The Ariel Helwani Show - Fall of Fighting Nerds? Raja Jackson’s arrest, remembering Tom Gerbasi | The Craic

Episode Date: September 19, 2025

Petesy Carroll, Chuck Mindenhall and Ben Fowlkes begin this week’s episode by discussing the doomsday thinking surrounding The Fighting Nerds after they hit a poor run of form in UFC main events (05:57).The conversation then moves onto Raja Jackson’s arrest and the realization that he will likely be a huge commodity for fight sports promoters on the back of his streamed assault of independent wrestler Syko Stu last month (26:05).After that, the lads take a look at the viral moments that were created at Thursday’s Chris Eubank vs. Conor Benn 2 press conference, with Eubank stopping promoter Eddie Hearn as he tried to pay tribute to the late Ricky Hatton (44:13).Finally, the lads pay tribute to Tom Gerbasi, a legendary scribe who had a profound impact on combat sports and particularly, combat sports writers (55:54). 

Crackheads. It's Friday. That can only mean one thing. It's the crack with Pizzie Carroll. How are you, everybody? Are you having a fantastic day? I hope you are. Well, it's a bit of an old dry one this weekend for the MMA people. Let's be honest. We don't have a whole host of fights going down. Not even an old apex event to tickle your fancy. But let me tell you, there's still plenty of things to talk about, crackheads. We know you're fiendin and I'm about to deliver that sweet, sweet injection of MMA chatter to you. Well, let me tell you. It's been a long week, you know,

back from Belfast, I became a boxing journalist last week. I don't know if you saw me. It was all over the broadcast. Pretty big deal. Now I'm back to the MMAB and as I just said, not a lot going on, but we do have things to talk about. Our beautiful fan base and media and everyone has given us a A beautiful reactionary week on the back of John Silva's loss.

Oh, it's the end of the fighting nerds are saying. And thank you so much because we use that as our thumbnail this week. Shout out, Oven. Yes, yes, we will discuss the fighting nerds. Have they, in fact, fallen? And have we saw similar things like this before? I can think of a few gyms off the top of my head where we certainly were eulogizing them long before they were actually finished.

We also need to talk about Raja Jackson, who has been a... arrested as of yesterday. And we will also speak about the UBank v. Ben press conference, a lot of heated moments as expected there yesterday. We have that and much more to speak about, but I'm glad to tell you, we are joined by the Dream Team. I mean, this is becoming a regular thing again. It's very exciting. Chuck Mendenhall and Ben folks are here. Chuck Mendenhall. Let's start with you. So how are you today? I'm well, Pizzi, you know, just kind of basking in that big Thursday night football. Did you stay up for it? Yeah, you know, I was actually, funnily enough, you know, we don't have on our Jordan today.

New York, Rick is here, but due to his contract with boys in the back, he cannot speak or cannot appear. The legal team will be all over that. We're breaking off. It's becoming very like the Monday Night Wars around here, you know, WCW, ECW, ECW. We're all different factions now. We hate each other, but he's here to do the job. And I respect him for that. Also, we don't have Oscar Losef.

we have the great mysterious Frank who's here who also will not speak or appear on the show due to his legal situation with boys in the back, which is perfectly fine. Which brings me back to the first question, which is Thursday night football. Chuck, I can't do it anymore. This is breaking me down. My body is finally given up. Today, I felt like a piece of shit that was scraped off someone's shoe. I went for a run to try and energize myself.

It did not work. and I'm holding on here but I think and I don't want you and Ben to tell me what I should do here I'm thinking about boycotting

Mondanoi football and Thursday night for the rest of the season What about Sunday night? I think you've got to do the Sunday night game but the Thursday night game of course you could skip that

and the Monday night games there's no real reason to watch that either but you got to watch the sun isn't that like the showcase event of the week for football you got to watch that one I mean Ben what do you think

would you think less of me if we just stop stop watching Monday and Thursday nights It wouldn't be possible for me to think less of you. I'll say this. I do find it hilarious that Pizzi is now talking about watching Thursday night football, the same way the players talk about playing Thursday night football,

where they get the short week, the bodies are all beat up, and they're just like, you know, you're shortening our careers. We can't keep doing this. And that's how Pizzi feels about staying up to watch it on TV. Also, did anybody else hear him claim that he went for a run? And went, did you know? I did, I didn't. It wasn't good. A very slow one as well, because I was just like, I need to try and do something with myself.

I can't. I got, look, it got me here. So, I mean, I'm happy I did it in the end, but I'm still sweating profusy. And I went like four hours ago, which is probably a sign. I probably need to go to the doctor. But nevertheless, when you watch the games on Sunday, like the normal, you know, the early game, the afternoon game, as we think of it here, what time is that? for you. 6 p.m.

is the first one. Then the last game is 1.15 or whatever. Yeah, okay. I would support you just being a 6 p.m. and a 9 p.m. guy, because that's basically our afternoon games are your Sunday night football. That's fine. You can get by.

They put together all kinds of highlights for specific teams you want to follow and everything. I give you permission. As an American, as a red-blooded American who grew up playing lots and lots of football, I say you go for it, PC. We're just, we're pleased as hell that there's anybody outside of this country who cares about American football. This from the guy who's in the real times on the one real times on 11 a.m. and 2 p.m., right, Ben? That's the only kickoff times.

It's perfect. It's, it's, I don't know if you've ever, I had the experience once where I was vacationing in Hawaii and like, you know, turn it on the TV in the morning and there's football on. And you're just like, whoa, it never occurred to me that other people were watching football. at a different hour of the day. And it's wild. It's amazing to me, Pizzi, that you've lasted on the NFL train as long as you have. So do it however you need to do it, man. I'm proud of you.

I'm proud of you. It's just my age and so much because I used to get shit-faced for that, like the whole day on Sundays watching this stuff. Just like shotguning the whole day and then wake up. Yeah, I'm sure that was a big change for you. Yeah, I can't do it anymore. I'm perfectly sober doing this now and it's still destroying me. It's maybe something's terribly wrong with me.

Who knows? Who knows? I'll tell you, there's a lot of people saying there's something terribly wrong with those fighting nerds. Oh, Ben, see what I did there? That's a transition. Yes. I would like to read from the first paragraph of Ben's mailbag piece this week. Is it time to pump the brakes on the hype for the fighting nerds?

Ask Ben, folks of Yahoo Sports and mustily have to put you. Sorry, that's a different topic. Ben, fighting nerds. That was a good rich issue, by the way. To be clear, it's the mailbag. I'm responding to questions about the fighting nerds. He hasn't even responding yet. This is directly the first question.

He's just saying, is it time to bump? That's what you said in that voice. I'm going to let you in on how I write these mailbags, all right? I put out the call for the questions. The questions come in less and less each week because just Twitter engagement is in the basement if you don't pay for it. And I'll be dead in the grave before I'm going to pay Elon Musk's money to. use that website.

Then I look at the questions. I answer them. I pick one to put up top. That seems the most time. And then the last thing I do is write the intro paragraph to tell you what we're going to talk about. So it's the impetus. And honestly, I think I got more than one question about the fighting nerds where people

were just like, I think the question was something like, do you buy the dip on the fighting nerds? Are they, because they were ascendant, they lost some fights. Now, suddenly, MMA fans, we're like MMA judges and that we remember what we saw last

and we go, oh, maybe these guys actually suck. And we've seen this before with other fight teams, but maybe it seems like the life cycle of this story has been so sped up

with the fighting nerds because it was like, we learned about them all at once. They all were winning fights, putting on the glasses. The fighting nerds, it's a fun thing. We all went,

hey, that's cool. We're into this. We want to talk about the fighting nerds. They all seem to be doing really great. They must be a great. They must have figured something out over there. Then they lose a couple of few fights. And people would go, actually, the fighting nerds are done.

They're through. Let's move on and forget we ever liked them. And it's like, maybe you got too excited initially and maybe you're getting too down on them now. Especially because I think when you look at those individual fights, you can't pinpoint anything and be like, the fighting nerds have a clear flaw that you see in all their fighters and now it is being exploited. Well, thank God that you're shocked in. get carried away with the hype, right? No, no.

