The Ariel Helwani Show - The Craic: Jon Jones snubs Tom Aspinall, the future of UFC Apex, dangers of Tyson vs. Paul

Episode Date: November 8, 2024

Petesy Carroll is joined by Shaheen Al Shatti and Chuck Mindenhall to discuss Jon Jones’ comments on Tom Aspinall not proving enough to be granted a title shot (0:00),  the future of the UFC Apex on the eve of it’s (alleged) 100th event (40:22), and the fear they have for Mike Tyson next week (57:06).

Welcome back to The Crack, everybody. I'm in. First of all, we had never done a video podcast before we got here, and now we're doing video podcasts live. What a time to be alive. What a milestone for the show. Thank you very much to everyone who's helped me with this. The great on-air Jordan is assisting us in the background. The great Oscar Loseff, who produces every week Mysterious Frank. And Ariel Awani for giving us the platform.

What a time to be alive. Of course, we have the fantastic and much celebrated Centenary Apex event this weekend. It's huge, of course. And of course, after that, next week, it's going to be an absolutely massive week for combat sports because it's US3 309 at MSG and Paul V. Tyson. Massive, massive week. Now, I know it's a milestone show for me and I needed to bring in the big guns because, my God, I can't do this all myself. This is a heavy load to lift. I saw the reactions last week to the great Man in the Hat and I said, how can I one-up Chuck Mendenhall? There was only one way to do that. It was to assemble the fantastic Man on the Myth podcast again. Two of the greatest writers in the history of MMA. One is our chief editor.

One is one of our chief scribes. It is Chuck Mendenhall and Shaheen Alshadi. Lads, thank you so much for joining me. Amazing. Sean, this is the man in the myth on crack. This is beautiful, baby. That was beautiful waiting how long were you holding on to that how long just thought of it i just thought of that this is i mean this is this is a high moment for me oh he's on fire already i can't i can't got nothing oh well shaheen how's it been man i mean

it has been intense over on the uncrowned Network, churning out the articles over there. How are you finding everything? Already one of the centerpieces of combat sports publications. How's it feel, buddy? It feels incredible. I mean, the team has been unbelievable. The level of content, like the level of quality in a lot of these stories has just been blowing my mind every time.

But I'll tell you my favorite part of this so far, my favorite experience so far doing this, is getting YouTube back in the game, baby. Getting YouTube, the pens back in your hands. We're getting Chuck Mendenhall bylines. We're getting Pizzi Carol bylines. It's a beautiful thing. It's been a process for me.

Both of you guys have had to talk me off the ledge every time I file an article. So I very much appreciate me. Both of you guys have had to talk me off the ledge every time I file an article. So I very much appreciate that from both of you. But is this the most active we've seen Chuck Mendenhall in terms of the old penmanship in a long, long time? Because he has also churned the stuff out, Chuck. Yeah, this has been a change. I think at the Ringer I was running maybe a couple pieces a month, usually. So it was not a heavy workload.

This is something different, but I enjoy it. You guys know that this is like, uh, what I do best. And the only reason I'm even ever talking on podcasts because I know how to write. Right.

So it's like, it's kind of fun to get back to, uh, what I do. And even though this was a quieter week, like you mentioned, man, next week is complete mayhem.

And I know that, I know that talking to Sean, we've got a lot of things, uh things uh happen i think i've got like six or seven days in a row where there'll be my byline on the on the site so should be a lot of fun man no it's great it's great and look i think one of the great benefits of going live is that we get to react to news in real time and last night there was a bit of news from the great John Jones consensus, pound for pound best fighter in the world according to Dana Hoyt he's done an interview with Kevin Aioli and I know this is next week and we will talk about the Apex later on, don't worry about this

but the whole... the fans are just waiting for this man but Jones, right the whole thing about this deep A fight is we are completely transfixed on what's going to happen after it as opposed to what's happening on that night at least that's my read on it and there has been lots of talk about how the winner of this fight will face the interim champion tom aspinall but as i said this interview with kevinoli, John Jones has pretty much slapped that idea right on its back.

Here's the quote here that great On Air Jordan has given to us. He hasn't proven anything, says Jones of Aspinall. He hasn't done anything. If there were to be a fight, it would be Alex Pereira. Alex Pereira, of course, the light heavyweight champion. A couple of people here i believe has him up number one in our pound for pound list i believe that's me and shaheen i'm not too sure about you chuck but um certainly a man who's been thrown about in these conversations i'll start

with you shaheen are you shocked to hear john oh look he's seething he is seething over there he's got some stuff he wants to get off his chest are you shocked by jones's take on this and do you think it's genuine or is he simply winding us up am i shocked no no one's shocked right this has been in two years of this basically this has at least been one very strong year of this where it's been very clear that john all fronts, is taking any opportunity he can to use it as an excuse to not fight Tom Aspinall. It's not shocking in the least bit. And frankly, like, this is ridiculous. What are we doing?

This is, like, man, I'm going to caveat all this with, like, yeah, John is a legend. He's one of the greatest fighters of all time. He's either the GOAT or second place in the GOAT goat list depending on how you view all the ped suspensions and obvious clear like drug testing problems that he's had throughout his career you know like we're not here to litigate that not taking anything away from what this man's done not taking anything away from this man's run at light heavyweight which was astounding but this isn't the real heavyweight champion like we we it's very clear at this point that this man is not the real UFC heavyweight champion. Tom Aspinall is the real UFC heavyweight champion because Tom Aspinall is the one fighting heavyweights.

Tom Aspinall is the one fighting people who are relevant. Tom Aspinall is not sitting here waiting to drag a retired firefighter off the couch who hasn't won a fight since like 2020. Like this fight, this fight is a pure vanity fight at this point. And now even this, like this lessening of the stakes even further of like, well, no, there's clearly no way I'm going to fight Tom who holds the interim title, who again, really kind of holds the real title. And I think a lot of people consider either the number one or number two heavyweight in the world, depending on where you view Francis. This is just ridiculous, man. This is very typical, but this is ridiculous.

We see it's very easy to see what John is doing here. No, I'm not surprised by this. I'm not surprised in the least bit. And again, this vanity fight next week, it doesn't really mean anything. This is the exact same thing of a George St. Pierre, Michael Bisping situation. When George came in and won the title, no one was saying, George is the best middleweight in the world. John's not the best heavyweight in the world. We know that. And the fact that he's refusing to fight

people who have a claim to be the best heavyweight in the world, and having won his title basically not beating the best heavyweight in the world already, there is no world in which that I will view this as a legitimate heavyweight title fight next week when this goes down. It's just ridiculous.

This is this is absolutely ridiculous. We're going to sit here and make Tom Aspinall defend his interim belt over and over and over again until you feel he is justified, John. No. In the meantime, go fight the light heavyweight who has wrestling issues because he's very clearly like a good stylistic matchup for you it's just this this like heavy-handed protection of legacy and all of this like very thinly veneered like manicuring of like oh in 10 years people will forget you know the fact that i ran away from tom aspinall instead ran to this and they'll look at the resume and see oh tom has a win over steep a miocha it's like oh that's pretty good steep a was like a really great fighter people will forget because that's what people do but i'll remember and people who are around

right now will remember like very clearly what was happening that's what it's it's beyond strange to have this as a metric because you know if you're just basically saying any anybody with a legacy um that's who i'll fight that's these are the guys i want to fight you why not go poke poke uh your finger in the chest of george foreman then or um you know just guys like who because what you could brush off any relic and i'm not saying that steve miocic is a um you know that he's a has been but he hasn't fought in four years you mentioned it he has a a very good heavyweight record and all that stuff but i don't think he enters into the relevancy factor of this. And when you look at something like Tom Aspinall, and I was thinking about this,

I think there's a lot that rubs you the wrong way when you hear champions talk this way. First of all, the kind of masquerading of having an interim champion, going through the process of setting this guy up to be next, basically what is it but a promise ring that you're going to be whenever there's availability for the real title, the unification that you're going to get it. It's a very strange setup, you know?

