff like Bryce Mitchell said, but as the owner and the president of a company, you can make the decision to say, I don't want my company to be associated with this type of rhetoric. I don't want the article on foxnews.com or cnn.com or thewashingtonpost.com to say, UFC fighter Bryce Mitchell said X, Y, and Z about Hitler and the Jews. You can make that decision. And they have chosen not to make that decision. And they have

chosen not to make that decision. And they have chosen to say, you could say whatever you want here. Now, I think that's a calculated decision until it hits the bottom line and hurts the bottom line, meaning sponsors pull out. ESPN says, we don't want to do business with you or any other perspective. Broadcasters say, we don't do business. They will allow this to continue to happen. And I also think, Chael, and I'm sorry for going long here, I think part of the reason why you don't, if you're the UFC, punish a Bryce Mitchell on Thursday is because then on Friday,

Conor McGregor is dropping N-bombs. And if you punish Bryce on a Thursday, you gotta then do something to Conor and you don't wanna do something to Conor because he's still the biggest draw. And so it's easier to just do nothing and hope that it doesn't affect the bottom line. And guess what?

It hasn't. And so they will continue to allow this. It's a very interesting discussion. I don't have like a final point. I don't have a thesis other than I'm just kind of reacting to what's happening in front of our eyes and somewhat new territory for us as MMA fans. I really appreciate that, particularly your last two sentences, because I find that with myself is too, I've got very strong opinions and very good observations of this, but I don't quite know my final analysis yet. Ariel, if you were to release Bryce Mitchell, Dana White can now do nothing with Bryce Mitchell. He wouldn't even speak to him again. There is a checks and balances in this. And so if you release

a guy, which is the final straw, what have you really done? Did you punish him? Oh yeah, you bet you have. But what did you really do? And now you're letting him do other things as opposed to if you have him, I suspect that he will be in classes for this. I've seen some things that have happened from gay slur standpoints and fighters so many times think they can use this word that starts with an f and that it just means wimp but it doesn't mean wimp and it really hurts some people's feelings but i will tell you the ufc even if quietly every one of those guys that use that word started taking classes on it they would donate some level of money and there would be events and i only share with you that while they don't ever talk about that there there is a checks and

balances bryce mitchell whatever sponsors he had part of they're gone and they're not coming back share with you that while they don't ever talk about that, there is a checks and balances. Bryce Mitchell, whatever sponsors he had, partner, they're gone and they're not coming back. I mean, there is some real fallout. Do you think so, Chael? Because I've seen a lot of support for him, if I'm being honest. I've actually seen, I don't know, maybe I'm looking in the wrong places. I've seen more support than criticism, to be honest. And so I can imagine there's some like red-blooded you know company out there that says this is the guy that we want representing us so i i don't actually know if there's that type of ripple effect for him sure and yes i i think that you're looking in the in the wrong spot even the demographic that you laid out like you know that that southern and uh that

that red-blooded that that farmer all vote red and the red stands with Israel. Not even a, maybe the red is the only one that's never blinked on that. I'm just sharing with you before we get too much of a political speech. We, I think you might've been looking in the wrong spots. Like this is going to be very detrimental to Bryce, not to mention Bryce could go lose a, a couple of fights and maybe still have a contract. He's not in that spot, whether Dana says it or not. Bryce steps out of line one time and gives him the reason to do it without blaming it on this. He's going to be telling his story walking, man. There are checks and balances here, whether the boss chooses to handle it publicly a certain way or not. He is

not okay with what was said. That I can assure you. No, and it did seem uh authentic could i ask in the early days you remember miguel torres getting released albeit for a week or so because of a a very insensitive joke that he tweeted you remember frank meir losing his versus job because he said he was gonna kill brock lesnar uh i remember matt matreon on my show making some jokes about fallon fox the transgender fighter, and Dana suspending him. I remember Nate Diaz using that F word and he got slapped on the wrist. That doesn't happen anymore. And so I'm wondering, why do you think that is? Why are there no quote unquote repercussions for these types of actions? And you can make a case that what was

said on Thursday was worse than all of that combined. Well, and Errol, in light of this, I mean, this is the final bar. Like there's only a few things in life you can't say. There's a word that starts with an N. There's the word that starts with an F. I have never seen somebody, no matter how smart they were, dance around and then bring Hitler and the Nazis into it. I have never seen that happen. I got held after in class.

You want to know what inspired me? I got held after in class one day. I was 20 years old. I was in my sophomore year. And I referred to somebody and I called him a feminazi. And that was a word that was out there. Somebody was using, I think it was Rush Limbaugh, but somebody was using this term, this feminazi. And the teacher just after class, you know, college is very different than high school where they sit you down or something. Why don said, why don't you stick around? So I stuck around. And he was a Jewish guy. And he said, I heard you say a term, something Nazi earlier.

I said, oh, yeah, feminazi. Yeah, I was proud of my word. And the person that I was upset with, the teacher was also upset. We were upset at the same person. And he just very calmly, he said to me, do you know what the Nazis did? And I said, yeah. And he goes, do you think comparing that person to the Nazis is adequate? And I never said it again. I learned my lesson, right? There's something that happens in your life when you learn. And I'm only sharing for you. I'm not positive that the Wild West that it appears is going to last. I'm not

positive of that. I think there is going to be something that is being put into place now that wasn't previously in place. And then where do you go from there? I don't know that you cut everybody or all of a sudden they don't get TV time or they don't get the opportunity. I'm not sure about that as far as being equitable, but we've had a number of other things all the way down to taxes Taxes and insurance and things that it turned out fighters didn't know and there's classes for all that stuff now And even though that doesn't get made public man all that stuff that now has courses you take what you make of what's what's become of Connor Every day appreciate what I just said. No, it's appreciate that. I love everything about it. Yeah, I'm just it's hard right it's a it's a hard it makes people uncomfortable it's hard and i'm

much like you i don't have a final analysis i can just tell you i i don't think they're actually looking the other way as much as it might appear yeah i i would like to think so but again i think sometimes people think that when i bring this stuff up and talk about it it's because i want to see a bryce mitchell get punished the only thing I would love to see happen to Bryce Mitchell, honestly, I would love for Bryce Mitchell to go to Poland and spend a day in Auschwitz. And tell me afterwards if your research holds up. I don't know where he's finding this stuff, but go there, walk into the gas chambers, look at the scratches on the wall, look at the mountains of ashes, look at the broken glasses and the suitcases and the dolls that they told the kids to pack as they were going on a trip,

which was to the gas chambers, to the concentration camps. And then tell me if you think all of this was fake. Tell me if you think all of this was made up. Tell me if you think these numbers are inflated. I would love to ask you, and it's not the same topic, but it's still a bit of an uncomfortable topic. What do you make of Conor and what do you do with Conor if you're the UFC? Because it does seem like we're in a tricky spot here with him, to put it mildly. Yeah. Well, again, I'm glad that you worded it like that. And these do, they are very close, including my final analysis, which is I'm still open to some debate on this.

