The Ariel Helwani Show - Karrion Kross in studio, Darren Till, Paul Hughes, Shayna Baszler, BKFC breaking news, Ariel fires back at Logan Paul

Episode Date: August 13, 2025

Ariel Helwani opens the show by reacting to PFL announcing the rematch between Usman Nurmagomedov and Paul Hughes (04:52) and recent comments by Dana White about how fighters will benefit from UFC’s new rights deal (19:57), before answering your On The Nose questions (34:58).Karrion Kross joins Ariel in studio to discuss his new best-selling book and address the conversation around his unexpected WWE departure. He talks about WWE’s contract offer, speculation that his departure is kayfabe, whether AEW made an offer, reports of fan signs being confiscated, revealing his viral WrestleMania promo was a work, advice he received from Paul Heyman, and more (1:00:07).Shayna Baszler breaks her silence about being released by WWE, touching on reports of her bring spotted at NXT, offers from other wrestling promotions, being satisfied with her time at WWE, what went wrong with Ronda Rousey’s final match, and more (2:13:54).BKFC President David Feldman is back to break some news: Mike Perry will defend his King of Violence title against Jeremy Stephens in New Jersey on October 4. He also talks about big money offers to Darren Till, Luke Rockhold’s lackluster performance against Perry, responds to Artem Lobov’s claim that he’s owed money, and more (2:54:12).Paul Hughes joins to react to his rematch against Usman Nurmagomedov being announced earlier in the day. He reflects on the first fight, states his intention to spoil Nurmagomedov’s plans, responds to comments by Nurmagomedov’s manager, and more (3:18:03).Darren Till is the final guest of the day, responding to David Feldman’s comments about their past negotiations earlier in the show. He also breaks down his boxing match against Luke Rockhold and Dillon Danis’ MMA fight against Warren Spencer on the same Misfits card (3:41:10).

Ladies and gentlemen, now, welcome to the Eria, Hawaii Show. Back in your life on this Wednesday, August 13, 2000. And 25, hello again, everyone. I sure hope you're doing well. It's great to be here on another lovely. summer Wednesday in New York City. Oh, what a stretch we have had. Tremendous, tremendous stretch of programs, incredible amount of riveting, fascinating, interesting guests. And we keep that train rolling along on this here Wednesday. So excited about today's program. I have been

giddy. It's been hard to go to sleep for the last couple of days because I have been so damn excited about this here program. Now, first, let me just say, yesterday was a fantastic day. Love the shows. We did too, our regular show, The Zone Show. Had the opportunity to be on the Bill Simmons podcast. What a pleasure, what an honor, what a privilege. That is, one of the biggest sports podcasts on the planet. Also, the impulsive interview came out, some thoughts on that to come.

But I would say, for the team, for the brand, for us, it was a great day. I think it was a great day to be had. Looking forward to more great things, more great vibes on this August. 13th, very excited, and shall I tell you who is on today's program? Yes, I shall. Back end of the show, we're going to be joined by Paul Hughes. You know him, the pride of dairy. More on him in a second. Prior to that, David Feldman, not to be confused with our good friend Andrew Feldman on social media prolific, David Feldman, founder of BKFC, Bare Knuckle Fighting Championship. He's going to join us at about 345 to share

some pretty big breaking news. Stay tuned for that. David Feldman, 345. 315. We're going to be joined by Shana Basler, the Queen of Spades. You know Shana.

If you're an MMA fan, Invicta fan, Elidxie fan, Strike Force fan, UFC fan, Ultimate Fighter fan, you know Shana Bezler. If you're a WWE fan, you know Shana Bezler.

The last chapter, the most recent chapter of her career, has been in the world of pro wrestling in WWE, to be exact, she was released three months ago. This will be her first interview since parting ways with WWU. Where does she go from here? Does she continue in pro wrestling?

Does she go to another organization, another promotion? Does she go back to MMA? Who knows? Shane and Basler, we've been talking to her for a very long time. She will join us at about 3.15. And then, my friends, at 2 o'clock. Perhaps the most talked about man in pro wrestling today. We had him

in studio. after WrestleMania in that interview he talked about his rise he talked about the groundswell of support that he has received he talked about his book

that was coming out which I have right here I've enjoyed it immensely life is fighting out right now in fact according to our sources the number one sports biography book on Amazon

as of right this moment shout out most talked about man in pro wrestling today, Carrying Cross, aka Killer Cross, who on Sunday, via his YouTube channel, announced to the world that his WWE contract has expired and announced to the world that he has not resigned with WWE. Now, the big question, since this all came out, certainly in light of the Seth Rollins injury angle, has been, this is a worker a shoot? I sit here today. hand on my heart, on my life, I have no idea.

And it's been very funny to see some people say that his appearance on today's show is validation that it's a work. Trust me, you guys think you know a lot, you don't know a lot. No chance it's any kind of validation. I don't know if it's a work, it's a shoot. I have no part in any of it. I'm going to ask him these questions. In addition to that, talk about his future. In addition to that, talk about what's happened over the last few months and talk about

this book. A lot of gems, a lot of great things in here. I urge you all to check out. Great Summer Read. It's a great life story and he's very excited about it. So that's today's program. That's today's lineup. Oh, Daddy, oh, I cannot wait for today's show. Today's show is going to be a great one. Also on Wednesdays, you know we like to shoot on the nose. Coming up in a matter of moments, questions obviously can be submitted. Same place as usual, ariahawani.substack.com. Do want to get to some breaking news off the top. Some breaking news off the top. We woke up this morning.

We got ourselves a gun. Get it? Anyone? Woke up this morning. I got myself a gun. Yeah. Anyway, we did get the news. We finally got the news.

The confirmation. The news we had all been waiting for. Usbander Magamatov versus Paul Hughes. to is in fact going down October 3rd in Dubai and perhaps most exciting. It's for the PFL lightweight title, 155 pounds. The actual belt is going to be on the line. I think technically they're going to pretend like it's up for grabs. They're instituting a new belt. In my opinion, Usman should be the champion. The Belltor belt should become the PFL belt, but whatever, actual titles are being defended. They made the right call. It's the fight to make. It's the most

interesting best, most intriguing fight that PFL can make right now, make the fight, give the people what they want, it's back at the same spot, scene of the crime, one of the best fights of the year, back in January, hotly contested, of course Hughes returned a couple months ago, fought in his home country, was able to be successful there, had an incredible win, incredible pop, an incredible post-fight interview, and now they are running it back. Love it. Love the fact that they're running it back, love the fact that the PFL lightweight title is on the line. Also on this card, also officially announced today, is that the PFL light heavyweight title is going to be on the line, as Corey Anderson is going up against Dovlett Yaksumiradov. Now, Dovlett won the PFL light heavyweight tournament in November.

This makes all the sense of the world. They're actually crowning champions. by October 4th, we'll have a PFL lightweight champion, a middleweight champion, a light heavyweight champion, barring any draws, of course, and we're also getting worried that they're going to do a big welterweight fight in November. This is good. This is progress. This is how a normal promotion should act. And these are all great fights that I'm very much looking forward to. Also in the release, by the way, Artem Lobov versus Zubaira Tehugov was officially announced as well. So we knew that already. Artem was on the show last week, but good to get the confirmation. Moments ago, the manager for one Usman or Magamatov, tweeting to Paul Hughes, this, this is from Ali Abdel-Aziz. It's embarrassing that you've built your name off of losing to other men. I didn't even think you deserved the rematch, but Usman made the call. He told me you're the only one he wants to smash because you can't stop running your mouth.

Now that he's beating you, nobody's ever going to mention your name again. You brought this on yourself. Imagine a manager writing this to another fighter. It's unbelievable. He also does manage Archie Calgan, who was in the running to fight Usman. So I can understand why he would prefer to have both of his fighters fighting for the belt. But yes, he sent that to Paul moments ago.

Gotta love him. God bless him. always does a great job of backing his guys. We'll ask Paul about that later in the program as well. When I saw this news, I was reminded of a clip in exchange back on August 1st, just what, 18, no, less than that, 12 days ago, where our good friend Shady, who does a great job, Shady Bashai, I hope I'm pronouncing his name correctly, was at the PFL Post-Fi Press Conference asking PFL broadcaster and I suppose spokesperson, mouthpiece slash figurehead. Not quite sure what he is. We've never quite seen a situation like this

where a broadcaster is serving as the promoter slash decision maker. Our friend Shady asked Jonathan Coachman about running this fight back, Paul Hughes versus Usman or Magamatov and also running back the Costello Van Steenus versus Johnny Eblen fight. This is 12 days ago.

My understanding is Hughes versus Usman was already done this exchange happen in any event please watch this exchange and and share some thoughts this is me speaking to the crew obviously you watching this at home can't exactly share you but you get the point take a look question is what happens in the instance of extremely close fights where the entire world is saying this is this this this rematch is being handed to you on a silver platter I'm talking specifically Johnny Eblen and Van Steens and then

Hughes and Newsman too those are two fights that maybe don't fit this new format but those rematches are in high demand are those instances where you guys would say, okay, we got to make those happen. I think the general fan base would want to see those rematches. Well, it seemed like Stenis, someone would say he may have gotten lucky, or, I mean, Johnny Eblen certainly thinks so. And the Hughes and Usman fight, I think, were very close or controversial among the fans. Do you disagree with both of those statements? No, I don't. But what I disagree with is that we have to make those fights next, right? Okay. There's got to be some patience in the game. And we could do something, let's just throw

hypotheticals out there for a second. Sure. We could have Usman over here. You got a Paul Hughes over here. What if they fought on the same card on the same night against two different people? Wouldn't that be exciting? And they say, hey, man, if they finish tonight, then maybe they can fight again. Doing the automatic rematch all the time is not necessarily the thing that you have to do. And Johnny Eblatt? Love Johnny Eblen.

You know what he could have done to be facing the Walterweight champion? I don't know. Thank you. The middleweight champion? He could have not been submitted. in the last 10 seconds of that fight. I suppose. You feel me?

You're right. So now we're not saying he's not going to get that opportunity, but Costello earned it. And so we've said, whoever wins this, we'll face that. Now, could we change our mind? Absolutely. We're not going to be locked into anything, but that's our plan. We've got a lot of new good people in our fighter ops department matchmaking, and we're going to figure that out.

But I'm telling you right now, you're going to see the fights that make the most sense, and then eventually we're going to give the fans what they want. but it may not be that it's going to be the next one it was a ludicrous clip when I saw it on August 1st it's a hilarious clip now because the fight was already done when he has that sort of look on his face like really people want to see that

all you're telling the audience is oh actually the fights that you all think are the most anticipated and most wanted fights in PFL actually they're not really those you're wrong on that not so fast Ari yeah yeah let me throw out a hypothetical for you let me throw out a hypothesis yeah yeah Paul

same night Wow That'd be magic That's good stuff They are gonna fight him The same night though So he was right about that part Yeah

Like it's never happened before right Like no one has ever done that And more often than not It doesn't fail miserably Right like it happened Times Square car Where the two guys fought on the same night And one faltered

One lost and the other one looked like crap Yeah Wow what a great thought That's amazing When I first saw this I was sitting on my couch In my living room And when he threw that out

He's like Let me throw out a hypothetical here here's my idea they fight on the same card against different people wouldn't that be a great idea wouldn't that be exciting

and I verbally said out loud to myself I was just like that would be the worst idea I've ever heard you have to stop this no this is this is a terrible idea

and then also goading like Johnny Eblen like oh you actually want to fight for the middleweight belt like don't get submitted in the last 10 seconds bro blew me away like come on the fucking audacity

and look we've had our issues with coach we kissed him made up he came up to me when we did the misfits card it's all good he's probably going to use this as fodder and I'm not trying to start a thing I really am not but it was

crazy to hear him say that on August 12th or excuse me on the first and now 12 days later to see that they actually officially announced it of course this was the fight to make any any insinuation otherwise I mean that would have truly been to quote our old friend Luke Thomas promotional malpractice

it would have been absolutely assinine to do anything otherwise but the smugness in which to suggest that the people don't want this fight and then the smugness in which to suggest to Johnny Evelyn, hey, but you know what, bud? Maybe next time, don't lose. Hey, man, here's a bit of a nice. Don't get submitted in the last 10 seconds.

Johnny Evelyn, oh, thank you. Okay, but what a cloud show, man. It's not only this, the smungness with which this was delivered and saying, we're not going to make those fights. Fans don't want those fights, man, we don't have to do that next. But then also back in June, wow, that's right. I've been too hyped up there, punching my own microphone. Also back in June, the PFL account tweeting that the winner of Colgan Barnau

would be fighting Usmander Magamatov, to the point. where Paul Hughes is responding to that being like, yo, stop with the rage bait. It's got to be me next. So it's like, the promotion is like denying this massive rematch you have and then in the end makes it anyway. They can't get out of their own way. This speaks to what we said every time

that the coach post-fight press conferences thing has come up, which is he is not making this decision, right? He is being trotted out there as a spokesperson for it and to have to be in this position. But as you said, the beginnings of this were already in the works. It may have already been

dumb by the time this is happening. Why even throw out the idea of, oh, you know what? Maybe not next. They might fight on the same card. It just makes it all look goofy because he can't speak to what is actually happening. Because when you're a mark for your own gimmick and you want to stand up there and act like a figurehead, a guy who makes decisions, you throw things like that out and kind of hope that no one calls you out on it after the fact. Most importantly, offending and disrespecting one of your best fighters. Like, could you imagine if another promoter said, hey, maybe next time, don't get submitted in the last 10 seconds. By the way, a fight that Johnny Eblen, according to everyone, was winning.

Was 10 seconds away from winning. It wasn't like he shat the bed. He just got caught. Oussman wants a rematch with Leon? How about he doesn't get head kicked in the last minute? Imagine if Dana White had said that. Oh, Oussman wants a rematch? It's crazy to me. Let's not focus too much on this. Petey, they got it right. You spoke to Paul. His sentiments. Did he always feel like they were going to get it right? No, I mean, everything you're talking about we're talking about here, the June 20. a tweet, Barnwee, V. Colgan. And let's not forget, the coach also spoke after that one and was like, he was asked about,

like, why is this a number one contender fight? And he was like, is it though? So we've had this situation where are we being worked by PFL at this stage? Like, you're talking about working and shoot at the start with the, in terms of pro wrestling. But it actually feels like this was a windup since January to just have us losing our minds every couple of months about this point. You know what? You nailed it.

You nailed it because I can guarantee you they'll go. want a show now and say look how we got everyone talking look how we got everyone worked up it worked this that's how you correct things right look it worked we had them i guarantee you this is the approach we knew this all long but we just wanted people we wanted to drum up interest we wanted to get people talking we want people to demand that they want to see this fight we were already interested yeah yeah this is you know when we were interested january 20th whenever the fuck that first had fight we were like yes give it to us tomorrow we didn't even need the miranda fight yeah by the way this is this is kind of a first step the the true sign that we will understand all of this

is whether costello and johnny ebblin fight my you know what's my prediction yeah my prediction is they won't fight my prediction is they'll go with fabian and dalton in large part because i think they think that if fabian wins in particular that he's a name i think they want to stay true they want to pick their spots and i think there's been look it's on ebblin to a degree there's more of a ground swell for Hughes, Nirmagamadov 2, or Nirmagamadov Hughes 2, I think they'll try to say, hey, we need to prove that these tournaments mean something, and so Ebblin will be the casualty in that regard, and they'll kind of split the difference. That's my prediction as of right now. Let's see what happens. Maybe one of those guys breaks a hand, and they decide to

run it back, but my sense is right now they're going to go in the direction of the winner of the middleweight final fighting Costello next, which, by the way, I think is the wrong call. I think it should be Eblen. Because if nothing else, he has earned it. He has been a fighting champion. He's been their best and most reliable champion who hasn't flown the coup. I think that's the way to go. Well, then your prediction of them saying, like, ah, we had this plan all along kind

of falls on deaf ears to a certain extent because you're about to fuck up the second version of this where you just do Costello versus Johnny Eblit. Like, do it. If you've truly learned the lesson and it was like, ah, it was all the work, we were just messing with you guys, then don't fuck it up on the second chance that you have to do it. Also, do it properly. The work doesn't work if Paul Hughes

is making Instagram posts of hype reels about him and Usmonder Magamadov and it says October. It was essentially him foreshadowing that this was going to get announced. He had been mentioning on his YouTube channel, big news is coming, guys. Don't worry, the announcement's coming. So it's just like, both people

are saying different things, and it turns out what Paul Hughes was saying was correct. Well, we'll speak to Paul. As a coach confirmed this, though, because Yeah, I can't wait. We'll get his, we'll get his thoughts. Okay, important to say, though, I feel like the tone could be misinterpreted here. PFL 100, 1,000, 1 million percent got it correct. And this is the fight.

Oh, by the way. This is the biggest fight they can make. Not only did they get it correct. They got the Corey fight correct, and they got the fact that both fights are for actual world titles. Yes, yes. They deserve all the credit in the world. This is us just kind of, you know, having a laugh. Again, coach, we come in peace.

Peace and love, peace and love. But, you know, you want to stand there at the table. Deus, you're going to be subjected to some criticism. I enjoyed my time working with him and Todd Grisham at that event, but it was kind of a ludicrous statement to make 12 days ago and now looks a little silly. We'll talk to Paul at 410. The other breaking news, if you will, since the last time we spoke, was that contender series, the first installment of this new season has come and gone. Not much to write home about. Dana's post event interview with Laura Sanko actually made me laugh out loud, like how ridiculous the whole thing was, how upset he was with the whole thing. It was very, very funny. Go out there and find it. It's been posted everywhere. Like he was just, the shot of him shitting on guys and like literally crushing their dreams. The two shot with the other guy just sitting there like a kid who has been sent to the principal's office and is told that he's being expelled and now we're

going to call your parents is just an all-timer. And they're like trying to hold it together like they're sitting there staring at the camera and they're like oh shit like i am not i'm not getting this and i'm getting like browbeaten well then the production accidentally showed the hunter the dude that that he loved so much yeah um they showed him and he was like no no no skip him skip him i was like oh is he gonna shit on him too he had the best performance by far so good of course it's the glowing review it's the be joe pie for a moment but obviously it doesn't roll off the tongue quite as well the big news though is post-event press conference he finally gets to meet the mma media he's been doing the rounds, he's been on all the shows, all the programs, a lot of softball stuff.

No, hate, I don't expect hard-hitting questions when he's on CBS this morning or any of the other shows. Like, he's celebrating the big news, the big deal, the Paramount deal, which we've been talking about for the past two days. That's all well and good. But credit, I think, to the MMA media in attendance in that room, because I think they asked them some good questions, some pertinent questions. Did he give us all the answers that we had been pondering? No, but we did get some clarity on some. hot topics. Number one, he was asked about fighter pay and whether or not as a result of the rights fee here in the United States going from about 550 a year from ESPN to 1.1 billion a year,

7.7 billion over seven years. Does that mean fighter pay is going to go up as well? One would think, right? Here's what he had to say. And then the fighter pay stuff, obviously that's going to go up and the fighters are going to get money. Do you guys look at that as a case-by-case contractual basis with each fighter? What's the question? I'm getting there. Do you look at it case-by-case with each fighter or do you go, right, we're going to... What was the first part of the question? Fighter pay? Fider pay. Yeah. So do you look at it as like case-by-case on each fighter? Or do you go, right, we're just going to up the base pay and maybe up the bonuses? How do you sort of figure out the fighter pay rising? Yeah. Yeah, these are... Listen, I'm not going to have any comments on that

yet because we still got to get together and figure this stuff out. You know, it's August. We have till January to figure all that stuff. But, you know, the low-hanging fruit that's easy to answer, bonuses are obviously going up. So, you know, that'll be big. And forget about the tide rising with all the other fighters. I mean, just the number that the bonuses bring to a fighter is, you know,

millions of dollars. Okay, so credit to Oscar Willis of the Mack life. Great question. he does confirm that the bonuses are going up. He does not say by how much. So I guess technically, if they go from 50 to 55, they've gone up. Now, I don't, I know it doesn't necessarily work this way, guys. But I do think it's fair to at least throw out the suggestion.

Hey, your rights fee doubled from 550 to 1.1. Can we go from 50 to 100K? What do we think this is? Do we think it's 75? Do we think it's 60, 55, 100K? What are we thinking? I don't know what it is, but the good news is that we'll find out because they make it public. So, like, come 2026, we'll know, you know, 100K.

100K sounds pretty nice. Nice round of number. We've been doing 50K for however long. It was 60K at one point, right? And then back down to 50K. Put it down to 100K. Nice round number sounds good. Let's still 100K.

Yeah. I don't think it's, I don't think that's good enough. Like, honestly, if it's just like bonuses, they're going to get extra money in the bonus. And look, he did say this is going to be worked out and stuff like that. but the entry level pay, I feel, is, is the most glaring problem people have with the UFC contracts. And, you know, you'd love to see that going up. Like, I think it's 12 and 12 now. Most guys are coming in or not.

So I think that's got to raise. Like, you got to remember, you know, for the most part, I know recently it's changed with contender series. Prospects are getting rushed into those situations a lot quicker than they used to. But up until about five years ago, people were spending 10 years trying to get to the UFC, at least probably. and then they'd get there and then your first check is usually 12 and 12 I think that's what I want to see

going up and I'd love to see that doubled like this is as you say like we're going from 550 million per year to 1.1 billion the fighter pay the revenue split is already so so low I think you know

and obviously there's issues for the pay per view boys and things like that as you were talking with Tom Aspin all about and champions will have that problem but I think that the main thing is looking after the lowest pay guys, that's what I'd like to see big improvements in.

Sure. And you know, we focus on the 1.1. That doesn't account for the Gates, that doesn't account for the site fees, that doesn't account for the broadcast deals that they have in the UK all over. Like, it's really, it's so much more than 1.1 what they're making, right, a year. So they can surely

afford all of this. Here's the thing. I don't think it will double. I don't think the base pay will double. There's a lot of things that I would like to see. I'd like the, I'd like the entry level pay to go up, but if I'm being 100% honest, compare it to say like an entry-level boxer, it's actually not that bad. It's the mid-tier guys, and it's the top-level guys who I actually don't think get what they are owed. It's the guys who are on the cusp of being

contenders, and then it's the contenders, and then it's the champions. I don't think that you get a lot of, you get a lot of pushback from the entry-level guys, because the discrepancy between that 12 and 12, or the 10-10, and the regional scene is actually quite large, but I certainly would love to see that go up. I would love to see the removal of the show win model. I don't think it's going to go away, but I would love to see that just go away for good and everyone just has split the difference. And maybe some guys wouldn't like that. This is just me talking. I think they are owed the luxury of knowing how much they're going to make by the time they step foot in that cage, win or lose. And then there's the bonus, which is the huge upside. So I would

love to see that go up. And I'm fascinated to know how they're going to address the paper viewpoints. I'm fascinated to know. In a lot of these interviews, he was also on part of my take, he's talking about how this is going to be great for the fighters. He has yet to give us concrete details. And I'm not demanding it right now. I don't expect, hey, if their story is true, guys, if their story is true, this deal got done five days ago. If their story is true, the deal to put together, you know, the whole kid and caboodle to Paramount, as opposed to just 30 shows and the 13 pay-per-views elsewhere, came together in the span of Thursday to Saturday, because that's what they said, right, 48 hours after the deal went through.

And so I'm not expecting it to come down and give us a whole PowerPoint presentation. But I hope and pray that by the time January 1st rolls around, everyone is aware of where they stand, they know what they're getting, and that they get their piece of the pie. They're never going to get 50%. As long as there's no Fighters Association Union, they're not getting that 50%. But I do hope, as he said, rising tide,

I hope that they're going to get some greater piece of the pie as a result of this deal. Now, he was asked further questions about the deal, including pay-per-view, the future of pay-per-view. He continues to talk about this as well. Here's what Dana had to say.

The decision to largely shy away from pay-per-view, I know you said it may still be on the table, but stay over it. I mean, how difficult of a decision was that to me. It's not that it's on the table. I mean, the whole thing started going on pay-per-view's dead. Paperview's not dead. We're on pay-per-view on Saturday. Okay, can you pause right there?

