The Ariel Helwani Show - UFC 310 weigh-in reaction, Ian Garry’s chances and picks | The Craic

Episode Date: December 6, 2024

Petesy Carroll is joined by Uncrowned colleagues Chuck Mindenhall and Shaheen Al Shatti to look ahead to UFC 310 and debate whether Ian Machado Garry has a real chance of beating the 170-pound boogeyman, Shavkat Rahkmonov.Join us on the bike: avironactive.com/uncrowned 

Welcome back to the crack everyone. I hope all the crackheads are lit in the chat as always it is UFC 310 fight week the weigh-ins have just taken place and there's a lot of things to talk about just back just just on the back of that everyone you'll be happy to know in the the main event and co-main event all good we did have two misses though from Brian Battle and Anthony Smith so we're going to get into all of that as soon as possible and of course I've got some very esteemed guests here today we're going to get into all of that as soon as possible. Of course, I've got some very esteemed guests here today. We're going to introduce them just in a couple of minutes. We're going to roll you some footage, as far as I know, as far as the beautiful on-air Jordan has told me, from the top two fights. So if we can, let's roll through and have a look at Mr. Pantoja there.

Look at that body. Oh, my God. That's what I look like with my top off. I swear to God. Let's see if we got Kai Asakura here as well because making 125 for the first time

in seven years, the vibe king, as I like to call him. I love this guy. Cannot wait to see that fight tomorrow. But here, of course, the people's main event,

Mr. Shavkat Rachmanov on the scales there. What a man. A lot of Irish people making a lot of his head after Ian Garry's post. A very large head. They're saying, there's Ian Garry. Never was in doubt that that man would make 170. Very, very lean, as we know.

And here they are. I can see their beautiful faces on my screen. It is the two legends, Chuck Mendenhall and Shaheen Alshadi of Uncrowned Boys. I am delighted to see you again. How are you? Chuck, we'll start with you, please. What's going on, man? It's fun to weigh in, if you will.

Oh, I see what you did there. Look at Sean. I've already got him squirming. This guy. We were like two seconds in. I got Sean squirming. It's good to see you guys. This is the second time we've done this.

And this is kind of like the old show, isn't it, PC? We're talking about weigh-ins and kind of timing this out. I feel a little nostalgia here. I just hope that we don't have the seven hours that we had that time with Diaz and Shumayev and all that stuff. Get Ed Evans on standby. That's it. He better be there waiting for us. Shadi, how are you, my friend?

A big day of editing, I'm sure, with such a big event taking place this weekend. Oh, you got gotta unmute yourself look at this guy jesus christ i don't know that i like how you teed that up that felt somewhat insulting uh also i would i would pay money to just listen to you i guess watch you sort of just overlay over way in video that was very entertaining that was good yeah well it's gonna get bad later on i have a couple of ad reads i just want to warn the public i'm only learning how to read now so well don't judge me too much but um i guess lads like i'm very happy i must say that everything went well with that uh that weigh-in uh shaheen i was quite worried about kai asakura as i said there i don't think he's made 125 for like seven years and he's coming in to this title fight and I was like oh no this could

be a terrible introduction and I've loved everything he's brought to the table all week so surely good news that he's at 124.5 I believe making the weight at ease yeah I mean that was sort of the big question right like it's it's one thing to debut in the UFC as a title challenger. Like it's a very rare thing that we, we just generally don't see ever. And I think that speaks to the level of respect that is kind of being shown to Kai, like,

and also probably the level of stardom that that man holds over in the East. Like, it's just, we still don't, can't really fathom and quantify it. It seems like just how big of a star this guy is in Japan uh but that was sort of the big question is like this guy's never hasn't done this for a very

long time so it is a risk but man did it man pulled it off I'm very happy to see that and Chuck um I don't know if you noticed Gary doesn't usually put on a lot of weight after he weighs in against Jeff Neal he weighed 177 pounds I believe and i believe neil was up around 195 gary put out a post yesterday and he had him and shavka facing off i i've cited this at the top a lot of people even when we put up the graphic for today's show are like wow look at shavka's head i didn't know this was a metric that we are we are weighing in on usually but do you think it's not something i ever thought about shavkat but do you see him as a much more imposing kind of physical guy than gary ahead of this fight after seeing those weigh-ins i kind of see him the same i mean i've noticed the head thing before i feel like where are people

what are people watching i mean you know in these in these uh these face-offs and everything but the dude is it's funny because if you go back to his kind of original fights the first couple fights in the ufc i didn't really find him that imposing. He kind of came with a lot of hype. And I remember people were talking about he was an undefeated fighter, all that stuff. But I don't remember, I don't remember him striking, like looking imposing. It was like he was in there and he kind of looked aloof, if anything. And his body was not like super defined or, you know, yoked or anything.