Historically speaking, criminal, whatever is going on with the criminal courts, all the way down to if you're dismissed or you got a trial coming up, whatever it is, the organization will recognize. That's between you and the courts, but whatever the final with the gavel comes, we're going to go on that. Whether we think you're innocent or we think we're going to honor what the courts do, that's historically. But that is not queried over to civil. And it's really never been tested to this degree. And the accusations and what it was found that he did with the rape and whatnot, it was very different when it was civil. And the

intent was not to punish him by taking his time and free him away. It was to have him write a check to you. It was just one of these things where nobody really knew how they were going to handle it. And then the ultimate suggestion is to go to Dana and say, hey, you've got to release the guy. And Dana has a hard time explaining that to the audience. Like, hey, if I'm personally pissed off at the guy, if I release him, I have, there's nothing, I have no ability. Right now, I got him under contract. And if I'm personally upset with him, I don't have to fight him. Which by the way, I'm not. And Dana explained that to a degree, but he was letting people know, like, it's not a matter of release Conor or let

Conor go somewhere. I released him. He goes somewhere else. He becomes a big star for somebody. He's with me and I'm not using him. He's sitting on Ireland, watching the show on pay-per-view like everybody else. Like there's a level of that that makes a lot of sense. And I don't always see where we're giving up on a guy or, or, or washing your hands

of him. I don't really see where that is always the most effective. I don't know that I get that argument. Do you think we see it? And politicians have this too. We have politicians that are mad at Russia. So because they're mad at Russia, they refuse to meet with Putin. And it was Barack Obama himself that came out and said, hey, this idea that we're punishing

Putin by not talking to him is not true. Let's sit down. Let's tell our side and see if we can get somewhere. But we're not just going to ignore him like a kid in high school. That's a quote from Barack Obama. I think Obama makes a lot of sense. No, and I don't think the UFC is going to cut him or release him. I mean, that's bad business if we're just being 100% honest.

Do you think we see him fight again? Do you think we see him fight in the UFC again? Oh, no, no, no, no. Errol, Errol, he pulled out of his last fight, which was a record gate. He beat all of his own gate records. They had 25 million waiting for them for the live gate, and they still had $2 million worth of tickets to sale. I mean, I'm just sharing, like, he is over and he is a star and he was very much needed. And he pulled out of a fight. He pulled out of a press conference where they took an American company to Ireland, played the venue game like everybody and set up shop. I mean, it's a big deal to leave them hanging right there. Ariel, the official reason he did that is for a discolored pinky toe, which may or may not be broken and may or may

not be his. He didn't take a picture of himself with the toe. He took a picture of a toe and posted it online and it was discolored and purple. And I'm sure it was very sore, but we, with no evidence that it was broken or any evidence that it was even his, if you pull out of a fight because of a discolored pinky toe, which may or may not be yours, it may or not be broken. You're not fighting again. That's just the truth. Do you have any interest in him in this, you know, Logan Paul, Jake Paul world, this influencer world, this seems to be of great interest to him. No, I don't. And a lot of that though would come from jealousy. I mean, if I was to look at it and go, Hey, wait a minute, you can make $100 million boxing guys that aren't even boxers. There's going to be a part of me that looks at it like that. You're going to pull out of a fight against Chandler, do what you did to Chandler, and then you're going to fall forward into something. I don't want that to be true. I want to be above that. But there would be a part where I go, wow, you know, it's just not generally that way

that game is supposed to be played. No, Eric, you got to understand, whatever adult, and everybody will have this on, every commission, everybody involved in this, whatever adult allows Conor McGregor to return with the same exact injury that Chris Weidman had. Now, Chris Weidman being possibly the most disciplined guy in the sport, Conor McGregor to return with the same exact injury that Chris Weidman had. Now, Chris Weidman being possibly the most disciplined guy in the sport, Conor being the most undisciplined guy in the sport, Chris Weidman doing everything right, from rehab

to taking his time to focusing to being at home at night and going to bed and getting rest on his leg, he did everything right and did not return as somebody that could follow the basic rule, which was to protect himself at all times, right? That hindered repaired leg was that big of an obstacle. But we're supposed to believe that Conor not only can return from the same thing, he can return better. And we know we

think he's going to be better because we're not booking him in three round fights. We're booking him exclusively in five round main events. So he is going to have to perform at a much higher level than the all American. Ariel, the laws of logic disqualify that. The basic rule is protect yourself at all times. Conor McGregor is not in a position with anybody under contract at the UFC to protect himself at all times. It's a silly proposition. And that is just the truth. I love these chats with you,

chill. I really do. I mean, that is just the truth. Like there's not another way to say it. I also went in on the Connor business. I also want to cover him and have him back. It's different when he's there. I acknowledge the fun,

but if you're talking about any level of responsibility, you can't book him, and you definitely can't book him in a five-round fight. That's insane. Will we see Izzy fight again? Yes. Yes, and I say it like that. Well, yeah, why?

I say it like that because that guy has no idea Do you remember Alexander Gustafson when he comes out and decides he's going to retire? because that guy has no idea. You remember Alexander Gustafson when he comes out and decides he's going to retire? I remember being so irritated. It's like, Gus, you don't know this sport. You're not one of us. Don't act like you're one of us. Gus only did main events.

Gus only did five-round fights. Gus only was headlining or was having to do fights in Sweden where he's carrying the media and the whole gate. It's like, Gus, there's another sport out there. It's called three round MMA, but that's a different sport. Five round MMA, five round practice, five ground run, five ground training sessions is completely different than three-round practice, three-round runs, three-round training sessions. So it's like, Gus, before you wash your hands of this sport, how about you try it in a way that the rest of us get to experience in a normal situation? And I only say that because Adesanya is a little bit in the same way, Errol. He has

never not main evented. He has not never put on top of the bill. He has not not fought for the title since going bad. I mean, my goodness, it's when they did 57,000 live and it was him versus Whitaker first time in Australia. That was a lot. That was a better part of a half a decade ago. And there is another life out there for three round fights. But one thing that Izzy needs is a genuine motivation

to want to beat that guy up. He has to have that. That's how Yoel got his opportunity. Izzy has, it's what cost Izzy in the Strickland fight. As much as he tried to get into character, that wasn't the fight he wanted. That wasn't the guy that he was angry at. That was not Drekus du Plessis and it cost Izzy. And right now, Izzy's got no beef. He's got no heat with anybody. He can try to manufacture it like he did with Strickland or like he did with Emanov over the weekend, but that's not who he is. Like, Jon Jones right now cannot retire. I mean, if you said it would be a good time to retire, no, it'd be terrible.

He's got an interim champion. Or if you used Alex Pereira, it'd be, no He's got an interim champion. Or if you used Alex Pereira, it'd be no. Terrible time to retire. He's got a signed contract with a guy who's favored to beat him. But Izzy doesn't have those things. Izzy's story, if he would like for it to be complete and written, it is. Right now is the perfect time for Izzy to walk away should he choose to. Wow.

Yeah. I mean, other than the money, you're right. There are no real beefs that need to be played out. And I said this yesterday, and I'd love, who better than you to ask this question. I said that the UFC has a superstar shortage. I don't say they have no superstars on the horizon. They obviously have Teporiaia they have islam marab could get there if he continues to win sean comes back we'll see sugar that is um sean strickland has a fan base but i i i do with with with izzy not around with connor not around with john jones being on his you know last chapter um you know these these were superstars over the last few years right do you agree that there's a superstar shortage right now? And by the way, I say this while also acknowledging that the biggest star in the UFC is Dana White, that people adore him, that the biggest draw in the UFC are those three letters.