The pay-per-view is dead sentiment came from Mark Shapiro. Mark Shapiro is the one who said, it's antiquated, it's old, it's only direct TV movies and boxing that are on pay-per-view, which is kind of funny because they're now in the boxing business, but he was sort of, he was sort of brandishing,

boxing with like this, like, it's an old thing brush, if you get what I'm saying, which is the opposite of what he does when he talks about Zoufa boxing. In any event, they're the ones that put that sentiment out. And I and others said immediately, isn't it weird to say that

when you have five more pay-per-views left to sell in 2025? So he's trying to walk some of that back. But let's be very clear about this. It wasn't the media or anyone else that was saying, hey, paper-view's dead. You guys said pay-per-view is dead. And then you try to course correct.

We continue. And the pay-per-view business is still very much alive and well, but, you know, we were talking about potential pay-per-view with other streaming partners that we were talking to in the deal, but just not in this one. And, you know, who knows what could happen? The beautiful thing about this business is every year something happens that I don't see coming, you know, a fight that you never thought would happen or who knows. I mean, now, you know, we're doing boxing and we're doing MMA. Who knows what could happen and anything could be a pay-per-view. Something could be a pay-per-view still. Does this require, like, massive restructuring of, like, fighter pay?

I mean, they used to be pay-per-view partners with you, right? Now what's the character there? And that's the voice of John Morgan, who I believe works for the U.G, formerly MMA junkie, does a fine job. Dana is leaving the door open. He's saying, who knows, who knows, who knows? But worth noting, he was asked point blank on the part of my take podcast which was posted today by PFT, one of the characters on the show. Does that mean, I got the exact quote here. The exact quote is, standby, stand by, standby, stand by, stand by, stay by.

He asked, PFT asked, there's going to be no pay per views on this deal until the deal expires, which would be end of 20, 33, Dana says right. And so I think all of this, hey, who knows, is just a way to not really piss off ESPN and end that relationship poorly. Because I could imagine, if I'm ESPN listening to this, like, hey, guys, why are you telling people pay-per-views dead when we're trying to sell five more pay-per-views and we're the ones benefiting from this? Like, we bought the pay-per-views.

And now you're telling everyone pay-per-views dead. No skin off your back. We get it. But, like, that's not really being a good partner. And so I think what he's trying to do is course correct in that regard, but he says point blank to PFT in the PMT podcast, no pay-per-views in the next seven years. So all this will go away. It's just been, as the kids like to say, hella confusing because they keep changing the messaging.

We continue. It's not massive restructuring. You know, we got a bunch of smart kids over there that work in the accounting department to figure out how to, you know, how to make all this stuff work. But it's so good for the fighters. And what I love about being with, you know, one company that made such a big investment in us is they're all in with us. So, you know, the fighters are going to get tons of promotion, you know, built by all these different unbelievable networks that these guys own. And, you know, these are aggressive, smart guys that are going to build a big media company.

So they always love to tell the fact that the UFC is a major league sport, and certainly the rights fees would suggest that they are in the company of the other major leagues here in the United States. In those sports, it's like, hey, this deal has been struck, and as a result, the players are getting X amount because of the collective bargaining agreement, aka the CBA that has been negotiated, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. In our little sport, it's, yeah, we got some smart. kids in accounting and they'll figure it out they'll figure it out and if you're a ufc fighter you're like okay cool cool dana gonna work it out Dana gonna work it out that's fucking they're gonna work it out that's pretty much what he's saying can i ask you arriel um i think it's about like the the figure people throw around to correct people wrong it's about 18 percent they're saying the the revenue share is for for fighters and the ufc yeah if they just

kept it the same with more revenue now on the table, wouldn't that mean an improvement for fighters anyway? Yeah, look, I do think something's going to go up. It would just be nice if the fighters knew and it would be nice if it was like, you know, like some sort of mathematical breakdown where you knew exactly what it was. I don't think that's how it works. I think it's kind of like a everyone, you know, fend for yourself and if you've got a deal that's coming up, it's not like if you're in the, look, I'd love to be proven wrong, but if you're in the midst of an eight-fight deal and you've got six-fight lights left. They're not going to just be like, hey, as a result of this,

you're getting now X amount. You'll get a bigger bonus, clearly, but it's just kind of the wild west. Every show, though. You know what I mean? Like, there's a lot of people that misses. Like, it's not really covering everyone if you're thrown out four performance bonuses and there's 24

fighters on the card. You know what I mean? The pay-per-view thing is going to be fascinating. It really is. Because if I'm a top star, if I'm an Islam, a Drichus, a Tom, You know, one of those names, and I know there's no, like, super-duper star, even if Connor comes back and he fights on CBS. How do they offset that? How did they offset that?

It's going to be fascinating to see how that all plays out. Yeah. One last thought on all of this, the more I think about it, the more I think about our conversation with David Sampson yesterday, I really do think, and I look forward to seeing if there's more reporting on this, I really think that Donald Trump had a big part in all of this. I mean, like, there's just too much coincidence and too much happened in a short amount of time from the settlement with CBS to the merger going through to then this happening and and was this a a byproduct of the settlement was this a part of the deal hey you got to do a deal with these guys like

it just seems way too connected you know what I mean I mean I'm that said it himself right essentially like it's a wild thought man it's a wild thought Dana's sitting up there talking about the White House show like it's wild how connected yes yes yes so again benefiting from timing I talked about they benefited from timing and in circumstance when they went from Spike to Fox because of the launch of FS1 and they needed a new shiny toy they benefited from it all when they went from Fox DSPN because Plus was launching they needed a new shiny toy they benefit from the fact that their guy is in the White House and this whole thing CBS happens and the Skydance merger is getting roadblocked, hey, settlement, hey, approval,

hey, do a deal, the whole freaking thing. No one predicted it would all go to one place. No one predicted Paramount Plus. No one predicted a billion plus from one entity. It's just an amazing thing. The rich guys get richer. All right, time now for everyone's favorite segment of the week. It is time.

look at that nose it's a nice nose you're talking about mine no the graphic oh uh triple double up first hey ariel what was your

honest take on your impulsive appearance do you think it was unprofessional the guy was scrolling or Logan was eating or was it all fun in games

why did you decide to do their show before your own well I don't know about before my own I mean I do my show all the time they had asked me a couple times

I know some of the guys who worked there And I thought it would be a fun thing. I'll say, like, in general, it was fine. It's an impressive production. I had no real issues. Yeah, like, can I nipick about a few things? Sure.

Did I love that he was eating? I wouldn't do that. I've never seen him do that. Did I call him out on it? Yes. Was it all in good fun? Yes. My style of interviewing someone is, like, you're here.

Like, when Cross is going to be here at 2 o'clock, I'm going to stare him in the face for X amount of time and I will not look anywhere else. I don't love when I've talked about this a million times when someone's sitting there with a sheet. And I don't love when someone's looking at a phone while you're talking. But I get it. Not everyone's me. I don't necessarily view that as disrespectful. It's just not my style.

And the reason why I do that is because when someone's here, I want to connect with them, right? I want to give them my full attention. If you're not really paying attention and you look at someone looking down, you're like, what is this guy doing? There was a moment where, like, the producer was in the back, and, like, his phone went off, like, and he was looking at Instagram. I don't know if they kept that in there, but, like, music from an Instagram reel popped up. I'm like, you guys are scrolling in the middle of my, like, am I boring you that much? So, you know, the T-shirt thing is fine. You're trying to, like, it's all fine.

I really could, like, it's all laugh. I'm down to play. Like, we keep playing the D-1 Glazer thing. So I can't be offended about that. Yeah. We're playing it up. The one part that I did not like, I will be 100% honest about that, is, uh, you know, part where he accused me of leaking, misreporting, breaking trust when it came to the story of him fighting Connor McGregor back in December. I even went back and rewatched the whole segment

yesterday just to make sure I was right. What he said on the show was actually 100% wrong. The complete opposite happened. What he said was that I reached out to him and asked him if that story was true because that morning Connor was tweeting things that they had a deal with this billionaire family in India, the Ambani family, and I asked him for it was true, and he said no, and I went on the show and said, it's not true. What actually happened was, since we're now talking about it, I reached out to him, he said yes, I said, meaning yes, there is validity to it.

I came on, I said to him, hey, thank you, we never spoke, because it's always off the record with me. I came on the show, and after speaking to other people and connecting the TKO dots, I said, no, there is actually some creed. to this. There is a possibility of this happening. Now, it never happened, but I actually never poo-pooed it. I actually did the exact opposite and re-watched the whole segment and never even uttered the possibility of us talking to each other. I never said I reached out to him and he didn't even reply. I never even went down that path. So he was completely wrong. And he,

it's all content. And I'm fine with Logan. But like, this is my life. I don't joke around when it comes to journalism. I don't joke around when it comes to trust. As I said to him, I could not be sitting here. I would have been gone long ago if I sat here and broke people's trust all those years. People telling me things. And that's why I get so fired up about the bullshit Brock Lesner story because for two reasons. A, every time I go on these podcasts, it's why I don't go on a lot of them, they always bring it up and they always get it wrong. If you're going to bring it up, get it right. The ban last 48 hours. I was back at UFC 200 and then 201 and then 202 and then 203 and on and on it goes. So stop saying that I've been banned since 2016. Stop getting

it wrong. Stop calling it leaking. I did not leak. I got it right. I reported it via sources outside of the company. No one told me internally. Leaking would suggest that I was internal, getting it from someone internally, and then broke trust by putting it out there. That never happened. So stop getting it wrong. That annoys me. But it annoys me even further when you suggest that I broke trust, that I DM'd you, that I reached out to you, and that you told me not to say something and I did it because that never happened. Not here, not there, not any time in my career. I take that shit seriously. That made me nothing to you. Content creators, YouTubers. That made me nothing and I get it and I respect it and we all have our own lanes. To me, that shit

matters. That shit fucking matters more than anything. There's not a single human being on the planet that could ever say that I broke their trust. You could call me a lot of things. But that's why I got pissed off at Brendan when he said I was a bad teammate because that would suggest that I break people's trust, that I'm not, I don't play well with others. That's not true. One step further, when it comes to journalism, I don't fucking break trust. If it's off the record, it's off the fucking record for life. You don't think there have been times where I was like, man, if I just told the UFC where I got this from, maybe all this would go away.

Maybe the heat would be on them. Fuck no. I would never do that. I would never throw those people under the bus. People, multiple people. I would never fucking do that. To anyone, because if you told me something in confidence, it stays that way until I die, till I fucking die.

so this may be a cool thing and they put out the clip of me talking about it with him and him accusing me of it and getting the story completely wrong and they didn't even put it at the back end where we clear it up so we kind of cleared it up in the moment

but don't put that shit out there don't put that shit out there because that shit means something to me for life like I am nowhere I am nothing I am dead I'm dead in the water

I don't exist in this game anymore if I don't have the trust of the people that I talk to that I deal with from the managers to the coaches to the fighters to their wives to their husbands, to their agents, to their best friends, to anyone associated with them. You tell me something, it is going in the fucking vault for life, unless you want it out there.

So that's why I get annoyed when people say leak. That's why I get annoyed when people suggest that I broke someone's trust with the Brock thing. Not true. That's why I got annoyed when he said that I broke his trust. That's the only thing. So to answer your question, triple double, I enjoyed it. It's a very impressive production. I have no problem doing it again.

I have no problem with Logan for the most part other than this little exchange I love the fact that my nephews thought it was cool that I was on there and other people will reach out like it's a big time podcast I get it like they are a behemoth, much love, thank you I'm honored that you'd want to talk to me no issues, no issues with Jake as well

but it's just that I'm gonna push back I'm always gonna fucking push back when you insinuate that I did something wrong journalistically again you could say I suck at this I suck at that fine but when you say that I broke trust journalistically I will push back and I will defend myself and I did that yesterday I'm not going to post a DM it's not worth it but I posted the clip you can watch it for yourself I never

ever ever did even a single thing that he said in that clip so in short fine go check it out impulsive love you guys shout out appreciate the prime the lunchly uh just fucking don't get shit wrong next time uh all right let's move on steak with gorge Ariel did you think Dana didn't contracts because he wants to set the tone and have braws slash finishes or did the DWCS fights really suck last night I thought he was a bit harsh on the last guy who fought terrible wasn't that bad before he got egregiously head butted I don't know I think look honestly like do we love when when it's harsh no but I will say I prefer them not signing everyone I think it means more when they just sign one person like the

previous, like the early days. Obviously the Brendan Locknain thing was very, very, very, very like egregious, but, you know, I don't think it's necessarily bad to just sign one as opposed to four or five. So I don't hate that. But, you know, it is awkward seeing people's lives get crushed in front of them. Blake, greetings from parts unknown. From where you sit, do you think TCO's current run of deals is intentionally closing the oxygen supply for any true challenger brands in combat sports, it feels less like isolated transactions and more like a coordinated play to lock up venues, media pipelines, and crossover town before anyone else can get traction. Look, it's a ruthless game. It's the fight business. Everyone's fighting. Everyone's

playing games. Everyone's jockeying for position. That's just the thing. And yes, it's no longer, like, it used to be like one big bad entity in MMA that was doing it. Now they're a freaking Goliath. I will say this. From what I heard, Glass Beagle's report front office sports saying that Zoufa boxing headed the Paramount, I've heard the same. And I think it's very interesting that Dana White said on Monday that the deal for Zufa boxing was done already and that they just hadn't announced it yet. I think they're spacing them out intentionally to make them seem like two separate entities. My understanding is very much a package deal. You're taking this, you're taking that.

I don't know if there was great. How could there be a ton of demand for something that doesn't exist? My understanding is it wasn't a ton of demand. And so part of that deal was, hey, you're getting the whole UFC freaking Goliath package. You're also going to get this startup thing that we're doing here. And so I wouldn't be surprised if they announced it in the next coming, you know, days, weeks. Certainly I would think around the time of Canella Crawford. to make it feel like two separate entities

got two separate deals and I'm sure there was an added price added to that but feels very much like a package deal. Can I ask you? So when you're saying get, do you mean as in additional content? Like, is there a separate deal

that is going to be made to you understanding? It's a separate deal because it's another thing and I'm sure there's a price tag attached to that other thing. but I definitely think that it's like a hey it was negotiated at one time yes part of it

100%. But it has its own price tag. It is not just part of this 1.1 per year is going to be Zuba boxing. Oh, I don't know for a fact but I don't think so. Okay, got it. I also think it was strategic to let ESPN go first with their WWE announcement

and then this follows suit. Wet Bandit, hey, on Impulsive you told Logan you want to be able to look in the mirror and like what you see. Do you think Logan can look in the mirror and like what he sees? He seems to squirm when you said that seemingly knowing him, he can't say the same. He's a bit fake unlike Jake. I don't fucking know.

How am I supposed to know if he likes what he sees? I mean, I think he's getting married this weekend. He seems pretty happy to me. But I really don't know. That would be a question for the man himself. Gary, hi, hi Ariel. With the new UFC deal, do you think international UFC numbered events will happen at reasonable local time? No more 5 a.m. fights for UK fighters.

Actually, I do believe Dana White was asked this question, right? Do we have this clip? I know I poohed it earlier. We might have deleted it. But do we have this clip? He was asked about the local time thing. All right, here it is. With the model that you have now with Paramount,

does that mean we can do numbered events in other countries prime time locally? So, for example, the Manchester event. Could you now do that at prime time in the UK? All that stuff still needs to be worked out. I certainly hope so. meaning I certainly hope what Oscar was suggesting happens because just look at the rest of the world man

first of all the sport is so damn global it's not just an American sport anymore there's only one American champion and it's Kayla Harrison you've got massive opportunities to be had in Africa with Drichis in Spain with Ilya in Georgia with Marab and Ilya

and on and on it goes obviously in England with Tom Aspinall and others so fuck man give us an afternoon card in one of these places if you don't have to if you can't say anymore

oh you know the paper view numbers go down when we're overseas it's all it's all under the same thing it's all on the Paramount plus platform no extra charge give it to us come on now give us some stadium shows make it fun make it different

shake things up add 10,000 to the apex go to bigger stadiums go overseas make UFC fun again. I could see the hats now. Fucking out. Thank you, O'Von. Hey guys, this guy, TJ, is asking me

to rate the UFC commentators from 1 to 8. Rogan, Cormier, Feltar, Cruz, Fitzgerald, Annex, Sanko, Bisping. And which would make a great addition to the team? I think Aljo or Dustin Porre would make a good fit. I ain't doing that, because I don't want to piss off anyone. Does anyone I want to do that? anyone want to volunteer no not particularly

PT actually loves the you love the commentator thing I don't give it for I see every time people talk about it I don't I'm just kind of phase it out I don't like it's you know who gives a fuck honestly yeah I'm kind of with you PT it's just like if they're talking I'm okay like I'm most of the time not even listening to what the fuck they're exactly exactly um they're all great

and Dana did say that nothing's going to change on that front I was actually thinking about someone recently Who would be good? Yes Was it someone on the show? As someone was really good on his TNT debut, remember that? Yeah, but he said at He's two in his prime right now

There was someone who was coming to the end Oh, I was thinking of Chandler I feel like Chandler would be good Yeah Right? I enjoyed on the Spanish broadcast The Moreno was on there Veronica Hardy doing stand-ups

It was pretty good I think you were about to say Veronica Hardy was doing stand-up comedy No I don't know. Chandler and Porre, same desk, breaking down fights? Oh, yeah, that would be good. Awkward.

Isn't Porre is on the desk this weekend? Yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah. Oh, shit. Porre's good. Yeah, he was on there, when was he? He's done it several times. Yeah, Miami.

Last event. Well, the last event is spot. Aspin was lying on TNT when he was there, and he was commenting the San Patterson fight, and Patterson was like six foot one lightweight. Yeah, and he said he's longer than, he's longer than a weekend in jail. That was fucking, that was a great line. Eric Hamidi. Hello, Ariel. A few weeks ago, I asked a question about the MMA media landscape. I understand the question might have been frustrating to read.

However, in all good faith, could you assess the landscape, please? I would like to learn more about how we got to this scarce point. Is it combat sports, or is combat sports media really going away, uncrowned in others being the exception? I think we've proven that it is not going anywhere. Hey, shout out to Chuck Minnandhal. Chuck Minnandhal on vacation and really whipped up together a beautiful article on the death of UFC pay-per-views. Anyone read that? I love that.

I thought he hit on the sentiment perfectly. It used to be like such a, it was like, first of all, it was worth the price, and you felt like you were a part of this, like, really cool club when you were either there or bought it, and you would talk to your friends about it. I don't know. I'm doing a horrible job of encapsulating his point, but he did a great job, and he's incredible at what he does, as is the entire team at Uncrown. Do you foresee a changing at some point?

I think it's evolving. I think YouTube is a thing. I think I think social media is a thing. These things weren't things 10 years ago. I think there are still websites. There's ourselves. There's MMA fighting.

Congratulations to them on their rebrand, if you will. They refresh the website. There's junkie still out there. you know like I said Oscar MacLife they're more of a YouTube channel presence they do have a website who am I missing over on the boxing side of things there's the boxing scenes there's the rings

I think there's a little more I think there's more talent on the MMA side of things personally but maybe I'm biased but the one thing I would like to see is I feel like we had a period there I think and guys correct me people otherwise, like 2016, 17, we were the Golden State Warriors MMA fighting. It's

like an unbelievable amount of talent altogether. And I felt like there was a stretch there from maybe like 11 to 16 where new talent was trickling in. It has been a while since I was like, oh, oh, oh, oh, new people coming in. You know what I'm saying? I do. What's fascinating? Well, what's fascinating about that to me was at the time it was because the sport was growing and reaching its apex, and the Connor McGregor and Rhonda Rousey's of the world were kind of pushing it to this next level, and there was investment in MMA and combat sports in general, and then the money that followed produced more people wanting to do this and having opportunities to do this.

USC has now just signed this massive deal. The industry, from a business perspective, is as strong as it's ever been, and yet they're not really like sports outlets and other outlets investing in MMA and combat sports. and trying to kind of sustain coverage around it, it's either remain the same or dwindled. So I'm not sure why at that time. I guess there was just probably more excitement. But from a business standpoint,

like it probably be a good idea to like try to get in while the UFC is as hot as it is. But I don't know. I mean, you know, I'm just, I just don't know what was different then. I guess there's just so many different things and it's harder to grab that attention and why we see more of the influencer style than opposed to the traditional media members.

PTO, you want to say that? Yeah, there's lots of people on the social media space that have broke through. Yeah. And I think that's like say 2011 to 2016, the people are, the main thing people are watching is your show. They're watching you. They're watching Luke, Chuck, all those kind of guys. And then they come through and they kind of, they try to emulate you.

They try to be like that. I think a lot of kids are spending a lot more time on YouTube and things like that. they watch influences coverage rather than that. So that's what they're going to gravitate towards, I think. That's just ultimately it. Like there's loads of new, like even the last event I was at Manchester, the amount of, and even in New Jersey when I was there with you, Rick, I was looking around and there was so many people just not involved in traditional media at all,

among the media. Like that's a real thing now. And I think that's why most of the new faces are probably coming up to the social media world rather than media and journalism classically. You know what I was also just thinking? There are so many more athlete-led things now than there. were back then. And if you are going to choose, right, from a media member or somebody who you may not know and is trying to get their break versus, hey, I'm Michael Bisbing, I'm Daniel

Cormier, I'm this person, hearing that kind of level of expert analysis. I'm Demetrius Johnson. You're probably going to lean that direction anyway. So I feel like that is also kind of curtailed the industry to a certain degree. Now rank your favorite media members, Ariel Hall. Yes, yes. Okay. At number one. Now, you know, what's obviously the most glaring thing is that there are just less people who want to be writers, right? Yeah, yeah. We, you know, Shaheen and I definitely, you know, saw this when we were putting together the roster,

but man, there's some, there's some great ones out there. And in particular on the boxing side of things, I'll say this, I think there are more, well, I think there's, yes, absolutely, reporting, wanting to, like, get your hands dirty. Yeah. Like an old school, Mark Romani type, those are hard to find. But we found our Darshan on the boxing side. of things. We found some great wrestling writers as well.

Elliot Wersall, when it comes to boxing in all combat sports is akin, in my opinion, to a folks and a Chuck Minnanhal. Like, oh, man, I freaking love the team that we have. I really freaking love the team that we have, and I think that everyone brings different things to the table. Alan Dawson has done a tremendous job. Dabbling with MMA, but mainly on the boxing side

as well. Lewis Watson. Drake Riggs has been outstanding for us. I mean, like a freaking revelation, a jack of all trades, really. But there are guys out there. And I would put Drake in that category of youngsters who have come up. We've had Anthony who has been killing it for us on the wrestling side of things. I'm afraid that I'm going to miss a name and someone's going to get offended. Raj has been great on the wrestling side of things.

Trust me on this. I sit there. I sit there, Frankie, as you joke and mock as I'm trying to give props to everyone on the team. I sit there and sometimes just look at Uncrowned and I'm so proud of it. I really am. Oncrown.com, number one, unbiased site on the planet. Just a couple of questions. We're going to be joined by Carrying Cross, aka Killer Cross, in four minutes time.

So let me get my things in order here. Scott from Portland, Ariel, does a small part of your soul die every time an interviewer asks you, how you are surviving after being banned by the UFC? Not necessarily that question, but it's like, why'd you leak it? Or what's it like being banned since 2016? Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. I just think it's been nine years, almost 10. surely there's other good things that we can talk about

and when someone comes on the show I try not to ask them the same questions obviously sometimes you have to obviously sometimes like there's no getting around it but even like I was thinking about this when Anthony Joshua was on our show for the first time it was January of 2024 think of the career that AJ had up until that point

right he had the Olympics in 2012 12 years prior 11 and a half and I wasn't like so tell me about the night you got knocked out by Andy Ruiz that happened in 2019 He had talked about it a million times. You've got to find new things to talk about.

Barely Perez. Hey, Ariel. Shout out to B-I-T-B and Pete C. That's P-E-T-E-S-E. What are the best films on Paramount Plus? Take it away, P-T. What do you got for us? Best films on Paramount Plus?

Yes. Come on. I don't forget about it. SpongeBob. impossible. All right, yeah. Titanic. Oh, is Sidney Sweeney?

Yeah, love it. And Kathy Bates. Hey, shout out. The water. The water's coming on board. What is the water? Oh, yeah. Kathy Bates and the Titanic.