And I'm like, if Stipe Miocic, I mean, if Tom Aspinall is not in the wings of this fight, it doesn't make any sense. You know what I mean? Like, you're going back to a time when the UFC didn't have dangling carrots behind every event, every, but the reason this thing works is because they've set it up to work this way. There's always a tomorrow. You're always looking at tomorrow as the present is taking place. And as far as Aspinall not doing anything, you know, I was looking this up. The guy has only, only Arlovsky has made it to the second round with

the guy, right? Like he's, he's won all those fights. He blew out his knee in the one fight. You've got to just kind of put that aside. Eight. So basically eight, no, through this run, like he's eight, no, through this run, beating guys, 32s. Where was, where was John Jones when he entered his shot? When somebody tried to take, when he tried to take the guy's name in front of him, when

he tried to take somebody's legs to a Shogun Hua, right? He just got through a 40 year old-old Matt Yushchenko. And he'd beat Ryan Bader. Like, this is, what's the premise we're looking at? Because he would have never deserved a title shot under the new premise he's operating on right now. This whole idea, sorry to cut you off, PT, but this whole idea that, like, oh, you need to prove it to me. That's cool if you don't hold the belt the moment you hold the belt that is not how this whole thing works like that's just not how the sport works

and that's that's not how the sport can work like you in effect hold the division hostage if that is the way you operate once you are a champion dude it's Tom Hasbro has the interim belt what is the point of an interim belt if not to eventually unify it with the real champion? If you were just going to make this man go on 10,000 side quests before you feel he has earned your presence, that is just insane. This is ridiculous. What are we doing, man? Plus, it's not up to him. It's not up to him to determine who's worthy.

It doesn't work that way. If you, if you, if you want to take this last part of your, of your career, because again, that is the thing, like you can, there are two elements to this that you can conflate of like, John is the champion and John is the all-timer. If you want to just take this last part of your career, John, because you've earned it. You were one of the greatest we've ever seen. If not the greatest, if you want to take this last part and just parade around doing fun fights with big names to make a lot of money and just add cool names to the resume, that's great. That's totally fine, man. No one would complain. If that's just the route we were doing and it's like, hey, you know, guys, like I'm kind of done, but I really want to fight Stipe because that means something to me. And also Alex is doing a lot of big things. He might be fighter

of the year. I think that would be a fun one too and the fans would really enjoy it. People would get behind that. You just can't attach the belt to it because then it is a fundamentally different thing. That is just not the same equation at that point, especially when an interim champion is sitting there. If you want to do these fights, drop the belt. No one's

going to care. You're still a two-division champion all time. At that point, just go. These fights are just as big with or without the heavyweight title do them at heavyweight do them at light heavyweight do whatever you want man it's fine but it once you when you are in effect holding the belt you like that is just not how this sport can operate that is exactly the type of thing that Dana White and the UFC have so long been like we are not these people we are not boxing we we we give you the fights that you want to see we do not do these fugazi sort of roads where we just sort of avoid these big challengers. Boxing is now not doing that. Boxing is giving

people the fights that they want. And now this is what we're looking at with this just ridiculous version of this heavyweight division right now. There's a little bit of read the room too, to this whole thing, because you're like, whole time this whole year through the rise of alex perry you mentioned him as a fighter of the year um doing crazy things and you have a guy like aspinall who's also doing crazy things so you got two guys on the sidelines both doing this amazing stuff and what keeps intercepting the hype that's surrounding these guys it's john jones right like there's john Jones. And it's crazy to me in the year 2024 that while you have two burgeoning stars, and I mean, really big marketable guys representing big markets and everything that your course, uh, your discourse through this process is Jon Jones is the number one. I don't want to hear any complaints about like, or anybody arguing

about him being the goat, the pound for pound King, all this stuff overshadowing in every single way like every one of their accomplishments this is alex perera like you know coming in at ufc 300 303 you know stepping in for connor on that one these are big things that he's doing it's crazy that he was able to pull them off but dana's like steadfast idea here was just to promote John Jones. I'm like, what? So let's read the room in the sense like, John, this guy, this guy has defended you against all logic and reason all year, overshadowing what they are trying to do, which is create new stars in the process, counterintuitive to everything that has ever run in the UFC before. And now you're saying you're not even interested in fighting one of the dudes like that supposedly should be next I mean it's like that's the stuff that bothers you right like you're like well dude if we're gonna have to hear about John Jones all

year even though he hasn't fought and when he finally gets there and you're kind of you know planting the seeds what's coming next and what should come next uh to corroborate basically Dana's story that you know that he is the goat and that he is you know the baddest man and if you put him in the room with anybody he's the one walking all this stuff he got to be willing to have that fight don't you like that's the whole point of this absolutely and lads we have some breaking news as it pertains to this situation this is a live show baby uh ariel awani has just garnished me with a tweet from Johnny Bones. He is reacting to the reaction, I'm sure, from this whole situation. It says, as at this point in my career, every decision is

rooted in purpose. My journey isn't dictated by hype or outside opinions. It's about crafting a legacy that speaks for itself, one step at a time. I'm here to do what's right for my career and my legacy with a vision that's clear and unshakable focused driven and in complete complete control of myself the story continues and it's unfolding exactly how as i've been as i've envisioned but in visit envisioned jesus sorry you got there um but this is what you guys are talking about what he's saying there is i'm going to do as i please with this belt but as you guys have just talked about for 15 minutes that is not what a champion is right jane dude that's fine if that's what you want to do john literally no one not a single person would begrudge that man you are a legend you are like

an you are one of the greatest fighters we've ever seen if at the very tail end of your career you want to do vanity stuff that is super cool man that is not a big deal everybody will give you that allowance graciously it changes when you hold the belt the heavyweight champion needs to be fighting heavyweights relevant heavyweights he cannot be fighting dudes who have not, again, dragging out the firehouse, four years on the couch, who haven't won a fight in four years or light heavyweights. Like this is just, I feel like I'm going insane with this, man. I feel like I'm actually going insane. If you just drop the belt, just drop the belt. It's fine. You're a two division champion

all time. No one will take that away from you and then do whatever you want. You just have an obligation to the division to keep the division going when you are the preeminent person at the top. It's very simpler, man. This is just how combat sports has always worked. Pizzi, let me ask you something, can I? Yes, now. Can I ask you something? All right.

I'm going to put you on the spot. You're ready for this. You're ready for the big time. If Aspinall is weighing in and he's going through this process next week to be the stand-in, is somebody going to fight this guy if somebody has to fall out? What's happening here? Is Tom going to want to fight him?