They don't necessarily need superstars. That's the wild thing about all of this. They have become so popular and such a behemoth to our previous conversation that they don't need it. But if you actually just look at the rankings and the pound for pound, there is a bit of a, of a shortage. Is there not? Sure. And you, and you left off Patty, the baddie who, who not for nothing, but if you, if you want a reaction from the crowd, he's as popular as anybody they got right now in arrow. That's very in line with what's going on at WWE right now.

Like there are a number of veterans, but as far as having, like, remember when The Rock came back last year, but we really needed him or the year before that and The Rock came, but we really needed him. They've got so many great guys, but I do hear you on that. Like when I was growing up, it was Hulk Hogan and Big Step and everybody else. And at some point it was The Ultimate Warrior for, you know, about a year and a half, but Big Step down, everyone else. Most of my life, it was Hogan, Ric Flair, big step down though, and everybody else. And I just bring that because yet to your point, man, they are doing business. They are turning this thing around. They got a show coming

up in Seattle, which is right up the road for me in a couple of weeks, but you got Dominic Cruz on there. You got Henry Cejudo on there. That's going to be on free television. Like, they've got these guys. They have so much talent and so many names. But as far as that superstar, that Conor or that Kimbo Slice, yeah, sure. You're right. They're limited. A couple more, and I'll let you go. Just curious.

Backstage in Tampa, you and Hogan, did you talk? Did you kibitz? Did you break bread? Any conversations? I'm so glad somebody's finally asked me about that. Do you know what that's like in my perspective? So I go and buy tickets with my buddy Justin Wolf in the sixth grade, and we go down in person to G.I. Joe's, which had a ticket master.

That used to be the name of the company. I think now it's like Live Nation. And we look at the schematic of the building, and we're only 11. We don't totally understand Blueprint, so we got to figure out where the ring is, which way it faces, because we want on the aisle so we can touch the guys. When they walk in,

we want to be the, you know, that's holding up the high five. So we get them. Everything's cool in the game. Everything is going my way. In fact, not only do I get to see Hulk Hogan wrestle, I get to see him wrestle Andre the Giant. Everything is going my way. I touch Andre on his way to the ring. I touch him on the way back. I even turn to my friend, I show him the sweat on my hand from Andre. There's Hogan. Here he is. He's within reach.

He's right there. I reach out. Somehow I missed him. Oh my God. I couldn't believe it. I told my buddy, my buddy touched him. So I, and I missed him. I'm like, oh my God, I missed, I missed. I don't know how I missed. He's like, how you, anyway. So then all these years later, I get to be in the locker room with him and on a level working with him. And Errol, he was so respectful. When he walked in, I thought he and Colby were like old buddies. That's what I just assumed. So when Hogan comes in and Colby comes over and says hello, it was very clear they were just meeting for the first time. So I'm trying to figure out this dynamic. And then Colby tells him, Hulk, when the camera comes on, I want it on you. I'm playing

your music when we come out. I want you waving the flag. Me and the team will be right behind you. Get a little bit of a head start. And Hogan stopped him. And Hogan said, this is the very first thing he said. I mean, he doesn't know anyone in the room. And Hogan said, you're going too far.

And he said, this is not my night. This is your night. I back you up. And he refused to go out first. And it turned into a thing where Colby was like, well, I actually know I want this played and then I'm going to come rip this shirt off. Like I got that, but it's important that you go first holding the flag. And Hogan said, I will not do it. And they compromised that Hogan would go side by side with him,

but Hogan would absolutely not go in front. And I just thought that was incredible leadership. I thought for him to walk into a room where he was a little bit caught off guard and then turn down some of the lights, I was impressed. That might sound like a simple move. It was a cool move. Do you want to see Colby fight again? Yes, for goodness sakes. I mean, here's the thing.

That fight was starting to go so well. I mean, it really was. And no one knows what the ceiling is on Joaquin Buckley. Like, we don't have evidence yet that he's not going to be a world champion. He's incredible. Colby's got his flap of skin. It's hanging down over his eye. So there's blood pouring out.

You can't see anyway. But then there's a flap of skin that is blocking. Like, if you made all the blood stop, you can't see because you've got a flap of skin. The reason that George Masvidal won his first fight with Colby in the streets and he lost his second fight with Colby in the ring is because Colby couldn't see him the first time. He came up from behind in disguise. Like, if you want to, And then it's not even close when

Colby can't see him. It's not too much for me to want my guy to be able to see. I mean, that's not like some big request by me. So Colby goes out there. It's still going his way. He's still upset when that fight gets stopped. He's completely fresh. I mean, I'm talking to him in the ring. He could go two more rounds very easily. I'm just sharing, like, he is so damn tough. And he was even tougher than I knew he was. I've known him his whole life. I did not know he was that.

I didn't know he was the guy that could fight with his eyeball falling out. They had to take him in the back. Two different doctors. Dr. Davidson and the head doctor in Florida. And it was a two-man crew where they're sewing him up and trying to get all of this to stop him. It was a very big deal. He didn't mind. He didn't mind at all. He was just mad. He didn't win the fight and, uh, he doesn't need to fight again, but, but will he likely fight again? Yes. Will he likely fight again against Gilbert Burns? Oh, also. Yes. Okay. A little bit of news. Last thing, last thing you told our guy guy Drake yesterday that you got this offer from GFL. They wanted you, but you have to know when to say when. Did you seriously consider it? Did you have a chat with the family? Were you close to saying yes and then change your mind? Or was it just one of those, hey, I'm flat or a better story to tell you. No, it wasn't like that. And by the way, I don't fully know what the GFL was proposing.

I never fully understood if it was a promotional standpoint, maybe through the YouTube or the podcast and just get them out there. Maybe it was be live and help to commentate. And maybe it was to coach a team or to go right on the roster. I wasn't completely clear, but I was glad that they called. I mean, not for nothing. They were calling all these other guys, and I was hearing about it, and my phone hadn't rang yet.

And then you start to feel a little bit left out. That's true. And no. So, no, there wasn't a massive consideration. I don't fully know what they need. And I just could not imagine doing anything again. I've always felt like my career would not be over until I had fought Vandalay Silva and Vitor Belfort. And I can't fully tell you why, but I had always thought that. In fact, John Anik

even said that to me way over in our Fox days. He said, well, your career will never be complete till you rematch Anderson Silva, you fight Vandalyen, you fight Vitor Belfort. And I just accepted that. When he said it in that moment, that became my destiny. And I never had the Vitor fight. And it does cross my mind. From time to time, it will cross my mind and think, how did we never quite match up? We had a contract one time. We had a signed contract, but how did we never quite match up? So that one would be the one that would make me at least think, or as you say, sit down with the family. I don't really sit down with the family. I'm in charge of this family. I don't need to ask anyone what they do. They come to me.

There's a reason they call me daddy, Ariel. You understand that? No, I understand. Daddy will make those decisions. But sometimes I pretend that I want to hear from them. Chael, there's a young man who works on my program here. We have a great team here at Uncrowned. We're building a great thing here. I don't know if you've heard about it, but his name is Jordan Kamzan.