Like he just looked like a normal guy but i feel like over the course of time especially going into that last fight and now into this one you kind of see it man like you can tell that he's in better shape he keeps getting in better shape and i think that sometimes you kind of make your judgments based on the scale and how they how they comport basically as they face off and all that stuff and i think he he looks really good, man. Yeah. It's, um, it's, it's certainly the people's main event. And one thing I wanted to ask you Shaheen is I think when this fight was announced and I can remember people when this fight was announced, it was a lot of, and you get this with Ian Gary, he's a polarizing figure, right? They're like, oh, finally, someone's going to shut him up, all this kind of stuff.

But as the fights got closer, I think there's a lot more people going like, this guy has a real chance. This guy could really pull this off against Shavka. I know I was on with the boys in the back yesterday and Rick shut me down immediately. I was going through my 25 minutes of point striking his way to victory for Ian Gary. But do you think that sentiments have grown fonder

in terms of Ian Gary's chances in this fight as the week has progressed? That's an interesting question. And I think it's always hard for us right because we're so inside the bubble like all of this is so insular that like it's hard to get a real sense of like how what people feel aside from the twitter sphere and like instagram and just the general comment section I mean Ian Gary has just been a very unlikable man it seems like for a long time for this fan base right like we've we've just seen this man over and over get booed out of the building and just you know and he kind of he does it to himself too like he'll put like he'll put on you know last couple fights haven't been super impressive and and he'll come out and say that

was the best thing that i've ever done with the mvp fight etc um i will say though man i think that the balls it takes to do what he's doing right to step in against shaft cat to openly call for shaft cat even before that and just really be the one guy in this entire division calling to fight this boogeyman this genuine boogeyman with 100 finishing rate who's just tearing through everybody in ferocious frightening fashion to openly just be asking for this and then get it and embrace it and really this whole week i think he's really stepped up to the task at hand just of really promoting this and again just emphasizing re-emphasizing over and over like i don't care how the sparring went like this is a different thing all the people in this the rest of this division

are chickens like just going up and down with what this guy's been doing and i will say also doubling down tripling down quadrupling down on the colby thing of just really putting out there like colby is a coward because of etc etc etc and just going deep into that well uh it does feel a little bit i mean correct me if i'm wrong if you guys feel otherwise it feels like kind of momentum fan momentum fan sway is swaying a little bit on his side right he has not come off in the way that he has historically in the past he has not done that this week i think i think self self-belief like what you're kind of talking about is a huge selling point for him man because he could have easily sidestepped this i mean when you talk about a guy like colby covington i'm not

trying to like throw shade to just like colby but but it's just hard math. Every time they're trying to get a match made for the guy. And I know he's stepping up in the situation in Florida, all that stuff, but just traditionally it's very difficult. There are champions where it's very difficult to book. There are certain guys that nobody wants to face because of, you know, the juice isn't worth the squeeze or the risk outweighs the reward. I feel like for him, he just doesn't care on that. And I have to give him huge props for that, man, because there weren't a lot of people pining for a match against Shavkat. It just feels like a sentence and it puts you back behind the eight ball, especially for a guy like Gary, whose primary concern, I would guess, would be the title. What would be

the most ridiculous thing for you to do is to trip along the way against the juggernaut who looks dog-eared for that title, right? Like, this is one of those situations you're like, maybe you avoid him until you're holding the title. I can appreciate it, man. I think that it's one of those things that, for all the people who kind of criticize him and scrutinize him and cringe at him and all that stuff, this stuff goes a long way for the integrity of the fight game and for him. I think it just shows kind of how much self-belief he has in himself, you know? Yeah.