What happens? Look, this is the strange thing about this whole thing. The Aioli interview withones comes out six hours or so after bt tnt sports should i say uh put out an interview with dana and i think we have the quote there jordan um he's basically saying this is 100 happening like these guys are going to fight here it is here whoever wins this fight competitively the way these guys are worried and the reason they're both massive legends in the sport they're not going to ride off into the sunset right like any doing anything other than fighting tom aspinall at this stage is riding off into the sunset i would say but what i'd say to

you chuck to that question is what was the point in making him the backup fighter there's a clear difference of opinion here between what the ufc expect to happen beyond 309 and what Jon Jones expects beyond 309. Why did they even do this? If it seems as though, based on what Jones said to Aioli, he's not interested in fighting Aspinall after this. Like, never mind this week if something happens to Stipe. Like, I genuinely, and I said this to Ariel last week, I don't think either of those guys fight aspinall if this fight falls out so i'd ask you like what what was the point in putting him in that spot i mean that's the i mean i i think the best intentions you do not want a card of this

magnitude at madison square garden to go without that right like you don't want it like something happens you want to make sure that there's a guy there, but you would think that the two men, the two principals that are signed up to fight would be on board with the substitute if it comes down to that. I would hope on some level that they are prepared to do that. But if you're listening to this kind of conversation that John is having right now, that doesn't sound like the case and what i mean which one was it was it uh it was ufc which one was it when uh it was he was supposed to fight hindo and then that fell through so could you that whole thing like uh hurt hindo's knee and then greg jackson became the sport killer 151 yeah that's right completely lost that thank you the event john jones and greg jackson murder that that's right because I said it was like Area 151 or whatever,

but it was at the time. But we know that John is not just, you know, he's not just going to be that spontaneous with it and just be like, sure, you know, whatever. So it's a very interesting situation. It'd be a horrible look, you know, honestly, if it comes down to that. I hope it doesn't.

I hope we're able to get through this fight because it's been held on to, and I knew it was not going to age well over the last year. It was supposed to happen last year, which would have been fine, but now that we're a full year removed and so many things have happened, you just want to get through it at this point, and then the pieces will fall together as they do. But if something happens, I really don't think that Jon Jones, like let's just say the

steepay can't make i really don't see a scenario where john jones takes this fight next week what do you think do you see you know i'm interested i don't i certainly don't but i wonder what you think she and like if say this happens tuesday we find out steepay can't make it like how did the ufc scramble do they end up having to pay john more ultimately do you think in a situation like that jones and aspen will fight each other in msg next weekend no no no of course they're not no what we know the answer to this like steve miocic has the opportunity to do the funniest thing imaginable frankly like i i know he would never beat john joe well that would be the second funniest thing that would that would be quite funny altogether.

But just like obviously Stipe is not going to do this. But if Stipe was to just, you know, hey, I'm good. I'm actually I've decided I'm going to just retire. Like this isn't for me anymore. And then put them in that type of spot. Like obviously you don't wish injury on anybody or anything like that. But of course, Jon's not going to fight Tom. And like every we're just going in circles.

Like if he wouldn't fight Chael Sonnen on short notice back in the day, he's not going to fight Tom in the, in sort of the closing era of his career. Like the fact that Tom is even the backup fighter at this point seems so performative. Like all, like the, the,

the, both of these interviews between Dana and John coming out basically simultaneously is just, again, is hilarious to me because it's so clear that the UFC is not on the same page with John. And it's so clear that John is determined to do whatever he wants to do with this. And I am supremely interested to see what happens after this event, how this resolves itself. Because if it gets to a stalemate where it's just like look john you're not fighting alex you're fighting tom because everyone sees what this is what is john just gonna call it quits at that point because if that if that's the end of john jones's career that's just a very bizarre

ending for a guy who kind of is our michael jordan right like again it kind of it's it changes how you how you view the ped stuff but like this guy more or less is either major Majorna or LeBron of this sport. He's the one or two. And if that is the end of his career, he's essentially retiring because he does not want to fight the man who holds the interim belt. It's very bizarre. Can you imagine? The Michael Jordan things don't fit in a way

of competitiveness in the end, right? Because it's like Michael Jordan, if anybody said anything cross to him, he was like, all right, it's on. He was ready to go play them one-on-one right away. There was not going to be anything in between that. The comparisons, I was just thinking as we're talking through this, it's crazy to me that if John Jones, if we're all kind of on the same page of John Jones being up here in the sport, just like Dana's been promoting and all that. It's crazy that we're having these kinds of conversations and not just, let's run through the legacy of John Jones

before his fight, man. This has been a hell of a run. Or just going through the conquests and all that stuff. It's a very strange career to arrive at a moment where there's scrutiny on a guy like this. You know what I mean? Rather than celebration, especially as he is kind of, obviously he's in the twilight one way or another. We don't know for a fact that, you know what i mean rather than celebration especially as he is kind of obviously

he's in the twilight one way or another we don't know for a fact that you know it's not his last we don't know if it's his last fight we assume it's not but it could be right so it's like usually a guy like this you'd be celebrating it's very strange to be at a situation where it's actually you know you're kind of scrutinizing his moves and looking at the shrewdness of his moves and stuff like that, instead of saying, wow, man, what a career,

isn't it? I mean, it's just a weird thing. I think it's only going to escalate, right? Like we're not even at fight week. Once we get to fight week, how many times is this man going to be asked,

are you going to fight the interim champ after this? Like, that's just going to be every, a daily occurrence on fight week. And at some point, John's going to get frustrated with it and say something maybe that is something ridiculous and just like again like chuck you nailed it perfectly of like historically there are so many different ways this could have gone where we could have spent next week celebrating one of the greatest talents that that has ever

existed and i just don't feel like it the way that this has played out over the year and just in particular these this past week and just these past months it does not feel like that's what this is going to be is this is going to just instead be a referendum on an absurd situation that is partly of john's making but also partly of the ufc's making by even introducing this interim title because this is also a different conversation if if tom isn't holding an interim belt right if tom has just been made to be going through the ringer this entire year but there is no sort of level of formality to it there's nothing official to his name and he's just the number one contender in waiting that even in of itself is a different conversation but once you introduce the idea of another champion in the division it's just it

can't go together it's incongruous i think that well it falls and it falls on the promotion too you're like hey why did you introduce this? It's no longer his druthers. It's not up to him, right? If you're doing that, if you're taking those measures, you're selling the public tickets to go see an accessory placed around somebody's waist. You sold the public on title fights

with Steve Miochic. To say he's not next, you lied to your public. I think the biggest criticism you can have with the ufc like back to the nganu john situation is they didn't make that fight like regardless of how you feel they treated him regardless of how you feel um you know whether he's coming up on countdown shows or whatever the hell they didn't make nganu and jones and they could have made it,

like as in, they were both contracted fighters, and now they're headed, straight to that again, with Aspinall and Jones, this time, this is two, massive, massive fights,

and, I don't know how, for how many years, Chuck, we were picking, Ngannou v. Jones, as our most anticipated, fighter of the year,

and it never happened, Aspinall and Jones, is only going to pick up, more steam, because of this conversation. And how poorly will that reflect on the UFC if they don't actually make this fight?

That's really where it comes down to. It comes down to the UFC looking bad more than any, like more than anything, even more than John, because you're the one who set the structure in place. If you don't hold it in place, it's, that's a bad look.