We call him On Air Jordan. And I don't know if you know this, but he used to work at ESPN with Corporate Jake and Elizabeth and Nick and the whole team over there. And he was a producer, worked on our show. And you used to hit him up from time to time thinking, he told this story on the program last week, thinking that he is who? Jordan Coker. Yes. the son of scott coker so you would ask him for bellator footage he told us this great story on the program and so uh he's in the back he's in the control room right now is there anything you want to say he actually would i think he would keep the jig up i don't think he i got him right here there it is i have my text

message with him right here did he not reply reply? Can I just jump? Yeah. Can I just jump in on your story real fast? Go ahead. Yeah. So precisely what you said, but I was building submission underground. And the reason that's relevant is the UFC owns that. So when I would go to him and need this content, the UFC would say to me, it would be this beautiful Bellator content.

And they're like, are you sure we have the right to do this? It's like absolutely this is straight from jordan coker and that was it they didn't make me supply or prove or get a lot of times they're like a little something signed when it came from jordan man that that was it and he was so good he was so johnny on the spot where he i'm trying to edit something or he would get that stuff back it could be a sunday morning at 8 a.m. Jordan would turn these things around and get them to me. So then I find out over time that that's Jordan from ESPN, which I guess got saved in my phone just as Jordan. It's not Jordan Coker's number. Turned out I don't even have Jordan Coker's number. And yeah, I mean,

that's the story. I think that's the one that you just told, but that's the story. And I've always been so appreciative that Jordan never treated me. I mean, if I bother him. I think that's the one that you just told. Yes, this is it. And I've always been so appreciative that Jordan never treated me. I mean, if I bother him on a Sunday at 8 a.m., it's work for him and he would always do it. And it's like, I've never even thanked him properly, but I was very grateful and still am. Well, there you have it. He writes on the screen right there, let him know if you need more Bellator footage. That's here. That is so funny.

I think he appreciates the thank you. And I thought you were wondering maybe perhaps what happened to him. Now you know. He's a part of the team here. I appreciate that. I was wondering. I know that you guys are building something great. So it doesn't surprise me that you've got great people like Jordan.

You've got a great staff all around, by the way. I was talking with Eric earlier today. I mean, all around you've got a great staff all around, by the way. I was talking with Eric earlier today. I mean, all around, you got a great staff. I really saw that the first time. First off, you invited me in to the new vertical, as you call it. But I got to be part of your debut out in Las Vegas. Oh, that was fun. And got to see the team when they came in in numbers to get that right.

Boy, did they pull that off. They really respected you in this program, by the way. That rollout that they gave you, wow. That was, that was nice of you to do. Um, we've shared many great memories. Of course, who could forget the, uh, the beef short rib that we shared with Liev Schreiber just a couple of months ago at the, uh, Teddy Atlas foundation dinner. That was a great time. One of the many great nights that we've had together, Chael. Uh, I love you. It was great. It was very nice. That guy. He was amazing. And I loved how excited you were to speak to him.

I don't often see you excited. And then the highlight of my night was one of the greatest college basketball coaches of all time, coach of the two-time defending national champion UConn Huskies, Dan Hurley, the great Dan Hurley, just glowing, giddy

over the idea of getting to shake your hand and meet you. And I was able to make that introduction. This guy is an uber fan of yours and a legend of the college basketball game. Two-time defending national champion wanting to meet you above all the legends up there. That was a delight. I'm sorry to shake my head, yes. But yeah, you introduced it.

And that did make me feel good. I had no idea that he would. And basketball and MMA don't always cross over. Maybe I don't say the nicest things about basketball. He knew that. He knew the things I said about basketball, but he was still into it. Now, that was a big thrill. That was a real thrill to meet him, but boy, did Teddy Atlas ever pull that event off.

I met Larry Holmes that night. In fact, Larry was rude to me. Michael Spinks, who fought Mike Tyson for 91 seconds back when I was a little kid. Man, these guys were all there. It was really cool. Turiel Gotti, his son was there. Yeah, it was awesome, man. That was a heck of an event.

And Lee was so nice, by the way. He was such a regular guy. And that does not happen very often. There generally is something like, you know, be careful when you meet these guys because you leave disappointed. He was so normal. He was just having a conversation with a regular guy. He was, that was great. That really was great to sit by him.

Yeah. And a real fight fan too. It was, it was amazing. Chell, I love you like a brother. Thank you so much. God bless you. God bless your family. I don't know if your wife is still there, but my regards to her as well.

And thank you for the time. Thank you for the time. And we you. God bless your family. I don't know if your wife is still there, but my regards to her as well. And thank you for the time. Thank you for the time. And we look forward to the ultimate fighter. When do you go out there? You want to say hi to Ariel? Oh, come on. She's still here one whole hour. Will you just say hi?

Come on, Miss Brittany. Say hi. Don't be shy. Come on. She's not coming. I can tell. She has that look on her face where she's really. She's like, drop it.

Thank you for wishing me the luck on the Ultimate Fighter don't need it It's just Daniel but we will have a good time I will get my guys and most Likely his guys in a right position So that they can be ready for the UFC And that's what this is all about thank you Helwani Peace out Chell thank you so much good luck to you

Kaboom there he is the great Chell Peace Sonnen One of the great friends in my life uh despite some of our differences has uh has been nothing but a true loyal friend and i hope he feels the same about me uh despite some of our differences i remember i will never forget the first couple episodes of ariel and the bad guy uh back at the uh the mothership and uh i remember i remember tweeting something to the effect of like like a kid who writes home to his parents like hey everyone

camp is doing well i miss you i'm fighting with my bunk mate something like that because the first couple episodes were rough because we weren't quite we weren't quite meshing. And I think part of the reason was, if I do say so myself, he wasn't used to me debating him or arguing with him. He was used to kind of this dynamic where I team up and ask him questions. And I think he was a little bit perturbed by my takes on the business

because I've never made that walk like him. But there is only one Shale P and I've never made that walk like him. But there is only one Chael P. And I do truly love him and appreciate him. And always enjoy those chats. And that was another great one. I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did. I think we could finally put the mystery of the Bellator footage to bed, Jordan.

Does that suffice for you? Do you feel good about that? Yeah, I feel pretty good. I mean, I love Chael no matter what. That's right. Great stuff from Chael. I appreciate him giving us an hour. And his wife is really

salt of the earth. Does anyone's significant other... Am I the only one that doesn't get this type of treatment? Do any of you guys get your clothes laid out for you in the morning or when you go on a trip i mean i've never heard of such a thing apparently it's it's pretty common over there i by the way i didn't even realize i thought it was just trips i didn't realize it was a regular tuesday morning occurrence i thought all right he doesn't know how to pack he doesn doesn't want to be, you know, stressed about

it every day. Respect. I'm not as rich as Chael. Yeah. He's a rich man and he's got the money to have the, the never have to wash the underwear and never have to wash the. My mom used to do it for me back in the day.

Yeah. She actually required me to wear a collared shirt to school at least twice a week. Couldn't wear t-shirts every day. Really? Yeah. Why twice, not three times? I don't know. Tuesdays and Thursdays were polo days. Monday, Friday was. Wow. And all throughout elementary school, Fridays were actually Hawaiian shirt day. Come on. I was dripped up. I had a little bit of the baby fat on me, Hawaiian shirts every Friday.