Did you make your own or did you buy, is that official merch? No, this came from, this came from the fighting nerds. They actually gave me a couple of pairs of these and, uh, a couple pairs of these. And, you know, I feel like I'm personally responsible for, for what we're talking about now because I went and did a piece where I talked to all four of these guys in Miami. This was only in April. So we're talking only a few months back. And every single one of those guys was on top of the.

world and actually the thing that was kind of the subtext of what we were talking about was who's going to be a champion first right we're talking about like which one of you guys is breaking through which one he is getting the shot all this stuff you know the the popular opinion was probably that kyle would emerge as that guy because he was kind of the originating member of the fighting nerds and he had put the together the longest resume but listen to this man i i had to go back and look at my piece oh no carlos preaches had won 11 in a row at that moment in time when i was talking him. This was right, but remember they bumped the, he was supposed to fight Jeff Neal, they bumped it, then he fights Ian Gary. So it's before this happens. Hufi, he had fought

seven, he had won seven in a row. Joan Silva had won 13, and then Barajal hadn't lost in 17 fights. He had won, no contest or something, but 16 in a row where he'd won. And yet, here we are, these few months later, at all four of those guys have lost. Now, why is that? Well, I mean, when you look at them individually, like the fights that they lost, I mean, okay, anybody fighting Ian Gary, tough guy to figure out, tough stylistic guy to figure out. You go in there, lose to Nasor D. Mimov for crying out loud, he's been sitting there looking like he's the number one contender even though we want to keep pretending he's not because he doesn't have a raven on his shoulder, frankly. That's true. Yes, he has yet to take my advice. the John Silva Diego Lopez won for one thing

Diego Lopez is a guy who just fought for the featherweight title came a lot closer to winning it than I think a lot of us expected and clearly pretty good fighter also though Jean Silva was doing well in that fight kind of until he just got too aggressive I mean he almost got finished in the first round but it was because he goes and throws a spinning kick that he shouldn't have thrown got taken down honestly was pretty impressive that he didn't get stopped down there. He stayed in the fight. He didn't give up. He kept after Jean Silva and when he got

kept after Diego Lopez. And when he got back on the feet, you could tell that he was taking the approach like, hey, I got to go get this guy now. And I'm just going to be nonstop pressure on him right in his face. And that backfired because you pressured your way right into that spinning back elbow and you're down. Those are all like different kind of losses, but they're all different kind of losses to good fighters. The kind of fighters that could beat a lot. of people, most people in the UFC. So I don't come away from that going, all right, clearly this was all hype to begin with. I think that it makes sense that they all start winning around the same time. We get excited about them collectively. And then when they all suffer losses

around the same time, we start to look at that collectively too. I think that that's just, that's a sword that cuts two ways and they're going to have to live with that. But I don't necessarily take anything from those fights that makes me go, fighting nerds have to get back, have a serious team meeting. You know, once I went to a fight, I went to like a regional event. It was a sport fight event in Portland. And it's kind of the early days, like mid-2000s, MMA.

And a team, a hop keto gym from somewhere in like Eastern Washington or Eastern Oregon or somewhere called the Bear Clan. They had signed up. They had put like three or four guys, including like the dude who ran their gym all into this sport fight event. And Matt Lindland, who was running sport fight. with Randy Couture back then. He saw what was going on there.

He's like, oh, the Hopkito guys want to bring them over here. And he matched them all up against Team Quest fighters, all of them up against his own guys. And they each just got this shit beating out of them. Because they got no takedown defense. All the Team Quest guys had pretty similar styles. Like, they're going to go in there.

They're going to double leg you. They're going to stand up and guard. They're going to come flying down on you with that right hand, you know, Dan Henderson style. Like they just got the crap beaten out of every single one of them. them. Those guys had to have a hard conversation when they went back to the gym on Monday. That's pretty brutal. Because they learned that whatever they were doing at the Bear Clan,

Hopkito gym was not working. And, you know, the choice they faced was either like, hey, we should all learn to wrestle, you know, or did they look at each other and be like, we got to get serious about Hopkito, you guys. We must have missed something. We must have strayed away from the principal somehow. Like, that's when you need to reassess as a team and like, what you're doing. These are all different kind of losses that can kind of happen to anybody, especially like guys on the way up who maybe we got a little prematurely excited about. Yeah. And I think that like there might have been a few red flags being raised as I was talking because you can sometimes sense that, right? Where there's something unnatural within the

conversation where, you know, they're kind of like they're kind of owning something that's not quite the case like we're talking about with, you know, who's going to be the contender. but there was just this connective tissue through the fighting nerds and it felt a little forced, if I'm being honest, where they're all kind of tied to each other. When I talked to Jean Sovo, he was the last of the remaining guys

who fought last, who hadn't lost in this last fight. But when I talk to him, you're asking him like, do you feel a responsibility to correct the ship, man, to kind of like get the fighting nerds back on track? And he kind of, that was the one thing that rubbed him the wrong way.

And I think it's because in teams, and this is why, you know, You worked at the IFL and then we saw this new league that tried to start up and was dead on delivery. Like teams don't make a lot of sense in the in the traditional way, right, with combat sports because they do this based on individual, like they can control their own destinies. And I think the teams are all supposed to be in a weird way working with them to get them to that level. And so a teammate, you try to do the same, but to where somebody's loss, loss, right? That's why they do an individual sport. They don't like team sports. It's a very strange dynamic and it's had a very hard time fitting into mixed martial arts. Like a lot of

times these guys, they're loosely, they're training partners, whatever, but they don't have teams. This is why it was a little bit more unique. And the reason it feels like the downfall is because it's not like one guy lost. It feels like one guy lost four times. If you were just talking about a single guy, you know what I mean? You'd be like, well, he's got a bunch of losses now. But that's not really the case. They all have one loss. that's really no big deal in MMA. It just feels like that. That's why teams in the sport are so strange and shaky.

It's interesting you say, like he kind of backed away from the idea of the collective when he did lose. The first thing he said was, listen, me, hoofy, Kyle and all the guys are going to get together and we're going to figure this thing out, you know?

Like that's his reaction. So it's interesting you say that. But I also have a theory that the fighting nerds where like MMA is equivalent to like the spice girls and we all had our favorite one and everyone everyone I was like a hoofy for me I was a hoofy guy myself you know I'm a John Silva guy yeah John Silver he's a madman. We had this conversation before right so like we all picked our favorite ones like oh this is so cute these guys who you bludging people half the death like these guys it's so cool right they injected the scene with this new energy and I think we all had a great time with them and I think that's you know you need to to be in a situation where everyone cares about you to end up in a situation where everyone's like, oh, this gym is, like, it's all over for these guys in the first place, because most of the time, you're not fucking pay attention. You're not paying attention to how a gym is doing, right, Ben? Yeah, I mean, I do think that we've seen some of this stuff happen before in,

with other gyms. And honestly, man, now that I'm thinking about it, which was my favorite spice girl, anybody who said baby spice, I feel like that's a red flag in retrospect. feel like anybody who is who that was your favorite look in the mirror. I won't say it then, but. I'm a sporty spice all the way. You know, I think it's a scary spous one. I see. I knew it. I knew it. Uh, I mean, how many times did somebody declare Greg Jackson's gym to be either like dead or everything that's wrong with this sport? Like Dana White at least a couple different times. Yeah, well, there was a sport killer thing when John Jones didn't take that fight and he blamed Greg Jackson for not taking chill soon and it's a last-minute replacement for Dan Henderson.

But then there was also a criticism of their fighting style years before that. I remember being on the phone with Greg Jackson about it where he was just like, look, we crunched the numbers to show you our record as a gym in high-level MMA promotions and what our finish rate was because the criticism for a while was they're too safe. They're too careful. They're winning a lot of decisions. Like they've kind of figured out how to game the judges and the scoring system of the sport. and they're making it no fun anymore.

And he showed it. He's like, look at our finish rate compared to everybody else's finish rate. We're ahead of them. And it was just kind of perception. Like, you see a couple fights that fit into this narrative that somebody else has put out there. And then everybody goes like, yeah, okay, that's it. And it's just the kind of sport that this is. It's the kind of like mindset that fans can easily have, especially because, you know,

you might have your guys go out and you have a guy in three, of six events and if they all lose we feel like man we can hardly remember past the last six events we go shit seems like you guys are just losing every time you step in the cage and that works both ways

but here it's just the fighting nerds experiencing the negative side of it I think the only thing that's different is that they experienced the positive side so recently you know it's just it's all packed into a very short span of time for them it's funny too because Greg Jackson had so many fighters right like those So that gym had a lot of guys.

So in the surges where a couple of them lost, it would always feel exaggerated. Like, okay, the gym's going on. They're not doing well. But when you have that many pro fighters fighting in the UFC, it's bound to kind of happen. You mentioned Team Quest. I was around them, you know, out in California quite a bit at one point in time.