Mullins, hi, team. Do you have any information on why Francis didn't intend? Attend the PFL Africa event. I can't help but agree with Don Davis. It does seem really poor from Francis. Peace and love. Peace and love. No more autographs after October.

over 28th. I did briefly speak to the man and he says there is much more to the story and perhaps we will get that side of the story. We go star? In the near future. No, I wish, I wish. If I'm ever having a bad day,

I just fire up that clip. Peace and love, peace and love. We are not accepting any postcards or anything like that after October, something, something. Dylan. Hey, Ariel, really enjoyed the impulsive interview. They asked some good questions, which you didn't answer because their attention span is terrible. You and Turkey Cool Now? Yes. Also, any thoughts on getting Maven Huffman in studio? I would love that. I've actually reached out to him. He lives nearby in Jersey. Let's get him over. Maven, if you're watching, huge fan of the channel.

Please come and join us. I actually love the channel. I'm just a gigantic fan. I watch it. the SummerSlam bit that you did in the parking lot, just, I mean, it was incredible. It really was. So, Maven, if you're out there, would love to have you. We'd love to chop it up. Okay, let me take this off.

Let me get ready. Thank you for all the questions. Perhaps we will get to more of them on the back end. Let me put my earpiece in. area hollanda. com is the place to be. Alert your friends. Alert your friends.

This, in my opinion, is one of the most anticipated interviews in recent memory on this program. Why? Because this man, the author of this book right here, which is number one on the sports biography list on Amazon. Right now as we speak, number one, we even have the proof of said rankings is perhaps the most talked about man in pro wrestling right now.

Everyone's wondering what is going on with his future in pro wrestling, his WVE future. He dropped an incredible documentary on his YouTube channel on Sunday evening. It has blown up almost a million views in the span of two, three days. There it is.

My W.W.B. contract ends today. Check it out after this. But that was on his platform. This is now on ours. And so without further ado, let us say hello to the man himself, the great carrying cross. There he is.

Or perhaps I should say Killer Cross. I don't know. We're going to be calling you now. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. Great to see you, man. Thank you so much. It's wonderful to have you here. Wow, this is exciting.

I said it. I just said, I don't know if you heard. this might be one of the most anticipated live interviews in the history of our program. Oh, boy. Yes. No pressure or anything. Yeah, you're notorious for that, though. You know, we try to give the people what they want.

There it is. And you have done so with this book, which I want to plug once again. I was just holding it up. Number one, number one currently on the Amazon sports biography list. Surreal? Of course. I never thought I was going to be an author. There it is.

Look at that, man. Holy cow. That's a big freaking deal. Yeah, yeah, it is. It's scary getting to that point here now for so many different reasons. Like you have, okay, I'm putting my story out there. How is this going to be received? You know what I mean?

Yeah, of course. I have no idea. I think it's like a safe thing to do to always check your own self-awareness. You know, you don't ever really want to be too sure about, I don't know, how you're being perceived by people to a degree where you offend people or you hurt their feelings. you kind of want to be aware. I don't know how that was going to be

what people should be thinking when they read that. It's not exactly a Brady Bunch style books. I loved it. I loved it. It's a great read. It's an easy read. It's not just, hey, this happened, then this happened and this happened in my life.

There's life lessons there. There's words of wisdom. There's like little detours, which I enjoyed very much. And there's several things I want to ask you about the book. What's perhaps like most interesting from an overarching standpoint is the book ends with you coming back.

Like the book was done. I do believe like three or so years ago. Yeah. Why did it take so long for it to come out? That's hard for me to say. So it went through like an internal processing period in the company where several people had to review it and basically green light at all. You say the company.

Do you mean WWE? Yes. Okay, got it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So that's how long it took in order to get it to publishing and then get it put on the shelves, which was a little frustrating. I can imagine. I would have preferred to release the second book right now.

But I don't know, maybe it's, maybe it'll all work out serendipitously, you know? Well, honestly, we don't really have the benefit of hindsight. I feel like it's working out. Like, imagine a book coming out on this week. Yeah. You know, you killed it on the YouTube, the documentary, which we'll get to in a second. But it kind of actually worked out brilliantly, and you didn't plan it to be this way. No, I've been, I'll just say it.

I mean, I've been really mad that it actually took this long to get the book out because I, you know, I was all the way here, I was very nervous. Yeah. You know, I just kind of wanted to get it out there and stop thinking about it and then it be done. I couldn't settle into how it was going to be received. I didn't know, you know, I didn't know. So, but now that it's been received really well, I'm happy.

As long as people are happy reading it, I'm happy. As they should be and as you should be, I have been interviewing pro wrestlers. I was on a Montreal local radio show in 2000 before I went to Syracuse University. It was called In the Ring on CFMB 12. 80 a.m. Midnights on Fridays. I have never asked a pro wrestler the question that I'm about to ask you. And the reason why I've never done so is because I have so much respect for what you guys do and for the history of the business. People could talk about the unreals and all that stuff. I think there are certain questions that you shouldn't ask out of respect for what you

do and what it's all about. I appreciate that. But I do feel like I need to ask you a certain amount of questions and I need to be as sort of pointed as possible. Sure, of course. Are you working us right now? No. No. I'm not answering questions today as a character. This is legit. This is Kevin. Yep. Okay.

What you put out on your YouTube channel on Sunday evening, a riveting documentary that I urge everyone to see, you almost have about 800,000 views as of right now in three days. That's incredible. You said that your WW contract came to an end on August 10th. And as of right now, you have not resigned with them. You do not have a new deal with them. No. Is that accurate?

That is accurate, yeah. You're not working us on that front. No. And I feel bad asking. you that i've never used that word in an interview to the best of my knowledge maybe i'm wrong but i don't think so because the reason why i feel the need to ask it is because of the set ralins thing that just happened right you understand why of course and i'm sure you've seen people say this is a work in fact people have said your appearance on today's show is validation that it's a

work they think that because you're coming here that means this has to be a work no i mean i was planning on doing a book tour and doing media i've been doing a lot of media um ECW publishing the publisher of the book has been helping me with that, being able to be on your platform, all the people we reach, like, there was no anticipation that this was going to happen on the way to do the book tour. So that kind of, you know, this is, this is just what's happening. So how did we get here? How is this possible? Well, I mean, truth of the matter is, I mean, you've already stated, like, you know, my contract was up last week. I never actually received a contract, like an offer until last week.

Do you remember what day? So your contract expired August 10th, which I do believe was Sunday. Yeah. I think it was Tuesday off the top of my head. Okay. You know, I got the offer. I wanted to know how they came to the valuation of that offer.

Just wanted, you know, like some information, some metrics, some analytics that's supporting to, hey, this is how we got here. When I inquired about that, they were unwilling to provide that information and told me he had 24 hours to agree to the offer or they were rescinding it. So, you know, the next day we talk, I ask if they have the information. They don't. And I said, I can't make an informed decision without the information. And I'd like to keep the dialogue open.

And they rescinded the offer. And that's actually where we're at. Wow. so and it's it's not meant this isn't like I know how a lot of people feel when they make an exit right I can empathize with everybody's experience every experience exit in the company is different right this isn't like to disparage WWE but because there's so many convoluted stories out there going on it actually even to some degree can affect our livelihood of what we're supposed to be doing afterwards people don't want to reach out because they're not sure if they're tampering

stuff like that, the goal has always been to be with WWE. My wife and I still want to be like with WWE. Like I'm still at the, I'm at the table for conversations. I did not step out of the conversation. You know what I mean? So, you know, we still, we still want to be there. We still want to work it out. Okay. So a few things to obviously follow up on. I have never heard of the, hey, here's an offer. You have 24 hours. And if you don't respond or take it, we're taking it away. Have you ever heard this being done before? I haven't, no. Have you asked other guys, like, is this how it goes when the contract is up?

I haven't asked anybody about their particular experiences, no. That seems a little odd, right? I mean, I've been in contract negotiations myself. I've never been given a 24 hours deadline, and if not, we're taking it away. Why do you think that was the play? Why was that the tone? I don't know. Was it less than what you were making?

No. But, I mean, at the end of the day, like, when evaluation is being suggested, there has to be something where people can go to, information-wise, and say, hey, this is how we came to this. Yeah, of course. And, you know, this is what we think makes sense. I asked to see that information. I still haven't seen it. I want to see it. Let's look at it together and let's decide whether this is appropriate or not.

I don't think that that's unreasonable. Was it a departure from what you were thinking? Like, if we would have talked and said, like, what are you hoping for? Was this way off? I didn't necessarily have, like, I wasn't thinking about it like that. I was thinking, let's assess everything together and see where we're at. I want to make sure that this is actually reflective fairly of, you know, what we have information-wise to collect and look at. That's all.

Obviously, we know this your second go-around with them. Was this the first time that you were in a renewal? situation? Because we know that the first time around, you know, they released you, right? And then they brought you back. But was this the first time that like, hey, you get a chance to see how the renewal process goes? Or was there another deal in the past where you re-up? No, there's, there were no other deals. I mean, like the contract, you know, contract expired. We talked a little bit before that. Nothing, nothing like that. Yeah. How close were you to actually taking this deal within 24 hours? impossible okay because you can't like I I had explained to them I had said like there's there's no

opportunity here to make an informed decision without looking at the information together so you you can't do that like your your whole livelihood is based on this idea with no information to support it I just wanted to get there I wanted to keep the dialogue open so and I still do you know like and just curious are you speaking through an agent a manager is a direct you to them me for sure okay I I came to the table to to talk and and specifically if you don't mind me asking who are you speaking to when you're going through this it's a rep that the company appointed to have a conversation with I would have loved to have spoke to

either of my bosses but this that be Polovec sure okay yeah like when we when my wife and I came back hunter had called us and we did our deals over the phone together so I was just under the assumption that we were going to do that again we did them at the same time and yeah like typically I would not put somebody in front of me to talk to honor I feel comfortable to talk to him you know in person we've always talked that way so but yeah yeah I believe I read in here I believe you said are you ready to come home right yes the first time yeah you did not get that and and it is worth noting there's another human being involved

in this your wife yeah who means the world to you mm-hmm she's in the same boat right her deal was up August 10th and she has not been resigned yeah when they made that offer was it for the two of you nothing she had nothing there was no offer to her nothing no I was told at one point because I did inquire of course yeah after we deal with you we'll deal with her like do you think that they were going to get to her like once they were probably hoping you'd say yes do you think they were gonna get to her or do you think there was a chance that she was not going to be brought back regardless?

I don't know. Wow. But I just, I didn't, I don't see why we just could not have done things the way we did them before, you know, where we do the deals together. That's how it's always been. It was like that the last time. Okay. In NXT, she was signed first, maybe at the end of 2019, and I came in in 2020.

Okay. So and so in the process of you not, you know, accepting and then rescinding, does anyone reach out to you between say Wednesday, Thursday and Sunday when you put out that video? Does anyone say, hey, let's figure this out, man. Like, okay, we've read an impasse. Do you get another call? Do you get another email, a text? Does anyone reach out to you in that period? No. Wow. No. Did that surprise you? Well, I tried not to invent a hopeful scenario in my head, but. A little bit. Like I said, like I, I wanted to continue the dialogue. I, it was strange. A lot of this is strange to me. I'm quite honestly blown away by all of this. And I'm still kind of wondering.

I don't want to disrespect you, but, you know, wrestling is, and I see you're very sincere, and I could even kind of tell that you're like, dare I say a little bit hurt by all this? Is that fair to say? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

It's unexpected. It's unexpected. I'm not sure I had a high level of expectation, but just any time I've ever gotten on board of the company hasn't quite been like this in terms of communication. So, and I just feel like there's still so much more to talk about. I feel like there's more to explore here, so it's just strange. Since you put out the YouTube video Sunday night, did you hear anything from anyone? uh anyone in the company sorry uh friends in the company yeah okay but higher ups brass people who would say no nothing no did that surprise you did you think okay

once this comes out and I kind of peel it all back someone's gonna reach out I didn't necessarily think the timing of anyone wanting to talk to me would have anything to do with that there's nothing derogatory or disparaging in that like that would create any sort of concern it's more just documenting how Somerslam went and right um yeah when someone gets released from wbd there's usually a period either 30 60 90 days they can't talk they can solicit offers things like that because your contract elapsed technically can you go work for someone today yeah you're free and clear yes okay but as you just alluded to which i thought was fascinating i was thinking of this because people are sort of unsure if this is

legit or not you're saying it is and i 100% believe you have you found that people are afraid to reach out to you because they don't want to get caught in an angle. I've been told through people. They're like, hey, like, what's actually going on? They're telling me that people are concerned about making contact. But at the end of the day, like, I'm not trying to turn this into a game. It's not a game to me. It's my life.

I'm very big on loyalty. Everybody knows that. But loyalty is a two-way street. And W.B. has given me and my family an amazing opportunity. you know, in the past, to change our lives. I've talked about working at NXT during the pandemic. People in my family getting laid off.

They have no idea how they're going to, you know, make their mortgage. I was able to take over their mortgage. Like, I'm very interested in trying to recover what I think is something, you know, that is easily recoverable. But, like, it takes two people to come together and talk about it. I'm still here, so. So you've been one of the, you and your wife have been one of the hottest acts,

the hottest stories, characters over the last few months. And, um, and so all this happening at the same time is obviously fascinating and somewhat unprecedented. So my question is, when did you start to get the sense that something was a miss? Like when you're hot and everyone's chanting,

we want cross and there's the signs and all that stuff, but yet you still don't have a new deal and you know August 10th is coming. When did you start to feel like, hey, this might not actually work out the way we thought it was going to work out, at least not now. You have moments of that all the time in wrestling. So it wasn't necessarily specific to what's happened recently,

but you always have moments where like, hey, the audience really likes something. You hope that you're given the green light to lean into it a little bit. Sometimes you are, sometimes you're not. Sometimes, you know, when people are formatting any type of television show, there is an intention for the show to peak at certain points

you might not be in the part of the show where they really needed to peek so there's a chance they might not lean into this thing that the audience is really enjoying because there's a different destination in mind that's just the reality of at least what we do you know there were times throughout this where there was creative things that I think we could have done to really nurture it Give people essentially what they're looking for out of it.

I can't really necessarily place a time where I was like, uh-oh, you know. But everyone was aware the crowd was really enjoying it. They knew. They knew they were into it. Live online, when to pull the trigger on really directly, I don't know, bringing attention to it, syncing it with something creatively. I mean, I don't know. I don't know when they would have wanted to have done that.

I would say everything really took a huge next step post-Ressomania, right? Sure. The interview with Sam and Megan and you're there backstage and you drop that pipe bomb, for lack of a better word. In the dock, you revealed that that was all the work. Yeah. Why did you do that? Why say that now? So I kept that protected because I was under the impression at the time from

things I was being told that AJ and I might be working a little bit. And there were some options as to different things we could do. So you don't want to let everybody behind the curtain while we're still watching the movie. Imagine watching Terminator 2. Yeah. The first time in theaters and in the middle of the movie, they're like, we're going to take an intermission and tell you all about how this is a robot and they got the guy on the strings. I don't want to do that. So I kept it protected like I would with anything so people can remain immersed in the programming. But then we moved away from AJ. And so some time when by and I wasn't necessarily supposed to have anything directly with Logan, but we're trying

to make it all cohesive and make sense. Why, you know, what was Cross's issuer's angle with AJ? How does Logan intertwine into that since AJ is going to fight Logan, all of that type of stuff? I was on the red carpet for WWE Hall of Fame the year Brett and Stone Cold and Hunter were inducted, all that stuff. And at least AJ and I didn't, we didn't, we didn't know that when we were coming up the elevator that we were going to walk through a live shot like we know there's interviews and media and stuff like that but we kind of thought we're under the impression we were going upstairs and we're in a rush to go sit down in the auditorium well I was like dude go ahead of me give you a five minute head start we can't

we were going up together we're going to cross through the shot together so he goes up and I don't know what happens about Rosenberg and Jackie were interviewing people somehow Now, I see him coming, Scarlett stops, he keeps walking, I can't stop, I walk through the shot. I'm like, oh my God, we're going to ruin the immersion of everything we just did on Monday. And I was like, I can't let that happen. The pro wrestler in me cannot. Sure, sure, sure, sure, of course. So I'm listening and I'm trying to improvisationally come up with something.

And Rosenberg starts talking a little bit of trash. I was like, oh, perfect. This is my inn. So I go over and I just kind of like have a meltdown about how he's running. his mouth about me. He improvisationally back pedals. He already knows what's going on, which is perfect. Now we're playing into it. We're essentially kind of washing out what people just saw of AJ and I walking through the shot together. So no one goes, what the heck? I say I'm going to break the lights. I say I'm going to throw AJ over the railing. Just kind of have like

a mini meltdown. As I'm walking away, one of the producers comes over to me and goes, that was hilarious. That was really, really good. All the guys in the truck are laughing. And I said, thank you. I said, I was trying to cover up for he goes no no I understand he goes do want to do the Sam Roberts podcast tomorrow I said sure I would love to and I asked him I go what do you want and he goes give me that guy that was pretty entertaining I said okay like premise wise what are you looking for and he goes we want it to feel real in terms of viewership and engagement with wrestling things perform better the more real they feel that's not there's nothing new under the sun the more real wrestling feels

everything the better performs like theater sure so I go okay at one point he was like we just had Dana White on one of the programs that he was overseeing or something and he was using the F word quite a bit so at the time I thought I had a green light I asked I'm allowed to say the F word I won't say it 40 times but I can use it impactfully it goes yeah it's we want this to feel real make it make this feel real I go okay so the next day we go to Sam Roberts And just to clarify with him, I just said, all right, all right, well, here's the story arc for Cross. This is the story that's been told.

He's had one match on Raw this year. He lost. He's not on WrestleMania in his hometown. He shows up to WrestleMania. AJ doesn't cheat. In fact, AJ punches him out. What is the state of the character of Cross? Oh, and Cross lost the Battle Royal that week, the Andre the Giant Memorial.

Cross is not in a good mood. he would be irate and I've got you know an improvisational moment I wasn't on WrestleMania why are people watching this they got central nervous system fatigue watching one of the greatest shows on earth WrestleMania you know people probably burned out they want to take a minute I got to do something

captivating something good here's my moment I wasn't on the show but if you're going to give me a little bit of time you're going to let me see the people see me it's got to be good right so I sit down I said what I said I walked out of the shot they turned the camera off walked back into the room

thank you very much everybody shook everybody's hands everybody was cool with it they were like holy cow they said another word we're not going to say but yeah they were everyone was really blown away and I let everybody know let's make sure

this is somewhat protected from the audience but let everyone know internally that this is a work because not every department is constantly in lockstep communication with one another so I told everybody that sure enough not everybody knew

that that was a work you think it backfired uh well I can't say that it backfired but people were very upset with it because they thought it was real when you say people specifically like higher ups

I'll say higher ups they were offended or did they feel like you you were too aggressive like what could they have been upset how do how would a wrestling lifer see that and be like yeah that's too far or you cross the line

or is this real or not I don't want to speak on behalf of them but this is this is what I will say about it so a lot of everything that you see goes through the creative process it goes through a team I was under the impression that we were doing something improvisationally and it was okay but like I said sometimes the communication is not in lockstep with each other so no one told them that this was a work no one said I shook everybody's hands I gave megan a hug before I left like so they're under the impression like a week goes by that you know I flipped out so like I one day I waited for a hunter outside the

production meeting once it was actually brought to my attention that that he was not okay with it and I explained everything to him no one told them anything so as far as I know at that point we were good but everyone was under the impression a lot of people like I just lost my mind I was just trying to do my job that's my job that day was to make people believe like any other day and yeah do you think it's possible that they thought that you were going into business for yourself or maybe trying to take away from WrestleMania

because you weren't a part of the show here you are trying to take the spotlight do you think that's possible it's possible that they felt that way but at the end of the day it actually drove engagement oh hell yeah it generated them money not only that that promo

was not done on my phone or on Twitter it was done on their YouTube channel yeah we were intending it was the post show right yeah I'll say I was intending for them to be able to make money off of that, to have something that we can use. We're never pigeonholed with this character that I was playing on TV. There's a million different ways you can take it.

I'm always thinking, how can I arm my creative team and everyone I'm working with with a million different things to do with Cross so you don't disappear off TV? Here's a great one. And yeah, it was good for business. So anyone of the opinion that I went into business for myself that day, they're really not thinking it through. It generated quite a bit of money. so and interest

and then also people were like hey can we have more of that that's the people liked it do you think if you don't do that if that never happens you don't show up on the post show you don't say a word you're still in WWE today um

I don't know is that a possibility in your mind have you thought of that hey if this great thing actually didn't happen I don't think doing that or not doing that has any sort of bearing or results on the phone call conversation that I had and maybe maybe I'm wrong but I don't want to think that it does because again it was very good for business it was good

for business if business is about generating money and engagement and fan interest then it was good for business it was good it was a good thing you said in the in the documentary on your YouTube channel that at some point you had a conversation with someone about your future and you were left feeling very upset afterwards because to you this is your life this is everything you're a wrestling lifer and maybe they're not and they don't really understand how to speak to someone in your shoes sure you know what i'm talking about right am i am i am i summing that up correctly fairly sure could you tell me like what you meant by that and that's not the phone call that you're referring to from last week right no that's someone reaching out to you or talking to you

face to face and saying hey we need to talk about your contract coming up it it was an explorative phone call and i was a phone call yeah i was i was happy to finally get it and how long ago was that uh it was either a week or two weeks before that it was a there was quite a bit of time between those phone calls but i was just disappointed because i had expressed interest to remain with the company in january in what context where are you i said hey i you know i spoke with a higher up okay and i said i'm interested in remaining on board um what is it that you need to see to me in order to make that happen um they gave me some directives um um I expressed where I'd like to land in all things.

And then I was told that one point the reps would get in touch with me. So all that time, I was waiting for that phone call the whole time. And then to get that particular phone call that I got and there was still so much uncertainty after the phone call, I was like, man, like what's going on here?

Was it dismissive the call? What upset you about it? Because it was just, I wanted to, lock in, I was interested in locking in remaining with the company because I had expressed that I wanted to stay. So that was what was disappointing about it. Just not the phone call. I was hoping it was going to be in that regard. What's interesting is you keep saying how much you wanted to stay and I believe you and you said that multiple times in the YouTube doc and you also said the notion that you didn't want to stay is so ludicrous to you, right? Because this has been your dream.

you want to be Roddy Piper, Brett Hart, et cetera. Do you think there are people in the company who actually believed you were disgruntled and didn't want to stay that you want? You don't. No. There were numerous articles

that went out online in all directions. Some were saying I had resigned. Some were saying that I quit WWA. Like there was just different things, 12 different stories online about what was going on. And there was just over a time period, I'm looking at this, I'm reading all this, And I'm just like, I don't know where all that comes from.

I don't know how that gets drummed up. Maybe it's just people putting stuff out there to see on, you know, who will click it. But it was odd. Like I, it's a crazy notion to me that I would just willingly walk away. No way. This is the only thing I've ever wanted to do since I was a little kid, specifically working for WW. I was a kid in the crowd once upon a time in New York. So I've had my mind made up about being a part of the company.

and, you know, being a part of the greatest show on earth since I was a little kid, so. A lot was made of the fact that the fans at the SummerSlam post show were chanting We Won Cross when Paul Levec was up there at Triple H and he responded, yeah, you want Brock, you got him. Do you think he just misheard or do you think that was on purpose? I don't know.

I don't want to frame that situation. But when I did see it, I laughed because he could have misheard it. And then he has like a very dry sense of humor and I thought there was a chance maybe he could have just been joking around I'm the same way. I have a very dry sense of humor and I'm very sarcastic. So was everybody in my family. It's like an East Coast New England thing. I didn't know, but I saw it and I looked at it and I just laughed. And then on the back end of that I was really I was very flattered that after the show. It's a show that I'm not even on. Everyone is chanting. Yeah. That was awesome. And then the night before the show's over. They were doing it on both nights. And I thought that It was really, really cool, man. And I've had conversations of people that have been in the business for over 30 years, and they've said really, really, really solid wrestlers. Like dynamite kid level solid people have gone their whole careers and never gotten an ovation like that.