Yeah, I was a killer back in the day No matter the season? No matter the season I was like the husky kid that wore shorts No matter what Dare I say you were action Bronson S Yeah yeah yeah cut from the same cloth Wow you would wear shorts I mean you grew up in Atlanta so how cold does it really get? I mean it gets cold

Like last week when it was like single digits here It was like 14 or 15 in Atlanta Oh I was thinking Celsiuselsius okay wow all right we are in america yeah no i forgot i forgot it's my brain just goes um yeah my mom would lay it out like first grade second grade it certainly don't do it now um even even i would hope kids i mean i'm not gonna lie i'll be totally real like seventh grade seventh grade and mom was still throwing them out there for me wow and then and then what like how did it end what happened he got shoved in a locker or something yeah he saw merch and then he was like i had to pick my own i had to get my own swag my own

identity my favorite part of all that is is her in the background saying of course like this is a crazy thing to even question of Of course I do it on a random Tuesday. Who knows what Chell would be wearing without, without her. That's right. That's a good point. Maybe that's what started it. Maybe nothing.

That could be it. That could have been what started this. She hated the outfits he was picking out. She took control of the situation. She took matters into her own hands. Guys, I wanted to bring up another thing as we, as we round third here on this lovely tuesday and of course we play two on tuesdays five o'clock uh ariel and ade on his own boxing's

youtube channel yeah there it is and i do want to let you know ariel hawani.substack.com is the place to be to uh send in questions for tomorrow's on the nose that post will be up in a matter of minutes and arielhawani.com is the place where you can get your official merch. There's more to come on ariahawani.com. Some very exciting things in the works over at ariahawani.com.

So please do stay tuned. And don't forget that uncrowned.com is your number one home for all things combat sports. I love when we go through these. And thumbs up to the chat. Yes, some amazing stuff

over at uncrowned.com over the last few days. Killer, killer stuff. Patchy Mix has asked for his release from the PFL, walking in the same footsteps as one Patricio Pitbull. I don't know how well this is working out for Patricio, to be honest, but he has posted this. He posted this, I believe, yesterday. Right now, I'm 31 years of years of age and by the way i do believe he is out in australia with tatiana suarez his significant other and there's maybe a part of him that sees everything that she is getting right now the attention the the buzz the spotlight the hoopla being a part of a ufc title fight and saying i need this i want this i spent my last six he writes, of my life fully dedicated to Bellator. I worked extremely hard and sacrificed everything to win the Grand Prix and become a three-time world champ. Now with the promotion gone, I'm exactly champion of what?

I've always showed up to put it on the line, never turned down a single fight. Right now, in perspective, as a healthy world champion, I fought just once going on 15 months. All my momentum in my career has been lost as this is the longest layoff of the 31 fights I've had between amateur and pro. He later goes on to say, I ask this with the utmost respect and urgency from, I do believe that's Don Davis and the PFL. Is DSCCT Don Davis davis perhaps please release me from my contract so i can perform to make money and do what i have to do to support my family i'm in the prime of my career i'm the best he fights at 135 by the way i should be able to compete against the other best fighters in the

world and not be on the shelf if the sky was the limit i'm on the moon right now, skill-wise, and there should be only one octagon I display my skill set in. Plus the ambassador for PFL is Francis Ngannou. I mean, I'm a world champion out of the same gym, and you personally see how hard I work and tried to be a leader for this team. There is no way, this is part of the the byproduct of oh one guy gets loud he asked for his release you oblige others are going to try and follow suit there's no doubt about it they all want to be in the ufc pfl has to at some point hold the line so that there isn't like a a revolution and an uprising and everyone wants out and and so if i were the pfl brass i would say all right let's make a deal in the spirit of luka donchic getting traded to the los angeles lakers after it appears as though

the mavericks at least what they're telling us through their media guys, grew tired with him. If I'm Don Davis or Pete Murray, I call up the UFC and say, I got this guy, let's make a deal. He wants out, we're willing to give him up, let's make a deal. And maybe that deal even includes someone else. Throw in a Dakota, let's make a blockbuster trade what is a trade that if you are the ufc you would offer and what is a trade that if you are the pfl you would accept for patchy mix who who who fits the bill or and this is for for you guys the boys in the back if you're the pfl do you not do this or if you're if you're the ufc do you not partake in this i think we should see more trades in combat sports and in particular in MMA because it's

a lot more exclusive with the contracts and people don't jump over like we see in boxing. Promoters don't co-promote. If I'm PFL, I at least explore this. I say, all right, you want out? Let's make a deal. Yeah, 100%. He's not value to them being unhappy. And also unless something has changed, they haven't been able to

find suitable opponents for him to this point, right? He would have already been fighting. It seems like he's been sidelined for one reason or another. If you have somebody for him, offer it to him. If you don't, I'd say yeah, look to explore something. The problem is, does the UFC need to give anything for that, or can they just wait it out? Can they just wait?

They can wait it out. I mean, Patchy Mix isn't changing their business. Who would you even trade also? Do you do a bantamweight? Do you just do anyone? It doesn't have to be a bantamweight. Remember, the only time we've ever seen a trade was Demetrius for Askren, and they weren't the same way.

Honestly, maybe could have put Rosenstreich in the trade block. I was literally going to say, some of the ones that they'd probably want are the ones you just let walk out the door anyway, so I don't know what the UFC's motivation is.

We need a trade machine to see if it's plausible, similar to the NBA and NFL. Could PFL have used a Chris Weidman? Yeah. Or Zeno Rosenstreich? Like all these names. Tony Ferguson.

Tony Ferguson. That just went out the door. You know what? It's not a bad shout. If you're the UFC, would you... I just wait. Just wait. Just for fun.

Just for fun. This will end poorly and I won't get him. If you're the UFC, just throwing it out there, Colby Covington for Patchy Mix, do you do it? No. Yeah, I don't think so either. I would do it if I'm the PFL. Yeah, sure, but Patchy Mix is not going to fight for you anymore.

Is Colby Covington going to fight for the PFL also? No, you get him on board. This is in a world... I'm just going off of the blockbuster trade that we had in a world where if you're unhappy in the nba you're getting shipped and and and if you get shipped you have to play and if you don't play you don't get paid right so let's just pretend like all these guys are unhappy right they just do they just think that the you in our world right if i'm unhappy with this arrangement that we have with yahoo and i say you know what i don't want to do this anymore i'm not getting paid

because i'm now breaching my contract now he could say they're not giving me fights and who knows what's going on behind the scenes and their season is about to start in two months so i would imagine he would be a part of it and he and he asks i'm a champion of what now he should just be a champion of bellator like it's just very easy. Excuse me, a PFL. They don't have a 35 division. Just make him the 35 champ. But it's about to start, so I would imagine he's getting a fight.

If he doesn't want to fight, you don't get paid, you don't get to fulfill a contract, and you certainly don't get to walk out the door and go to the competitor. Right? So let's make a deal. What is a deal that you would make if you're the PFL? I would take the that you would make If you're the PFL I would take the Colby trade If you're the PFL of course

I wouldn't take that if I was the UFC though Okay so we haven't found a winner Would you do I'm just throwing it out here Would you do Jamal Hill Again I don't think the UFC is doing this No Think about the upside How old is Pachymex I'm losing Jamal Hill. Again, I don't think the UFC is doing this. Think about the upside that Patchy...

How old's Patchy Mix? But what's... I'm losing Jamal Hill is the problem. 20-1, 7-5 win streak. Here's the thing. You know what? The Askren for DJ trade was the perfect trade. It was the perfect trade.