And I remember them kind of going through a big slump because they were a team, right? They had the Portland chapter. They had the Temecula chapter. And they were kind of, you know, I remember this was around on. So could you, you know, was fighting and guys like Christoph Schisinski or whatever that remember that guy the guy he was still around and Vinny Magalish and all these guys and they all kind of just started losing including Dan Henderson and it kind of felt like I don't think it was the the outcry that it is for the

fighting nerds because it didn't have that kind of clickishness but it was it was certainly one of those things for a guy who covers a sport you're like wow what's happened to this gym these guys can't win suddenly and it reminds me a little bit like I guess the teams that have tried or they've really identified with their gyms as a team, like the team alpha male back in the day when Dominic Cruz was beaten all those guys, remember, before the Garbera fight, there's been these moments where you see that kind of like heaping on over the course of that period of time where they're like, man, these guys have lost it. They're not doing anything. And remember that gym, man, had like Benavita, is it Adela Shah Faber? It had all those guys. So it was a lot of big

names. I just think that it's a, it's a, it's just happens. If you identify, I think Ben pointed this out, if you identify as a team, you take the criticism as a team. That's just kind of how it's, uh, that's kind of how it's going to go. It's just unusual in our sport. You both have mentioned the phrase in our sport. Is this an MMA thing? Or like, because I can, I can go on like we mentioned NFL. Sometimes I dabble on ESPN. I will find Stephen A. Smith screaming about absolutely all kinds of everything. Every, every Tuesday or whatever. I mean, it's not like him, right?

Or like Skip Bayless saying like, this is the end. Like a team just loses one game. Is it, it does feel like an MMA thing in a way because our fan base is so vocal and unashamed and outspoken. But is it just me standing too close to the elephant, Ben? Well, I think that the difference that you see in team sports is that If the, you know, Cleveland Browns go out there and have a terrible day on Sunday, they get to play again next Sunday. And they get an opportunity to turn right around and take away that memory for you and replace it with a better one.

Or they get an opportunity to lose again and it snowballs. You know, fight sports are different in that sense because, and you feel this when you talk to fighters, they go out there and they have a bad night. They lose one, and they have to wait a long time to get back in there. You know, if you fight every three months, you're incredibly active. That's about as best a reasonable case scenario as you could hope for as a fighter. But if you had a bad night, three months is a long time to wait to show people, hey, I'm better than what you saw. And it's a long time for people to sit around and talk about how you suck and you're done.

And so I also think the difference is that in team sports, everybody kind of has their allegiances built in, where the Cowboys fans, yeah, they're going to get concerned, they're going to get mad about it, you know, they're going to be on top of the world when they win a couple in a row. Everybody kind of knows how that goes. In fight sports, you know, you pick a favorite maybe because you see him win a fight or two. You get to know something about his personality. You go, I like that guy. But you don't necessarily feel that same baked in allegiance. He starts to lose a couple. It's not a big deal for you. to go, well, let's see who else is out there who seems like maybe I want to get on that bad

wagon. Whereas, you know, it's sort of a point of pride for people in team sports where you're just like, hey, I stuck with these people through so many terrible seasons and I'm still here. It becomes a point like, it's part of the bonding of being a fan of a team sports is that we are all mad at these guys together. They are disappointing all of us and we're in on it together. And fight sports just don't have that. Buffalo. How long before we have the team Habib fraud-checked headlines. You know, can you see that one coming on any time soon? Juk.

Jeez. Well, not as long as Islam's still kind of the guy, right? I feel like that that's a, they're not going to find a lot of fraudulence there, you know? No. Like that kind of. That, they're that one gym where I'm like, when they talk about iron sharpening iron, I'm like, you think about guys like that. But at the same time, they did have a, you know, back in the day when the cost

check and um you know mike swick i remember they i remember them kind of going through this a little bit too is before all that stuff so it's nobody's completely um you know free from that kind of criticism at some point spj obviously heavily got this you know because connor was the guy and then you know kavana's showing up on the mime or wearing like you know dressing gowns and whatnot like i feel like they were giving people plenty of ammunition at some points to be like Yeah, come on, bring it on. You had Artham there, of course. Artham, it was a cult-like following for his win, then lost, then win, then lost record.

Of course, he's back in action a couple weeks. Yeah, one time I made a joking article about that. Oh, yeah. Boy, did I remember that. That was more commoner than Aritam, if I remember correctly, right? John Kavanaugh, yeah. He quoted the man in the arena. Oh, nice.

Classic move. Man, what would the MMA community do without that quote? You know, that has served so many, so many different purposes. How do they not know? It's a meme at this stage. Like, I see guys doing it every time they leave us. I know like it's original, like they're bringing you something. Oh, man, I hadn't thought of it like this.

Wait a second. Hang on a second. He's talking about me. It's to the point where, you know, me and some of my friends who were also like MMA fans or something and, you know, they'll ask me like, hey, how did the, how did last night's hockey playoff game go? you were talking about how excited you were about that and I'll just send a screenshot of the man in the arena thing just to let them know like that's great we didn't win or else you can

just say the man in the arena without giving the result you know what I mean like how did so and so get on just say man they're in and they go oh yeah we are um lads as you know we're a big time podcast now and look we're on TV and we deserve to be there uh the only issue being that we need to to pay us with all of the money that we make we need to somehow go to advertisement breaks during the show. But don't worry, because when you come back, we're going to be talking about Raja Jackson. We're going to be talking about

the UBank v. Hearn, I mean, V. Ben, press conference. If you didn't see it, got a bit hairy. We have those clips for you. So please enjoy these ads and come back to us in two minutes. And there we go. We've kicked out the makeup artists and all those people. We just need two minutes to refresh. You know what I mean?

Get our thoughts in order. And of course, all of the money into the bank accounts, which is the most part and port of podcasting, of course. Lads, Chuck Mendenhall wasn't here when we were talking about the Raja Jackson episode. In fact, we were all on vacation when this happened. And when we came back, I was telling Ben how I was listening to him

speak about this when I was on a Greek beach. Crazy story. Here's the first two paragraphs of an article that is on Uncrowned at the moment. Raja Jackson, the son of my legend, Quint and Rampage Jackson, was arrested Thursday in Los Angeles, that's yesterday, nearly a month after a brutal attack on a pro wrestler was captured live on stream. The arrest was first reported by TMZ. Uncrowned has confirmed via Los Angeles County Jail Records

that Jackson was arrested in the morning on a felony charge with a bail set at $50,000. The attacking question occurred on August 24th at the Knox Pro Wrestling event which was being streamed on kick. Jackson can be seen entering the ring and hoisting independent wrestler Stuart Smith, a.k.a. Psycho stew above his head, then slamming him down with his head hitting the mat. Jackson then mounts the unconscious wrestler and throws down more than 20 punches at his head

before a group of other wrestlers rip him away. You can check out the rest of that article on Uncrown, but it's a crazy story, Chuck. How have you unpacked this all? It's just such a weird, unique situation, I guess, right? You know, it's funny because you're right. Nobody was responding. Ariel was also out and I remember everybody was saying like hey why are you ducking it man why aren't you talking about Roger why aren't you doing this?

Nobody was actually saying that to me so I felt like I kind of dodged one there but at the same time I don't know how you got I didn't catch what if you've talked about this before but that footage when I saw it I was like

what it's still struck me as something that wasn't real it struck me as something that wasn't you know you're used to wrestling you know quick flashes with the camera like boom boom they don't really show you impact and stuff like

that but you're watching in a wrestling ring something go on that you're like what the hell is happening and it gave me it has if you see something like um you know some like i used to always always for whatever reason on twitter like i'd be on some algorithm where it would show me like a street street fights would show you like these brutal things like how to i don't get them anymore but there was a moment in time where they would show you these in it always had that same feeling of like oh could you'd see somebody get knocked out hit the pavement and then somebody come in and just hit them again and again you're like dude somebody step in there they're just it it's it's it's a crazy feeling that you get when you see that.

That's the feeling it gave me. It was like watching, and that's what he's charged with, assault. And I'm, I'm, there was a moment just like this last week where I was wondering, is nothing going to come with this? Because you know how our new cycle moves? It's like, suddenly you're like, man, this is just going by. Nobody's talking about it anymore. Is this guy just going to go Scott Free on this?