No, I agree with what you guys are saying, but I guess the one thing that, and look, you both mentioned it there as you're speaking about this fight, like, you know, there's massive title ramifications here for the winner of this fight, either Shavkat or Ian. What I want to know is, Shane, do you think either of these can make a massive banner marquee for a fight with Bilal for the UFC? I think that's something that we kind of,

we know the UFC want to make the biggest fights possible. These two are fighting for number one contender spots. What is the bigger fight? Let's take Bilal's opinion of who he'd do better against. Like for the UFC, what is the bigger fight here? Why you gotal's opinion of who he'd do better against. For the UFC, what is the bigger fight here? Why you got to tee me up to crap on Bilal? I don't want to crap on Bilal. I like Bilal.

You're always doing it in the slack, Sean. I mean, you're like all the time on there, crapping on Bilal, so why not do it on my pair? We did like a welterweight fantasy draft way back in the Man of the Myth days, and I think I picked Bilal even back then when he wasn't even close to this type of level. I've always respected that man.

But the question of like, if either of them makes a big fight with Bilal, like obviously not. Like we know the answer to that. You know the answer to that when you ask me it. Um, I think probably. Shavkat right now is the bigger fight with Bilal just because the Shavkat aura is so extensive and overwhelming and just all-consuming, frankly. But man, a lot of change can happen on fight night, right? If Ian Gary comes in here and backs up everything he said and just comes in and really does something to Shavkat that no one else throughout the history of the world has been able

to do to Shavkat and stuns the world and lives up to every word that he promised like we come out of Saturday night thinking of Ian Gary differently right like he we come out of Saturday night thinking of this man as the truth as the future if you want to go with the name tag right like it's it's crazy how things can change in a matter of an hour in this sport but if Ian Gary goes in there and backs it up I think that he comes out genuinely like on the precipice of actual stardom because the man can talk the man can own a mic hour in this sport but if Ian Gary goes in there and backs it up I think that he comes out genuinely like on the precipice of actual stardom because the man can talk the man can own a mic like it was very cool seeing him speak to Portuguese at the press conference and just sort of do again the way he's navigated this fight we've got been very impressed by and and Pete I almost want to

ask you just quickly like we've seen historically like the Ian Gary relationship with Ireland is not there in the same way that it was with Connor, right? And it was with even just past other Irish fighters. It's just, it hasn't been the same. What is it going into this fight? Like, is there excitement for it in the country? Is it just kind of like being overlooked? Is it being ignored?

Like where, where, where does sort of Ireland sit right now with Ian Gary? As we sit on the precipice of something where, this could change the the direction of his career dramatically well i think i think it's something that's promising is i know he was featured in mainstream outlets this week he was on a big drive time show i think yesterday it's called game on big sports show kind of previewing all the things this weekend so it was great and he was his usual extroverted jovial self, like came across very well from what I heard of the show. Um, so that was a national that's on the national broadcasting. It was also featured on Joe,

which is a really popular website between the like 18 to 35 demographic. Um, he was featured on there speaking about how he's going to paint a beautiful picture with Shavkat's blood, a lovely message to send, of course, but, but,

but the real disgusting, by the way, this is blood sport. But the problem he's going to have is just the general perception of MMA in Ireland now. And the shadow that McGregor has cast over it. Like, I mean, you, you've been helping me with all of the stuff that's coming out of the course the last month or so, Shaheen, even the way the judges are speaking, the way McGregor's own council is speaking, like it's clear that this is a massively polarizing guy. So I think that's really the biggest issue here.

Already Irish fans had a problem relating to him from the get-go. And I think that a lot of that was driven by the fact that he was praising McGregor. Every time he was given a mic, he was like, this guy is the greatest. And look, he's his hero. Like there's no doubt about that. That's all genuine. Ian was inspired to fight because of Conor McGregor.

But the problem is the casual sports fan hears his name and they're turned off to a large degree. So it's a massive monumental task, I feel, for an Irish person to stimulate that casual sports interest that we've seen with the likes of McGregor and that generation of fighters, to be fair, because back then if Carl Pendrick's fighting in Mexico, people are staying up. If Neil, uh, Siri is fighting in Stockholm, everyone's staying up. Ash Daly, the rest of them, like it became a real thing. And MMA was covered alongside the biggest sports in the world. It's still there. It will still be featured in papers tomorrow a previewing the previewing the fight and then on monday's papers they'll be there as well it might be a conversation point on some radio shows but really you never know you're in the good old days when you're in the good old days and unfortunately i feel like we knew in mcgregor's day though we didn't know that one yeah yeah that yeah. That's fair. 2014 to 2017, I guess, culminating with the Mayweather fight. I think that was probably the peak it will ever be here. And it's a really, really difficult task for anyone to be tasked with getting this sport back to a mainstream. But right now we've got Paul Hughes, who's fighting a Maga Madoff, obviously very soon in Dubai.