Let me ask you guys something. If you take belts out of the equation okay and let's just say john gets through miyochich but there's no belt that we're not worried about that part that part of it what is the more intriguing fight for you would you rather see him still fight aspinall or would you pick the perera fight at this point i mean for me it would still be aspinall just because I've always had a question of what John would be as a heavyweight, right? I mean, this is something he's been talking about

for a decade. And it does, at this point, feel like we are going to see him leave the game without really giving us a good answer on that. Because, like, sure, C.O. Garland is a good win, but it's also a very stylistic, like, opportunistic matchup for you. Like, obviously, this guy doesn't have that great a wrestling, and we saw how that worked steve mjocic again if this was five years

ago this is a different conversation but the the hand-picked nature of that again very reminiscent of sort of the michael bisping era at middleweight doesn't really give me the answer that i want whereas if you fight tom who is a legitimately great heavyweight who is blowing the doors off of everybody whose wins are better than john's wins at heavyweight and and also much more numerous like that that gives me an answer that gives me a great answer to a question i've had for more than a decade the prayer fight is fun and like i would love to see that obviously if there's no belt attached to it or even if it was after tom but it's just again we kind of i feel like there's a route there that feels similar to the gone fight in that this is a guy with maybe a deficiency in wrestling to some degree, at least compared to Jon.

And I don't think anybody would be shocked if Jon goes in there and just wrestles Alex and submits him in the first round, right? That would be, I think, most people's picks for that fight. It's a tremendously intriguing fight, but it doesn't have near the intrigue to me as the Tom stuff, just in terms of the questions historically that would answer. I feel like that might be,

that might be one of the reasons he kind of likes that. He favors that fight a little bit, just that he could take him down. I'm going with it. I'm going,

I'm going with the Tom fight as well. And I think all of this just makes it bigger. Like as soon as, like he essentially poured gasoline on appetite for that fight

by saying, I don't want to fight him. That's what he, he's essentially shot himself in the foot by saying I don't want to fight him. He's essentially shot himself in the foot by saying that at all. I think Pereira is going to act as the, and I mean this in no disrespectful way to Pereira, it's just given the circumstances, he will be the consolation

to whoever stays if the UFC can't make this happen. As in, if Jones leaves, Aspen will be Pereira could be an option for a heavyweight title if it's not G gone or something like that. And then, you know, if they need to keep Jones, you know, the new TV deal, all that stuff, maybe they do Jones v. Pereira, and then they have to deal with the mess they've made with Tom

because there's only so many times you can do this. We continue to have him defend the interim titles. It's absolutely ridiculous. I think we should just keep plugging Cyril Ghosn in no matter what matter what just always plug them in just like you're a favor back in the day i was just gonna say pizza you you make a great point and maybe you're right that all like if all of this is just a genius masterstroke by john to just pour gasoline on this and get people get idiots like me on these shows screaming for no reason that's like that's a genius ploy like at that point it's it's certainly working on me because if all of this happens and we get through next week and

then afterwards john's like yeah all right i'll do it at that point like that's a that's one of that's the biggest pay-per-view of 2025 if not like what true connor and connor always changes things if connor actually fights, who knows if Connor fights. But, like, regardless, that's, like, one of the biggest sporting events of 2025, I would imagine, at that point, is whatever this would become. Because of this, because of the fervor with which

it seems like 90% of the fan base is calling for it. And I do want to caveat, too, because I'm seeing a lot, thumbs up in the chat, thumbs up in the chat. Thumbs up in the chat. I'm seeing a lot of this, like, John's not scared. John's not scared. And yeah, man, John's not scared. I don't think he's scared.

Yeah. No one's saying John's scared. John's not scared of any human being on the planet. Like, the dude would run through 40 of, if there were 40 Shaheen Alshadi and Chuck Mendenhall. For Tom Aspinall. Well, if there were 40 me and you in the room, Chuck, he's getting through all of us in a matter of two minutes. No one's saying he's scared. Yeah, true.

He's one of the greatest fighters of all time, and he's a gigantic man. I've stood next to him. He's a very large man. He has no reason to be scared. Scared is not in the equation, though. It's just, again, we can reiterate it a thousand times, but it's just a certain level of risk management that is so obvious to everyone here. That's just not an appeal when you're the champion. I want to finish this off with a great Dana Hoyt analogy that he made about Jon Jones many times.

And I wanted to put to you guys. Yeah. Jon Jones, Steve Bamiocic, Tom Asplund, and Alex Pereira walk into a room. Only one man can walk out Chugmanden Hall. Who is this? Oh. It's going to be John Jones, but he's going to have puppet strings, and it's

going to be Bamiocic. No, but that's a great question. I would probably say Asplund. In part because he's probably raging angry at this whole situation. You know what I mean? Like, so I'd probably say him.

What do you think? I mean, that question alone is why I so badly want to see this. And I've wanted to see it really for a decade. It's because I don't actually know. I guess 51-49, I would lead Tom. But the idea of picking against John in a fight is ridiculous because I've just never seen that man lose a fist fight, although Dominic Reyes beat him, but we don't need to talk about that.

But I guess I would sort of lean Tom, but I wouldn't with any confidence say that at all. And I would be fascinated to see it. I would be front and center to see that. Used to be that you'd look at a John Jones fight and you'd be like, how interested is he? Is he taking it serious? You know what I mean? It was like he was so above the cut that you would look at these fights and be like, can anybody cast doubt on him?

Can anybody, like if you're doing these things? And I think that it's crazy that he went up and we saw what he did to Gon. And you're like, okay, motivated. He's been out of the game. He's motivated and all this stuff. Um, he looked great. It's kind of crazy that I don't know, like, it's just, it's such a difference in how we look at him these days, but I guess in a weird way, we're kind of paying him tribute to saying like, you'd got to fight Espinel. Why? Because we think you're that good. You know, we think you're that good. We've seen you be this good for so long that we want to see you against the one guy who looks like he'd crash in and bring

that kind of doubt upon you, you know? And I guess that's one of the reasons why I really hope it does happen. I know we're sitting here criticizing, but I'm like, I really hope it happens because I think Jon Jones is that good. And if he goes in there and he does the same thing to Miocic, and I know that we could say the guy's been out, he hasn't had a win in four years, you know, we can say whatever we want. But if he does that, I just want to be able to see Jon Jones

in that situation where he's probably going to be an underdog. How does he react? You know, we saw with Ali when he's fighting guys like Foreman. You have to see it at some point, like with your heroes, right heroes right the guys who've been at top of the game for this song if you're going to wear that forever and if you really want to get over in the most legendary way that is how you do it you go through the scariest guy right that's the thing so i hope that you just nailed it perfectly and that's why you're the goat chuck as you talk about another goat is this the whole that's the reason this is so frustrating, I think, at least for me.

I can only speak personally for me. But this whole narrative and this whole discussion from John's angle is legacy. Legacy. I'm building a legacy. I'm building a legacy. And if that's the way you're approaching this, none of this builds the legacy in the way that like the the tom aspinall fight would fighting alex perera does not build the legacy in the way that beating tom aspinall at this point fighting steve abiotich certainly does not build the legacy in the way that beating tom aspinall

at this point would tom aspinall right now is the man we if you want the ultimate legacy moment if you want michael jordan flu game if you want you want Michael Jordan 1996 or 1998 whenever the last one was where he's on his last legs and it's the Utah Jazz and he's doing it all over again if you want LeBron down you know 3-1 and coming back like this is that moment right this is the moment where everyone doubts you this is Ali's rumble in the jungle like this would be John's rumble in the jungle to come in here when nobody really thinks that he's going to win and come through and look tremendous and just put it to bed of like, you guys thought I wasn't the goat. I am very clearly the goat.