So I guess in a strange way, because it was such a visceral react, like the way it was presented, the way everybody had seen it. just the kind of damage it caused and the video itself just being like what it is. I'm like, I guess I'm happy that some action was taken on this because you start to lose your bearings on what's a crime anymore, you know, like at this point. So I was, I was, I guess, relieved that something was actually happening because I don't think that that sort of thing, man, that's just very unhinged. And I, you know, that kind of thing.

If you have that in you to hit a guy down when he's down like that unconscious. from the month for like 20 times, I mean, what else can you do? So I'm just glad that some action has been taken here. Yeah, it's a felony charge. There is different reports going around as to what it is, battery. I was doing some very brief research in terms of what kind of sentence he could have been looking at. It looks like it's a, like a huge kind of range in terms of what he could go down for, like from a minimum of a year to like decades in prison. this could be, I mean, this is, this feels like this could be the end of, of this guy's life for some, a significant amount of time, Ben, and it seems crazy. And the craziest thing

about it to me has remained the same. It's this mixture of, of technology versus reality. Him, him, him being goaded on this screen as he's sitting at this event is just such a disturbing scene, like the, these streaming guys and the, and the impact that this can have on the way you act in society is is crazy to me um it's obviously rampage as well has been tangentially and kind of involving this he came onto a real show to speak about we spoke about that at the time but isn't this crazy that we ended up here where where this guy is shows up to a wrestling event with no plans of anything happening really at all i think he was just meant to attend then psychos stew hits him with a can thinking he was working they

He then arranged to sort it out in the ring to some extent. And as far as I'm concerned, no one really explained to Raja, the extent of what that meant sorting this issue out goes in. And obviously we see the power bomb, an unconscious psycho stew immediately, and then him just unloading on an unconscious wrestler. Like, it's, I think there's going to be a lot of appetite for him to be handed down a very stern sentence here. Would it be wrong in saying that, Ben? Yeah, I mean, I'd be surprised if it ended up being dead.

decades or, you know, I think, you know, it'll be notably less severe than that. I was surprised how long this investigation took to result in an arrest just because so much of it is right there. I know. So, like, I was just wondering, like, we're not exactly investigating the watergate break in here. This is not a ton of information you have to go out in search. Yeah, it's so much of it was very intentionally on tape, on video, and up to not only just what happened before, what happened during, what he was saying beforehand about what he intended to do. Like, all that stuff was right out there. And it was surprising to me that it took that long, because it was getting to the point

where you were going, wait a minute, is anything going to happen here? Did we just forget about this? Did we move on? Did we get distracted by something else? as seems like it can always happen I don't know it's the thing to me I guess is that

you would like to see more support for him from Rampage of all people I still was very shocked and saddened by Rampage's take on it when he went on Ariel's show where he was just like I'm not talking to him right now because he dishonored my name and it's just like first of all

we've all those of us who've been following this sport for a long time seem Rampage dishonor his own name before you know and rampage do stuff where he he would have not like to have the people the loved ones in his life turn their backs on him just because he messed up that's when you know you need your your loved ones your dad to be there for you to support you even when you messed up i mean that's that's is the difference between like family and just friends you have in your life is that your family's supposed to love you all the time and that part i hope i hope rampage maybe sees the

error of that thinking because yeah this clearly is going to move forward into a potentially serious thing for Raja so at least you'd like to think that Rampage will be there for him you almost wonder if

because Rampage came out with a statement right away that people saw as two lacks remember like it was like he came out and it was kind of saw it as like hey what are you talking about this was an assault and it's almost like he went the other it went completely the other direction when he talked to Ariel to correct that

And again, I'm with you. That was a very strange piece of this whole thing. It was just, you know, the reason we're paying attention to Roger and probably the reason he's even in that spot is because he is his son, right? So you would expect, I guess, I hate to say professional in this sport because so much of it is not professional, but you would want some genuine, you know, hard understanding and love there, like where you're just like, listen, man, he made a huge mistake. I don't know what was going through his head.

um but that's something we got to sort through so i feel like that became part of this this storyline right is just the kind of strange rift there with that uh that that jackson has presented to his son so it's like it's it's it's a crazy it's a crazy thing for it's what i'm trying to say is like in a fight game it's hard to be shocked you know what i mean like did you see so much but i still think that that was one of the more shocking things that's happened this year when do you think we'll find out, like, how long or what the sentence is here for this kind of situation. I can't help but think, like, there would be, and I don't know which cases of this applies starting up, but I can't, I feel like this whole thing has played out online. I feel like every

part of this, as Ben said, like, it would almost feel fitting for this to be like, it wasn't a lot of contrition, right? Like, I mean, even that's caught on tape. Like, yeah, kind of like, just that stuff, you know yeah huge part in turning people against him as well the way he was behaving the way he was reacting to people being like this guy's still down i think that definitely went against people people felt really really really really impassioned about this whole situation which is what he's going to say like this feels like appropriately should be on core tv nearly at this stage because every single facet of it has been played out like we've been able to look through absolutely everything and i think the the the public interest in this would be huge um what

What, like, what, how does that decide? Like, does it depend on what, like, state you're in? Like, how did they decide these things? Like, what's, what's going on TV in terms of court cases over there? Is there still court TV? Because that still exists? Well, I remember the Johnny Depp one, right? The Johnny Depp case, when Amber Heard, that was, that was all over the place. Like, people were watching that here while they were in work all day and stuff. It's, um, crazy. Like, I'd go into my phone. I've relied on other people to fill me in after on that one I mean you know the wheels of justice can grind rather slowly in this country at time I would think something like this you'd probably settle with some sort of plea deal that they you know Roger Jackson would probably be given half the opportunity you can't really plead not guilty right though it's a tough one it's a tough one like I don't

know what your defense would be in that kind of situation. And it also... Wasn't me. And it might depend on like what we hear from the victim in this case, that kind of stuff, you know, what kind of like restitution

you can make to the victim. I don't know. It does seem though like the... Like Chuck said, I had a similar feeling when I watched that video where for one thing, I felt like, I wish I hadn't seen that now that I have. I wish

wish that wasn't in my brain. I remember because it was going around the internet and I remember I saw it like shortly before I was going to go to bed and I was I was troubled to the point where I was just like I definitely didn't need that in my head right before I lay down and tried to go to sleep here. And so that kind of thing, if I'm anybody involved in like a defense for Roger Jackson, I'm like, we don't want to get into any sort of situation where we're in a trial and that video gets shown over and over again. Isn't it crazy real quick? Like, where are you, used to, if a guy goes unconscious, he gets punched or knocked out in any possible way, he may land that extra shot or two. And we're always like, oh, God, what are they doing? Come on,

ref, get in there quicker. Um, but generally, you don't see that. This was, this was part of the crazy surreal nature of that video was that the people around it were just kind of like nonchalant going around there where nobody was jumping in there like, hey, whoa, what are you doing, man? There was none of that. It's, that's why I was like, what am I watching? Is this real? Like, what is going on here? um it's just such a it's such a bizarre bizarrely disturbing piece of video it really is for those reasons like you're just used to people not doing that you know even a guy in an mama fight i mean there might be some guys who and we've seen it like dan henderson coming down on uh on bisping we've

seen guys hit him like with something big on that follow up that you're just like gosh but have you ever just seen anybody wailing somebody who's unconscious i mean that's it's too much you know And I mean, I guess that because we're used to somebody intervening, that's what made it so strange to me. It's like, nobody intervened. Yeah. I wonder if that was like, they were still like, well, that was, what I was thinking at the time was, they all think that this guy's acting. They think like he's selling this power bomb that he's just received. And now he's eating these punches.

But it's happening so quickly because time slows down on those unanswered shots. Even in MMA when it happens for me, like when you can tell the guys out and the reference. just isn't there on time, those seconds feel like minutes. Like, you're just like, oh, shit, here we go. It's happening again. And you're just, come on, ref, come on, ref. And usually, thankfully, they do get in there. I have another inappropriate question on the back of my core TV inquiry.