And we have Ian. But I think that's a lot to put on them, dude really really do you know what's crazy is I think that just going back to the original question I do think that Gary would obviously translate better in terms of like if you're looking at who's next for Bilal uh for marquee purposes like but that's only because he's a polar and an old structure kind of fighter, like a guy who kind of draws attention, polarizing whether you like him or not, you kind of care about this dude where he's going. So you're going to pay attention,

but this is such a blood dim tide for the meritocracy at this moment. Isn't it? It's like you get a moment right now where you're talking about Balal being the dangling care, a guy who we didn't think would ever get a, you know, a title chance, much less wear the belt.

And now you get guys like Rachmaninoff who, you know, in terms of just what we look for in fighters, like obviously he's a finisher, but he doesn't bring much in terms of charisma or, you know, he doesn't, he's not going to speak English to you and like do all the, you know, the things that we're familiar with. Yet you have a potential of those two guys fighting, and it's fascinating. This is almost like the die rare that you get heaps of momentum going at each other again and again so many times in the sport you know you have a guy like Miocic for instance or somebody kind of grandfathered into a spot or somebody jump in the queue like Colby Covington or whatever it is and you kind of have to just kind of ride through it while somebody gets killed off in that process usually but this is one of those rare moments in MMA where you're really catching the best versus the best and I gotta say I can appreciate that that's i think that's a great point and also i will speak more broadly to that like with shavkat right because shavkat to me like

obviously there's a ceiling on whatever shavkat can become for the ofc just in terms of stardom and like the interest that he draws from like a mainstream public eye it's like you said chuck the charisma and the lack of english and just like all of that kind of caps the level that I think this man could probably get to. Like he's never going to be Alex Pereira out here, just be having this legion of adoring fans. But it does feel, I do feel like there is something there with him

that is special in its own way. And like, again, that aura and just this, the aura of invincibility and terrifying nature of this man feels like it does seem like it could translate and transcend boundaries to some extent, right? If he's able to, say, do what he normally does, pull off a Jeff Neal to Ian Gary and standing choke this man and just take the O from Ian Gary in really violent fashion and then go and do that to bala muhammad as well and all of a sudden this man this guy is the guy at the top of the heap this guy with the 100 finishing rate who just leaves a trail of dead bodies at his wake like that's the dude that you have to meet at the top of the mountain that's the shang tsung that's the shao khan that you're waiting you're climbing the mountain to get to like at a certain point i feel

like that would translate and would become like actual appointment viewing uh for if not the ufc like obviously the ufc fan base but just you know at some point like a habib became a big star habib had english habib had the connor thing but like you don't have to just be that traditional fighter to translate often or always if you have a level of dominance to go along with it i think i feel like shavcott can be that guy like he can be there's that potential in there there's that ceiling in there it's not i don't think the ceiling is as capped as people maybe have been assuming it is and there's something to be said about like levels of mystery at some point in this game because it used to be there used to be you know you had this all the time long before social media and people could just advertise themselves and brand themselves and all these things you dealt in their mysteries and it was sort of an unveiling as you went like you kind of

understood who these people were um as time went on i kind of feel like in that way it's fun because he comes from a region of the world a lot of people especially in north america don't know much about um you know the hats just the the style the attitude you know the the fact that he doesn't really emote all that much but yet sometimes like when he finishes his last fight he gets up and he starts peeling off money like he's you know and i'm like okay there's there's layers to this dude we just don't know him yet i think sometimes that can be um you know it can be one of those things that it dawns on you as it goes too and sometimes the mystery is a good thing but sometimes don't you kind of crave that i don't know much about this guy let's find out about him to me that's that's one of the fun aspects of

him never underestimate a fun hat never underestimate a fun hat in mma the power of the fun hat at mma is undefeated my friend if you have a fun hat and you're able to pull off consistent levels of dominance yeah they did yeah i love it well chuck's whole career like he has no talent whatsoever it's just the hats i've always been telling you i've never had a talent i've never written anything yet um i have an ai thing that does that but i mean it's cool the hat it works i mean it sells and before we move on uh we just need to take a brief word from our partners, NordVPN. We're delighted to be partnering with NordVPN. So why use NordVPN, you might ask me?