And that's, I guess, where I'm coming from. Like, it's not a like, it's very much a dad like energy of I'm not mad. I'm just disappointed. I'm not mad, man. I mean, I guess I am a little mad just because of the screwing with the title situation. I'm just disappointed because it's exactly like you said, Chuck. I feel like this would be the ultimate test of the thing that you are always talking about, John, when it comes to the legacy. And yet we're just, you're so staunchly against it.

Although, again, maybe you're playing me. Maybe you're just playing all of it. It should be an interesting week anyway, because as you said, we're going to be hearing comments from John. It's always going to be asked about next week. But of course, Tom's going to be there as well. And Tom won't have the same fight week and he won't have the same fight week obligations. But the media are obviously going to want to talk to him. And he has very strong opinions on this.

I know. And I'm sure he's... This is a guy that's absolutely in pursuit of the Undisputed title. At this stage in his career, of course his legacy isn't where Jon Jones is at. But he's basically wiped out the division minus Cyril Gann and Jon Jones. He has tried to fight Cyril Gann on several occasions, and the fight just hasn't come together.

So it's going to be very interesting. Him, who is very composed most of the time, reacting to Jon if he continues to stoke this fire. Before you move on, can i say one quick thing if miocic goes in there goes right through john jones first round knockout boom hilarious does miocic fight it'd be hilarious it would it would be the chaos that we're used to in this game i for sure but does he fight your gut feeling just like do you feel like he fights uh does he fight espinal he sounded like he might not walk away like he was kind of leaving i think there's zero chance he does and i think there's zero chance he needs to at that point right like if like that is one element of this fight that is just no no one's looking at because it feels so improbable but if steep amoebic does do that to

john we the way he elevates historically is stratospheric right. We are suddenly talking about Stipe Miocic in ways that we have never spoken about. That's so awesome. Stipe wins. Jones is off the chart. Stipe wins. Stipe is a top five fighter of all time. That's crazy.

Stipe. Stipe. All roads lead back to Stipe. I know. You know what's happening zero gone we have images of steve amyogen's shape here i believe the great drake riggs uh shared them out earlier do we have a look at uh steve bay's bayern's physique here he looks uh he looks in great shape man this is uh drake shared these out earlier today um and ariel last week he kind of started trying to bend me and um

gc's here about you know how could you possibly favor anyone over steve amy ogich in a heavyweight he was trying to give us that one i'm not seeing it that way but like before we keep on saying before we move on we've talked about this for 40 minutes about but are we underestimating the great steve amy ogich and he is great nobody here will dispute that yes um has it got to the point where we're looking so far beyond this main event next weekend that we don't even see it as a contest anymore it's the narrative the narrative is all around jones right and it's been about jones and the aspen but in that way yes we're looking right past Miocic, aren't we?

I mean, that's kind of the setup. That's the subtext. I know you love these things, too. Sometimes this is what makes the story is the fact that we have an idea of what's going to happen and somebody approves it wrong. That becomes the kind of marvel of the fight. So if Miocic goes in there, I think that he is being slept on. I don't know if he takes it personally. Sometimes I'm like, does he care about the critics?

Does he care about this sort of thing? I don't know. He used to. I don't know if he still really cares about that stuff. But if he is paying attention, he should have a chip on his shoulder going into this one because I think just about everybody's looking past him in this fight. Yeah. I mean, I would echo everything Chuck would say.

And also, too, I just want to add, because because Pete see you mentioned something and now my mind's just running I think actually my like most anticipated feature of next week and just sort of like element of this that now I just really am looking forward to is what Tom Aspinall is going to do on the ground because you're right he's going to be there he's going to be I guess

cutting weight to a certain degree how much weight does he really cut but like he will be preparing to ostensibly be a backup to a fight that he will never get and he is i would imagine the way john's going to approach the week he's gonna be very dismissive of tom and have you guys ever seen dazed and confused i would imagine you have right yeah there's a point in that in the end of that movie where i i haven't seen in a long time but it always stuck with me of like the kid there's a kid at the party in the in the woods and he gets he gets like you know something happens to him bullied at the beginning of the party and he just spends the entire party getting progressively drunker and more angry like

walking around the party just being angry in his own mind until he just eventually explodes and that's kind of what i want from tom out of next week it's just like at the beginning of the week he's at a certain level already because i would imagine he's on tilt a little bit already about this and then just throughout the week with the more comments that come from john and the more dismissive this gets and the more he is like getting ready to weigh in for this thing that he's not definitely not gonna get is just being the kid at the party getting more and more mad within his own brain until he eventually just explodes and maybe him and john run into each other at one time or two and the interactions are how they go and it just contributes to that but i just want to see tom get really worked up to

where by the time it's like friday saturday he's just frothing at this whole ridiculousness of this situation i am supremely in on whatever that could be he's just show up like dollar slices to every interview and like burgers and be like i may as well right come on like you know i'm not fighting this week paying me to weigh in i think i can get like 265 on friday um as i said earlier there's still gonna there's gonna be so much to talk about this next week and i'm sure we will do that but of course it is uh the great apex event this weekend and i actually i think yeah i read ben's article and ben's just absolutely killing it as well. He did a brilliant article, you know, 100 events in, weighing the pros and cons of the UFC apex as the future of fighting.

He looks very concerned in that freeze frame. He does! Oh, that's great. But this is a great article. We know our frustrations with the apex. As consumers of the sport, we have talked about it at length. But he does outline the positives in terms of what the UFC got from this. The production team know where everything's going to be every week.

It's perfect for them. They don't have to deal with any kind of unexpected things happening. They know the arena inside out. As he pointed to, during the pandemic, they created a whole new world of programming based inside this apex and we saw when the wwe did a battleground event there what it could look like with more people there gave us an eye to the future as they look to get more people in um but ultimately the the final paragraph of this article that ben put out it's just fantastic because it just hits the nail on the head it says it feels like the place the ufc returns to when it has something to show us

that's not as good as the other stuff that's not necessarily bad for the ufc it's it's certainly cost effective which let's be honest was probably always going to be the real future of fighting i know you've been there Chuck but before we get into the great tale of Vlad Dumont should we like how is this a very negative thing for the fan base

do you think Shaheen that the UFC seemed well based on what Dave Shaw said which is cited in the article by Ben last week that we are looking at a future full of of ufc apex maybe a death a different kind of apex but a future in the apex nonetheless that's an interesting way to frame it is it negative for the fan base i i would say it's par for the course for the fan base at this point because i think yeah obviously like this this this

fan base that we always just talk about right like this very general royal we to go lebowski on this that we always talk about like it's not the same group that it used to be right like they're the way this sport sort of cycles in and out especially since covid like you know people are fans for four five six years and then it seems like a lot of them drop off and new people a new crop comes in who doesn't really have any history with the past sort of that had happened before it, right? Like, that's why I'm so excited to see people now getting to read Chuck all the time, because I think there's probably a certain portion of the fan base

who didn't realize that this dude is so brilliant on the keys because they just hadn't seen it in a while. Or they hadn't seen it ever, I guess, for them. Sean, I like this. Keep talking. No, for real, though. I think a lot of people are just getting used to it but i think for like a large portion of the fan base now which is a pre post-covid fan base this is just the ufc this is how the ufc operates and has always operated to

them at least this at least in their heads and their experiences so to them i'm sure this is nothing this is just like oh okay yeah it, yeah, it's another Apex show. All right, yeah. And they just move on with their day and they either watch it or catch up with things they were interested in or just read about it afterwards. Like, I don't think it is impactful to a lot of people

because it just is. And it has been at this point for so long. And for the UFC, man, that's incredible. Good for you for pulling it off. You pulled it off. It's incredible that the UFC was able to create this situation, right? It was a huge, smart business move to build this facility. But you go forward. Like, to me, it's like, okay, you were looking at the makeshift thing to get the operation up and running when everything else was shut down.