So, and this is the most fucked up thing about the fight game. Because Chalcuner made a point, and he's correct about this. And he's often correct in terms of what fascinates people, what intrigues people. he happens to be an expert in it he was speaking about it's not often correct in general but anyways go ahead he was speaking about uh craig jones looking for an opponent and like literally the the week after this happened he was on ariel show and i think it was Craig jones had called him like who would we get to do this i think he was trying to get chale and chale said why don't you get rajah jackson and like as crazy as as that was to say that i was thinking the

world is so messed up that if they could actually do that everyone like people would buy the shit out of it and didn't shale just miss his calling as a pro wrestling promoter because those because those instincts that is that is the instincts he had been born 40 years earlier it's true he would have run a pacific northwest like chale sonan's big time wrestling and it would have been one of the territories that that you came through you know he'd be out there promoting uh kurt ha versus super fly jimmy snooka and man it because that that is like if you were just trying to grab attention and make headlines it didn't much care how you did it i guess that would work well here's the point um i don't know if you've met a lot of combat sports promoters ben

but uh that's kind of the fucking business they're in buddy i'm not going to like to you and my my question is this guy goes in right we're saying we don't think it's going to be a decade long sentence like, am I crazy to think that people would be queuing up to get this guy involved from a situation that was so horrific they can make money off this guy somehow competing on their cards? Dude, they're trying to book Andrew Tate into a boxing match with Darren Till, aren't they? Yes, they are. I mean, yeah, I mean, that's a good point, like, especially that if you bring any sort of notoriety, it means you bring attention and this is an attention economy above all else. And, you know, it's when I was working with my friend Chad Dundas and a bunch of other people

and we wrote a bunch of like themed short stories in a shared kind of fictional universe about pro wrestling territories, those days of like, you know, the 60s, 70s, early 80s of different pro wrestling territories. And I did a lot of research for it, including listening to this podcast where Jerry Jarrett, who used to be the promoter of Memphis wrestling was talking. And he told the story about Randy Savage and his father and brothers running a competing organization in Louisville. And they would just go on their TV show every week and just talk enormous amounts of shit about Memphis wrestling and about all the different Memphis wrestlers and about Jerry Jarrett. And it was their thing, like trying to create this rivalry. And then they went under

just because it was not, maybe not the greatest strategy. And he said, Randy Savage called him up and was just sort of like, hey, I just wanted to be like, hey, we're shutting down. And I want to make sure you know that it was all business there was no hard feelings there and he said well hey why don't you come work for me and he said really you want me to work for you even after all the shit we said about you and he said listen in this business i don't believe that we should ever waste heat if we got it if you guys went ahead and created it you put all this effort into creating a thing where people think that there's something between us people think there are hard feelings between us don't just let that dissipate let's do something with it come work for me we'll work with that

not that that knowledge that the audience already has and I think that there's a lot of promoters who would take that some similar approach with something like that with Roger Jackson if he were free you know didn't Tanya Harding have like a boxing matcher am I miss for yeah I think you're right yeah she did you're right I feel like the idea of this sort of thing I mean especially because the Roger has had some MMA fights right like he's uh he's actually involved in the sport his dad being who he is I can guarantee you this is crossing people's minds I can guarantee it. I mean, you know, there are certain people, you know, the Bryce Mitchell one comes to mind where you're like, well, he says something completely crazy. Let's put him in, John Silva, we'll put

him against John Silver and like, you know, people tune in because it's just, uh, some people want to see him get his ass kicked, right? Like, are that kind of concept. Um, but it's really just you've got this fire brand who, you know, people are paying attention to. That's kind of the same situation. The fact that he might get served some comeuppance only adds to it, right? So I feel like that certainly is going to play in. And it would be interesting, if he doesn't go away for a long time, I feel like it's a certainty that he'll end up in a fight with somebody in a big situation like that.

Well, speaking of not wanting to waste heat, match room certainly don't want to do that, Ben. And they're doing Chris Eubank v. Connor Ben again, this time in November. And yeah, well, guess what? The press conference is going to turn into an Eddie Heron v. Chris Eubank situation again. Ubank making some lofty claims But maybe let's start off with the clip of Hearn

Trying to pay tribute to the late Ricky Hatton And Chris Eubank Who never wants Eddie Hearn to speak A press conference who's made that abundantly clear Decides to cut him off at that point If we have that one, please New York, Rick Just a couple of... You might just gonna say 30 seconds about Ricky Hatton

There's no thanks Chris, Chris, one second You know the drill Chris, Chris, Chris. the drill, I'm not going to say... You are, some arseal, you are. Anything you say. Okay.

Then don't listen to any... I'm a bad guy. I'm in this. All I was going to do was say a few words about Ricky Hatton. I don't want to hear of you a few words. Okay, I won't say anything about... Let's move on with the press conference. You're an arseoll.

You talk shit. You get what's coming to. It doesn't matter. You can do that. Anyway, we know the drill. Jamie. Let's move on. Right now, before I open this up the discussion, there is two fields of taught here, right?

One... being with Eddie Hearn, Chris Eubank, you're an arsehole. As soon as he mentioned Ricky Hatton's name, just let this happen. The other side being, Eddie is trying to speak at this press conference because he knows Chris Eubank does not want him to speak at this press conference. As he begins to speak, Eubank starts cutting him off and then he mentions Ricky. This is not what I think.

This is just what people are saying. Then he brings up Ricky's name, which he hoped would prompt Chris to stop, but then it didn't. how do we feel that's wait you didn't you didn't think this because that was that crossed my mind it's like you know you've already got kind of a heated situation and eddie herne wasn't born yesterday kind of knows what he's doing and i feel like he he might have taken that occasion to uh maybe have that result you know what i mean i'm not you know i think he probably really did want to say something about hadn't but i don't think that the um it didn't cross his mind that this you know that this type of thing could happen yeah yeah yeah

Boy, what do you reckon, Ben? Maybe I'm just not as willing to think the worst of everybody, you guys. I don't know, because it seemed like, you know, he was, that was what he was going to say to begin with. Maybe he performed the calculation at advance to be like, all right, as soon as I start talking, he'll jump in there. Then I'll reveal that this was what I was going to say. And then he faces two choices, which is either to, you know, continue talking over me. and therefore disrespecting my attempt to pay a tribute to Ricky Hatton

or he does have to shut up and let me talk and I've kind of won the exchange either way. You don't come off as a super nice guy if somebody else is just trying to be like, hey, this dude died suddenly who is important in our sport and we should spare a moment to say something about him and you're like, no, I will not sit here for that just because of who is saying it.

Sing along. That was bad. That was bad. It was all just like a, you know, the spider capturing the fly in the web that it was pretty well thought out, you know, but still, I don't know. I'm inclined to think that he was just going to like speak up and say something about Ricky Hatton and then, you know, maybe it wasn't all an elaborate trap, but who knows? Maybe I'm just too kind to people.

Have you guys ever been to one of those, like a live event and they're like, they talk about some soldier or somebody who passed in like a moment of silence, please? And there's always some drunk idiot. he goes, ah, I start screaming. That's what that reminded me of. It's like,

it was like, it's so inappropriate, you know, to listen to that and where he's, I'm just trying to say, can I please just say something about, you know, he's just trying to talk.

It's just, it drives you crazy to hear something like that, right? Because you know, like, when somebody dies and it is, especially within your own game, the boxing game,

and you're trying to have like a tribute moment and somebody tramps all over it. It's just not good, man. First of all, I wasn't that drunk at that call. all the Rockins game that time, Chuck. And when are you going to let it go for crying out loud?

Just to give you more of an idea of the dynamic between Chris Eubank and Eddie Heron. Here's another accusation that was levied at the matchroom chief during this press conference. I'm laying there in a gurney, oxygen mask on, and the car cannot move. They will not open the gates to let us leave. Sorry, who won't open the gates? Now, if this was a serious injury that I had sustained, that 20 minutes... Chris, I want to know who wouldn't open the gates. It's important.

That 20 minutes... You can't answer that, can you? Could have been the difference between life and death. You talk shit, you do. And while this was all happening, Honor Ben and Eddie Hearn are in here talking to the media, lying about how I had a broken jaw, and that was the reason why I was going to hospital.

bullshit artists of the highest degree. Chris, can we get one thing clear? Can you just confirm that you're accusing us? I am accusing. Match room? Yes. Okay, say it.

You guys... Say it from... Say it. Say it. You know, because... Who else? Who else would have been? Go on, say it.

Why was I... Say it? Why was I in an ambulance for 20 minutes? Say that match room stops you from going to dollars. I was like what? So you can try and sue me if you're a little lawyer. Not a little lawyer.

all, I think you're talking about the wrong guy. Say it, say it. These are the levels... You talk shit. These are the levels of... Kind of Ben, I mean, it doesn't love to say a word, really. Well, there you go. Fight so.