There is a perfect trade out there. I'm finding it. Because you're getting Askren as a foil to some of your guys who can talk the shit and help you on the promotional side, but also you're done with the DJ business. You no longer want but if I have Jamal Hill or Colby, I probably want to keep them. You guys have to tell me this though. Was Askren begging to get

out of one when the train happened? He wasn't begging, but it was like the road, you know, it came to an end. He was done. Yep. Okay. Patchy mix for Rose Namajunas. Hmm. That's doable.

That's not horrible. Championship days are likely behind her. Big name. Opponent for Dakota. That's what I'm saying. I'm working here. I'm working here. You make that trade. Trade machine savant over here. I'm trying to find something. I think there's a trade that can be made.

And you know what? She fits into that thing we were talking about earlier in terms of the salary is probably pretty high for Rose, right? Whereas now we're entering territory. Is it worth paying her this money to keep her? Yeah, that's not bad. Because if I'm the PFL, I'm like, all right, I got a great 35er, but who else do I really have at 35, right?

Yeah. No, that's the problem. It's not a bad route going the women's flyweight to get opponents for Ditcheva. Okay, this is going to get a package deal. Is he a... Oh, I thought you were saying is. I thought you were saying is.

You know what? Is he a needle mover to where he's going to sell out a stadium in, I think he's from Buffalo. That's your mix? Yeah. Yeah, he's. I don't know if he's a needle mover like that, but he has the potential to be one.

I mean, he's so good. No, but I'm saying that's why. All right, you could get a Dakota versus Rose fight. I don't know. I don't hate Dakota versus Rose fight. You know, at the UFC, you start selling MMA's next power couple, strawweight champion Tatiana Suarez, her boyfriend, Patchy Mix.

Okay, throwing out another one. That was a pretty good one. I'll give you credit there. Patchy Mix for Aljamain Sterling. No, stop. Come on. Only because... Aljamain just got to 45.

There's plenty there still. You think Aljamain would fight at 45 in PFL? I would assume, yeah. By the way, fast forward, or excuse me, rewind the tape to 2018, yeah? Demetrius Johnson just fought for the UFC belt. He was their champion, and they traded him. Yeah.

Like, we're way past that with Al Jermaine. Yeah. But from the UFC standpoint, this guy is begging to get out. I also, I did confirm, DSCCT is in fact Don Davis. No post since 2019, though. On what? Last post was actually

Todd Gurley with a PFL shirt on. Oh, wow. And then if you look at the comments, it's just people being like, release patchy mix, release patchy. Oh, no. Free patchy. Oh, I guess because they clicked on.

Yeah, but even from eight weeks ago, people were saying free Patchy. Damn. By the way. Todd Gurley. Whatever happened to Todd Gurley? Is he still in the league? It's a tough business being a running back in the NFL, man. He's out.

Been out, bro. Been out. Great dog. I still feel like you were onto something with the Rose one. Yeah, like the Rose. Hey, that's the biggest Text on that idea Corey Sanhagen

Nah No I'm not doing that Corey's got a bigger name Than Apache at this point Okay Throwing one out there Jose Aldo

I thought about that But Man it's like It feels like he's too much Of a legend to trade him But He's not only too much Of a legend

But if I'm the PFL What's his value to Like I Also do No no no There is value for PFL, what's his value to me? Also, dude, there is value for PFL because people get hyped for Jose Aldo fights. I mean, the amount of Mario Bautista memes that have come out. Against who?

Who we put in? Alex Pereira v. Mario Bautista. Jose Aldo versus who in the PFL? Fuck, you figure it out. Nasty. That's... Winnable fight. Anyone. Winnable fight. Rose is the one Throwing out another one Wonderboy Thompson

Yeah That's doable I just don't know if Wonderboy is doing that At his stage in his career You're taking the business You're taking the business out They have to do it This is like Luca has to play,

Davis has to play. Do you do that deal? Yeah. It's a fun game. I'm not gonna lie. My worry is Wonderboy being like, I can just retire. I'm all good. If we're really treating it like that, Yeah. I don't wonder if we're really treating it like that. If I'm the PFL, I'm not taking any of these people back for Patchy.

Serious. Patchy, you get some name value. Patchy Mix is not, he's an incredible fighter, but he's not selling pay-per-views for you. That's fine. I'm not giving up the Luka in this one. Patchy's the Luka. He's a stud. I'm not giving up Luka. He's a stud. 20 and 1. He's nasty. By the way, Patchy is Anthony Davis.

He's 31. I'm saying, like, in this scenario, Wonderboy is a Wonderboy. Age is different in this game. I get it. I get it. I get it. Most champions are in in this game. I get it. I get it. I get it. Most champions are in their 30s. I get it. I get it. If you're going to give me

a 26-year-old, then I'll take it. Oh, so is 31 that old nowadays? No. What I'm saying is Lucas is 25. Am I washed? How old is Peyton Talbot?

How old is that? I think he's 27 or something. Yeah. I'll do that if we want to do it. Peyton Talbot? You would do that already? You're off the... I don't know. No, man. There's an upside there with Pey something. I'll do that if we want to do it. Peyton Dalbert. You would do that already? I don't know. No, man. There's an upside

there with Peyton. I don't know. I'm saying. Bring Apache Mix over. I'll take you, Phil. Okay, but the UFC ain't doing that. I'm trying to think of something the UFC would do. Curtis Blades. Nah, I'm holding Apache on that one. Yeah, yeah. It's hard. The Rose one's a good one.

You really... That's the biggest. That's a good one. You really, you really That's the biggest, that's the best one? And the key there is that you have an opponent. You have the opponent. It's a big fight. Okay, so yeah,

so we're trying to, that's a good point. We're trying to match her up with your biggest star and their biggest star right now is Dakota probably, right? Makes sense. How about give me,

give me, Okay. Give me Okay Give me Give me Cyril Gann And then I'll just Take over France I'll put Cyril I'll put Cyril and

Cedric Dumbé on a card And just Take over France You think they would do that You think they would do that Let's do it Gann would be hyped about that I don't think they would do that

Francis Ngannou Cyril Gann Okay how about this one Cedric Dumbé We're taking over Raphael Fazeev I don't know if PFL is doing that. The reason I'm asking you now is because I'm thinking,

okay, who are the other big stars? You got Usman at 55. You have a potential great fight there. I don't know if PFL is going to jump. You cooked with Rose. I don't know if PFL is going to jump. Okay, what about BSD? BSD, France?

If I'm PFL, I'd say you want us to take over France, throw in Ghan as well. I Ghan as well Okay, final offer There's your fight right there Final offer Final offer Yeah Rows and BSD for Pachi Yeah, let's do it, sign the papers

Who are you speaking as right now? Both, let's get it done Okay, you're UFC, GC's Bellator, or PFL. So, Rick, UFC, you're doing this? You're unloading those two? Rose and BSD for Pachi. That's the trade. I need Pachi, and I need some kind of future consideration.

No, it's two for one. Pachi's got the upside. He's the champion. High ceiling, Tatiana, significant other, power couple, blah, blah, blah. You want me to take a guy? You want me to take a guy coming off two straight losses and another fighter past the championship days?

Face of a market. One of the faces of a market. Face of a market? Yeah. We already have the face of the market. We got another one. By the way, I think there might be a feud there between the two of them. I'm leaving this meeting. I appreciate it. When you come with a real offer, you let me know. Come with a real offer. For real.