Never mind once, they've never had things like this happen. It really put things in perspective for me. Like, yeah, he's right. Like there's incredible people that have been in this business that aren't received like that from the crowd. And stuff like that, I will never forget for the rest of my life, man. Like, it's awesome. I'll never forget that. It's incredible.

You can't buy that. I mean, it's price of stuff. It's stuff that I would say you guys dream of, right, as performers. And the pops that you were getting on main event or any time you showed up was incredible. And I was wondering, so you're on back-to-back PLEs, Night of Champions and SummerSlam. You don't get the W, but you're still being featured, right? So are you taking that in the midst of all this as a sign like, hey, they're putting me on

these shows, I'm having singles matches, I'm not just thrown into like a six man or a battle royal, like surely this is a sign that they're behind me and this will get sorted out. Did you view that as a sign or is that, would that be a false thing to do? I wasn't thinking about it like that. I was really more or less trying to think about the task at hand. I've always been like that. I'm never really like, if this happens, this is what it means. Because that's not what it, that's, you can't equate things like that in wrestling. You could be, on top of the world for an extended period of time and then there could be a decision that's made

or something happens where you just fall right off working at NXT being NXT champion no one would have ever thought that I would have went to Monday Night Raw get a weird helmet suspenders and then be gone like people even then people privately asked me if that was a work back then

I think because of the Rollins stuff and Ron's situation, truth, people don't know now, right? They're calling it new K-Fabe. Brian Pilman invented new K-Fave. It's nothing new. That's just my opinion. I'm a huge Brian Pilman, Mark. What can I say?

Yeah, I didn't equate any of that. Okay. Speaking of Ron Killings, you also mentioned that you had a conversation, I think, on the way home from Saudi. Yeah. Could you tell us about that? I really only kind of want to say what I said in the documentary,

which was essentially Ron had pulled me aside and talked to me and he basically he just he knows what's going on with me he's been in my corner he's always been in my corner I've always been in his Ron somebody I've always gone along with mutual friends shout out to Conan um yeah I love that dude um I had a night of champions was a little rough um because one of my relatives uh my uncle Chris had passed away a little bit before Night of Champions and the process of developing a service forum was taking a little bit. So right around the time that my family had announced we were going to do a service forum, I got a call to ask me to go to Night of Champions. So I told the person with the phone, let me call you back. Let me see how like my family feels about

this because I don't want to agree to anything over the phone. I'm thinking I'm going to the service. So that night of champions match didn't happen. I spoke to some of my relatives and they said your uncle Chris would want you to go do this match. You can, you can grieve anytime you want. This is something that's coming around right now and it's important that you go. So I had their support. I spoke to quite a few of them and that was kind of the consensus. So I went and it's just you're you're in the moment and you're enjoying it. No regrets about it. But then there's also that and you're in this weird seesaw all day and the whole trip like almost feels sometimes like guilty that you're having a good time. Yeah, yeah. With this on your mind and I just kept thinking about

like all day and talking to him under my breath. I talked to Ron a little bit about that on the plane and that's kind of how the conversation began. Okay. I'm sorry about your your uncle and you did talk about that, it actually now makes a lot more sense, at least to me, because you had said that people kept coming up to you and saying, like, we're going to do this the right way, right? Like, we're not going to make yourself into the good guy here and get the crowd. You're the bad guy, right? And you said, I was just thinking about my uncle on that day. I wasn't trying to do anything. I was trying to do exactly what you guys wanted. Why did you think that they were so nervous? Because you sort of implied that they kept coming up to you. People kept coming up to you saying, like, this is going to go according

to the plan, right? Yeah. Had that ever happened before? Where you, you went off script, so to speak? No. So why do you think there was this fear? I don't know. I was, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, that happens, right? But that happens, right?

You know, it's, it's, it's happened a million times over, over time, over the history of pro wrestling. There's a million different, uh, it's not as if I was going to, uh, run like a Hogan comeback on, on him, like, you know, know, forcibly, yeah, we're changing, we're changing, we're changing the finish, brother. I would have never done that. At no point did I ever think that the crowd was going to boo Sammy. That's insane.

I think they were concerned that they were going to boo the finish. But I never saw that. How could you do anything about that anyway? Like, how could they say to you like, hey, you got to make sure they boo the finish, they boo the finish. That's not necessarily on you, right? That's what I thought too. Yeah.

That's what I thought too. This was never ever going to be a reality in my mind. that would happen. It was never going to be a reality. I was like, there's no way that's going to happen. This is not a real concern. Him and I are going to go out there. We're going to kill it. I had a blast working with him. It's one of the best ever, my opinion. So it was just, that was odd. And not their fault. Like, I didn't tell very many people. Only a couple people knew in the company ahead of time that my Uncle Chris had passed. So I didn't bring that to work with me. I kept it to myself but just while that's on my mind and the directive for the day and then these strange

concerns about this thing that I knew was not going to happen was I was like what's going on what what what's happening here so how did you feel about the summer slam match very grateful to be there very happy to be working with Sammy if I could have done it differently. I would have wanted to have blown it off bigger. So story format wise, the heel is terrorizing the baby face for an extended period of time. Babyface has to get his comeuppance, right? At some point. I know a lot of people wanted to see Cross win the match. If we're following basic psychology here, baby face wins, okay? No problem. I would have like to have gotten nuked in that match though something real big something something really like

i don't know just something crazier something like a spectacle moment we had a moment on the end of it when he's got the pipe it was that luke skywalker moment is he going to go to the dark side you know i would have liked to have gone bigger maybe i would have had him i don't know maybe we chase up somewhere really high and maybe i slip so we protect his integrity as a good guy i slip and fall off something really high i don't know i would have i would have liked to have on bigger so maybe a scaffold with lava and alligators with top hats you were open you were open to killing carrying cross sure why not if that was going to be the end sure they paid these people paid good money for those tickets at summer slam why not give them something really

like oh my god do you remember that right it was a crazy card lots of stipulations lots of different match types belts I would have liked to have done the match in a bigger fashion if I was allowed to But at the end of the day, you have, you know, you have your directives you go out there. You have your marching orders. Everybody does. When that was over and you were leaving the ring and walking to the back, was there any thought in the back of your mind? This could be the last time I compete in this ring, at least for now. I had a gut feeling.

Really? I couldn't tell you why, but I had a gut feeling. My gut's never wrong. You felt in that moment this is the last time? Yeah. I felt it all day. I felt it all day. Why?

Subtle things that I couldn't even tell you. subtle things happening that I could not even could not even convey in words body language energy stuff like that I felt it I even had a friend of mine tell me you know maybe maybe do something for the live crowd when you're leaving to say goodbye or something I was like I don't want to be an unprofessional this moment clearly by design is for the baby face to get everything back that we took away from him I don't need to make this about myself right now it's about him I've been taking from him for weeks. So let's do the right thing. Let's be accountable. Let's not go into business for ourselves. Let's not upset the audience by doing some sort of, you know, whatever in

the middle of the show. Just go out there and do the job that they're asking you to do, as I have always done. Sure, sure. And when you get to the back, what happens after the match? Does someone say something to you? Do you get a chat, a hug, a thank you? Like, what is that vibe like when you walk back to Gorilla and back to the locker room. Thank you, is making sure everybody was okay and handshakes, and that was pretty much it. I thought it was cool. This is the only time I've ever known for this to happen, but Taker was in Gorilla, and Sammy and I went to Taker after the match to get his thoughts on it, and it was all good.

Wow. So that was cool, like The Undertaker watched one of our matches, which is cool. I grew up watching him ever since I was a little kid. He's actually giving you pointers? He just talked about what he liked about the match. And we asked him if there was anything that jumped out or stood out that we would do anything differently with

and he said he really enjoyed it. Incredible. Yeah, that was cool for me. When you leave the arena that night, you probably, were you at night too? Yes, I came in for media. Okay. Yeah.

When you leave on Sunday, what are you feeling? Well, I was told we were going to Raw. There was a creative idea in the air. Um, Sunday we get a message saying, uh, we're going, you know, we're, we're going to be flown home. So now we're not going to be at raw. Wow. That didn't feel very good. No. Was there reason? No. Dan, the two of you, you and your wife. Do you watch raw that night? Of course. When you, when you hear people chanting your name, when you see the signs, what does

that feel like? Really good. Never in my life, man, have. I ever felt more supported like ever. It's so much support I don't even know what to do with it, but it is motivating. I've been one of those people most of my life I've had a weird disassociation thing with people that I've had to overcome. I talk about it a lot in the book. I feel like putting this book out and getting feedback from people like they're not talking to the character, they're talking to me for once, you know.

I'm getting over those things and to feel so much support from my peers, from strangers, from fans. It's really, it's really wonderful. Like even as undesirable as this situation is, I still have hope that we can recover it, work it out. And the support that I get from people on a daily basis everywhere is, is unbelievable. Does it ever feel like, hey, why me? Do you ever think to yourself like, do I deserve this? No. You don't have that imposter syndrome?

No. Okay, that's good. I think about it like every single time you're tested in life, it's an opportunity to self-discover something. Everybody can tell themselves a story about what they're like and what they do and how they are. It doesn't become real until you go through it. It doesn't, like you tell yourself, I don't know, fighting, you cover a lot of MMA.

Every single person on the planet will, you know, you tell yourself, I don't know, you tell yourself, I don't know, fighting, you cover a lot of MMA. you know, think that they will excel at cage fighting until they actually do it, right? People who watch it who like it. I could knock that guy out. I could fight this guy. Until you go in there and do it, you don't know, right? And I just look at a lot of challenges like that in life. You know, this situation is forging me into the next person I'm going to become. And I feel really good about it. There's no fear. I'm going to embrace it and take whatever's coming on the chin and see who I am at the end of it. your wife handling it really good okay same type of attitude oh yeah yeah even more so even more so

what do you what does that mean we're all about we're all about preserving integrity we're not kids anymore when you're when you're when you're a teenager and you're you're you're in your early 20s anybody you know life is about making choices and finding out sometimes if it was the right one or the wrong one everybody makes mistakes right our conscience is clear we don't live with any sort of self-resentment the only way you can let self-resentment in is to make choices and decisions that you're going to regret and I'm not going to do that I want to proceed forward with integrity in all things and she supports that so there hasn't been a moment in in all this time

where you thought like man maybe I should have done this differently and maybe I should said that or talked to this person. Do you find yourself sort of going over these moments, relitigating everything, or you're not that type of guy? No. I mean, it's always case by case in life. But where we are right now, let's do things, let's do things honestly. Let's look, let's observe things together. Let's make decisions together. It doesn't have to be this the way it is right now. Did you see Paul Heyman on the show last week, or at least what he said? Did. What did you think when he was talking about you?

His answer. Dude. I've had a relationship with Paul Heyman for a very long time that I've never talked about publicly. I consider him a veteran. I consider him a great source for advice and information. I do consider him a friend. And I've never named him dropped him once. I've never ever wanted him.

Look, I know who he is to this business. I've never, ever wanted him to feel like if I go talk to this guy, he's going to go on media and start telling me about, you know, telling everybody how I put him over to use that as like a chip to cash of people. I've literally never reiterated a single conversation I have ever had with Paul in my life on media ever. It's different when somebody compliments you privately. it's a whole other level when they do that publicly and that'll be one of those things

I'll never forget for the rest of my life too man it feels I'm really honored that he said that and I don't want to say it I just said I wouldn't we've had conversations about what he said before I'll leave it at that

previously yes okay we've had conversations about that before there was one thing that he told me a long time ago and I don't think he'd mind that I'm that I'm saying this a long time ago in this last term that I had there was a time where I was off TV for over three months I'd have to ask my wife she has a much better memory than I do maybe four or five months I was backstage at TV every week hoping this is going to be the day we're going to get back on TV he calls me over we sit down and gorilla just check in shoot the breeze

we get to this conversation, he goes, I want to ask you a question. I go, what? And he says, say they pull you off TV for another two months, three months. Do you think if you were given the opportunity to go out there and perform it your best, you could get over with that audience, you could entertain them? I said, of course. And he goes, good. I do too.

Never forget that. How about five months? Could you do it? Of course I could. Good. How about six months? How about a year? Could you go out there?

If you had no handcuffs, no restrictions, could you go engage that audience? Could you get over? Could you do what you're supposed to do with this job? I said, yes. And he said, good. Don't ever let the time you're spending off TV rattle you because you know what you're doing. I can verbatim repeat that because that was one of, that was a conversation that has lived in my head to now. It solidified my confidence in what I was doing.

Like I had never, ever had it before. once you know what you're doing and you're certain you know what you're doing and you've demonstrated that you know what you're doing there's your relationship that you can have with your people you just can't doubt it you can't let things get between those ideas and fast forward maybe maybe that was a year and a half ago fast forward to now here we are he was right man he's a guy who's seen a lot he's a guy when he was a young man he had an idea about professional wrestling that all the old timers were like you don't know what you're talking about you're wrong this this is what's this kid know he goes off eastern championship wrestling becomes eccw

turns out he was right changes the entire commercial landscape of professional wrestling they copied everything you did we all know it to get a compliment from him to be able to know him be able to talk to him as a human being wouldn't trade it for anything it's amazing because when you were reciting that i can hear him saying that the four months the five months i can i can i can i can see this conversation and it's great because I noticed that you gave him a shout out at the very end of the book and I never really heard you talk about him or he talk about you so I was like I know there are people that have come up to him we spoke about that in the interview last week with him as well so I thought this this makes a lot of sense silly me shame on me I thought for sure you

would get resigned I thought you probably were resigned already I never even asked him that question because it wasn't even like a part of my thought process the way he was labeling it and kind of laying it all out was like oh yeah they're going to demand and then just just like Stone Cold, and I said CM Punk, you're gonna come up and the crowd is gonna go crazy. You're gonna get your moment. And so that's, when he said that, I think everyone thought, oh, okay, look,

like Paul's laying it all out and it's about to happen. And so that's why it's still so hard for me to believe that we're here talking about this. When you heard him say that, did it give you hope that this would get fixed between then and now? No, because he, to my knowledge at least, because I hadn't really talked him about anything,

he didn't know what was going on. I didn't think we were going to get here. I think it was going to get to here. So I kind of just, you know, figured this would, this conversation that's taking place right now today, I didn't think it was ever going to take place. Right. We're just going to work through this and this will be like it never even happened. So he didn't, he, he, he did not know about any of that as far as I know.

I'm assuming you probably heard from a lot of people within the company, friends, peers, colleagues, right? Yeah. Anyone reach out with advice that really meant to you? like meant something to you that really stood out. I'm sure friends checking in, like these are your buds, right? You see them more than your, your own family. Obviously, you're lucky that you're with your wife.

But any, any vet, any OG, any, any, any pal? A lot. Okay. A lot of them. I don't, I don't like name dropping people. I get it. Because then sometimes they may feel a particular way about it, but a lot of people. Anything in particular that they said, you don't have to tell us the source,

but some advice about how to navigate through this. Because I can, I can understand this is probably not fun for you. and not very easy, right? No. I feel for you right now. This is your life. To us, it's like, oh, it's a great interview.

Let's see how it all goes. It's a fun story. This is amazing. Let's see if he pops up. This is your freaking life, man. You built every, this explains it. This explains everything from the fighting to your relationship with your father. Like this, look at the title.

I mean, could you have not planned this? I mean, it's unbelievable. So I'm just wondering if there was advice on how to navigate all of this, because I can't imagine what's going through your mind. I was told to do the right thing. and you know don't make any decisions that you're going to regret think everything through be logical stand your ground and that that was essentially to paraphrase across the boards the information you know that was the advice that I was given so since Sunday have other promotions reached out to you yeah of course big ones yes can I ask specifically you can ask but I won't tell you brother has AW reached out no no no are you surprised No. Why?

A lot of people think it's a work. They were the ones I was thinking of when you said, hey, people don't know whether or not to reach out. Because the theory that I've heard is, if Cross shows up on TNA, this is all a work. Because they're in cahoots, right? If he shows up on AW, obviously, this isn't a work. Yeah.

Do you agree with that sentiment? Yeah, that's what everyone is thinking. I've read it. I've seen it. Yeah. I've seen it. Everyone's thinking I'm just going to pop up under some other company that's in the WWE umbrella.

They're hoping I do because this seems so nonsensical to people. People are following the course of events that have happened to get to here and they're going, how did this happen? This must not be real because this makes no sense. And believe me, I also think that this makes no sense either. This is baffling to me too. And it drives me nuts that I have to, that I actually even have to admit that. It is baffling.

It is. So it would be an all-time story if you go up and show up on the Indies and then come back. That's what people are concocting this. But you have said repeatedly this is not the case. Is it are you open to even talking to others at the moment, or are you still holding out hope that things will get sorted with WWE? I've talked to many people across the boards about doing a lot of different things. I have things that we're lining up.

My wife, both and I, like we both have things that we're lining up. We just haven't announced dates. But nothing so far that we have taken on would necessarily interfere with coming back home to WWA. It's like I said it before. Like I'm not trying to turn this into a game. I know that could be advantageous for a lot of people. I don't like to proceed like that.

I don't like it. I will resent myself for proceeding that way, even if it's monetarily beneficial to do that. I don't want to do that. So, um, I'm still waiting, man. I'm waiting at the table to, to finish discussing, you know, things that we never got a chance to discuss. I, I think that there's, I think there's still a lot.

to talk about sure so and when you say that you mean like from a character perspective right there's so much more work no i mean like from attempting to recover the issue with wwe okay like that's what i'm not i'm not fishing for any um major television wrestling companies to call me i have been contacted by several but i'm not i'm not looking for that that's not actually what i'm looking for what i would i would like to explore the conversation more with w w a do you think if you called them today and said you know what on second thought i'll take that offer do you think it's on the table or or is it really gone well the offers are sent it you think so well that's what they said that's what they said that's what they said believe that i mean because that's business too right

that's negotiation well i mean i want to believe what they are telling me that's how communication has to work unless they say something that is untrue um but in life no one is going to make a decision without information that's going to impact their entire life. You need to have information. You can't make a decision like that without being informed. All I ever asked for was to integrate information that we could assess together into the conversation. They weren't willing to do it.

I'd still like to see that information. I never even saw it. I never saw it. I'd like to see it. Where's the basis for everything that we were talking about? Where is it? Do you speak to your peers about, like, do you know what market? value is. Of course. Okay, so you know what carrying cross right now should probably be making.

Certainly. And was it far off from that? Was it a slap in the face? I'd prefer not to say. Okay. And the reason being is because let's look at the information together. Okay. That's the fair thing to say. Let's look at it all together and let's see what's appropriate. You know what I mean? Imagine, I don't know, trying to buy a car. Somebody's trying to sell you a car. You need a car, but you have absolutely no information about the vehicle whatsoever. You know what I mean? Sure, sure.

What year is it? You know, what make, what engine, what model? I'm curious if you thought of this. I'll just insert myself in it for a moment. When I was about to leave ESPN, they made me an offer, and it was for the exact same amount of money that I was making.

I was very disappointed by that. I thought I deserved more. And there were some people who were telling me they don't want you to accept this. They're only offering this to you so that they can say they offered it to you, but they are hoping you say no, because it's for the exact same amount.

I was like, no, no, no. Times are tough, pandemic. They want me to stick around. Maybe I'm wrong, maybe I'm foolish. Do you think they were hoping that you either didn't take that offer or didn't accept it or didn't answer in 24 hours just so that they could say,

hey, we offered him something. He just didn't accept it. I really don't know what was the intention with all of this. I really don't know. I don't wanna be unfair and speculate and put that on them. Like, again, it's not,

I'm not trying to make anybody feel targeted by this. I just think that the wrong people were in the conversation. Got it. You know what I mean? Yeah. Certainly things like what you said go through your mind though. I can't deny that. You know, you wonder what, what is going on here.

It's not following a logical course of discussion. I really tried to get it on track with that. so i read in your fantastic autobiography which is out right now by the way number one on amazon as far as sports biographies are concerned can't recommend it enough a fantastic summer read i read in this book that at one point when you left wb for the first time i did not know this uh you had bandied about the idea of going to be kFC you had spoken to david feldman who uh as fate would have it is actually on the show today i saw some news weirdly enough how i had no idea How close was that to becoming a thing?

Really, really, really close. This is when you left the first time. Yeah. Wow. Yeah. He reached out or you reached out? I was in the audience. I would see him all the time.

Okay. You'd go to shows where in Florida? Florida. Okay. I was at the shows almost every single time he was there for a very long time. We got to know each other. It turns out he knows my father as well. Ah, yes.

We spoke about the first time you were on, yes. Yeah. So he kept asked me. He was going, when are he going to fight for me? When are he going to fight for me? And I was thinking to myself, oh, God. do I want to invite this energy back into my life and at the time I was thinking yes I did so we were talking about doing something together and then coincidentally enough hunter called me uh and my wife within that two week period and we were back wow you think if that call doesn't happen you're fighting a BKFC at least once wow yeah for sure is that door open is that something you're considering now in this new that energy is that energy is totally out of my life okay I'll tell you like and it'll be very evident from reading the book when I was in that mindset of training to fight like I didn't I didn't like the way I felt I would just

look at everyone be like I have smash his face will smash his face I would go to practice and then I would go home and watch fights all day like I did not manage my mindset well when I was immersing myself into combat sports at all I just felt crazy all the time some people can do it like it's a switch for them they go in and do everything they have to do with the gym and then they go home and they're like back to dad or husband or whatever and they're not watching fights they're they're doing whatever i was weird i had a very difficult time balancing the energy and the mentality and the perspective of being even keel while also doing that so you don't want that back no i really don't so so the

idea of you going down the the shoot fighting route at this point in your life not a possibility no and i'm glad that's out of my system i don't i don't want to feel like that anymore i felt crazy is there any chance you have wrestled your last match? No. Okay, so you're not one of those guys who's like, if it's not WWE, I'm out. No. Okay. Okay. No way. How long do you want to go for? Forever. Forever! Terry Funk! Yeah, what a great.

I mean, I feel very good. I feel very good. I'm very healthy. I'm good to go. I don't know how long. I don't see an end in sight. Okay. That's for sure. So, this, what you were talking about, these other plans, these dates that you and your wife have, is that non-restling relationship? most most of them are yeah okay most of the mark acting stuff okay um conventions uh different cons and

stuff like that i wanted to knock all of that out that type of stuff out first author related stuff my film is actually at the new york chain film festival here in the city tonight yes it was officially selected for their festival so thank you man it's exciting it's stuff going on with the film uh here in new york city tonight it'll be going to texas soon i still can't tell people what's going on in Texas, but it's coming. We have a festival in Burbank that we were selected for, which is a really big one. I'm pumped about that.

So we're just, we've been responding to emails for the last 72 hours. We're like neck deep. Yeah, when you put that out there and your wife did as well, your email address, how many did you get? Dude, it's, I'm trying to answer them in chronological order, and I'm playing catch up. Yeah. It's really crazy. So we're just, we're locking in dates all over the place to be at.

And we agreed. we're like let's not put out single dates so people can see them because if we do it that way like every time we confirm something or get like an advance we're going to have like 30 different things to post let's get a massive collection and just drop it one time and then people have it and they can always go back to it and see where we are and what we're doing so outside of wb you can be killer cross right oh yeah and do you think that's who you'll be i have a feeling he's still around okay he's not going away i think a lot of people would be excited about that Um, is, is, is, is there any part of you that is, like, so there's a great, there's a great line here that I, uh, bookmark, if you don't mind me reading. Please go forward to. And, uh, you know, in, in the movie, uh, what's it called man on the moon. You're going to get lunatics going. He's in on it. He just referenced Andy Kaufman. No. Oh, yeah, that's right. That's, boom. There it is. I'm connected to what's truly important to me. When I'm done in the ring for the day, I go home, take a shower, put on a Norman Osborne oscarp bathrobe, hang out.

out with my family and I can be me. I don't want anyone to call me cross, carrion or killer. I don't want any of that. I like to get back to being Kevin. Kevin knows what's important. I light a cigar, pet my dog and tell Elizabeth your wife, I love her. My life is good. And it's not just good because I fought hard for it, but because I stay true to my values when I could have taken the easy way out. And so is there any part of you, when I read that, I'm like, maybe these dude is just kind of being tired, tired of all this and just wants to be Kevin for a bit. I like my, I like my time between performing that's for sure I exhaust everything at least that I'm allowed to when I go to perform all of the energy completely immersed myself into the character presentation get out

there and give people the show that they're looking for that I'm allowed to give after that though I it's a very long recharge yeah and I and I like that process I enjoy the process of being able to recharge with my family and and just be around people that have known me my entire life that aren't going to treat me and talk to me like the character that I'm playing on TV. Like that's a little hard sometimes for anybody who's in the business where if you meet people while you're wrestling, there's like this weird thing where they're always talking to you and communicating with you like you're like a person on TV. Yeah. And it can be hard to close the distance and have like an authentic friendship with people

sometimes because they just see you differently. But the truth is like we're sure. It's it's a job. It's a job I love but you know I'm I'm not going to power bomb me through this table even though I think about it I think about it a lot I'm really not so you can like you can let your guard down and we can talk about Seinfeld yes yes oh I love that show one of my favorite with it again by the way thank you I can't imagine what it must be like to be at a crossroads in your life or whatever you want to call this and people not believe you right when I tell people hey I'm leaving ESPN known's like are you telling us the truth and so for the last few days when you probably see everyone

weighing in with their opinion if you're consuming any of this perhaps you're not But it's got to be frustrating, right? A little bit. Yeah. I go online periodically. I see what's going on. I turn it off. There's a time, there's going to be a time where I can address this.