It's up. It's incredible. The two moments that come out of this, despite the hatred and the generational hatred between the U-Bank and band clans, it's Eddie Heron versus Chris Eupank. I feel like we don't get a lot of this. And, I mean, the kinds of, press conferences that we have, you know, it's usually between two fighters. You don't really get

Dana involved with a fighter or anything like that, right? And usually Dana's like, who's got the next question? You know, at the, at the soon, whenever you can jump in and intervene. These things, it's just like a soap opera. They just let it play out. Like, I love that about the boxing, the tension that builds in those rooms sometimes, man. But, Eddie, of course, in boxing, they have guys who can actually talk back to the promoter. True. Without worrying that they'll be blackballed from the sport. And nobody took Canelo with the Dana one, right? Like, yeah. And, and In the UFC, everybody's got to kiss the ring and hope for favor from the emperor. You know, the boxing is different.

I do like, though, like Eddie Hearn, this is a thing that I wish that Americans could work into our speech, where he says, instead of, you know, if you just say, you're an asshole, it only lands so hard. But when you add, you're an asshole, you are. Like, there's something about it where you're like underlining it, you know. You talk shit, you do. You know, and it's just like, oh, okay, like it makes it land with more force. somehow. I like that. I'm going to try to use that. You got to adapt that. It's like, that's good. It's common around these parts. I'm not going to like to you. I got to ask,

like, I was actually speaking to New York, Rick, who cannot appear or comment on this show due to his legal situation with boys in the back. And he is, was the big champion of the first fight. And of course, he comes off shining, um, like gold because he called this would be an amazing fight. It was an amazing fight. Like theatrics, everything. Chris Eubank arriving with his son that walk. It was fucking unbelievable.

The fight itself was insanity. No eggs so far this time, though. No eggs this time. You know, the first press conference, there's a lot of time. It's November. Yeah. But I'm way crazy. Like, this possibly can't

live up to the first fight as far as I'm concerned, Chuck. Like, am I am I crazy here? Like, I just feel like it was so perfect. Everything was so perfect. The public weren't exactly on their side, even though it was in Wembley, I believe it was, or Tottenham Hotspur Stadium. They got lots of people in there.

And then for it to shine, despite this criticism I had, I just don't know if it can be that magic again, you know? I mean, it's a good problem to have that you're like, will it live up to what it's starting to build into? Because I think that when you get that it off, it doesn't really, the big win, right,

will be at the box office in that sense, because they're building. it up, but dude, I got a feeling it will, you know? It's like you're dealing with guys who genuinely don't like each other. I saw some interview though where Ben had been like, I don't know if it was a joke. It was just a clip where he's like, hey, I think after this all, we could be friends. I don't know if that was a, you know, if that was just like something where he was joking around. But these guys have such heat, you know, like real heat that I'm, it brings, you know, I feel like when this happens sometimes the guy, I'm not losing to this dude.

I'm not losing this dude. And that's generally when you get a guy who goes out there willing to die in the ring. And if you get two of those, it produces a classic fight. You know, I think it's got that potential. Maybe I'm just being optimistic because the first fight was really fantastic. But I think it could, man. What do you recommend? Got your juices flowing?

Yeah. I mean, this is the hardest part is getting people interested in the same fight over again and getting people to get excited this far in advance to see the same. same fight and they seem to be doing that, you know, you throw some breakfast foods in there and who knows? Maybe you got something. It does, like to Chuck's point earlier, like even being around the sport last week, it seems like they're having a lot more fun. Everyone's like buzzing. I don't know how to, maybe look, and it could be the fact that I don't go to many of these events I'm arriving in going, well, look at all this. It's like a TV set and everyone, like, you know,

Eddie's speaking to everybody. He, like all the team. team are going out of their way to make sure you've got everything and everything. But then it just seems like boxing are just having themselves a little jolly compared to MMA at the moment. Is that just my cold dead, jaded heart? Now, hey, when you told us when you were going at that event and they sent you the email beforehand to

encourage you to dress intelligently, was that how they said it? And I am curious what you ended up going with and if it proved to be the intelligent choice. It didn't rain. It didn't rain. I went with all black because I was like, this is going to get terrible. I had a black parker on, a black sweater, a t-shirt, black jeans. I was just like, if they get wet, no one's going to know. In the end, I was just very, very cold. It was freezing. We're all sitting there just shaking, watching the fights, but it was a great night, honestly. We actually, again, look, we got to get paid, guys. And it's coming up to old ad o'clock. I'm not going to like you,

But please hang around because we're going to pay tribute to one of the greats, Tom Debacy, who passed away earlier this week. The lads in particular know the man very well, would have had dealt with him over the years a lot more than me. I've had a few meetings with him over my time too and a great guy. So please come back. Chucks wrote a brilliant piece about it for Uncrowned. And we would love to pay tribute to the great man with you guys.

So enjoy this break. and we're back on the crack and you know to Ariel's credit I do believe he could do that for eight hours me yeah

a little over an hour he doesn't usually doesn't he's something like that he's he's a wild man um we obviously know earlier in the week

Ariel paid tribute to Tom and um you wrote a brilliant piece about this uh Chuck I read it this morning before we did the show just so it would be fresh in my memory but um

it's funny to me that Rick said on Wednesday show I believe it was that everybody has a very similar story about Tom. And then we obviously couldn't tell it as well as you did. But just a, it's perfect headline, the man who championed so many because I think we've all been championed by him.

He was a guy that's checked in on me so much despite only meeting with person twice. You guys knew him far better than me. So please, Chuck, if you can't tell me what made Tom such a special guy. I wish I knew that because I would try to be more like Tom. I mean, honestly, he was one of those guys that it was kind of astonishing over the course of time because the way that I kind of described this in the little tribute piece there, you know, I'd met him after writing something that was in a fairly obscure Newsweekly out in the Inland Empire. And I really don't remember how he got a hold of it.

But he saw the piece and he just, you know, that's how I kind of had correspondence with him. It could have been that I reached out. I really don't remember anymore. But he was like, hey, would you like to do these a couple of profiles? and at the time I'm an editor at a paper so I have nothing really to do with the fight game other than the piece I'd just written which was just one of many subjects that you were covering out there

and I said sure I did it and that's all I did and I think I might have done a few pieces and I'd see him at events I saw him at UFC 84 and then I pointed out that UFC 88 event and it was weird because he just kind of took me under wing introduced to me these guys and at this time remember like I think MMA Live was a thing and that's how Franklin was already kind of a known player in the game.

Like Kevin Ioli had been around boxing and MMA, you know, so he was this guy. And then Neil Davidson, these guys were like these, you know, these guys who were well entrenched in the fight game. And he's chatting me up as if I'm among them as if I should be it. I was like, man, I kind of wish I was, but I'm not like that. But it was strange. There was just this warmth that he had. It never went away.

I remember feeling it on that very time, because he was introducing me to people at the USC event. I didn't know anybody. You know, he's introduced me to like Joe Silva, people like that, the big players. And over the years, man, like, obviously, like, I didn't do that for very long. I went and, you know, worked at all these other places. And he's constantly been in touch, constantly, you know, there's never been hard feelings about anything. I've never had a single thing where something's happened where he had a hard feeling about it. Even if you're criticizing the UFC, he stayed out of that, the political side of it.

He stayed out of all of that stuff. He just was that guy. He would remember my daughter's birth. I remember I pointed out in that thing when she went to kindergarten. He knew this some. I don't remember how he knew exactly, but he called me that day. Like things like that. You're like, it's just a fairly incredible human being who, you know, puts his busy schedule.

If you knew this guy, how much he wrote and how much he did on a daily bit, had several books and just wrote about a variety of different. things including boxing and all of the all of the upkeep with the UFC you'd be like how does he have time to remember little things going on in my life but that's what he did and in that piece it's funny because you mentioned that everybody kind of has a similar story that's what I've heard everybody who's kind of dealt with him was like man that has been my experience with him you know it's been like that with me too and to think of that of many people that he touched you know over the course of the time their lives and played you know a role and just being a good human being especially in a sport like this

where there aren't too many of them it stands out and I think that's why it was such a just a very tragic thing to get that news and it left a big hole in the fight game man Ben please tell me tell me about your relationship with Tom

yeah I mean I was not anywhere near as close with him as Chuck was but I worked on a story that should be going up later today where I talked to a bunch of other people who knew him very well worked with him to kind of get that sense. And the thing that you hear over and over again, for one is, as Chuck said,

the kind of inclusivity where he was always really willing to help everybody. And that is kind of rare, especially in the media space. And in the media space for a sport like this where it's not like there's ever been too many jobs to go around. And a lot of people are very protective

of their territory, their spot. You reach out, you're a competitor, you know, you're just from some other site. you're wanting contact information you're wanting something the impulse might be like why should I help you you know why should why should I help you get it potentially ahead of me and he was

one people one of the people who was never ever like that was always just like very excited to help people very willing to to help mentor other people and you just don't see that a lot but the thing that also came across especially in talking to people who either do work for the UFC or have work for the UFC is just what a a source of institutional knowledge he was for them there. And that's the part that I wonder, man, what are they going to do to even attempt to replace him? Because it's a huge loss for the UFC.