So you had this makeshift kind of situation where we're like, we're going to do our own events right here on our own premises. And a ton of fans did come in on this. That's what's crazy. I know a lot of people just around here that are pandemic fans. They came in because that was showing. They could watch it. Gamblers especially, they were like, this is a great thing to gamble on. So they all kind of came in because that was showing they could watch it they gamblers especially they were like this is a great thing to gamble on um so they all kind of came in there but it's crazy to me that at a remove what came to symbolize originally the show must go on that the ufc was going to be resilient and

they're going to pat themselves on the back for being the only show in town now feels archaic and on the other end of it and a throwback to those times while everybody else has moved on to live shows and everybody else is doing live productions and everything else and yet the ufc is doing what like a third whatever it is of their shows still at the apex if not half i don't even know at this point but that's what's crazy to me is just that when i look at it i'm still looking at the pandemic nobody wants to kind of be stuck in that right you know and i'm like to me that's a very strange thing and even though they've had some good fights there as the years have gone on especially over

the last two years it's a content show it's it's a content filler it uh it's all the overflows people who need fights it's uh you know the main events might have some intrigue you know they might sprinkled in there there might be some intrigues but it's really just a content filler and it's just strange because it's a different way to be but I agree with you Sean I think the reason

it's acceptable is that half of the fan base a lot of people came bored during that time this is just the norm to them. It's only weird to guys like us who've known a different norm going way back that was a lot more exciting than this, and you kind of get bored with this kind of situation. I don't know if we're going back.

I mean, they've made that kind of clear that this may be the new thing, and I don't think half the fan base cares that much. I find it very hard to just... I feel like I used to maybe i'm romanticizing the past um before the apex but like you know it was a again before this there was a cluttered ufc schedule as it was we were complaining as media goes the same way saying like this is week to week it's hard for us to really sink our teeth into anything because everything keeps revolving so quickly um but i'm finding it very hard to keep tabs on all these fighters,

more than I ever was before. And I don't know why. Is it because, as Ben said in his article, this is not as good as the usual product? Am I turning my brain off? Am I alone in that, Shaheen? Or do you find it's harder to stay on top of all of these fighters as much as we used to um in this apex era well i think there's a level of watering down right like the the anonymity of so much content with when it comes to the contender

series and you know whatever looking for a fight ultimate fighter like all these things that i think at this point a lot of people don't watch uh like a large portion of the fan base don't watch and you just hear like oh this is a contender series guy okay okay cool that's Like all these things that I think at this point, a lot of people don't watch, like a large portion of the fan base don't watch. And you just hear like, oh, this is a contender series. Okay, cool. That's one in a thousand at this point. So it doesn't mean much anymore. I think when it first starts and you're getting Sean O'Malley coming in and Snoop Dogg's reacting

to him and all this, like it felt like it meant something at that point. That moment is long past. So there is just a level of anonymity to a lot of this that I think it's harder to seek your teeth into. But also just the environment, environment right like all of this looks the same all of this feels the same the broadcasts feel the same and so when you do have a big highlight on an apex show like let's say one of these guys that maybe we don't know a lot about on saturday comes out and has a spectacular show and it's just like this big coming out moment or should be this coming out moment if he was fighting in front of you Know 20,000 fans in Moncton or wherever the UFC would have gone to before, you know

I don't think that translates in the same type of way when it happens in an empty apex with maybe like 20 Just super rich people. They're watching with their with their feet up Like it just you don't get that same level like oh this is a real moment that maybe you used to and even back then i mean i feel like we're being very wistful right now and almost naive to the pre-pandemic product because i like you said there was a lot of talk about this is already a very oversaturated so even back then it was very hard to make those type of moments memorable on these smaller shows. But I think it's just gotten exponentially so as you do it in a cavernous cusk of an arena, right? It's just, like, just as humans, it doesn't translate in the same way.

It's like passion is secondary these days. If you really watch the early UFCs, I don't know when you guys got into it, like 2006, 2007 for me, like when you really were watching everything. It was – the passion of it is really what translates. Like it's the passion of the product. The fans were so passionate, everything about it. And somehow that's lost in translation, obviously, when you're in this warehouse in the desert and, you know, there's a few people there. And you can hear the corners kind of barking instructions and stuff like that it loses something it's also weird because we're coupling it i guess it's sort of epidemic because you're coupling it with the emergence of the saudi

arabian uh you know kind of takeover of boxing and like having events there which also have like this sort of gala chandelier you know appeal that it's just like these rich people that are there and sprinkled celebrities to watch these events, super, super exclusive event, you know, which is not the way the fight game loves to operate. You know, the way it really wants to do is just, you used to watch any of those old boxing events in the nineties, man, people parachuting in you know like just the crazy stuff that was going on around those events but the fans like you just you think about all those fans and just how mad those scenes were and it really mattered like every time you'd look

like you still can go back and look at oh yeah that fight madison square garden baby that was crazy or you know what happened in vegas or whatever like you could look at those crowd like you could look at the venue and it really mattered and i feel like that's what's kind of lost to this whole process i was just gonna say i will say i almost i don't know if we're like this should be framed as a complaint even though because like this the the tiered system with which this has sort of been created and operated now feels like it works to a certain degree right like no one's forcing you to watch i mean you got neil magny you know headlining he's never going to headline an event even if it's oklahoma city you know like right at this point the goalkeeper he is the perfect

like apex headliner right now he is the exact person that you would want in this type of situation it feels like we the the tearing of this system makes sense just inherently within our brains and the way we've sort of been trained to look at a lot of this stuff. And it feels like it works, right? If someone does well on a couple of these Apex shows, they graduate to maybe headline an Apex show or being on a pay-per-view. And then they keep going and escalating from there and there. And again, it feels like it makes sense. And no one's forcing anyone to watch any of this. This is all supplementary content at this point like if you're just a hardcore fan and you yes i have nothing

going on on saturday and you really want to watch some fights there are almost certainly going to be yeah you want to throw some money on something or a parlay like there's almost certainly gonna be something for you there and a lot of times there are fun like a lot of fun fights on these shows it's it's similar in the way that if you go to a regional show like if i go to a rage in the cage show down the street in arizona i'm probably gonna have a great time because the talent level is maybe just not to the point where i'm gonna get these really sophisticated you know 15 25 minute wars i'm gonna get lots of knockouts and submissions a lot of times it's that's what this feels like too on

these weekends and that can be either good or bad. I guess your mileage can vary, but I almost don't know if it's a complaint at this point. It's just, it's all what you make of it. If you, if you want this stuff, it's there for you.