You don't consider that. And you got an opponent for Rose. Look, not only do we have the face of the market in France, we don't need BSD. We also have Todd Gurley wearing PSL. See, here's the thing. Connor's not playing this right because Connor has no leverage. Connor has zero leverage.

That's the issue. You would take whatever, right? Because Pachy Mix, all he wants to do is walk. You compared it to the Lucas situation, but it wasn't like Lucas was like, I'm never playing again for the Mavericks. I'm never playing another. It's more like

Jimmy Butler, actually. You would take whatever you could get if a trade got proposed to you, especially if it involved Rosnama, Unis, and BSD. You would run to sign those papers because Pachy Mix is publicly posting, get me the fuck out of here. I need to leave here. I'm done with this place. So even if you got him for one fight, I feel like he would still be itching to leave after that. As you talked about when we were talking about the Patricio stuff, it's like they're broadcasting here.

So the UFC has a lot of leverage in their direction where they can just go, yeah, well, wait. If it happens, it happens. If it doesn't, it doesn't. But they want to be with us. You want to come to me.

I don't have to come to you. Sure, but if I'm the PFL, I'm just like, tough noogie. You're staying with us. That's what I would do if I was the PFL. I would not let Patchy Mix go

if I was the PFL. Well, that's why I say, okay, you're so unhappy, let's make a deal. Let's improve our situation situation you get to be happy the ufc gets their guy like why can't why can't it be why does everyone just have to be released look i i know i know we always we hate doing this especially rick hates doing it the old the old ig follower game oh yeah tell me what's y'all's guess for fory mix? I'm gonna say I'm going to say in the range of

16 to 25k. I'm gonna go 40k. Alright, you guys are both pretty close. 36k. Oh, I was really close. You guys were really close. And by the way, what's BSD? Benoit Saint. Over a million. Denis, 795,000.

Not bad Rosnami Yunus 2 million 2.2 million Yeah 2 million Just like I know it's not an indicator Of everything

But like it is Partially an indicator Of star power It is wild Like you see like MVP now MVP was in Bellator forever And then he posts something After his UFC fight

And it gets like Insane likes That he would never touch in Bellator. I mean, he's touching a million now. Yeah, hell yeah. And by the way, 141K on the ring post? This is what Patsy Mix is saying, right?

Like, it's like, if I can get into that machine, if I can be in the UFC, if I can leave this, this is what's awaiting me. He can find this fortune. He can find this fame and fortune if he's in the right system

and has the eyeballs on him that he believes he deserves. I also believe he deserves it. I also think you're making a great point with him being in Australia, probably with Tatiana right now and seeing the treatment that she's getting and the opportunity that she has this weekend

to become the champ undefeated. And the way he's getting treated at PFL, he is probably itching to get out. Is there any way the PFL can make amends? Sure, if they offer him something. But I think he probably watched what happened with Patricio. I think he sees how his – I keep saying significant other because I'm not sure if they're married or not, so I don't want a Girlfriend whatever partner Is being treated

I think he gets paid pretty well So if they offer him something tomorrow But I think everyone wants to be in the UFC And you're kidding yourself If you believe otherwise And that's the battle that the PFLs of the world are always going to have to Fight And that's why when Paul Hughes gets on the microphone and says this is where i want to be because they believed in me there's incredible value to that but they all

want to be in the ufc if they're being a thousand percent honest and so they have to they have to make it right or they could just say all right we're not going to make it right we don't want to be in the bantamweight division business but we need need to benefit from this, so let's make a deal. The other one is, and shout out to the chat. I see it on the YouTube chat. Thumbs up, thumbs up. They had a good one? You need an opponent for Francis, and so you have to think, right?

You have to think. Dakota is your star. Francis is your star. Maybe the Srelgan fight is. Jairzinho too? I think I got it. I got it. Jairzinho too?

I got it. Patchy. Throne Rose is the track on they. For who? Derek Lewis. How much more are we getting out of Derek Lewis at this point? We do Ngannou Lewis too? Yeah. Man, the promo for that one's gonna be good. I think there's something. There is an appetite for that. It's better than anything else

they have. I'm watching it for sure. I like Rose better, but I'm not opposed. I like Rose better, but I'm not opposed. I like Rose better, but I'm not opposed. Do we think a trade happens period? No. I told you way back in the day, there was some early preliminary discussions about two fighters.

Did I ever say who the two fighters were? No, you did not. Oh, I didn't. It was Patsy and Usman. There were phone calls made. There were deliberations. When are we talking? Early days.

MMA needs more of a trademark. When is this? Give me the timeline. There were deliberations. I like that. When are we talking? Early days. MMA needs more of a trademark. When is this? Give me the timeline. Pre-sale. I want to wake up at 6am to trade news. Yeah. I want a Helwani bomb. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Where everybody thinks it's fake. Like, holy shit, Patchy Mix got traded for... I mean, I, by the

way, I broke the, you know, you remember the Askren DJ. I remember exactly where I was. I was in the basement of ESPN, like the basement basement next to the digital section of that building. I don't remember what number it was. Jordan's on his phone talking to Chael. And I remember. I think it was building two. Was it building two?

And I remember typing it up and being like, this is absurd. And I remember my heart pounding because it seemed so absurd. You know, like i'm sure shams felt the same way actually i saw an interview with him where he said that he thought that he was being duped because it was so absurd and i love that idea oh my god when he got told the news he was like there's no way yeah that's how i mean obviously not to the same level but it was unprecedented what demetrius johnson traded for Ben Askren? It makes no sense. I want to wake up to

Rose has been traded for Pachy Mix. She'll fight Dakota Ditchew on May 17th. And Pachy will fight Corey Sanders. I got it. I got the trade. I got it. Oh, what a deal. This is the one.

Pachy Mix traded to the UFC for the rights to Zabit Magomed Sharipov. Oh, perfect. What? Whose brother fights for them, right? Yeah. And who has been seen

online with itchy feet. Did you guys see this? Yeah, well, I saw it. This is it. One of the great what-ifs in MMA history. What could have been? Can we show this? Here it is.

Look at Zabit. Do you know this man? Oh, my God. The human highlight reel himself. Still got it. And then they get the rights to Zabit, and then Zabit's like, yeah, I'm not fighting. No, no, no.

Listen, I'm Don Davis right now. I make a call. Zabit, you Zabit's like, yeah, I'm not fighting. No, no, no. Listen, I'm Don Davis right now. I make a call. Zabit, you in? I'll trade patchy mix for Zabit. That's a guy you could build your business around, especially overseas. That might be it. No? No, he's not fighting.

I think he's just done, man. I think that was his way of saying, tag me in. I would love it. I think he's just done, man. I think that was his way of saying, tag me in. I think that was, was that him saying, PFL, trade patchy mix for my rights and I'll come back and fight? Subliminal message, something. I mean, I felt like there was something there. I thought it was significant. That might be it. By the way, 145, who's there?

Oh, they don't have a 145 champion. Oh, maybe perfect. Right? No, no, not perfect. That's the problem. We want only ones that are... Would Zabit fight Usman? Or are they boys?

I don't know. It's Rose. Rose is the one that makes the most sense. That was a good one. Yesterday on the show, before we go, we had Terrence McKinney talking about the paint in the locker rooms. Well, on Twitter, we had a couple other fighters weigh in.