I don't think there is any one person who can replace him. I think you're going to need several people to do that. Because, you know, I would talk to these UFC people for this story and they'd say he just became a sort of in-house Google for them where if we're having an argument about, you know, is Stefan Struve actually seven feet tall or is he 611? Call Tom. That was always the way you settle it.

It's just like, Tom Jrabesi will know. Call him up. He will be, you know, we want to know exactly what year pride kind of stopped being pride. We want to know what year, like this guy, when did he first actually get into MMA versus what it says on the record? Call Tom. And that level of knowledge to have lost that in one person is going to be a huge. loss for the UFC but also for the sport and also just the the the different things he was doing

for the UFC yeah I think people might look at it and they go all right I'm I recognize the byline from reading stories on the website so what he's a guy who wrote stories on the website and it's a point that aunt Evans who writes for us sometimes on the uncrown made uh and you know he worked for the UFC for many years he was like Tom would not get precious about much would not insist on credit did not like that kind of attention but the one thing that he was kind of notably proud of is that he was not the editorial director of ufc.com he was the editorial director of the ufc and if you saw anything come out of the ufc that had any written word element to it he had a hand in it and he said that extended from you know the trading cards the little bios

on the back of the trading cards people who needed help with their speech for the ufc hall of fame uh coming up with you know even things like metadata on the ufc fight pass videos or uh the ufc video game. He pointed out that at one point they had a problem in the UFC video game where somebody was looking at the work that the makers of the video game were doing, looking at the fighter ratings, you know, they're rated in all these different categories. And somebody said, hey, how do you have Dan Hardy with a higher rating than George St. Pierre has on the UFC video game? And then the answer that they would come up with was, all right, we'll just get somebody at the UFC to do it. And he said, whenever somebody said that, whenever somebody said, we'll get

somebody at the UFC to do it, he was always that somebody. And that, that, that, that, that came in handy when the UFC was purchased by WME because, you know, I think we all remember they told us right away, the new ownership group was telling their investors, we're going to find efficiencies at the UFC. And that meant cutting a lot of people. That meant just getting rid of jobs that they thought, oh, we know somebody else who can do this, like it already works for us. A lot of people were casualties of that. And he said that they, one of the things they looked at was Tom Gerbacy's role. And then enough different people in different departments at the UFC, we're like, hey, if you get rid of this guy, I'm going to have to hire a full-time guy

just to do what he did for my department. And somebody else is going to have to hire a guy for what he did for their department. You're going to need three or four different people in order just to fill the hole, not even to be better than off than you were before. You're going to end up spending way more money that way. And so they kept him. And it's, you kind of look at it and you go, is there a longer tenured UFC employee, maybe Dana White? But other than that, Like you don't see a lot of these people stick around for that long for two decades, you know, at the UFC, either because they get burned out or they move on to something else or the UFC gets rid of them or something. Like somebody who's been there that long is really, really rare and is such a asset for them to lose. And it's just like a really, it's a gut punch for all the friends that he made.

He was such a warm, friendly guy that so many people loved him. You know, what was the other thing? you know when somebody dies like this you hear that cliche where somebody's like you know everybody loved them never had a bad word to say and it's almost never true there's always somebody has a bad word to say except for tom like especially in this industry plenty of people got bad words to say about all three of us you know uh especially pizzi and the but but but tom nobody had a bad thing to say and that's you know somebody was telling me there we're like hey we had like a saying kind of that was if anybody had a problem with tom you knew that was a problem with

them you knew it wasn't that he did anything you know and like they're not that many people like that and to have lost him like suddenly like this especially when you know he just had a book come out straining for yet another marathon all this kind of stuff is very shocking and then that's it's a tough tough week for a lot of people i've been spending uh the week kind of looking back on um different things he popped up on and there he is with his book there if you guys want a absolutely brilliant book go and get boxing the 100 greatest fighters by thomas jrbasi it is available in all good bookstores and i know gc's already got his copy delivered on everything fair play gc even though boys in the back of the crack don't quite get on one of these juror anymore

but anyway you know you know one other thing uh elliot worsel the our boxing guy uh was that when i did a couple of pieces i remember he was doing stuff there too with with aunt and those guys way back in the day. So, I mean, again, he just kind of had, it was like, he was one of the rare guys who kind of extended into the boxing and, because if you looked at a lot of the, uh, if you, if you saw a lot of the people who were like, man, I can't believe this and paying their tributes, it was the boxing world, even more than MMA. So, I mean, he extended both ways. And so he had the whole combat sphere, you know, uh, mourning him. That's, that's saying something, man. And he got the, he received the Nat Fleischer Award, uh, from the boxing writer.

Association of America just last year, you know, so it was definitely they all recognized the work that he had done there and just how long. And honestly, somebody from the UFC sent me the medium post, because that was the other thing is just like how much writing he was doing just for fun, because he was doing so much stuff for the UFC, churning out so much stuff. Ant was telling me, he was like, I asked him once what his daily word count was, and he told me, and I said, I couldn't hit that if I was just writing words out of the dictionary. And in addition to that, you know, he's doing like music reviews on medium. He's writing stuff for the village voice.

And one of the medium posts he did. Yeah, he yeah. He was really into roller derby there in New York. And so he would write stuff on that. And like a lot of stuff, these are just for fun just because he wanted to. And I read his medium piece about the one and only boxing match he had in 1997. He signed up for the New York Golden Gloves. And it's hilarious.

I, in my story, when it comes out there, there's the link. in it and everybody should read it because he has so many great lines and especially he got knocked out in this fight and the the new york daily news or somebody or new york post whoever was there like writing something about here's what happened at the golden gloves this year they noted that he was he was down on the mat for a good 30 or 40 seconds and one of his friends said what would be a bad 30 or 40 seconds if that was a good one uh you know he just has so many good lines in there especially about, you know, like signing up for one of these, like, gym fights before the, at Gleason's before the golden gloves and how, you know, he's exhausted by the end of round one.

He goes back to his corner and his coach is telling him like, no, look over there at that guy. He's more tired than you are. And he's like, you know, what I wanted to tell him if I could have breath, if I could have got the breath to say anything, was if he was more tired than I am, he'd be dead right now. Just hilarious stuff. but yeah like same similar to Chuck's story

first time I met him Jeremy Butter introduced me to him it was over there for one of the McGregor fights it might have been McGregor's first Vegas fight against Porre

and Butter was like it was like meeting the shot caller of the entire industry like the way butter was talking about him on the way over was like

oh gee what am I going to do this is going to be what if he doesn't like me you know all this kind of stuff and he's sitting at a table with Chuck you were there wagon home was there and kevin ioli was there i think luke thomas might have been there as well everybody was in town for the fights back then you know and i was just so nervous i didn't know where to

look i was like which which guy is this and straight away just like the loveliest guy in the world knew who i was i knew all about severe on may who was writing for at the time and i met him again after that and again just a lovely interaction with him but it's funny that he he must have a great sense of people, because I'd get these messages off him when my confidence would be on the ground as a writer, and you'd get this message off him. And I can remember the last time he reached out to me, it was just when I'd started for Uncrown again. And all of you guys can remember, like, you guys deserve a lot of credit too, because you had to prop me up because I was like, I don't really, I don't really have the confidence for this anymore, this writing stuff.

I'd rather just talk, show it on a podcast. And that comes a lot more naturally to me. I wrote an article about shaky shore and him getting over cancer. And Tom just mess with me saying, Pizzi, it's 6.30 here and I just read your article. And it's absolutely brilliant. It makes me feel good about writing when I read stuff like this. I just want to let you know. And I was like, geez, you know, getting a message off of a guy that's pretty much a deity in your industry like that, just out of nowhere.

And you're just like your whole month is made. And you're feeling like you're 10 foot tall. And he did that many times to me and did not know me very well, but treated me like a best friend every time it was in his company. And, you know, as the lad said, just echoing everything. They said, like, just an absolute gem of a guy. What was the word count if you don't mind me asking, Ben? Because I've been hearing all about this, all of these different writings and just writing for fun. Imagine that. Like, what is he clocking in a day here? I think it was like four or five thousand words. But I believe that. I think he really did do that. It's crazy, man. most prolific guy I've ever known to do it. If people think that's easy, try sitting down and get into a thousand a day. I know. That's a college dissertation. It's $5,000.