And if you don't, you can easily skip it and catch up on it. You know, I mean, you're not going to get shivved at one of these apex. That seems like a negative. I like the excitement, you know,

this year. at one of these Apex. That seems like a negative. I like the excitement, you know? Yeah, I topped out on the Mariner this year, and I was actually feeling guilt, you know, because we have to watch so much. And I was staying up until 6 in the morning to watch the main events of these cards, and eventually I was just like, I just can't do this. I can't justify it. Because the next week we'd be doing shows or whatever,

and nothing would come up for the most part with all this stuff you know and i'll be like what i'm after i'm after taking out my sunday just to stay up and watch this fight that it seems nobody wants me to talk about or weigh in on this week and with that said i'd ask like will you guys watch uh tomorrow night like will you are you guys excited for any of the fights tomorrow night? Genuinely asking. Because again, despite the historic implications of this event, despite the amazing preview

the boys in the back gave yesterday for this fantastic event, I ain't watching this shit live. No way. Yeah, you'll stay up and watch any pro football game. Don't make me get my ball. The people want it. The people want it. Look, I'm just working on my action at the moment.

I'm not quite where I used to be. I want to bring back the 1940s. Your refusal, your continued refusal to hold the ball by the laces is the best part of this. I didn't even know that was a thing. I actually didn't know that was a thing until GZ said it the other day. What did you think the laces were it during just a cool design thing i actually had this discussion with my friends during the super ball last year what is the story with that man why do they have that fucking thing on there that's like me saying like i like to handle a soccer ball with my hands that's how i like to

pick it up and score a goal yeah yeah it's unbelievable i mean what you have to say like it's easier to watch an NFL broadcast than it is a... There's a bit of an atmosphere there, especially in Baltimore last night, let's say. A bit of one, yes. But again, it does translate, right? I agree with you.

It's weird, man. It is weird to watch. I've been to the Apex. Like you were mentioning, I've been there a couple of times. It's a better experience, I think, if you're there. You've been there too, El Shadi. Than if you watch it on TV. I've been there for fights, not a live UFC fight night. But, oh, sorry.

I've been there for fights, not like a live UFC fight night. And I agree with Chuck. It is. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, last night. I mean, does that ring a bell because i was at that fight man a lot of people talk about being there but i know there were only about 50 people in that room it was it was one of those legendary notes in apex history so did the end of time along with your name i was intoxicated i will say that i had a lot of what is that what is the how ahead how ahead

they had like a they had a vip howler head um in the back that's where you'd find all the uh the you know the managers and stuff and hanging out and schmoozing but they're handing out free howler head uh syrup and i had some of that and it was it was uh there's no way that stuff is good banana flavor liquor is just not the move um i'm seeing yeah it was not i mean i tried to mix it too i was gonna point back to you because i'm pts is a question whether you're gonna watch it whether we're gonna watch it and like i'm i'm a very boring answer because i avoid that you know run an mma website extensively so i kind of have to you have to so yes i will be unfortunately

watching it in live blogging the main event it in live blogging you set them up you set them up pizza because i can't pay any of you guys enough to be able to do this for me so i don't know what else is going to do it all my articles so far you should just look into that um but i am very curious whether chuck Mendenhall will be seated watching this. I will not, I will not, but watch the whole thing. There's no way, but I will watch the main fights,

the main fight, you know, I'll check them out. I mean, you got, you got the, you got the fight nerd, right?

Like he's fighting in there. We'll check out. We'll check him out. We'll get Neil Magny. Let me see if he can get that 22nd win in the World Weight Division. Quietly the record. He got Murshart. He's on that car.

That should be good. Fighting that cat from one. Fighting that cat from one. All right, let's give ourselves a get out of jail clause here. I mean, it's because the gravity of next week, isn't it? That's really why.

Disrespect, Ryder DeRidder, like that. I'm actually looking forward to his debut. Dude, I am so excited for him. That will be good, though. The fact that he's not even the co-main event on this card, I would take that as such immense disrespect if I was him. I'd be like, oh, you're not even going to put me on a pay-per-view. You're not even going to put me as a headlinerper-view. You're not even going to put me as

a headliner, a co-headliner on an Apex card. I'm just somewhere in the middle of the flotsam. That's what you view of me. I know. That's so Dana, though. Bring in MVP. I know. You bring in MVP, though, and you just kind of throw him in.

He has to prove it, man. These other organizations don't really matter. It's like, this is the UFC. It's just, that's so Dana to put him, uh, as a spot.

Is it because, um, do you think my interest has been dampened because of next week and how big it is? You know, like we, we talked about three on, I had to start.

There's also this, this Jake Paul, I'm just trying to segue here. That's not a real question. Jake Paul, Mike'm just trying to segue here. That's not a real question, Shane. We got Jake Paul and Mike Tyson. Ariel Iwani, of course, will be on the broadcast, which is always my favorite part, Ariel.

I love you very much. But I watched the countdown for this show yesterday because I was saying during the week, I was like, the fight between Tyson and Paul might be the thing I'm least excited about in the lead up to this like I want to see the broadcast we got Taylor Serrano the rematch um just this whole situation with Netflix like having this in three nearly 300 million homes like from Monday of this week you know you click on Netflix and the countdown is coming on Thursday and of course I duly watch the Thursday the marketing worksflix fantastic work but um i'm watching it and i'm

talking to my mates who are watching it too and suddenly they're like oh man it's tyson you know like it's hard not to get excited about tyson and this is obviously very controversial like i spoke to a lot of boxing journalists during the week for a piece that will be coming out next week about this. And they're completely against it for the most part. Well, the guys I talk to are like, this is bullshit. This is a bastardization of the sport. This is a gimmick fight.

All this kind of stuff. Are you guys warming to it all? Or were you already warm? Like how are we feeling about it, Chuck? I mean, I'm in the same spot. It's not, it hasn't grown on me as it's gotten closer. It hasn't taken on any new dimension. It's just, I find it like, and I think it was, we were talking about this before,

the juxtaposition that's going on in this fight card from having, like, basically a circus top you know uh a top event to a very awesome boxing match you know between katie taylor and amanda so like if you look at that sort of thing it becomes like legit and i think it needs that kind of legitimacy for people to truly pay attention because you have to like any serious journalist right or any serious fan is going to want to see that. The rest of it is spectacle, but at the same time, I'm like, it is Mike Tyson, right? It's Mike Tyson.