But if I go online and try to disprove or confirm every single thing that's going on, your whole day's gone. Sure. And I can't because I have different opportunities coming in that require my attention and my focus right now. So, you know, that's what kind of occupies my time, for the most part, at least currently right now. So I knew that we were going to get to a point where at least recently where I was going to be asked about this when we talk about it and I would address everything then and there so were signs really taken away on Monday? I have no idea. Did you hear that? I did. Yeah. I've heard for years someone who used to be in charge of a wrestling company told me that sometimes stories are leaked or fed so that.

there's an opportunity for someone to drum up an issue being made that wasn't a real issue so somebody else can circumvent back and say it's not true and now any sort of stories that are coming out whether they're true or not get washed out the window well this one story wasn't true so we can't believe any of it you know it's a way to kind of control and format narratives I don't know if that's what's going on I've seen so many different stories that are not true revolving going around I don't know but I have no idea whether that was accurate or not but what takes place online and why who knows your guess is as good as mine dude will you give yourself some sort of deadline as to when you will make a decision a how long

you'll wait be how long you'll decide if you'll go in this route or that route like have you given yourself that kind of timeline no no I haven't I'm not concerned about it like I said I mean I I I've never felt I've never felt this supported in my entire life in all directions. I've never felt like I've had this before. There's not a sense of urgency or a rush to commit into anything that is not right for me right now. And that is a blessing. I've never felt like this in my life. Everything is okay right now. Everything is good. I would prefer to go back home with my wife. That's what I would prefer to do. And let's give people

what they want. Home meaning WWE. Absolutely. And despite the fact that it's been a little bit frustrating. The initial release, the suspenders, the helmet, the comeback not being on raw that many times this year. Even on the doc, you said, hey, communication has been great, collaboration has been great, I'd like for it to be more. Despite the fact that you've had multiple frustrations since you joined, you still want to go back.

Yes. You still call it home. Yep. Why? That's life, man. Life, there's grief and setbacks and frustrations that are going to be a part of every single aspect of life, whether it's this job or another. It was like an old Japanese saying that's kind of stuck with me for a while.

It's, um, you find a job you love and you never work a day in your life. Wrestling to me, I know for some is just a job. It's not a job really for me anymore. I tell people it's a job. To me, I still love it. I love being able to go out there and perform and create moments for people that they're not going to forget. That's what it is all about.

I don't have an interest in making a complete and total departure from that, especially with WWE I have so many great core memories of being there even amongst all that other stuff for me personally as I speak to you today

pales in comparison to the relationships and friendships that I have not even just with people in the locker room but supporting staff everybody like I've had every when I tell you I've had everybody reach out to me about all this I mean it's literally everybody

yeah so I can't imagine and in the end you use that word blessing like it's been a while since we've had like a sort of voice of the voiceless like you have become in my opinion to steal a phrase from punk back in the day you are the people's champ now and you become the people's champ even more so when they feel like you've been wronged yeah right now you've become like a martyr oh boy you know what I mean it's true you become very sympathetic I don't know if you could be a heel ever again at least not in the interim right right and so I'm

I'm wondering, and we're rounding third here, I'm wondering if you have allowed yourself to go there. When you pop up somewhere else, if it's not WWE, if it's WD, the place will go insane. But if it's somewhere else, it's killer cross, the place will go insane. Now this becomes a part of your identity. You recognize that, yeah?

I do. Okay. Are you excited about that? Or are you still sort of in the like, holy shit, what happened stage? No, no. I'm excited. Okay.

There's something readily available for the audience that we can give them. Yes. I'm still here waiting, man. All they got to do is show up to. their side and let's figure this out and let's give it to them yeah and are you cool with leaning into this oh yeah okay we should always be giving the people what they want always if you want to starve them for a little bit with a payoff on the back end that's okay uh that's not what is happening right now it should be what's happening and i think it's not too late to go there have you reached out to paul

personally no why not i spoke i had a conversation with him earlier in the year about all of this. They took a point man, and they put him between us to communicate. So now the point man is responsible for all of the dialogue. You can't circumvent that guy. You have a personal relationship, a history with Paul. He knows that I want to talk. Yeah.

He knows what I want to do. He knows. Are you tempted to send him a text? I don't know what I would send him. Yeah. Because that guy who they put in front of them to talk to me is telling me that everything is coming from them. Got it. I've made it very, very.

clear that I want to keep the lanes of communication and dialogue open it's a very weird situation yeah it's weird dude i get it so i i've conveyed everything like there's really like this is the way forward everyone just needs to stop being weird in life i would say it's a good life lesson yeah yeah there's a t-shirt uh what about the people in conclusion uh and feel free to speak to them these people have your back man the we want cross hashtag all this stuff the the the t-shirt sales. Yeah. They were flooding our chat before the show started.

Very excited that you'll be on. What do you want to say to the people who have had your back throughout all of this and then some? Absolutely cannot thank you enough. There were different periods of my life where I thought for sure, sincerely, maybe I wouldn't have like made it to even this age. I was pretty troubled. And to find myself waking up with this sort of level of support in all directions from friends, peers, vets, total strangers, it's unbelievable.

And I just want people to know that I'm not playing a game with them. This is real. And I'm here to fight. I'm going to fight to do the right thing. I'm going to fight to show up. And I'll see you again soon. incredible thank you anything we didn't touch on that you want to get out while we're alive right now we never talked about how newman did not get his own tv show he should have had a spin off he lost

all that weight it got a little bit weird yeah probably what michael richards did in the comedy club screwed things up probably didn't help yeah uh duck man never got released on DVD wow you're really going deep here you know the archives they're gonna go what's he talking about yeah no no duckman was great wow what about rochelle rochelle do you remember that what a film that was incredible stuff it is called life is fighting holy shit what a time to come out with a book

and it's fascinating reading it with like today's knowledge in the back of your mind you know what I mean how all this sort of juxtaposes is really kind of weird you know what I'm saying it's really weird yeah I I was not expecting to be in this situation at the end of the book where I'm going back to WWE

and now I'm sitting here and I'm not in WW as the book comes out. My closing thought was, holy shit, the second book is going to be fantastic. The second book is going to be very off the rails. I'll tell you that right now. If you want to support this man, buy this book right now.

You could buy it on Amazon, anywhere you get your books. Also, pro wrestling teas.com. You've got your shirts out there. Your wife has her shirts out there as well. Scarlett, there it is. Look at these. I'm a five. I'm a 10.

That's some great stuff. And then, of course, Roberts as well. So go check them out. Go support them. Ken, thank you enough. Honestly, thank you for coming. I'm sure you could have gone on a million different shows today. While you're here in New York, we appreciate it more than you know.

Good luck with the showing tonight and everything that you're doing and keep us posted and keep doing your thing. Keep being you. Keep standing up for what you believe in. It's very, very inspiring and admirable to watch from afar. I appreciate it so much, man. Sincerely, I do. Kevin Robert.

Kesar. Kizar. Kizar. It's Kesar in Croatian, but I'm not going to make people roll. there are. It's just not going to happen in the United States. Kesard. Yes. All right. Close enough. Keysar.

Keysar. All right. I wanted to get it the authentic way. There he is. Kevin Robert Kesar, aka Killer Cross, formerly known as carrying Cross, at least for now. Incredible stuff. We're going to be back in a couple of minutes with Shana Basler, another person who is sort of moving on from WWE, at least for now. And David Feldman's still to come. Paul Hughes as well, don't go anywhere. All right. That was the boys in the back from last week, getting a set for UFC 319 this Saturday. In studio was Armine Kevin, formerly known as Karen Cross,

aka Killer Cross. The book is out. Please do check it out. Please go get it. Please go support him and his wife over on Pro Wrestling Tees.com. And that was riveting stuff. I mean, one of the most fascinating interviews we've ever had did not think that it was a shoot. And it is a shoot. I'm a thousand percent certain of that right now. So I hope you enjoyed that. I wish him well and really appreciate him stopping by. Very much looking forward to talking to our next guest. I do believe this is our first time talking to her in quite some time.

And I do believe it's her first chat as far as a public interview is concerned since leaving WWE parting ways back in May. We've been talking to her for a very long time over the years, dating back to the elite X-C, Strike Force, Invicta, UFC, and then Pro Wrestling Days. She is the Queen of Spades herself. She's the one and only Shana Bazelor, who is kind of to join us right here and now on the program. Hello, Shana. How are you?

What's up? I literally, like, just walked in from the gym. Okay. Thank you. I appreciate you doing this. Yeah. Are you all sweaty and stuff? Are you uncomfortable?

No, I'm good. I'm good for right now. Okay, all right. Perfect. Yeah. Perfect. Well, thank you for doing this. I appreciate it.

By the way, tremendous setup. You're doing like streaming. I think you're on Twitch or something, right? Yeah, yeah, doing, I stream on Twitch a little bit and like a few times a week. And I'm going to be, I have a YouTube that I haven't been very active on, but I'm definitely going to be firing that back up here coming up. I got some plans. So, yeah.

Okay, well, it looks great. It sounds great. And we appreciate you being here to talk to us. I do believe this is your first time talking since leaving WWU, right? Yeah, in this sort of format, yeah. Yes, of course, like an interview. Just for the sake of sort of being accurate, were you released or did your contract expire? How did it go down?

I was released. I had actually not too long ago signed an extension. So, yeah, it would have, I wish it would have ran out. But yeah, I was released. How much longer was on there? I had like three more years. Oh, okay. Wow. So you just signed it. Was it relatively newly signed? Okay. What was your reaction when you found out about their decision? You know, it's kind of funny because it's, I wouldn't say it's like, it's obviously never a good feeling, I don't think, in rare cases.

But it's, it was not unexpected. Like we hadn't, you know, as far as like Zoe and I and with Sonia being released, And then since Sonia got, or she got, they didn't, they didn't renew her contract. And then from that time, we just weren't on TV, me and Zoe. And so you kind of get this feeling like we were, you know, trying to pitch stories and ideas and do our own stuff on social media and that kind of thing. And just nothing was really hitting with creative. So, I mean, as much as it's a. bummer in that moment. It's kind of like, yeah, yeah, I kind of knew this was where we were at. How did you find out?

They called me. They called me. I was not, I was fortunate to be one of those that did not find out through social media. Sure, sure. And when they do this, when they call you, do they give you a reason? Do they say, hey, we just don't have anything or we want to go, like, is there any sort of reason or it's like, no, we're parting ways? Yeah, it's kind of just straightforward. you know we're we always hate doing this we want to wish you the best all the normal kind of cliche stuff nothing you know nothing dramatic no real reason why and i'm not a person that's going to sit in that moment and be like but why right right right so so i believe you were signed with with by w w in 2017 right yep so it's been you know a good eight or so years with

them when you hang up that phone and and allow the news to digest what are you feeling in that moment well so you know obviously we all are pretty you become pretty good friends with people over the years so there's people that were on that same uh release list that i'm friends with dakota kai like there there's and you have this conversation and i think about at least for me my like height was that black and gold NXT era and I don't

say that I guess it's easy for me to say that because I was like champion at the time and I'm very proud of that run that I had but even just being in that era of wrestling and I'm grateful that I had that there's some people that I feel like never really found their footing

whether that was they weren't given the chance or they just didn't, for whatever the reason is, they never really got the same sort of like run, satisfied run that I had. Now I can sit and like commiserate and be upset of all the different ways that I feel like a main roster run could have gone,

but I'm overall very pleased with my time in WWE, and there's no arguing that equity-wise it was amazing right like there there's such a reputable company as far as sports entertainment like there's i'm i'm so grateful that i at least had that because they're like i said there's people i mean shoot there's people that probably get told all kinds of promises just signing to nxte and then don't even ever make it on tv and get released so it's like i i'm very grateful for my time so you don't look back with regret or what ifs you're you're happy you're content for them obviously

no one wants to leave, but there's no real, like, sort of bad blood. There's no bad blood from me. There is, obviously, there's stuff like, I really feel like the whole COVID thing, really threw a wrench in the way my run was supposed to go, and that's not anyone's fault. No one knew how that was going to go at the time or how long or whatever. And there's always, like, man, if they would have just listened to this story, I pitched, but I don't, I'm not a person that's going to sit and, and, like,

commiserate on that stuff. There's some things that are in your control, and the things that were in my control is I can promise you, um, like, as far as the, the, my peers in the locker room, I have the respect of everyone there. And whether people, um,

you know, it's, it's not about like what Twitter says. I think, I feel like it's more important, like when the people in the business, that you do that know the ins and outs and and see the stuff that other people don't see can can respect your work that's a bigger compliment than like you know a fan liking the flavor of lollipop or whatever you know what i'm saying i don't know so um no bad blood on my part i do you know there will be like i wonder man i wonder if i could have been that or why why you know there's all of that but I don't know, you're just going to make yourself miserable kind of like dwelling on the things that are not in your control. Sometimes we're not in control of, like, creative and what stories they put. And as much as you want to say, like, everybody gets that opportunity. Sometimes people don't get the same opportunity as others, but I can be proud of everything I had in my control and I am. And I think, I don't know, as you know, like Josh Barnett is like a mentor of mine.

And very important for my lineage, more important than like winning the WWE title is that did I carry the banner of that style of wrestling that I represent, which is when people watched me, they believed me, you know? Yeah. And I think that is a harder thing to achieve in this day and age for pro wrestling than people realize.

so um well can i ask do you think you did do i think i do you think that you yeah do you think you did you did you carry on that that legacy did you represent the right way i think i think i definitely there's if there's something to be said about my ring work whether you thought i was exciting and you were a fan or whether you thought i was boring and whatever you believed what I was doing in the ring. Like when I hit someone, I hit someone. And that's something that like with Josh and Billy and working along that whole arm

of pro wrestling, that's something that's very important to me. And it to the point that sometimes my stuff looked so real that people are so used to seeing it a certain way in pro wrestling that they thought it looked the opposite. I don't know if I'm explaining that, properly. For example, me and Rhonda have this MMA style match at SummerSlam, and you can say what you want. We knew going in what was going to happen. We were pretty handcuffed for a lot of

what went on around that, but I got so messed up. I legitimately like shoot how my eye was swelled shut. I broke my thumb. I hyper-extended my elbow. Like I got so messed up that match. And I remember seeing people be like, if they were going to do an MMA match, they should have just hit each other for real. And I'm like, do you guys not, like, we were, but you're still used to seeing like an arm swing back in the hairfly that you don't, you forget what real looks like. And so I think even in that we achieved what I set out to in some sense, you know? So there's, like I said, to get the respect of the peers. and then have people believe and any time

any time there was ever a whiff of a rumor of me shooting on someone in the back or in the ring everyone believed it. So I think that says... Yeah, you're legit. You're a shooter.

You're a legit fighter. Former UFC fighter, all that stuff. When you left the UFC in 2015 and you embarked on this journey, could you have ever imagined it work out this way? Here you are 11 years later, essentially leaving WD,

like with a great run as you mentioned with some great highs or had all this exceeded your expectations this is it's strange because it's a little bit of both

right like I always thought man I'm going to take this as far as I can like there was that moment but at the same time I think I was getting

into pro wrestling right as the changeover for what women's women's wrestling and how it was presented was happening right that was right around the time NXT was taking off and you had like their

NXT horse women were like really changing things and it was right at that time that I started crossing over so it wasn't quite a tangible reality for you know I already had this long MMA career

so I'm on the older end of combat sports and so I don't know it was I think I don't know if people even realize this but my WWE debut was on total divas, and I was helping coach Nikki Bella's return. Natty had brought me in, and I remember thinking, sweet, since I'm older,

maybe they'll see I can coach like this. You know what I mean? And that was kind of a thing. And then when I got a tryout and they were talking about, you know, doing this May Young Classic and all this, then it started kind of being like, if they're being serious, I can take this pretty far. And so that actually leads me to some of the stuff that I saw that I wanted to ask you about. Did you return after parting ways as an NXT producer?

So it's really funny. This whole thing kind of blew up bigger, to be bigger than it was. So I have a really good relationship with WWE still. I'd like to think, especially with NXT, with the time I put in and the coaches there. Um, so I had just happened to, I'm not going to, like, name any names, but I happened to be in to help some friends of mine work on some submission transition stuff. And they, like, is it cool and whatever? And it happened to be on a Tuesday. And the truth is years ago when Daniel Bryan was, uh, it was during the COVID era, but he, so like, people might not know this, but in guerrilla, um, you can, you have the opportunity to, like, sit on a headset and hear all the communications going on with the truck and the production and all of that stuff.

However, generally speaking, just for the top guys. Like, I wasn't in a position to sit and do that on main roster, but I remember Daniel Bryan telling me, if you ever get a chance to do that, it completely changed his understanding of how wrestling works, right? So he could, he saw, he understood, like, oh, they want me to do this because of this camera and it takes this long to switch to this angle

so that's why I have to hold this. There's just certain, you see wrestling differently for TV and I always remembered that and so anytime I was around NXT after that I would just jump on a headset and listen. Oh wow. And so I happened to be there that Tuesday jumped on a headset and listened to the calls.

So it wasn't like, you know, I wasn't, I wasn't like on a microphone like. So what happens then? someone then goes to tell someone else and be like Shane is a producer now at NXT because that's how it kind of came across. Kind of telephone game, I suppose. I mean, and you know, I haven't been gone for a million years. I know many of the talent there.

So there was maybe, if anything can be said, it was like, oh, I have an idea. Why don't you do this and this and this? But I wasn't like standing there, putting this match together, writing down the notes and like on a mic to the truck being like all right we're going to need a floor camera you know it wasn't any of that um but i mean we have that kind of open relationship where you know is it a possibility someday sure i would like to think so maybe maybe they maybe they i shouldn't yeah i shouldn't speak for them maybe they think different but that's not beyond the realm

of possibility. I would love to be the Anoki of NXT and bring a little you know, visceral reality into things. But I also am not sure I'm ready to be done in the ring. But I also am not sure I'm one of those

people that would ever feel like I'm ready to be done. So there's a lot to like juggle around. Do you know what I mean? So... Was it just that one time? That's been a few times. I mean, I... It's as far as that whole thing sitting on a headset and NXT I've been doing that for ever.

Like, I've been doing that. It's just I think no one paid attention because I was a talent. You know what I mean? So it was like normal to see me there. So I think this thing. And actually it's funny because I'd been doing that pretty much my whole 90 days.

I'm just in there helping out with this, with a couple matches here and there friends of mine. And then it wasn't until NXT had a show right before evolution when all the Ron Smackdown girls came and showed up in the audience and they were promoting the Battle Royal

and so I know it was one of them it had to have been because I'd been there but in all seriousness I think it was just like a game of telephone like somehow it got out that I was on a headset and it translated into me producing you know but you know how it is not any Joe Schmoe off the street

could be on a headset back there and so yeah for sure there's a level of trust i would imagine and and i wonder if you want to do it like if they called you up and said you want to do this full time do you even live in orlando i do okay so like would you say yes would that would you be open to something like that i'd be open to discussing something like that a conversation would need to be had about you know the normal things the yeah of course yeah and and then also as i said i'd have to really sit and kind of like figure out what um in ring looks like but i i'm very aware of like where i'm at in the world as far as like i'm in my 40s this is not like a young person's uh you know what i mean this is not and and all that to say there are people in their 40s at the height of it so

could i like this this would all be stuff i'd have to navigate um i do not take lightly that They allow me to even, especially it's not often. I think the anomaly of it is like, I think any talent could go to NXT and be like, can I just sit on a headset? Like, I think anybody could do that. I think the anomaly is that I was released and they still allowed me to do that. I always think, you know, I, I wrestled when I was a kid. I was in MMA, I was in combat sports gyms, my whole adult life, I was in pro wrestling.

These are all very male-dominated industries, and I think they're always looking for women that can step into a role like that. So, like I said, it's not beyond the realm of possibility, and I don't take lightly the sort of compliment it is for them to even allow me to do that post. being released. So I just take it all as even if nothing comes of it, I'm learning the craft. I'm learning a whole other side of the craft. So it's just more tools to put in my tool bag. You're free and clear at this point to sign with anyone, right?

Your 90 days are up. Yep. Have you talked to other promotions? Oh, there's been talks, and I have, it's really funny. There's some indie companies that at the time I signed with WWE, it was for the May on Classic. And so we did the May on Classic,

and I hadn't like officially signed on full time yet. And kind of the discussion or the understanding at that time was like, yeah, yeah, yeah, just sign. And then when you need to drop all those titles on the Indies, we'll let you kind of go back and take care of those. And then that never came to fruition. So, you know, these companies have reached out and been like, hey, remember that title? Yeah. So there's been some talks. Obviously, it's not a secret.

You know, I'm really good friends with Marina. I have a lot of friends there. So there's been some discussion as to what the future could hold, for sure. Would you like to go to AEW? I would like to. I've said this. I said almost exactly this statement when people were talking about UFC to WWE transition. I don't care as much the letters behind it.

I just want to practice my craft, and if I can do that alongside my friends, that's always a great place to be. So, you know, I'm not going to say a hard no to any of that. An Invicta promo aired during a TNA show, I believe, Slimeversary, and so everyone thought, like, oh, this is a sign that she's going to show up there. Did you see that? I caught wind of some fans and some social media buzz about an MMA return. yes

MMA or meaning that you'll show up on TNA like this is sort of like a way to introduce you to the TNA audience Yep yeah I saw some of that

and again this is another reason why I think you know for anybody that's that's thinking about getting into this business or

whatever your goals are if your goals are or WBE it's it's good to keep good relationships because you know if that worked out

I'm glad that if the possibility of a TNA thing were to come to fruition, I am in a position that I haven't burned that bridge. They work very closely with WWE, right? So if I were to get out and do all these podcasts talking about how creative did me dirty and this and that, like there's like a lot of doors that closed for me, you know? So the TNA, God dang,

their women's division is so good right now too. but it's the same as it's always been man wherever there's bodies that people want to see me move in ways that look disgusting and they want to see that I'm down to do it we just got to iron out the details

by the way you did mention MMA is that a possibility oh man I tell you what I I think I I am smart enough to know that I could keep up up here

but the training I would have to do to get back into MMA shape and not that it would be impossible I'm not saying like I'm too old just the work that it would take for me to get back into that sort of shape to be competing at the level that I would be satisfied competing at

I don't know if I have that in me anymore you know what I mean? That's a grind man and I did that grind and I don't know it's it's I think I think I could see myself in a more of a coaching capacity than actually competing in MMA. But I mean, hey, who knows? They're going to open some old-timey legends division or something.

Who knows, you know? Do you still keep up with it? Do you still watch it? Yeah, yeah, I do. And obviously now a lot more, you know, just time constraint-wise, I would watch kind of the bigger cards, the bigger UFC cards or whatever. I have a lot more time now, especially because if people have paid attention to my YouTube channel, I kind of have this like, here's pro wrestling in MMA and grappling. So I'll show like a Daniel Bryan yes luck, but here's how you can use it in like a jujitsu match or something.