He's doing it every day for God's thing. It's crazy. And, you know, man, like, I know, just to put a cap on, like, I don't know if you ever saw, like, fighters interacting with him, but I would see that over the years, too, and all, you know, all the fighters loved him, you know, it was one of those things that he was, you know, kind of extends beyond just us, us guys that he, like, helped her. was checking in on the fighters themselves really loved them too boxers mima guys everybody and that was another story i heard is that you know he wrote literally

the ufc encyclopedia uh which they put out two different editions of uh and at one of the ufc expos they wanted him to sit down at one of the tables and sign copies of that for people and he was just you know not the kind of guy who liked that sort of attention and didn't want the focus to be on him yeah and but he said all right fine like i'll do it and but was also kind of like who's going to want to come over here and like get my signature on this book like they don't even know that I wrote it and this is stupid and I think it was Ann Evans who told me he wasn't sitting there five minutes and Frankie Edgar saw him and came over there and was just like oh you're sitting here you sign this book well hey I'll sit here with you and sign with you so that like people will come

over and then another fighter comes over and then another fighter and these are guys who had been attending to these kinds of duties all day long for sponsors for the UFC like for money because they were obligated to and here was one that nobody asked them to do they just saw him sitting there they all loved him so they went over there and and were glad to be there and glad to be of help even though you know they had to be exhausted of it by that can i can i make a confession i was one of the people who visited his uh his booth that day and honestly i was just looking to see if he signed it and he signed it he signed it for me and he said uh chuck i have an assignment for you that's what he put.

Pretty good stuff, man. Well, look, rest and peace, Tom Jervaisi. Thank you for everything on behalf of all of us, on behalf of just combat sports writers in general because it seems like you have helped every one of us based on how people have been reacting to this

over the last few days. I guess we'll be back. Oh, sorry. I was just about to say it. I was just about to say it. No, you are. were no you listen I paused just as I was about to go there I think the guitar lick was just ahead of you though yeah they had the New York rig had his finger just hovering over the button

he's just like oh this is a good one there if this was a boy bond could we call it Irish spice or crack spice oh crack spice I think might lead people to expect something different than what it would be did you have spice in same demographic Ben See, you guys had legal marijuana. I'm just wondering, there was this legal synthetic thing that came out over here for a while. Marijuana is still illegal here and I would never touch it. No. There's this thing called spice that was sold in the shops.

And everybody was going and getting these bags of spice and smoking. It turned out it fucking completely destroyed people. I can remember my uncle just absolutely fried smoking. He's like, yeah, no, it's exactly like it. I was like, I don't think it is. man you're vibrating as you speak John Jones's brother one of John Jones's brothers who played in the NFL

he like went to a police station and turned himself in because he was yeah because he was so freaked out from smoking it and they were just like we yeah and they were like we don't know what you want us to do here with this man like it's not illegal yeah it's like

spice band yeah one of them but you know at least we had a conversation with synthetic marijuana spice bag is what Rick says Spice bag Because Rick has had a spice bag You two If Rick ever starts talking to me again When the divide

When the schism has been reunited Maybe we could go for another spoise bag You two You get the fuck over here And I'll get you the spice bag And a big feed of Guinness And look if we could find a fucking bag of spice We may smoke a bit of that too

Any more super chats UFC Get Tea Crawford 30 mil for White House card That's not enough money For him He doesn't want to mailbox for that kind of money.

It would be more money than any UFC fighter is going to get and still not nearly enough for him. That's not enough money for him to do that. Like that's, it's crazy. Like, you need to give him a hundred million. Do you know what? He's set, like he's not going to do it. That is crazy to think about that, isn't it?

Like $30 million wouldn't be enough. You're right, though. You know, fucking bad for it. And, oh, it's just this fucking Ilya Tepuri is, and I know I'm driving it. And I know why he's driving it's because, well, because $30 million is a lot of fucking money if you're a UFC fighter.

that's why um and they just aren't getting that i just it's just rubbed me up though i don't blame tuporia i get it but um that whole situation is is constructed around the fact that these ufc fighters even if you are literally on top of the world like like well not literally well also though i mean the we had this story out this week by john nash uh on on ground where about comparing boxing pay and MMA pay and it was just exhaustive very well done. He notes, this is a quote from his story. Connor McGregor was paid approximately 46% less than Cadell Alvarez for five pay-per-views from 2014 to 2016 while generating 36% more revenue on the same number of events.

And that's Connor McGregor, the biggest star our sport has ever known. That tells you something right there. Also, let's please be honest with ourselves. I know we love to speculate about this White House event. What's going to be on it? What it's going to look like and everything. It is September, my dudes. It is September.

And the way things are going, we're not even sure there will be a White House by then. Like, if there is, we're not, like, it might have turned into its own little Versailles by the time summer 2026 rolls around. So like, we really need. to pump the brakes on some of that because of the way, the pace at which things have been developing in America suggests who knows what the situation will be by that.

That's Ben's code for Connor McGregory thinks it's going to be on that card. I like that. Honestly, so that's what you're saying. I hate, Chad and I were talking about this on the CME this week where Michael Chandler was popping back up and being like, me and Connor at the White House. And we were just like, all right, the hope springs eternal for

Mikey C. But also, if I'm honest, I could actually see that fight happening at a UFC White House card, Connor McGregor and Michael Chandler, like, if Connor McGregor could make it through a fight camp and fight anybody, I could see him fighting Michael Chandler and I could see the powers that be seizing on that one as being like, all right, here's one he might have a realistic chance of winning at this point. Michael Chandler's got this kind of like Captain Americaish thing going on. He's going to see at the top, all this kind of stuff. Like, to the extent that I could see any fight, like picture it still.

being a realistic option by then it's shocking to the extent to which I could see that one. Look out for Ben's top five fights for White House 2006. It's coming out next week. We got to do a live show from the White House lawn though. You know what I mean? That'd be fun. That would be a lot of fun. I would fucking pay

any amount of money just to cover that event, just just plug me in. Just like, what the what is going on? Like, I love it too. Like, it's just any more than chat chattis? Supers. Oh, will Peezy forget today? I didn't, boo. Alpaca.

Well, well. I didn't, right, I didn't seamlessly go into it, but I was a bet. If you rewind the tapes, if you rewind the tapes, you'll see I was consulting the notepad here. And it does say super chats on that. Next week, next fucking week, I am going to fucking knock it out at the park. People are going to be like, I've never seen someone segue to super chats better than that in my life.

I do want to point out that I said it right before we started recording because shouts out to the big homie Shador 66 over there on Twitter because he hit me up like when I retweeted that hey we're going to be going live on the crack and he was like don't forget Super Chats Peezy and I was like he is going to forget it but I told you that reminded

me to tell you right before we started like hey Super Chats and you wrote it down I watched you you went mm and you wrote it down and you still he wrote something I don't know what he wrote down I wrote four things down during the show one is Super Chats another one is Charles Sondon talking about Craig

Jones. I don't know what that was about. And then what is Ben's wrestling book set in a different universe? That was the last one I wrote. So if you want to plug that very quickly, please, Ben, because I do want to get a copy of it. It was called The Territories. And I think you could still find it on the internet. There's a lot of good fun stories. Chad Dundas has a, like, a novella in there that's really good. I have a short story that's set in the Memphis wrestling territory. The big homie, Dan Brooks, who writes for the New York Times, has a hilarious one set in Iowa. A lot of good stuff. I think that there's a volume two out like on the way sometime soon. I don't know, I don't have one in that one. I don't know exactly what the status of that one is, but I know

volume one was out there. You can look for it. It's got some great art too from the big homie Marco Bucci, who's a very talented artist. But yeah, it's, I recommend it. I will. I'll check it out. Is that all of the super chatty's? Yeah, I think it is. Everybody, thank you so much. Tune in next week. Take that 15 second pauses, but that's it. tune in next week to see if I do, in fact, remember to segue to Super Chats. It's been beautiful speaking to you. Oh, thank you. I didn't know what that was.

I was like, what is this a new fucking segment? Nobody told me about. Chuck, I love you. Ben, I love you. Mysterious Frank, I love you. New York, Rick. I love you, even though you won't appear or speak on my show anymore. Thank you so much for joining us.

I love you all. See you next week. M-hmm. Thank you.