Mike Tyson has stayed, and I don't know, like, I know Sean, especially, is only still in his, what are you, 23? Yeah, he's got that. 24 years, so very young, so maybe he doesn't even, never even saw Mike Tyson, like, his career was long over. But Mike Tyson still holds his mystique from the 80s it's a crazy thing does he not like he still has that um i just feel bad that you're probably going to see some sad some sadness come out of this thing that will ruin that forever but that's kind of the setup isn't it like you're setting up you're using a guy's mystique

versus a guy who's kind of been the biggest interloper in the game so it's just uh as long as you accept it on those terms you can watch it but it's still i feel like it's still going to be a little bit of a car crash i mean i think it is it is the biggest car crash of ours time frankly right like that's it's going to be the most watched fight of our era most likely unless like unless like it's hard to be the most watched fight of our era, most likely. Unless, like, it's hard to say what Netflix will do after this, right? Because if Netflix just generally enters the live combat sports space, then maybe every next fight is the biggest fight of this era. But, like, the amount of people that will be able to watch this

and that will tune in to watch it because of the names involved, because they are perfectly sort of split in the middle of, there's a whole segment of the population generationally wise that reveres tyson that remembers watching tyson or that grew up hearing people revere tyson and want to understand why and like seeing the highlights and those people and then there's a whole other segment of the population who grew up watching jake paul and loving all the jake paul stuff and being into that and so you're hitting this this incredible incredible cross section of generations that this is going to be like the, the number of people that will watch this will so far eclipse anything else that I think anything combat could really put together just with all the factors involved. So like it's, it's as we head into it

for me, like, it's a very bizarre thing to reckon with, with like, that this is what a lot of people's view on combat is sort of going to be coming from is something like this. Because I don't know, man, like, I tried to generally not be the guy who's going to come up here and moralize and come up here and be like, you know, I'm so worried about this. I'm so worried about that but like i don't know man i i watched you know all these press conferences just like everyone else when jake paul pushed mike tyson at i think the new york presser it felt like a young man pushing a frail old man like it did like you could even tell when jake did it of like i'm not going to really put a lot into this because i don't want mike to get hurt and cancel this fight again. I don't know. It feels weird to say I'm genuinely concerned for Mike, but part of me, at least in the back of my brain, is genuinely concerned that a 60-year-old man, we're all going to watch him get pretty badly knocked out

by a younger man with incredible resources, multi-million dollar resources, who has been taking this very seriously for a while now and obviously has some actual power and has beaten some some real athletes if not real boxers i don't know man it's it's it's very gross to me still and it's and obviously you know we're gonna have to do a lot for it and so i'm having to reconcile a lot of that of just like i just hope everyone's okay like i hope i just hope mike comes away from okay, because this again is a 60 year old man, basically,

who's probably going to take pretty severe head trauma. And maybe that doesn't happen. And maybe I'm just being naive and, you know. What's the best case scenario? Well, Tyson wins. Rick said that during the week.

That's gotta be right. Right? Like, you know, it was so far away from that though. I didn't even, I wasn't even thinking of it when he said it. He was like,

oh, Tyson winning. And I was like, oh yeah yeah that is a possibility i suppose you know like that that's where my head's at and you know you're talking best case scenario before we get onto that joke if it is the worst case scenario as shaheen is put forward there and paul goes in and he just starches tyson in a round like do you think that's netflix kind of saying okay we need to take a break from that because the reaction to that i feel a brutal knockout of tyson would be very very poor i feel like that will be that will be people will be upset to see that given you know we know that the disparity of age going in yeah i think if he if that's how it goes down if uh tyson goes in there and just gets

knocked out and any kind of brutal way where you're just it seems gross like what sean's saying if it just feels like it plays out the way we're dreading that it might i think that's going to be a very bad look they'll get the numbers and i think they'll say okay wait this is for this kind of platform they're going to have to revise this and uh they will not do that kind of fight again i honestly don't think that they need to. You know what I mean? They don't really need to do this sort of thing.

This is just a vastly intriguing fight for all the reasons we've already talked about. But I don't think they go back to it. I just, it's going to be, if it goes down the way we're talking about, that would be it would be one of the sadder things for anybody who's revered Mike Tyson.

Like if you saw a Muhammad Ali at 16, obviously this would have never happened, but if you'd seen a Muhammad Ali who was if you saw him in even the early 80s when he was getting lit up, but imagine if he came back in 1990. I mean, it's just insane, right? Like it would be not a fun thing. There's a lot

of people who care about him, you know what I mean? So it's not going to translate well to see him get two things always pop to mind as i think about this fight that are just inescapable for me both of which we covered and watched which was obviously tito ortiz versus chuck liddell the last version where you trot chuck out there after a whole week of it being very clear that this should not be happening basically right and then we see what the obvious version like obvious result of that is and it felt awful at the time it did not it was not fun to watch and tito ortiz is out here doing the grave digger over an actual almost dead body and it's just nobody feels good about this other than the tito ortiz family and then the other one

which is oh my god forgot all about that and then the other one which is oh my god forgot all about that and then the other one which is maybe more representative of something like this and actually closer in comparison to it but i think one that like not a lot of people saw because it was in such a weird setting was vitor belfort fighting what i believe was like 58 year old evander holyfield a few years ago where that was just awful to watch where it was very clear that evander holyfield should not be out there and sure evander holyfield is one of the greatest fighters of his era he's a hall of famer he's a multi-division champion but like he's almost 60 at that point and vitor belfort runs through him in a matter of minutes

and it did not look good it did not look fun it was it looked really awful and gross to watch and the whole time you just left like being man a why am i watching this b like i hope evander's okay and that feels very similar to this except jake is younger and has more resources than v tour did so i don't know man like again i i try i'm trying to try so hard next week to not be the dude raining on everybody's parade but i just genuinely that's sort of where i'm at i guess i just i want this to be okay and get it and we get over with it and it's not something that we look back on of like how did we not see this coming absolutely well that's that's all we have time for today uh thank you so much for joining me.

This has been an embarrassment of riches in terms of my guests for my first Cracked Live. You guys have absolutely killed it. I felt like I just walked out there. I felt like I was listening to the podcast, your old podcast, which I absolutely loved. No, these are absolutely brilliant. We made your job easy today, PC.

It's going to be a massive week next week. I think that's why you can't really wait to get to the back of Shane, if I'm being honest. You just can't wait until about 700 articles are filed and you can maybe go to bed for one night a week. I think that's why you can't really wait to get to the back of Shane if I'm being honest. You just can't wait until about 700 articles are full and you can maybe go to bed for one night a week.

That would be lovely. Listen, it's all ahead of us. It's going to be a mad week on Uncrowned next week. You're talking Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday shows.

Oh, look. Oh, sorry. Shane, where we meant to mention there was... Oh, no, no. Is there a certain basketball team that's doing pretty well at the moment that isn't the Knicks or the Nuggets? Shane, where we meant to mention, there was Oh, no, no. Come on, man. We're so close to getting out of here.

We don't need that shit. The Knicks or the Nuggets? Cleveland Cavaliers, baby. They look pretty good. 9-0. We're not going to do 20 minutes on the best team in Western Conference. It's okay. I see what this is. I just want to see that gif of you in the stands back in the day when you had the Phoenix.

What is it? A flag you have in your hand and you're giving it sucks? It was a drink and a free t-shirt is what it was. I was seeing quality basketball for the first time in like a decade and then all of a sudden

we were like terrible again that year. So it didn't really translate. Yeah. And much like Antoine Evans who runs the YouTube site, Alshadi is absolutely yoked and you can see that

in the video when his arms like bulging out of the growl. Absolutely out of his mind on steroids. That man always has been but he's a great editor. I just keep talking shit until this ends.

I'm very bad at signing off, but I love yous very much. You are inspirations to me, and it's great to have you here to guide me through my anxieties as I go about this writing. Yous are both excellent. I looked up to you this for so long, even though you're younger than me, Shane,

absolutely crazy. But you're like my big brother in this, as are you, Chuck. Absolutely love you. You did great today. And I guess we will see you next week. Thank you to Jordan.

Thank you to Oscar. Thank you to Mysterious Frank. And thank you to Ariel Awani. From me, P.T. Carroll, Chuck Mendenhall, and Shaheen Alshadi, we're signing off.

Have a great weekend and enjoy the 100th maybe show from the Apex one