And so I like now that I'm trying to get that fired back up and rolling. again. I like being relevant. Like I don't just want to throw random stuff on the channel. I want to be relevant. So if I see, you know, someone hit something crazy, some crazy submission that people are like, oh, they smokes. And then I could show the pro wrestling history behind that or whatever. So I like keeping up on that stuff. I studied it for years. Yeah. It's never going to be out of my system, you know. Earlier when you were talking about the Ronda match, SummerSlam 2023, her last match. You mentioned you guys were handcuffed. What did you mean by that? Well, just we were very aware that in a in a stadium environment, that sort of match to a pro wrestling crowd is going to be

hard to see. And we were kind of counting on this jumbotron, but the stadium didn't have a jumbotron. So we knew like it'd be hard for people to see. And on top of that, because we were in a stadium, So a lot of people were talking about, like, why wasn't it a cage mat? Like, they didn't have the structure in a stadium rather than a, like, a bigger arena to lower a cage or a fight pit. And just, I think it would have been different if, okay, I'm not saying this in a way that's like, this isn't like a jab or a jab or. anything but if we had been like the men's title picture i think and it was the last match of the night and they could have built they could have like brought that stuff out and built the cage around it or something along those lines we could have done something like that but because we were

we were not the last match there was no way to quickly like cart the pieces of structure out build it and then also take it back down and cart it back out for the next match to take place so we tried you know we tried to get creative and it's just it was just tough the venue made it tough I do think like Rhonda having a sort of hard out date kind of handcuffed us in that we had to rush

like we had to like do the story now I think it would have been better served to have that sort of match as like a blow off after a longer feud right um but yeah i did uh the handcuffs were not like you're not allowed to do this it was more just the the circumstances of the events the time and and and the venue that we were at obviously the the the era is completely different now but i had read a while ago that initially correct me if i've got this wrong vince didn't really sort of like understand your style or didn't get your style and and was like kind of slow to to get on board

with it. Am I wrong with this? No, he, it wasn't that he didn't get my style. He very much understood my style. I think, and this isn't just a Vince thing. I think this is a thing in modern pro wrestling as far as training is that

I have to dance this dance between this sort of UWFI blood-sportish type of style with the way modern wrestling is presented today. and people know it when they see it

so if we're talking about Vince for example Vince knew that he wanted it when he saw it he didn't exactly know how to communicate what it was he wanted to see out of me does that make sense so you're talking about a guy that

knows the inns and outs of pro wrestling like unbelievably obviously right um so he knew like that could work that could work that could work but he also knew like because i know your background it looks weird when you do a drop kick so try to think of something else there he didn't necessarily know to tell me this is the move you should do but he knew like that's not right i need you to do something different so and that's and that's you know you used Vince is the specifics, but that's kind of like most pro wrestling today is that way.

And that's where I think, you know, the possibility of like coaching, producing someday I would be a great, like, niche fit in for someone because I could look at someone like I see these, it's a big thing now, right? Everybody studies some sort of jiu-jitsu or M.A. I can see someone coming in and then they learn how to do a, drop-down leapfrog, hip-toss, but it looks weird because it's like, you, you wrestle D-1. You know how to do a hip-toss? Why are you doing it like that? You know what I mean? So I think just having a translator is where I could have maybe gotten in a little bit faster. I had to kind of navigate that myself, but, yeah, it wasn't that he didn't understand. It was that he didn't know how to communicate to me what he wanted to see to fit into, today's modern wrestling kind of had to figure that out of my own you you briefly mentioned blood

sport they just had another great show somerslam week uh in new jersey your guy josh barnett i love what they're doing and i know you competed for them in april in Vegas you seem to be a fit like if there ever was a person especially on the women's side of things that would be perfect for bloodsport it would be you safe to say more appearances to come there yeah i imagine i'm very very very close with Josh, if people don't know. He's like, I don't want to say he's like a father because he's not. He's more like your uncle that let you swear and

have a beer with him. A mentor is a good way to describe me too, right? He's very much a mentor. He, man, I owe him my life. He changed my life. I was just this kid from the Midwest.

He brought me out and started helping me in M.A. And he helps me understand the other side. the entertainment side right um and so you know i'll always do my best to help josh and his stuff and like you said that bloodsport style of wrestling is the wrestling that i came up in that's the wrestling i know that's the the banner of that uh style of wrestling is what i feel a responsibility to carry um and i think that's why when i do go to blood sport it's such a good fit and it seems so natural because that's

that's the type of wrestling that's the type of wrestling that I know you know so I'll always be you can always hear rumblings of me being on bloodsport I'm sure I'll be like Minoro Suzuki and be like 60 going and doing blood sports Japan would be tremendous as well

I'm just curious now that you look back with some distance on the run what was the high point not nxte main roster what are you most proud of is it elimination chamber is it the the ronda match is it something in between is it what is it what comes to mind you know so i could i all those things are great i feel like i really feel like people are going to be surprised to hear this but i really feel like uh me and naya's tag team run during the covid era yeah that would have been on tv would have been like I thought it for for two people that weren't really friends like we just met we didn't hang out ever the chemistry we had on screen and then just like the run we had we were I think

people forget because we were heels but we were running all three brands during that era too everyone talks about like Sasha Bailey doing all three brands and carrying the the COVID era but we were we were on all three shows carrying that tag division we were on every show And I really wish, if there is like one huge regret, I really wish it was, that would have been in front of fans, or we could have gone back to that and see how they would have reacted. And then obviously just for my, oops, sorry, my personal thing, the Ronda match, I know it's maybe not what people, I don't know,

expected or wanted. I'm very proud of that match because we stuck true to, what we knew that style should be and we wanted to give that at the time and we we said it before the match that I think 10 years from now people are going to look back and and see it with different eyes than they did in that sort of environment that it was in so I'm glad that we pulled that off the promos the stuff leading up to it um I'm so proud of uh yeah I think probably those two things. That's fair. That's fair. And I appreciate that. By the way, I know you're into like the war game

Warhammer. Yeah. I don't know anything about this stuff and we were watching some of it. There's actually a guy on our show, our audio extraordinaire, mysterious Frank, who's dying to ask you a question. Frank, take it away. Ask Shane a question about this wacky world. Hey, Shane. I'm a avid 40K hobbyist, less than a player. But I was just curious, what army are you fielding now, like, you know, if you could just speak to that or what you've done in the past. So I have no idea what he just said, by the way. I am, I have this tattoo right here. Oh, wow.

Oh, that's sick. So I'm a huge Iron Warriors fan. I can't even put my finger on why. It's just like his story and I'm like, yeah, he is. He does do all the hard work, the unglorious work. This guy deserves more, you know, I don't know. identified with it a little bit but he uh my whole gym is i call my gym my home gym the iron cage and i uh i have uh you can get like custom uh like signage for your squat rack and it says

iron within iron without um so i'm a bit i'm i'm super into horace heresy at the moment as far as like the miniatures and stuff frank you don't know what she's talking about stop Pretendix right. Absolutely, 30K. I know exactly what she's talking about. But based on like the Sidious statues and stuff behind you, are you like way into like the dark side of things?

Like the, the heels, so to speak, when it comes to your geekdom? Yeah, I think I do lean more heel. I think just, I like, I like, I guess, heels when, and people that do character study on storytelling and stuff will tell you, like if the best heels are the ones that are justified.

And I think I love when a story can be like, oh, this totally makes sense. Like, I really, I really like Darth Vader's story, not because, you know, he's cool, like everyone thinks he's cool, and people, it's cool to like the bad guy. But honestly, if you got a vision, if you knew you had powers and you got a vision from the future that the love of your life was going to die,

and someone said, listen, follow me, I can give you the power to keep her alive. every one of us would have done what he did and I think like people I don't know people get so stuck on like liking bad guys because they're cool I like bad guys because I'm like wait I totally would have fallen into that bad guy stuff because that makes sense to me okay you lost me there for the last couple minutes but I'm so happy he's been dying to ask you this question and he's so happy he's he's he's I think he popped really hard for just on my on my Twitch okay um I'm adding one nine

a week where I'm doing an IRL stream and it's just me painting and talking to the chat. Wow, Frank, get on that. There it is. You can see me there. I appreciate it. There it is. I want to ask you one last thing before I let you go. When you left, when the word got out, you tweeted, no one can offer what I have to offer

reality. Let the galaxy burn. What are you trying to tell us there? You're legit. You're a shooter. This isn't play fighting to you. There's no one in all of pro wrestling

that can offer it's exactly what I said P.S. Let the Galaxy Burn is a war hammer reference also. Oh damn. I just know I know what I have to offer and I'm not saying this in a way like

I know my value. Like that's not it. I know that I have something that no especially amongst women nobody has. if I could tell you not to get into this or again I'm not going to use names but if I could tell you the people that come to me to ask for a way out of this or that hold

or a transition or do you have a submission or like my fingerprints are forever on this business and I know that whether people know that or not that's a whole other thing but that's that's not I just want to keep the flag waving for catch wrestling and for the roots of what pro wrestling was, which is you believe these people. And I offer that. And there's very few people that can offer that today. And it's harder today because the secret about pro wrestling is out, right? Yeah. But I don't think, you know, if I go to Vegas and I watch Chris Angel

saw a woman in half. We all know he's not really doing that. The secret is out. But if he does his job right, we come away and we're like, I saw everything. He had to have cut that woman in half. I have no idea. And so if I as a pro wrestler with my background and doing my job right, people will come away going, that was for real. Like she must have been mad at her or she botched. I love that too. Boy, she botched that. Like if I did that, then I'm doing my job. Because if I can fool you in today's day where the secret is out, then I've done my job. And I think I can do that in a way that very, very, very few people can do that in wrestling today. Well, I have to say, from afar, took immense pride in seeing you succeed on this level,

knowing you from the MMA world and then, like, you're one of us. It was so great because you had been talking about it and then to see you manifested and succeed. I remember seeing you on that indie show in Cleveland, the weekend of UFC, 203. And I was like, wow, she's really doing it. It's unbelievable. And then to go as far as you did was unbelievable. So congratulations on an incredible last 10 years in this wild and wacky world and looking forward to seeing you do from this point forward. So thank you so much, Shane. Great to reconnect. Great to have you on. Again, congrats and appreciate you coming on to talk to us after the dust has settled. Yeah. Thank you very much. You know, I wanted to get on

right away. But, you know, I had that whole 90 days. I got you. I didn't want to mess up. But I, I, thank you so much for the support over the years. You've been there since the beginning, beginning. So like, Invicta, even before that, like, Bodog and all that stuff. Oh, yes. And we'll still be here.

It's pretty crazy. It's pretty crazy. So, yeah, there's more to come. So hopefully not the last time I'll be on here talking about that. Absolutely. Looking forward to that. For now, thank you. Congrats.

And good luck in this next chapter. Thank you. There she is. Shana Bazler coming on to talk about life after WWE, great stuff, and what a run. Don't know if a lot of people thought it would go quite that way when she left UFC in 2015. Some 10 years later, she's an eight-year

WWE vet, had a great run early on on the Indies, and then an amazing run in NXT, and then a really great run in WWE as well, some massive highs. So good on her, well done. Congratulations on a great run, and appreciate her. coming on. All right. By the way, fantastic job by Mr. Mysterious Frank. We'll get to that back end. There's still some business to take care of. Matter of seconds, alert, alert, alert,

Mr. David Feldman, the founder of BKFC going to join us in a matter of seconds to break some news. A lot going on in the world of BKFC. We talked about that press conference a couple of weeks ago with all the big dogs, all the champions, all their stars, including Mr. Cona McGregor, in attendance. They did announce a big show on October 4th across the river in New Jersey at the Prudential Center, their first time running that massive venue. Mr. David Feldman is here to break some news, perhaps, perhaps pertaining to that show. Let us say hello to him right here now. Hello, David. How are you?

Going on, Ariel. How are you? Good to talk to you, as always. I know it's a very busy time, a lot going on as always, but don't want to beat around the bush. We were told you're coming bearing gifts. Yeah, you know, I was hoping to drop this announcement with Connor. He was actually going to come on here. But he's actually, you know, I've been talking to him a lot, and he's so focused and he's

training a lot, and he just said he didn't want to miss his training session. It's really a different Connor than I've seen in a long time. It's the kind of Connor that I think that everybody's going to want to see back in the cage. And I think that I think they're going to see that, and I think they're going to get the best version of Connor. I just wanted to get out there prior to making this announcement because everybody associates obviously Connor with BKFC and you know there's been some stuff in the news and I'll just tell you man he's he's super super focused right now okay appreciate that would have been nice if he showed up

with you but this is great too no problem appreciate you making that effort what do you have in store for us we're going to announce the main event for our our monster October 4th card that we have happens to be my birthday um at the production center in Newark New Jersey it'll be our first time in the state of New Jersey at one of the, you know, most sought after arenas in the, in the Northeast United States and Prudential Center. Phenomenal people to work with there. The main event will be the King of Violence. It will be the King of Violence Championship.

It will be Mike Perry taken on Jeremy Stevens. There it is. Thank you for that, Frank. Yeah, that's a, I think it's going to be, I think it's going to be a great fight, man. We had, we were in talks with some other people at first. just because we were trying to make a match of someone that's talking a lot of stuff about Mike Perry, and we try to make that match that fell through right now, Darren Till, for the time being. But, you know, we'll see if we can revisit that one.

But this is a fantastic matchup. Jeremy Stevens is coming up a little bit in wait. But he showed that, you know, he belongs in BKFC, and he's undefeated here, and he can bang. And I'm excited for this banger. Speaking of that way, what weight will this be at? 175. Okay, 175. Now, okay, several follow-ups there. Obviously, no need to beat around the bush. There had been talks of Perry versus Lawler. Why isn't that the match-up? He's still under contract with the UFC, and we just weren't able to work that out. Okay. That's really all there is to that at all. You know, that's, there was nothing else to that. It was just really, truly, it was, you know, it's their fighter, and we thought they were going to release him to us, and, And it was just a little difficult to get that done.

Still hoping to do business with him, or is that now off the table? I mean, listen, he's been fantastic. His team's been fantastic, but, you know, it was tough to get the deal done. And I don't know if we'll ever get that deal done. He just got inducted into the Hall of Fame again. So I think he's, you know, I think he's going to ride off into the sunset. Okay. So then you go to Jeremy.

Was he always the next guy in mind? Well, actually, you know, prior to Robbie, was Darren Till. So we were in talks with Darren Till, trying to get the Darren Till fight done. And then he had a fight come up August 30th that he was already contracted to with misfits of boxing match. Obviously, he's fighting Luke Rockhold. You'll probably be there. And, you know, we couldn't get it done. So we chose Jeremy Stevens, who I think was the next viable candidate. I mean, he comes to fight. He's going to promote. This is going to be a great promotional effort by Jeremy Stevens and Mike Perry.

and I think a lot of people are going to get interested in this card. I have a spectacular co-main event, but I can't announce that it's only because the ink's not dry yet. I have to get that dry. I wanted to announce that today. I was actually supposed to get the phone call, which I could possibly get it during the show. Oh, my dear.

I didn't get it yet. Can you tell us one of the names involved? Maybe one guy's, no, no, okay. Weight class? It's one of two. So one's going to be the comate event. One's going to be the feature fight. it'll be one will be a

heavyweight matchup and one will be a 155 pound matchup. Okay. Do you think Darren will ever sign with you guys? Like, you know, I don't know if you saw when he was on our program a couple weeks ago, he was kind of disparagingly speaking of BKFCs saying it's where careers go

to die, where the old guys go. And for the record, I did push back and I say, what about MVP? Look how he's doing post BKFCs in the UFCs and big fights. All to say, it always seems like he kind of pooh-poo's the idea of fighting Perry in BKFSI. What do you think? What's the sense?

I mean, I offered him more money than he's ever made in his life. And I just, I don't know if he wants to take the gloves off or not. I don't know what it is. Obviously, the guy can fight. But, you know, I don't think, I don't know if this sport's going to be for him or not. I mean, we were in deep, deep talks. And, you know, it was actually about to get signed and it just never worked out. So I don't know.

I don't know. I mean, you know, this is different. As his opponent said, you know, he shit on the sport as well. you know, um, the sport just wasn't for him either because, you know, he, uh, he opted to quit and, you know, you don't opt to get knocked out in a fight, but you do opt to quit and he opted to quit and it just wasn't for him. You're referring to Luke Rockhold. Yeah, I was just about to ask you what you thought of his comments. I mean, look, you know, he had no problem signing the contract. He had no problem leading up to the fight. He talked great about the promotion the whole

entire time. He did get his teeth knocked out and, you know, I'm sure in the other combat sports, She has not got his teeth knocked out yet. So, you know, that was a little shocking to him. But to say that, you know, to say bad things about the sport in general or even the promotion in general when, again, we took very, very good care of him. Again, you know, he can fight. He's a legend. He's unbelievable. But had he got knocked out by Mike Perry, I would have had a different take on this.

But he didn't get knocked out. He chose to quit. And, you know, you don't choose to get knocked out. you get knocked out but you do just to quit and he chose to quit so what about Jeremy Stevens

here this is fascinating because he has that big win beginning of the year in Philly against Eddie Alvarez then somewhat shockingly announces that he's going back to the UFC to fight in Iowa

now he's back to you was this always the plan or no it wasn't the plan but at the end of the day he wanted to fight in his hometown he's from Iowa it was a great shot for him and you know a good opportunity

it wasn't the great the best opponent for him stylistically and you know he didn't win that fight but his his fighting style is the stand-up and bang and you know that's that's what he's going to have to do here against mike perry it's not an easy task against mike perry i mean he's he's a this is his sport you know he's made for bare knuckle and he showed that time and time again it's going to be a tough task for jeremy stevens but he said he's up for the task he you know he said he told me yesterday he said he throws all these wide shots and he's not going to get in on me i'm going to he told me he's

going to knock Perry out. When you, when you, like, heard, when you were told that he was leaving to go back to the UFC, were you upset or were you leaving the door open at the time saying, hey, you could come back when this is done? I wasn't upset. I mean, you know, if I was upset, then I would have had him tied up on a multi-fight contract. I wasn't upset. It was, we didn't know where he was going to go next with it.

And we had some other ideas for Perry, but here it is. And I think that if he does beat Mike Perry, he has. got a good shot of having a long-standing relationship with our with our organization and I think that's that's what he's trying to do you know we're paying him very very well we're treating him very well and he has an opportunity I think in combat sports to really you know have a great resurgence here on October 4th is this a one-fight deal it's a one-fight deal wow we're probably gonna add two more fights to that before this fight gets to happen okay because I

mean there's a bit of a risk right he goes in there and and maybe is the first got to beat Perry and BKFC and then goes off to somewhere else? Sure, we'll get. I mean, that's not going to happen because the money isn't somewhere else like it is here for him. Okay. And what about Mike? Because I do remember going back to last year when you were in studio, it did seem like you were a little bit upset that he went to, you know, do the Jake Paul fight. There was the stuff with Connor. There was the stuff at the press conference. How did you get him back into the family, so to speak? I mean, he's always been there. you know, at the end of the day, is I thought he heard momentum,

and that's what I voice. I thought he heard is momentum with the Jake fight. But, you know, he's a bare-knuckle fighter. He's back in the media a lot now. He's making a lot of noise with his podcast. He's doing a lot of different things to keep himself out there and promoting himself, and I think that it's going to be a great attendance here. I really think that we're going to sell at the Prudential Center,

and I think it's going to be a great step forward for BKFC, for Mike Perry, and for Jeremy Stevens. Having a show at a place like that in New Jersey, one of the first states to adopt the Unified Rules of MMA, I feel like this is like a really massive deal for you guys to be in an arena like this. This feels like another milestone. It certainly is a milestone. I mean, it's, you know, it's New York without being in New York right now. And it's also great to have this event in New Jersey.

The commission's been fantastic. Nick Lembo, Larry Hazard, they've both been great to work with for us. and they're very, very supportive. The Prudential Center, again, also very supportive of us, wants to really see us succeed. And, you know, I'm happy about, I'm really, really happy about being there. Again, it's close to home, and it's another event that I think that we are going to sell out and shock a lot of people.

In that press conference that we talked about, when Connor is up there and he's getting fired up and he's going to your, you know, arguably the face of the promotion in terms of fighting, Perry, like, dance for me, dance, and all that stuff. what is David Feldman thinking internally because it feels like they're like that close away from throwing hands to be honest I was like I was like man this is unbelievable Connor it's just unbelievable when he says something even Mike said to me caught me in the casino afterwards he's like you know this the first time I didn't know what to say say and also on top of that I was like you are they are going to throw him right here because there's no way

that Mike Perry is going to let him say that and not you know not throw down, but he kept himself poised, you know, he knew why he was there, and, you know, I appreciate that part of it. But great promotion there. Obviously, Conner's the best in the business at this, and he was on that he was totally on. I know that wasn't that long ago, but at that presser, you did announce the baddest man tournament, 25 million, all that stuff. You also have a baddest bitch tournament as well coming up in 26. Is there anything new since then? Anything more to add to the tournament? Not a lot yet.

We're going to be doing the open tryouts here pretty soon to get into the, from the 100, actually from this, we're going to get it down to 64 people and then the 32 people are going to be inside the tournament. It's going to start in California. The first show will be in March. We're working on multiple venues right now, and then it's going to end up in the Middle East. A couple different partners we're talking to you right now, and we'll have a commitment

pretty soon and I'll be able to announce that. But it's going to end up in the Middle East. It's going to take a year to run this whole tournament because of the spacing of it. But I think it's going to be fantastic. It's going to be an open weight class. It's going to be 185 pounds to 275 pounds. We'll kind of match the lighter guys first and the heavier guys first. And then, you know, when they get into the money rounds, it could be, you could see a Mike

Perry fight of Ben Rothwell. Jeez, Louise. And I guess if you're overseas, there's no commissions involved. So there won't be any issues having open-weight fights, right? Yeah, but I mean, we do bring the ABC over there. We do bring Mike Mazzoli over there to govern our events. They'd be okay with that. Yeah, no, he's okay with it.

California's okay with it. You know, a lot of other commissions that we already talk to are okay with it as well. I'm excited about it. I think it's going to be unbelievable. I mean, it's, you know, people just don't think it's going to happen. So when it happens, I think everybody's going to get very, very excited about it. Because, you know, I don't know if we're going to find the world's baddest man because some of the people may not get in it, but I think they're going to. And I think we're just going to be fantastic to Crown who will be the world's baddest man, right?

I mean, everybody would want to know who's the baddest man in the world. If he's walking on the street and you point at him and go, that's the baddest man in the world, like you really want to know who he is. And I think that that's what we're going to do here for the world's baddest man tournament, $25 million, $15 million grand prize to the winner. and then the rest of it gets sprinkled down through the rest of the contestants. We're excited about it. Are you having a hard time finding an opponent for Y'O. Romero? No, I mean, yeah, we did it first because, you know, he's, it's Y'O. Romero, right? I mean, he's a bad dude, but he's also 48 years old.

But he also showed in the last couple fights that he's fighting like a, you know, a 38-year-old, not a 48-year-old. So, you know, we matched him appropriately. I think that, I think, you know, we matched him favorably, but I do think this guy is going to come out, and I think it's going to be a great fight as long as it lasts. And so maybe I missed his the announcement. Okay, I see it here. It's Theo Dukas, right?

Theo Dukas, yeah. He's two-and-two as an MMA fighter. He's had some boxing experience, but, again, he's a little younger, and Yoles a little older, and, you know, it's going to be exciting. to see him take his gloves off and throw it down in there. Any bare-knuckle fight can be a very, very good fight. And we've seen that in the past, and I think we're going to see it again on September 12th. We'll see what you all has, and we'll see how we continue this relationship with him.

You also added Tiago Santos, Aspen Ladd, Derek Brunson, obviously very recognizable names. Any other names that you want to share with us? Actually, we have a former two-time boxing world champion is going to make his debut on this October 4th card. Tremal Herring, former 126-pound and 135-pound, 130-pound world champion out of Brooklyn, New York, and he's going to make his debut on this card as well. Okay. What about other signings? Anyone in the pipeline?

Yeah, we actually just signed for that day, and we just matched him today. He's going to fight on September 27th in Manchester, former two-time boxing world champion James DeGale. He'll take on Matt Floyd in our show in Manchester on September 27. And so we're very, very excited about that. Okay. Last week on the program, David, you may have seen we had Artem Lobov on the show, and he claims that he is still owed some money from his time at BKFC. Do you have a response to this?