Mike Davis weighed in about the paint in the locker rooms, the fumes, the smell, the oxygen. He, of course, fought and lost on Saturday. I'm telling you, I was not myself out there. I was out of breath, shadowboxing for the camera. Felt like I was breathing through a tube the whole fight. And then we had Lucas Alexander, who also fought, tweeting, people have no clue how bad it was.

I was lightheaded, super tired in my warmup. Sunday morning, I went to the hospital and had to get oxygen with some cortisol because I couldn't breathe. I never felt this tired in my life. I got videos of them opening the roof and more stuff. Crazy. By the way, he lost as well. Horrible. You hope that they will learn lessons from this

for the next time. For me, the unfortunate, like, this is going to sound unsympathetic, but, like, other people were also in that locker room and also faced the same condition. So, like, they won and you lost. Maybe it was some locker rooms that were paying. I mean, MVP said he didn't feel it.

So, maybe it was bad luck. But it sounded like Terrence McKinney did feel it and then won. So, like, I'm, you know't don't get me wrong i'm not wishing this upon anybody and i'm not saying like that they didn't suffer and not perform their best i feel the same way about this that i felt about like the 5 a.m uh uk card where it's just like everybody was kind of in there and some people lost and some people won it is what it is you know honestly the um the initial reaction I had was like, that sucks.

But then when I spoke to MVP about it, I was like, oh, well, maybe it wasn't that big of a deal. If it was one locker room and only those fighters experienced it and the other locker room had no, that's a different story. I mean, they probably were in the same locker room, right? They're all teammates.

Yeah. It's 5 a.m. in Manchester. That's what it is. That's how I feel Yeah. It's 5 a.m. in Manchester. That's what it is. That's how I feel about it. Run it back. No. No need. Gentlemen, what a day.

What a day we had here on the program. A couple TSI versus Dylan Danis? Yeah. There goes Frankie. Let's go. Sorry. Hey, Frank, how are you? Great.

I feel like we didn't really hear from you. Yeah, well, you know. What did I say? Hard out 344? Who knows? Fuck, Frank. Right on pace. from you. Yeah, well, you know. What did I say? Hard out 344? Fuck, Frank. Ariel, how do you feel about the entire 20,000 people in Crypto Arena

singing A minor? That was messed up, man. By the way, you ready for the Super Bowl this weekend? I'm not watching the Super Bowl. What was that happening at the same time as? That was happening at the same time as something. When was that? Was that last night? Sunday night. It was happening at the same time as the Clarissa Shields. Oh, as the Clarissa Shields.

Hell yeah, I was locked in on that. I wanted to drop that in. I was 100% watching that. No doubt. I was definitely watching the Clare. Ah, the Grammys. Mason Bickner writes, do you believe superstars

are worth more as champions or contenders? I feel if you're only superstars or the champions, you lack actual stars. I would say most people become superstars when they become champions yeah but this is the point i was trying to make earlier is like you need the other people to

and anderson silva is not anderson silva without chail you know and so that is how you become a legend that is how you become the star and they aren't the the chails aren't there anymore. There are no chails. Okay, yes, but also there's a concoction that is needed to make a superstar. And if you look at even the people rising up, I'm struggling to find the next generation. I'm not talking about the next generation

in CFFC and in Cage Warriors. I'm talking about the current roster. There is a process, right? And so at some point, the guys at the top start to fall off and retire, and then there's the new batch. And so we're about to hit that point where the new batch is coming in,

and I'm just wondering, who are the superstars among the new batch? You're telling me that if you take the innovation and uniqueness of a sport completely away and everybody becomes homogenous, that it's harder to make people stand out? That's crazy talk. I don't believe it. Homogenous.

It's a good SAT word. By the way, this is opening up a whole other can of worms. But again, you laugh. You laugh when you hear about freedom of speech and hate speech, yet everyone has to wear the same thing. There are uniforms. By the way, was it freedom of speech, hate speech, or something else when they took away all the flags? When they didn't let some fighters even represent Russia? What did that fall under?

It goes back to the point that I made with Pablo Torre a year ago. As long as it doesn't hurt the pocket, as long as it doesn't hurt the bottom line all of this will be fair game once it does and if it does then perhaps things will change and perhaps even then it doesn't change but that would be the only tipping point uh there was that thing with peloton or something that dan talked about who knows yeah um but what you will continue to see is this by him speaking the way he speaks and by him by by media being like tell us more tell us more, tell us more, you know, uh, Sage one, you will see companies who are struggling, who have maybe hit a controversy, who feel like a certain sector of the society is, is turning on them. IE Bud light be like, how do we reverse course? Go here. This is the place to go, right? This is the sport.

This is where you will be accepted. This is where everything will be forgotten about. And so even if people jump ship as a result, there are always going to be people saying, no, I want those 18 to 34 year olds. I want that demographic. I want that fan base. I want those like-minded people to accept us so this can be washed away.

And so it will always, I i think cancel each other out it's it's if a espn or a netflix because that's the biggest money out there the tv writes deals if those say anything or get bothered by anything i think that's when it will change but no one asks those questions so wait why does everyone have to wear the same thing and and why couldn't they have flags and why were certain flags not allowed and you know and then there's the sitcharan thing and on and on it goes you could drive yourself crazy doing this stuff i just think it's funny when you're seeing these piers morgan tucker carlson types being like tell us more tell us more how to run a business how the government should be run what now tell us who's fighting next tell? Nah, tell us who's fighting next. Tell us who's

fighting Ilya Teporya in April. That's what it should always be. And that's the way it used to be. Would you say 344? Got a few minutes. Yeah, 344 is my guess. What else you got? No, I'm done.

I'm in. I actually think your response to 344 was, no, no, no, no, physically impossible. We cannot go that way. And here we are. Here we are. You should start taking bets back here on this. Here we are. Where will he hit the hard out? Hard out definition was also for Eric Jackson, the top dog non-finalist.

You've been good lately. I feel like this is a miss. That was a miss. I don't know. Wow, we were dunking on Jordan's lower third. It didn't hit. It's alright. Yeah, that was shit, Jordan.

They've been good. They've been good. It's been a great day, guys. Fantastic day. We're just getting started. We are just getting started. That's the beauty of today. Chelp, as always, great to break bread with the bad guy. Scale of 1 to 10, your level of excitement for Tuff, 33, I think it is. 33 out of 10, baby.

33 out of 10. Are we doing, we haven't talked about it. Tuffang? Yeah. Yeah, I think Frank threw his hat in the ring. He said he wanted to step up. Ah, fantastic. Frank, who are you? Just do it's tough to you. Oh, my God. There's a there's a higher chance of Jake Paul knocking out Canelo than there is of me watching a single second.

I'm saying who doesn't love a nice summer reality TV show? You know, you love it. You love it. I love the way you paint that picture. By the way, did you guys notice me say to Chael, hey, are you going to have me as a coach? And then he completely turned it into a pitch for why the Ultimate Fighter is so great. The roast beef line. He wants you to come in and teach them the mental game. Sure, sure, sure.

I'm sure that will go over very, very well. Thank you to Chael. Thank you to all of you. Thanks to all of them. Back later today, 5 p.m. to Zone Box thank you to all of you thanks to all of them back later today 5 p.m to zone boxing we'll see you then and then of course tomorrow peace i'm out of here