Yeah, I mean, it's not the case at all. I mean, I will tell you a little bit about the specifics. The guy we did a little bit under 100,000 buys. And I know he claimed 200,000, but he claims we own 300,000, and he got a dollar a pay-per-view buy. So it just nothing adds up there. there, no one has ever said we didn't pay them, ever. So he's the only one that came out, and he came out six years later.

Obviously, he has a little animosity with Connor, and maybe it has something to do with that. But I've always treated Artem great, and, you know, I'll continue to treat him good. But at the end of the day, that's just not true. Okay, fair enough. I do continue, and I understand that this might be a tough question to answer, but I continue to hear things about Triller and their future and whatnot. Anything you could tell us about the future of the company and your parent, company and where you guys might be going yeah I mean we've um we're we're making some moves now we're we're having a new investment team come in um we're working on that for a while

trailer was good to us at you know at the time and then they just couldn't find their way to to keep a keep a float and keep making noise and and you know more importantly keep funding the company so we had to make some moves and um we will be going away from them um you know i think Triller rules will still be involved as long as they're in business, but they'll be a minority partner. And they were a majority partner. They will be a minority partner now. And it gave us opportunity to bring in a couple big name investors that are going to be coming in. And I'll break that on here too, but that'll be in about four weeks from now. But it's some bigger names. And I think it's going to really, really help us. We have a group of professional athletes that

are coming in, very well-known professional athletes that are coming in with this. I don't think I've ever been more excited about BKFC than I am now for 2026. I think it's going to be the real true breakout year. I think we're going to be seen by millions and millions of households all over the world. I think we're going to have some great stuff here in the United States. And I'm super excited about where this is going. I really, truly couldn't be any more excited. Okay. Because, yeah, when you hear that, and I know they had bought a significant stake in the company, and I hear that they're going to... Growing up, we're shopping investors, we're shopping TV.

with TV deals and then they send this auction out for 3 million Triller shares that are being auctioned and people are looking at us like wow they're doing an auction for their shares no it was just it was just something that had to be um it was a formality um it's an accredited lender that lent triller um money for shares and and they didn't make the payments so they took them back and and they have to do it but great people there too um in in that company that that helped them out and And they're being very, very good to us, and they're allowing us to do what we need to do. But I think that, you know, as you're climbing up this mountain, you're going to hit big rocks and you're going to slip a little and you're going to find your way. And we're fine in our way.

It's not the easiest thing that has ever been done. But if it was easy, you know, everybody would do it. People don't want to do this stuff that's hard and it's challenging. And this is the hardest challenging thing that I ever could have dreamt of. But today is it's unbelievably rewarding. We're building something special. We created a sport. I mean, we didn't start a new MMA promotion.

We didn't start a new boxing promotion. We created a sport, and we've had so many speed bumps and so many dead ends. And I think we finally found our way. And I think 2006 really opens us up wide, obviously, on the heels of the humongous, like, you know, history-making UFC deal for $7.7 billion over seven years. It changed a whole entire platform and television landscape for combat sports. And it's been a great two days for us as far as incoming phone costs. Okay. Interesting. Talking to people. Are you happy with DeZone? I'm happy with the zone. The zone is great. This fight will be on the zone.

The October 4th fight will be on the zone. They're great partners. And, you know, we're going to see if we can enhance that partnership. And if it doesn't work out that way, I mean, there's just so many options out there. and very interested options because, you know, hats off to Dana White, and I know a lot of people will talk bad about them, as you may too, and I'm only saying that because you don't like him, and that's okay. But what I'm saying, what he did here,

and to set the tone for a $7.7 billion deal, it's truly unbelievable, and it opened the door for a lot of different combat sports promotions, including ours. Yes, just to be clear, don't have any sort of, like, dislike for him, but, you know, don't obviously agree, and I think it's fair to criticize professionally and you know what I mean so I don't I got nothing again for you say I'm just he's the top dog and so the top dog is going to receive great praise and criticism as well he's peace he's paved the way I mean he truly has you know his journey was

wasn't as tough as ours meaning he had funding going um you know where he was going but I mean to do the things that he's done to turn this into really a true franchise like like similar to the NFL or the NBA or major league baseball, it's just incredible that he's in that kind of numbers. And it's mind-blowing. But hats off to him again because he really, truly just opened so many doors for combat sports promoters right now, especially ones that are, you know, in the upper echelon of it right now. And we're excited about the future. Last one. How many states are we in as of right now and any on the horizon? Forty-two states. We just opened up Arizona. We just opened up Tennessee. We're working on, we're still working on Nevada and New York. And I think

we're going to have some, some good news there. But we have some, a lot of good stuff coming up in California. So I'm not, I'm not like, it's not detrimental if I don't get Nevada right now. But they're a great state. But, you know, I have California, I have Arizona. I have, I have states over there that, that, you know, in the whole scheme of things are the, um, are power players for us. We had a great event in Texas. We're going back to Texas. We have Pennsylvania. We have Jersey now. We have all the states in the northeast. So there's not really any state that we really need to be in right now that we're not in, including countries. I was just writing this down. We are doing Montenegro, which I'm not sure if you know where that is, but that's right

next year. We're doing that August 30th. Then we have Manchester. September 12th, September 27th, October 4th, right? Am I right about this? September, I'm talking about the different country, September 27th in the UK. October 25th in Rome, Italy, November 20th and 21st in Dubai. And then we're going to open up a lot of new territories

in 2006. We're going, oh, I think we just, I know that you and a lot of the fans have heard that Australia pooled up pull a permit from us and we were able

to get that fixed in another part of Australia, and we're going to announce that next week. We're going to be in Australia on November 29th. Okay. Well, a lot of exciting things, as always. We always appreciate you coming on and breaking this news for us. The big one, October 4th, Mike Perry, Jeremy Stevens. King of Violence Belt, looking forward to that at the Rock, at the Prudential.

On that show, I just want to add to this. On that show, we also, this is called, you know, the King of Violence, but we're actually calling it violence, because we also have the Queen of Violence Championship. is going to be on that card. And that's Jessica Borgre taken on Christine Faria at 135 or so pound championship. So that's going to be another exciting matchup for it.

But I can't wait to announce the co-main event. I think you're going to really like it. And I think the fans are going to love it. And I'm excited about it. I'm really just excited about another challenge, right? The Prudential Center is not an easy task. It's a challenge. And us at BKFC, we like challenges

and we have another challenge ahead of us and we are going to sell out to the Prudential Center on October 4th, and it's going to be a great birthday present for myself. Thank you, David. Good luck to you guys. Appreciate it. Thank you.

Bye-bye. There he is. David Feldman, founder of BKFC. So that's October 4th. October 3rd, we found out earlier today, over in Dubai, we are finally getting the rematch that we've all wanted. We've wanted it since January.

We were worried for a minute that they were going to go in a different direction. We were wondering why they were delaying. There was all kind of posturing and weird comments being thrown out, but they got this one right. And it's even better this time because it's for the inaugural PFL lightweight title. It's Usmender Magamatov versus Paul Hughes number two and the pride of dairy, Mr. Paul Hughes. Big News himself on to talk about said big news. He joins us now on the program.

Hello, Paul. How are you, my friend? Doing good, brother. How are you? I love that. I love the Celtic stuff behind you. What a great time that was. what a great year it has been for you

and thank God they made the right call now were you were you playing with us with the rage bait tweeting all that were you were you working us as they say in the wrestling business I genuinely wasn't when I seen that that was the first I had heard of it and it got me

like it definitely was it rage baited me it definitely did when you said that when you tweeted that to the official account when they were talking about the lightweight finals being you know or this lightweight fight right here saying, hey, look, the winner is going to fight for the belt and all that stuff.

And when I saw you say that, because you're usually like a mild-mannered kind of company guy, you're a good guy, you're very proud to be a PFL guy, you have flown the flag very, very well. I was like, wait a second. Is he, he's either messing with us or something has gone awry here? No, I genuinely was not messing. I don't know how that happened. I think it was something that was maybe proposed, like, way back earlier in the year that

was a supposed plan but obviously you know things happened knockouts happened people the fans wanted the rematch and I think all credit to the PFL they really did listen to the fans

in this one and they made the rematch they made the fight that everybody wants to see and huge credit to them for doing that do you think that if people weren't vocal if people weren't talking about it they would have gone in a different direction potentially

I mean I think it's definitely a good sign that they have seen like the hype for this fight and they have truly seen what the fans want to happen and they've made that happen so I think that's a huge positive were you ever worried a couple times I was worried a couple times when when when I think to be on to be completely honest to cut to the chase like Usman was just refusing to fight me and that is just the reality like I could

give the whole stories and and this and that but the reality is he was just straight refusing to fight me and they probably just had to look for other options but then I think push come to shove and they were like no this is happening and here we are the fight's done

and so do you have any idea why he was refusing to fight you um I mean probably because he doesn't want to get absolutely battered to be honest and no to be truthful I think there was clips of him that went

went up after the night that we fought and it was like oh Paul needs to win two, three, four more fights until we fight again. So I think that he kind of gave away his mindset there and then it kind of got to the points where I was like I had heard that they wanted to do this rematch and then I was like, what's going on here? I just need to go to the source and find out what's happening

and I literally just texted myself on Instagram and I was like basically this rematch needs to happen now like what this was just after I had chaoed Bruno and he ripped back saying you need to win one more fight brother that guy i didn't know that guy you need to win one more fight so he basically just told me that what was going down in and that's what it was and it took so long i think to actually get it done then i think he was still just straight refusing to fight me wow but ultimately he is not bigger than the company and as i say credit to the pfl for getting this fight done and i will deliver absolutely once again and i

plan to get that belt and keep that belt for a long time. Do you know how they ultimately got him to agree to it? Do you have any idea? I have no idea. Probably a bundle of cash. I would ask to it. Yeah. Everyone's got a price. And so when he DM'd you back there, like did you guys go back and forth? Like when he says to you, you got to win another one. Do you say to him anything? I think I just said no. I think I said the rematch has to happen now. You know that it's best for business. And then he didn't get back. But at the end of the day, what's best for business for him is not to fight me because he's going to get smashed and

then whatever his plans are whether he was, I don't know what his plans were, maybe a lot of people were saying he was planning to go off to the UFC now that Islam has moved up weight class but I'm going to completely ruin that entire plan and I'm going to be the champion and I'll be calling

the shots around here after that. Do you genuinely believe that he is worried about fighting you that he knows that he's going to lose if he fights you and that's why he was dragging his feet? I genuinely do because, you know, obviously now we're saying to fight again. There's going to be a whole buildup. It'll be a case of, oh, the excuses will come out.

Oh, Habib wasn't there, or I didn't get a proper training camp, or I was sick, or this or that. I underestimated him. But all these narratives can go out there and he can tell himself that all that he wants and push that out there. But ultimately, I was in that cage with him. And I know that I had broke him. I know that he was basically on death's door towards the end of that fight and had that head clash not happened towards at the very end of the fourth round where he got a full three-minute recovery,

there is absolutely no chance that he was going to do another full six minutes with me and me not finish him and get him out of there because he was a broken man. And you just watch that fight again. You watch that head clash in round number four. You watch the momentum change in the two to three minutes before that. it was night and day that he was done in there I had broken him

and there was no chance that he was going to survive whenever my coaches just said to me empty the tank which they can do and I will do that and if I have to do that again

I will so yeah I do believe that I don't know if you saw and by the way I just want to mention you did tweet this just for the record earlier today we just showed the tweet but I want to read it to the audience

this is your tweet when the news came out he tried everything to stop this rematch from happening now his days are numbered see you in Dubai. So the build is great. You even had the duck that one time when they showed you on

the program, your version of the Tom Aspinall duck. Tremendous stuff. By the way, who's the brains behind this? Who came up with this one? That was me. That was all me. That was all you. That was all me. Now, obviously, completely stole it from Tom Aspinall and coincidentally was training

with him a couple weeks before that. So I did text him to say, I'm sorry, bro, but I'm also not sorry at all. and he was like, nah, fair. You got, that was a good one. Yeah, okay, all right, fair enough. So he gave me, he gave me the all okay, like, so the heavyweight champ set is okay, so fair enough. Okay, and by the way, great to see you training with him.

I saw, I think it was, yeah, right over here, you, Craig Jones, Tom Aspa, what a crew that is. What a room that is? Bro, it was so funny. It was, I was not expecting that on a random Wednesday morning. So Craig was doing seminars and he was coming to Ireland. and he was going to come up to Belfast to train. We have the same management, so I kind of know him through Tim and Dan. So he texted me saying, bro, I'm going to come up to Belfast,

but I was going out of the country. I can't forget. I think I was going to New York. So I was out of the country, and I was like, tell me where we're going to be at the next few days, and I'll come into town. So he was in Manchester. So I flew to Manchester, rocked up.

It wasn't even in Manchester. It was outside of it in a little small town, like 45 minutes outside of it. And I didn't know what I was getting myself in for. walked into the gym and there's Tom Aspen all training as well so I was like all right lads how's it going will you do more of that oh yeah absolutely I picked up so many good details from Craig just in that one

training day it was oh it was phenomenal really really good nuance details that are going to be a huge help and have already been a huge help to my training any chance you have him in your corner he's had some success against the the Dagestanis the Chabib team. We'll see. There's been talks of it. Maybe he will be in the corner this time. Wow. Wow. Okay.

Very, very, very, very interesting stuff. This morning, this morning, once this news came out, I do believe the manager for one, Uspan Nirmagamatov, tweeted at you. Ali Abdelaziz, did you happen to see his tweet? Oh, I did not see this. Here it is. This is him writing to you. It's embarrassing that you've built your name off losing

to other men. I didn't even think you deserved a rematch, but Uspen made the call. He told me, you're the only one he wants to smash because you can't stop running your mouth. Now that he's beaten you, nobody's ever going to mention your name again. You brought this on yourself. Well, I mean, at least

he's doing some promotion. Like, obviously, that's kind of what Ali does. He just talks shit. But at least he's doing some promotion. I'd done all the promotion for the last fight, so at least there's something on there. But, yeah, like, that's all a load of bollocks. Like, I don't give a flam fuck what Ali Apollaziz says.

Not a single fuck, like. By the way, credit to him. usually he sends those messages hiding behind his fighters accounts like he'll do it under their name at least he's actually sending it from his own account then maybe he meant to do it under Usman's name but at least this time he's going straight from his own yeah tell you what wouldn't be the fucking first time or out would it yeah exactly exactly wouldn't be the fucking first time so there you go so that's the response right there does it irk you when a manager writes to you like that um um if because i know he's doing this on behalf of his ass

to help his athlete promote. I understand the business aspect of it, and it does help his guy, so I get it. If it was another manager, I would kind of be pissed. I mean, ultimately no manager or coach really should be talking shit about Fighter, in my opinion.

It kind of pisses me off, so, but I kind of get his thing. I don't, I just don't give a fuck. I really don't give a fuck what he says at all. I don't know if you saw this, but someone who's been sort of like anointed as a PFL spokesperson. Jonathan Coachman, formerly of

WW. He's a broadcaster. He did a press conference where he was like, hey, maybe we don't do the rematch. Maybe we have them fight on the same night against other people, and if they win, they fight each other. Did you see him saying this, and did you have a reaction when you saw that? And was that ever actually in play? Was that a possibility?

Yeah, I seen the clip, I think, was after one of the shows recently. Yeah, August 1st. I actually had no idea what he was talking about. And I still don't, not even I don't even mean that in a disrespectful way. I just, I don't, maybe he was trying to get,

I have no, I genuinely just don't know what he was on. My understanding was the fight was kind of already done at that point. This is like 12 days ago. Oh, it was only 12 days ago, yeah. No, it probably wasn't signed at that point, but I think it was agreed. But then again, as I said, like, it only got signed recently,

because Usman was Delaan at this time. Like, I'm not just, I'm genuinely not just making that up. Like, that's, that is the storyline of this fight. I mean, Ali's tweet, whatever it said, like, Usman says that you're the only guy wants to fight. Like, I know that that's fucking bollocks. Like, I know that that is a lie. So that's why I don't care what he says.

Fair enough. Could I ask, going back to Dubai, the scene of the last fight, do you have any issues with that? No, I have no issues with that because he's not getting, it's not going to be a decision this. Okay, so there's no worry about any sort of judging or anything like that? No. Okay.

We did have Artem Lobov on the show last week. He talked about being invited by you to do some training. Is that going to continue leading up to this? He's also on the card. Yeah, he's on the card and it would be great to have him up here. I mean, we've had John Mitchell join us there, who's another Eversy fighter, that is fighting on the same card. He actually lives in Dubai, but he's moving to do his camps here in Bel. So we've got a hell of a team.

We've built an unbelievable team here in Belfast. Honestly, we're really, really doing something special here. We're in that phase where nobody really knows yet. But I think in the next couple of years, I think we'll have that blow up like SBG did back in the day in Dublin. That is certainly already happening here in Belfast.

And we've just got a phenomenal team. And it's open door. You know, I would obviously be amazing to train with Artum. I think he's the man like I really really respect him and anybody else that wants to come train we're open doors like we're working hard we want to be the best

we're performing at the highest level now and yeah welcome it you know what I really love about this obviously they got a right with the rematch but I love the fact that the PFL lightweight title is on the line I like that the light heavyweight titles in the Comain I like that Costello

is the middleweight champion I like that they're doing a welterweight title fight finally we're getting some sort of clarity as to who are the chance and then the tournament winners can fight the champs. To the best you're understanding, this is a minor detail, but just curious, is Usman the champ or is the champ or is the champ vacant and you guys are fighting for the vacant title? I genuinely don't know.

Okay. I mean, ultimately you win, you win the belt, no big deal, but I was just curious if he becomes the champ or if the belt is just kind of for grabs. I'm not too sure about that, but I mean, certainly it would be great if the belt or belt was on the line as well. I would definitely, coming home between belts would be a lot. me belts will be a lot nicer than coming number one for sure um so ultimately what is the uh what is

the prediction what are you feeling how does this play out i definitely could i could see myself clipping him early i really could i mean you seen my last fight my first punch that i threw knocked them almost knocked them clean out and i finished them right after that i didn't get hit once i can do that i certainly certainly can that's always a possibility for me me, but I would love to break him in there. I would love to just do exactly what I said, do what I was going to do, like just bring him to that same place again, break him and finish them to where there's absolutely no questions asked. Love it. Can't wait. Love the way you're selling this, promoting it. I know it's all very genuine and from the heart and very, very

excited to see how it all plays out. There it is October 3rd. Friday, October 3rd. What a great weekend that is for MMA because the UFC has a pay-per-view on October 4th, so you're not going head-to-head with that. The BKFC show is on October 4th, too. So a massive weekend for combat sports. The, I mean, the rematch we all wanted, the fight we all wanted. And as of right now, August 13th, still a front-runner, in my opinion, for fight of the year, for 2025, fight of the year. And that first fight happened all the way back in January. So looking forward to seeing how you guys can top this. Thank you, Paul. I know it's laid out there. I appreciate it very much. Good luck to you in training. Can't wait to see you in action on the

3rd of October. Appreciate it, Ariel, always a pleasure and an honor to be here. And please say hello to Claire for us as well. And here, here, not just Claire, John Madat as well. So, Ariel, he discovered YouTube and the TV about three or four months ago. And honestly, all he does is watch your show. Yeah. I love it, but it kind of annoys me.

Why? I'm like, home. He's like, did you see this guy at Ariel's show this week? And I'm like, no, I didn't watch the 40-minute interview. of a guy I don't know like you want to hear by this and that but it's so shout out to John as well

hey sure and John gents thank you so much for the support we appreciate you very much and you're welcome to come on the show the next time Paul is here and thank you for watching when he's not watching thank you for keeping him up to speed we appreciate you guys thank you thank you Paul up the Hugheses

yeah what a great time for the family and what a big fight that is going to be looking forward to it very much, PFL figuring it out, getting the titles on the line, making things happen. Now, I do have to say, this has been a massive day, carrying across in studio, breaking all kinds of news, Shane and Bazler, first interviews since the UWWA. Paul Hughes on the program, first interview live on the program since the news comes out. And oh, by the way, David Feldman with the breaking news. David Feldman had some things to say about one, Darren Till.

I got a message. I looked down on my DMs. Darren Till sent me a DM. everyone stopped chatting shit sort of along those lines perhaps that's the sentiment sent me a DM and said get me on the show what time are you on Till

now I don't think he was talking about himself he was like until like not Till as in like hey Till you get the point Darren Till is going to join us in about three to four minutes is there any is there any program like this is there any program on the planet

in the world of combat sports fuck combat sports on the planet live indirect where you can jump around and go from one sport to an we went from we went from pro wrestling to pro wrestling to bare knuckle to mMA now we're going to boxing there until the boxer slash mama fighter we're all over the gaff here and i freaking love it i mean you got frank asking questions about war hammers and stuff where can you get this you can't get this anywhere I'm fired up

what did Feldman say someone someone rejog my memory what do you fit is there is there a clip let me see if I could find a clip here he had a lot to say he said some things about Artem Lobov he said some things about he said that he made

an offer for the biggest money he's ever made in his life that was yeah that was the thing yeah and he was the number one choice right He said he was the number one choice. He said he wanted him on the October 4th card against Mike Perry. And he said he offered him more money than anyone else before. And he isn't quite sure if he wants to do this, right?

Is that a fair thing? Is that a fair assessment? You don't have to have the clip, do we? Try to see if someone clipped it off. Where are you at, Jedi? You clip everything else off. Where's my clip? Anyway, we're going to be joined by him.

Is he here yet? Not yet, right? Frank how has life changed since you got to ask Shane of that question I have been given a crown Were you nervous a little bit? I felt like you were a little nervous out of the gate I mean it's they can't see me you know it feels impersonal I felt like you warmed up over time yeah yeah I got Were you nervous? No not really was it a good answer

I think it was a great answer I think that we could have had a whole show just about that Were you surprised that she had a tattoo? No. No, I feel like she knows what she's talking about. Do you have a tattoo? I have several tattoos. No, like about this stuff. No, I don't.

The kitty stuff. No. The kitties, oh, wow. Is it Dungeons of Dragons? Is that what it is? No. Oh. I mean, she spoke about exactly what it is, and I guess you weren't listening. Well, I know what it is, but like, is that really what it is?

You know what I mean? No, no, sometimes people are going to tell you it's something, but like, if you know, you know, IYK I'm picking up with you're laying down Yeah Will you check out

Her Twitch stream Yeah absolutely Yeah If it is as she's described it It's really cool And I can't wait She's saying it's like She has a Twitch stream

But she's actually sitting there Painting a model And like just having You know Answering questions It's fascinating Yeah like I would actually Go and paint myself

When you say she's painting a model Do you mean like an actual physical person No Is it like that stuff like where there's like miniature models that you paint with small paint brushes Okay

It's fun stuff I could tell you're really into this No I mean I'm listen Far be it for me to Poo Poo what someone is into I mean I like all kinds of weird things Yeah name one weird thing To be honest I don't really actually like a lot of weird things

I mean I guess some people might say pro wrestling is weird Well no not in this case We were talking to a pro wrestlers Not on this program no Yeah What do I like that? That's weird. Sports.

An Adam Sandler movie. Adam Sandler. I thought Frank would say like Megan Kelly's podcast. You would say that's weird. Yeah, I've already said this. I'm just, you know, so Meg Kelly's, Glenn Beck, that's another one. No, not much of a Beck guy. Not much of a bet guy.

I'm being honest. Newt Gingrich? Not so much of Gingrich. I was flipping through the channels and I saw him on the TV. Does he have a pod? No, I don't know what he was doing. But I looked up how old he was, man. He's still kicking, 82.

Legend, legend of the game. Yeah, I guess. I don't really even know. I don't even know what he would be a legend for. Just kind of like a lifelong politician, right? Your guess is as good as mine, man. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Frank, tell us about the history of Newt.

You can't really go wrong. I'm surprised Frank hasn't chimed in here. Well, let me tell you, back in 1967, Newt Gingrich was part of the GOP. He spoke at the convention over in Oklahoma. Oklahoma City. It was quite the scene as everyone came together under the banner of the elephant. Is it the elephant? I don't even know. Frank's the elephant. Yeah. The good old elephant. We have the clip about Feldman talking of one Darren Till. Oh, we have it. Okay. Well, that's amazing. Let's wait on that and let us, breaking news, Frank.

well we were kind of rounding third here the plan to be honest was to answer a few more questions I hope you are all okay with this we were going to say goodbye to Paul Hughes answer some questions and call it a day past the baton over to the boys in the back then all of a sudden I look down at my DMs and I see a DM from my old friend Darren Till saying hey get me on the program I want to respond I want to defend myself moments ago we had one David Feldman on the show this is what he had to say about Darren Till do you think Darren will ever

sign with you guys like you know I don't know if you saw when he was on our program a couple weeks ago he was kind of disparagingly speaking of BKFCs saying it's where careers go to die where the old guys go and for the record I did push back and I say what about MVP? Look how he's doing post BKFCs in the UFCs and big fights all to say it always seems like he kind of pooh-poo's the idea

of fighting Perry in BKFC. What do you think? What's the sense? I mean, I offered him more money than he's ever made in his life. And I just, I don't know if he wants to take the gloves off or not. I don't know what it is. Obviously, the guy can fight. But, you know, I don't think, I don't know if this sport's going to be for him or not. I mean, we were in deep, deep talks. And, you know, it was actually about to get signed and it just never worked out. So. And so without further ado, let us bring on Mr. Darren Till to respond to these comments from David Feldman. He reached out, And there he is.

Hello, Darren. How are you? Thank you for reaching out. And here we are live. Appreciate it. Are you upset? Are you pissed off? No, no, of course, no.

What's your, by the way, can I just say, you look fantastic. You look spelt. The face looks thin as hell. I know you're getting ready, August 30th, the zone. Ooh, what happened? What happened? I lost a two thin sparring today. Is it true that you can lose those veneers?

I thought they were good for life. I've had them since 2019, so I've only lost one. up to now, so I'm doing well. Who hit you? Liam Smith? Who was it? No, Liam's too small. I've had two Sparta partners brought in for this camp, just to obviously imitate Luke, so

two good professionals. They've both got over 15 pro fights, so yeah, we've been getting good working with them. Okay, so where are you when you see this comment? How did this come across your radar? Because it just happened, like, 25 minutes ago? I don't have a... I don't go on Twitter much, do I. I only go on to

to all people and then I've seen David like said something but I know you were saying you said so I did I think I must have said like a negative comment on it but I haven't got nothing bad to say about Beirnuchel I wanted to work with Beirnichle and David did he did offer a lot of money but that was

on my end of the negotiations with me and my team that wasn't exactly how I thought like it played out so that's why I was like so to message you then please so give us your side of the story I know you usually chase me for the interviews area but yeah look how the tables have turned no do you know what I have actually got not

negative I haven't got nothing massively negative to say like David's David's tried to David's pursued me for years and obviously the time's never been right and I have never like maybe I probably have bad my BKFC in terms of saying oh sometimes when you're a bit older but no it's it's a great promotion and David's doing it you know correctly and there's no bad blood between me and David

of course not, but what happened was, like, so, like, from, from, from my point of view of the way things have gone with me and obviously, I don't know exactly what goes into talk to, and obviously, you're speaking to my team and stuff like that, obviously, you just get told sometimes brief stuff, you know, if you're in the gym and that, you don't really

care, you just want to fight, especially someone like me. I was on holiday after my last fight with Darren, and basically, obviously, the Nate Diaz fight in my, what I assume, got made with misfits, so I was going to be fighting Nate on his terms and stuff like that, he picked the weight. He picked like the date and stuff like that because obviously he will.

He's the A side and he's the bigger, you know, he's the bigger name in fighting if you will. And then obviously that fight fell through like a few days when I got back, so I was like, okay, so then obviously when like we were trying to negotiate and stuff like that, I knew misfits were totally up for like doing a co-promotion with BKFC

and I know they were all four of us well. So there was no like cross wires there and then obviously it was going to be the Perry fight and also Perry's organisation had offered me $350,000 to fight Perry on his organisation which, you know, I'm sort of like well you're offering me that but for you to come over to misfits they were offering you a lot more and you said no

so I was a bit like whatever about that so I don't want to go into that but then from what I can recollect them remember I just I think negotiations just fell through with David and my team I don't think they could come to like an agreement on and don't get me wrong the money what he offered was fantastic but I just don't know whether they could get the date

or whether the offer was as legit as he said and I'm not trying to say David's like he's talking shit because he has pursued me for like two years and I know he's real about having me on BKFC because obviously that peri fight would be massive and I'd love to do it on BKFC it's not like do you know what I mean but that's that's it from my

My sad, I'm not going to come on here talking negative, because I haven't got a lot of negative things to say, but it wasn't like he offered me this massive amount of money, and I said no, because the money he offered was amazing. It was immense. It was a fucking seven-figure deal and a half, but negotiations somewhere along the land broke down. What happened?

What was the stumbling? Okay, is it true that it's the most you've ever been offered? He said that. It's not the most I've ever been offered, but it was a hell of a lot of money. Okay. I mean, David, David, David doesn't know. me personally and David doesn't know what I've earned

over the course of my 20 I've been fighting 20 years now you know I've earned a lot of money I mean I've spent it all but I've earned a lot but I've earned a lot but yeah so where did it break down that's what I'm saying I'm on here

to not like trying I'm not like usually I will you know I'll always go in on people and I'll say the sooner but there's not a negative I can say only that I know from my side I did say yes but then somewhere along the line negotiating broke down

or don't know whether that was because a date, place, location whether Perry would Perry

have been ready for that date and location because I know he would like had other so I don't really know like

how and why or what so that's what I'm not saying like there's massive negative stuff to say but I just know

from my side I when he offered what he offered when he offered what he offered sorry who is that is that your manager

no it's me missus okay I wasn't sure I wasn't sure I wasn't sure she wanted to chime in too oh she'll charm if you give her a chance

we won't go down that road you'll say a lot fair enough no basically there was nothing like there was nothing massive in terms of like oh this dad

you know me here I think you've known me long enough now to say I'm not a dishonest guy I say the truth don't I so I'm not going to say like it was negotiating broke down because of him

or because of me but I did say yes when he did give me that offer so you know I still had one fight left on my contract with Miss Fitz which I'm fighting with Luke now on that and obviously I know Miss Fitz

are going to want to renegotiate me. They've just brought like these rankings out today and apparently I'm like number one. I don't I don't pay too much man to, you know what I mean? Like the only thorn I have in myself about being number one is, you know, obviously I want to be a UFC champion at one point and stuff like that. So yeah, that's it

area. There's not a massive like lot. I just wanted to sort of come on and I've seen it. I thought I'll text area. You'll definitely have me on because you know I pull the biggest numbers. Ah, okay. You were good up until that last shot. You didn't have to go there. That wasn't very nice. Do I not put the biggest numbers then, no. I mean, you know, Danis does a good job. Fair play

to him. Yeah, Danis does a fucking tremendous job. What do you make of that fight, by the way? Who's this Warren Spencer guy? I don't know. Listen, you know, I like to break things down in a realistic aspect. I don't like to break things down because

if someone hates Dylan Danes, they're going to say, oh, he's shit. Like, MMA wise, I don't think he's up to the level that he probably thinks he's, but, I mean, mean, we can't discredit is jujia to level, you know, as credentials, he's a

black belt under Marcelo Garcia. I don't know whether they've cut ties or what I heard something, but that's obviously none of my business. The fact of the matter is, he's a black belt under Marcelo Garcia and he's a legitimate, legitimate jujitsu player. So I do think it's going to be a good win for Danes,

do you know what I mean? Last time we had you on, you abruptly left the face-to-face. We were rolling, we were vibing, we had such great stuff going down with you and Luke, why did you leave so abruptly? I just can't with Luke. Like, I don't hate him, but I just can't. I just, Luke's vibe's just not my vibe.

Like, I can get on Dylan's vibe more than, or Colby's vibe more than Luke's. Like, I just can't with someone like Luke, like he sat there just in this dreamer of his and I'm sat there giving him all these props and credits to like, you know, when I was a young boy watching him in Strike Force, he was a phenomenal champion in there,

and he was a UFC champion, and I think he's a great fighter, but I just can't when someone sat there, like, talking utter shit about like he's trying to say like if he's trying to discredit my striking in a sense and it's just like okay if we look back

like apart from Mazvedal knocking me clean out when have I ever struggled with anyone in the UFC when it comes to striking Drichas look back on that fight on the feet Wittaker look back on that fight like he was jumping for take downs in the fifth arm

Gasland Stephen Thompson Cowboy Soroni all the people before him do you know what I mean like Woodley didn't knock me out knock me out Woodley countered me in our world title fight and he submitted me but it's like you know I've never I've never struggled with

Stikers ever so for him to sit there and just say something's saying just like I can't with you you just your ego's too big your pride you just you're just a knuckle and I can't look at you with that blonde there so I just was like I need to leave you think he's smug do you think that he genuinely thinks he's better than I think look I don't hate him like as I said

don't hate him like it's not there's not I just me and Luke couldn't get on his, like me and Luke. I could get along with Dylan Dennis. I could get along with Colby. I could get along with a lot of people. I probably couldn't get along with Luke. I just don't like Luke's outlook on life.

I don't think Luke looks down on people. He walks in hard. I think his ego is big and stuff like that. And that's just not my type of person, Ariel. I'm just not that guy. You know what I mean? I just don't think I could get along with someone like Luke. Does that make you feel a different way going?

Like, in other words, has it been a while since you felt this way about someone that you were fighting? I don't recall recently you having this type of feelings, this type of animosity towards your opponent. No, I haven't got animosity at all. I feel like I'm being more sensible on this. This is usually.

I'm just like usually spouting a lot of shit. It's not like animosity. I'll be honest with you. My coach text me before and he was like so proud of how you've trained in this camp. You're so fit. You're so strong. You're done 10 rounds this morning. You were on the track.

You've been hitting all the best times since you started two years ago with us. So like I am fit strong. I'm proper ready for this fight is just like yeah there's probably a little extra room for me area because you know I just

I'm not gonna sit here but I don't like Loof like I don't know him personally to not like I'm just I just get the vibe from him the way he is the way he talks he just talks to me

he just talks a whole load of shit and he's just like he's just not my type of guy but that's just I hate him like I wish him all the best and health and happiness outside outside in life like his life

never going to affect my life do you know what I'm not gonna I don't walk I've got too much things going on life in the gym and in business to worry about Luf, but I, you know what I mean? Like, just inside the thing is just, I just want to fucking hurt him yet, but I don't hate him. Like, he's just not my type of guy. He's not my, he's not my type of people. Like,

he's one of them people. I wouldn't invite him for a drink. I wouldn't invite him for a drink. Would you invite me? Would you have a drink with me? Hell yeah. I would just be, I would just be worried about making the plans because I would be worried you'd leak my phone number. I think you have to be more worried about other stuff than you're going to put something in my drink you're going to put something in my drink no but things get messy don't you know I'm banned

from the Canary Islands you know oh that's true I forgot about that visit and stuff like you know things get messy but I'm not saying in a bad like we'd have a good time but things get messy we would but I just don't think Luke would be up for that

for me what I see because I feel and I don't want to say this lightly I feel like Luke's one of them guys he'd like he'd see someone below like in a different manner to someone above him, whereas, like, I was in the gym the day, and one of the young

lads, you know, he hasn't had many fights and stuff like that, and he gave me, he was telling me a little bit something about a boxing thing, and I was just, like, oh, that's really good advice that made. I just don't think Luke's that type of guy. I feel like he thinks some certain people are beneath him, and I felt like that when I

was with him, I felt like I was beneath him. And could I ask, you know, since you're talking about that past, so to speak, is that the problem with the Perry fight? Just to be blunt, we all remember what happen at 244. Is travel an issue? Is getting to the states an issue? No, not in a sense that I can't travel.

I still do need to do my visa, but no, that that's not the problem. Like, I have everything set in a place there to do that. That's not a problem. Like, I can get in the states, you know what I mean? Like, last time Trump helped me, didn't he? Yes. Dana and Trump, but obviously I'm not with the UFC normal, but yeah, no,

that's not a problem. That would probably when I was scheduled to fight Travis junior on the MVP show I had to start the process from when the fight got box so it would have took like eight weeks but it would have got done you know what I mean

so that's not the problem okay okay by your mate Hamza was helped out by Trump this time around close Trump's the man isn't that crazy how do you feel how do you feel

that's your guy going up against your former foe DDP there's nobody better to comment on that fight than me yes please tell us what do you think What, you want me to break it down a little bit? Tell me, tell me, yes, yes, yes.

Everyone keeps asking me. Do you know what, mate? Honestly, I'd say him it comes up for the best part of like a year and a half. And like we had, mate, when we used to train together, like, he's already known as an overtrainer. At that time, I was sort of coming to the end of like my UFC career. So I probably wasn't as given as much entertaining. Like now I'm super fit and stuff like that and, you know, fully on my game.

But he's a phenomenal athlete that comes out. He has to be veined in a little bit. And as we all know, is grappling. is grappling you know, chef's kiss breaking it down, mate I just see it like everyone else sees it a little bit

but I see it in a different light like, like Dreechus for me yet that that awkwardness is what gets into win fight but that's not only the only factor with Dreecus I feel like Dreechus is a little bit

like Paddy I feel like sometimes people have tried to like undermine Paddy's because like I was striking might not be as crisp and it's the same with Drix but this is this is the art of MMA so we're putting all the arts together

So Paddy puts us, Paddy and Zichas, I feel like they're a bit of the same fact. They put the strikes together to get the take down and obviously Paddy's grappling is really good and Zika's got good ground as well. So I just feel like that works for the type of fight they are where there's Kamzat. If we were to break him down,

he's a pure, he's a pure grappler and to be honest, he does have power on the feet. So I think if he's been, I think for Kamzat with a win on the feet and to get it to the floor because I feel like in the first three rounds Zikis is going to be really powerful. So if the sub doesn't come,

Camzat's got to lay off the pedal a little bit and start being smashed. like on the feet and stuff like that like trying to like sort of you know like what's the word stork him so like because he's got a lot of power cams at you know what I mean I felt Zika's power on the feet

because for me doesn't really have power but he's a phoenom and he's a specimen he's so strong so I just I just see first round's cams at but I feel like the way Armand Syracian is talking the day that they've stopped cams after him over 10 I feel like he's definitely going to be good to go full pedal

for the full five round so I'm so I'm sort of, I'm just like 70, 30 at the moment, I just think, I just don't see away where it comes, that doesn't beat him, but obviously I'm not going to overlook, Drikas, Drikas is this guy who, he knows how to win, he finds ways to win, he's got great, and

you can tell he, he's definitely, you know, he changed really hard, and he's obviously got a great team that's strategically, and that's what I mean, it's like, people can, I give him shit, I've said, like, he's, he's the way, he's the best shit as fighter ever, but his team are very strategic,

I can even you see when I was comparing them, him and Paddy. Paddy's got a great team behind them in terms of strategies. So it's not only about when you're coming in or when you say like, oh, Paddy's just got grappling and Zika's just got, like, strength. They've got a team behind them and a strategizing for them opponents. And that's ultimately sometimes what makes the difference in these fights. So Dziekis has got a hell of a chance,

but you know me, I'm team cams, as I've trained him. And I don't see past three rounds of cams. As I do, I reckon he can knock him out. on the feet as well. I really do. He's got a solid left hand. I've been on the receiving end a few times. But it's grappling and the people he's training him,

and he's got Armand. I trained with Armand in Thailand. And Armand, for me, I'm a fan of Armand. He's a phenomenal athlete himself. So I'm third round comes at me. Okay, fair enough. By the way, can I ask you, you said one fight left with Misfits?

You think you'll resign? Are you happy with them? I think they're going to offer me too much money to not resign. They love me. Who would be the next one after Rockhold? like who's who makes the most sense I think if we could come to an agreement

with misfits and BKFC to do a coprocom like me and Perry like one boxing one bernacle oh wow and that's just dusted and then next year obviously you know the big one's Jake and it you know I'm not going to be sat here calling out every time but that's a big one to get in this

space that we're in Jake but obviously if that doesn't come about there is there's names I was on the face time to Masvedal about four weeks ago so I was asking him for the fight oh wow boxing yeah yeah yeah he showed me though he's got a bit of a be of Ellie at the moment so I don't think he's ready okay all right well August 30th the zone paper view by the way can ask your missus what's it like living with Darren erratic erratic I can't even imagine I'm not I'm not a it's you don't want to

live with me aerial I feel like this is actually kind of like the most tame version of you that we've seen in quite some time a lot of people have been saying that I'm uh there's a guy you come, you know, the Varda testing, you know, the steroid testing, because I've asked for it because I think Luke's on steroids. He came the other day and he said I used to be scared to come to you till, and I was like, why, I was like, I don't know, but I used to be scared. He's like, you're so much calm and all, and I was like,

everyone keeps saying that. Maybe I need to be more erratic these day now, Ariel. No, maybe this means you're in good spirits. What was that? What was that? I've said, no, we've teamed the gorilla. Wow, well played. Well done. No, I'm honestly, I'm really focused and I'm in great shape for this. This is going to be a good fight.

August did, because I've been watching Luke, Luke's in phenomenal shape. So, you know, as I say to you, I'm not overlooking someone like Luke. I know he's a bit older, but, you know, you don't get to be a former Strike Force World Champion in the UFC World Champion without having a bit of bias. So I don't overlook him, but I just hope he's not overlooking me either because of that last fight with Darren's shirt is so tough and, like, to take them shots, you have to give props. I just don't feel like Luke can take them shots, but if you can't, then it's going to be an eight-round war and made the best man win.

Is Luke doing the testing too? Luke has to do the test, then, mate, he's... Come on. Do you know? Is he doing it? Do you know? Has he signed up? I don't know. I fucking hope so. Okay. All right. Well, we'll see. You know, though I could be on a little bit of certain, certain. Oh, look. Wow. We haven't seen that in quite some time.

Getting a little friskey next to the misses. I like it. I like it. Yeah, well done. Well done. This has been great. Thank you for coming on. Did we clear the air? Do you feel good? Yeah, there was nothing to like sort of clear. I was just like, I just didn't want to, I didn't want the narrative being like, I broke down because I said, oh, I'm not ready for a big. Like when David put that offer across to me It was too stupid to decline It's not saying I don't want to do BKFC Because I'm scared

I'm just not in that I'm not in that phase of my career just yet You know what I mean But negotiations didn't happen And I'm not putting the blame on anyone But I certainly don't want to blame being put on me either Much love Darren Good luck to you

Thank you for coming on You're always welcome We appreciate you And looking forward to the fight on the 30th of August Bye Mrs Till as well Bye Take care, Darren. There he is. The great Darren Till. Kind of up to join us. A rare appearance from his better half. Okay. We're up against the clock. Hard out. 510. Who would have thought? Let me get to the super chats because these are from our loyal, loyal, loyal, loyal, loyal, fans. Clutch attitude. Frank, you're the man. Guys, Nunes versus Harrison. Talks are slowing down. What's happening? Also, W.Y.T. What is that? What do you think of O'M Malley versus Venizius.

Cool with it? Yeah. Don't know if they'll go that direction, but don't hate it. I don't think Talks are slowing down. They've got a lot of fights to get to. They've got one more show in December. Maybe you'll be on that one. Jake Unator, 722.

To be honest, I stopped having sympathy for fighters when they folded like lawn chairs in the class action lawsuit. They made their bed lay in it. Fair, although those are the former, for the most part, former fighters. We're talking about current fighters now, but hey, that's fair. And there's a lot of people who say, why should we care about the union? and the fans shouldn't care about them getting, you know, a part of the... That's a different Darren Till, by the way. I get it, I get it, but we care about those things here.

Hey, Ariel, this is from Sammy. Could you name a pivotal moment in your career that has made you the great journalist slash presenter you are today? Wow, thank you so much for that. Man, there's been a lot. There's been a lot. The MMA rated job in 2008, the AOL job in 2009. the interview with Dana and Abu Dhabi in 2010. The Strike Force breaking news in 2011.

The WEC breaking news in 2011. The Fox job in 2012. The Fox firing in 2016 and all the crap that happened after that, getting the ESPN job in 2018, returning to my home and the ringer job as well in 2021. And then, most importantly, launching on Crown, the number one unbiased combat sports platform on the planet

right here with my friends at Yahoo Sports that has been without a doubt the greatest pivotal moment Not getting the Beniers with Mike Breen? That was pretty big I'm not going to like fuck Let me tell you about the time I was in New Orleans with Mike Breen Ryan Maddox looks like Pita C split a few Gs last night Golly

not here to defend himself Not going to go there Andre, hi from Brazil, you're the man. Cross. Cross was fantastic. Killer cross. Jamal, objectively, does the UFC have the roster to have 43 quality cards a year? Yeah, they've been doing that for like 13 years now since the Fox deal. So, I don't know if you've been paying attention, but it's been 43 for a long time. And finally, from Slito, just saw Hamza tell the media that Susser Kayaev.

Did I nail that? Susser Kayaev from DWCS last night We'll be fighting on UFC 319 Is that true just four days after his last fight? I did see the clip of him speaking to spinning back fists and telling them that. I can't imagine why he'd be lying. I did see Dana yesterday in the post-fight interview with Laura Sanko say

Hey, we want him to come back very, very quickly and he emphasized very quickly. Apparently he meant four days. That's a great story. Sometimes that when they want to put the rocket ship on you and strap it on you and send you to the moon, you just got to ride the wave. hey, you lose, you took a big swing, you win, now they adore you.

Reminiscent of Hamzad himself. Reminiscent of Hamzad himself who did break the news, yes, and that's his guy, right? So who better than him? I think it was a 10-day turnaround, right, between debut and second fight, and then he came back and fought like a month and a half later. So, yeah, no greater example of that. He's fighting for the belt on Saturday. I pass the baton over to the boys in the back tomorrow on the program.

A deep dive into all things 319, pound for pound. Top moments from the ESPN era. Ooh, love it. Now, is this like my time at ESPN, your time at ESPN, Rick's time, or just the UFC on ESPN? The UFC on ESPN era. Let me tell you something. If Rick and I ushering in the new era is not number one on all lists, I'll be very disappointed. It will be an honorable mention for me.

Wow, wow, wow. You were in your father's nutsack at that point. I'm not giving away anything. I was actually working at ESPN as well. I was probably on the overnight shift Figuratively I was actually probably on campus with you guys

Just probably like 20 yards away So your dad was somewhere in the building Huh? It's more of like a figurative sort of I was actually in Bristol With you guys as well We probably ran into each other in the deck Happy New Year's guys

Leave us the voicemail Yes 415 SUPBITB is the place to leave the voicemail Can't wait for that What a day it has been Love you all I'll be back on Monday. Actually, I lied. I'll be back on Saturday night. UFC 319 post show with the great Pete C and the man in the hat.

Old school, Ringer MMA post show. What a time it will be. The next time I speak to you all, it will either be and new middleweight champion. Chamsat Chamaev. Now this is barring any breaking news, me popping up anywhere else. Let's just say. Or, and still, Drickus DuPlessi. What about Loran Murphy? And Aaron Pico, what about MVP? What about Mr. Carlos Prachas going up against Jeff Neal looking to rebound? It's a great card. It's a nice little card.

I'm looking forward to it. United Center is going to be hot. The last time the UFC was at the United Center was 2019. That's when Punk fought Mike Jackson. Overim on that card. Nice little card. Whitaker on that card. We did a road show on the Friday night.

That was a good one. Great crowd. Great house. Great house. and I think the Warriors beat the excuse me the Raptors beat the Warriors I think it was like game four of the NBA Finals that's how long ago it was

so long overdue long overdue looking forward to it this is the book Life is Fighting Kevin Robert Kiesar hopefully I said that right Killer Cross it's a great book honestly go read it

Thank you so much to him. Thank you for coming in. Appreciate him very much. Thank you as well to Shana Bazler. Thank you, Mr. David Feldman. Thank you, Paul Hughes. And thank you, Darren Till. Thanks to all of you.

Thanks to all of them. Back on Thursday, tomorrow, business, and peace. Everyone stop chatting shit.