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To get the best discount off your NordVPN plan, go to nordvpn.com forward slash uncrowned. Our link will also give you four extra months on the two-year plan. There's no risk with Nord's 30-day money-back guarantee. Check it out, guys. You stuck the landing, man. Look at you. I knew you could do this. Crushed it. Let me just tell the people at home,

can I say this? I'm going to break down the fourth wall. Like, this was the only thing giving him stress about this was he had to do an ad read, and look at that. He kills it. What a pro. Well, after the last time we did one of these, I had to do an ad read and look at that he kills it what a pro well I had to after the last time we did one of these

I had to read my own article which I somehow flummoxed eight times I could see the comments after like wow PC can't read

and I'm like starting to agree with the crackheads on this one that's the shit you wrote but let's get back to the fights lads

big misses before we move on to what fights were exciting outside of those top two, which everyone's buzzing for, um, big misses from, well, particularly from Brian Battle, uh, in. You know, and Battle has had a history with this as well. This is not his first rodeo in terms of missing weight. Is this a killer one? Not a killer one, but like after the France thing, I feel like he was everyone's sweetheart. And then this happens and obviously Randy Brown there, 171. We still don't know if this is a health issue.

We're probably going to wait till later on the day to find out make sure everything's still going ahead but is this a bad look for a guy who seemed so high coming off paris joke yes i mean we did we did a piece sean knows i mean i was like i gotta write about brian battle because to me that was one of the great mic mic drops we've seen seen this year where he just kind of incites that crowd into a violent state they're just yelling and booing and he's like give me it all you know to me that's the great you know cinema that we look for outside the fight right like if you're going to use a microphone use it well this was his moment I feel like I know he was on Ariel's show

there's a lot of eyes on him and this was the one thing you can't do you can't like you know what i mean you can't miss weight in the on the moment when everybody seems to pay attention to you and wants to see what's the next phase and i mean seriously you tell me guys i felt like he was nearing the verge or the cusp i guess of um of becoming a star in this game i that's how it felt to me and now i'm like i don't know we'll still see how how it all plays out but that's a bad one man that's a bad bad miss i think star is probably maybe a little over overselling it but he was certainly on the cusp of becoming someone who like a main player right like breaking out of that ufc anonymity to a certain degree right like this is a guy who's been put in the work since 2021, like 6-1 in the UFC, 6-1 with no contest in there.

Like he really was on the precipice. And I would say still is on the precipice of like really, again, breaking out of like it's so difficult to just get people to remember your name in this sport because of the deluge of content that we have and contender series guys and just all the various like machinations in this current day of the ufc it takes so much for people to just even remember your name to a certain degree right and he was there he still is there but it's just like it's it feels like so often we get these

moments where like guys are just in that exact moment and then something dumb like this happens or just like that they can't live up to the moment in that in that way that we want them to so we'll see i mean it seems like the fight's still going to go on forward and if brian goes out there and you know does something spectacular and cuts another killer promo well i'll spend like hey hey by the way sorry for missing weight but then you know got some awesome promo like we'll be right there back with him and whether it leads to move up in division or he's going to try again like i think I think people will still ride with it, but it is disappointing. Yeah, I agree with you guys.

Like I can remember, I used to often think about, you know, he came in from tough, I believe, and Gary was, you know, obviously doing great in the UFC and they kind of had a, a back and forth. I think battle lost a fight and he felt very much out of that conversation, but on the back of Paris, I was like, wow, he's picking up momentum. Like these guys could be around this title conversation at the same time, have to see how the UFC reacts to this.

But I will say when you do. Real quick though, the last time you missed Wade, didn't he like smoke the guy? It was like in Charlotte and in his hometown and he smoked the guy on like inside of like 12 seconds or something like that. Are you saying this is a tactical miss? Is that what you're saying?

Yes. I'm saying keep, keep an open mind. That's all I'm saying. Yeah, he's... Look, I think he's, as I said, came on an awful lot. UFC don't like that shit, though, obviously. Especially when you're talking about guys in the title mix. They want someone that's ironclad.

Remember all of the conversation about Hamzat at 170, Davis and Vigorato at 125. I mean, the list can go on with guys who, Kelvin Gastelum, every time he fought, we were just like, oh God, how's he going to do here? Brian Battle, not quite Kelvin Gastelum just yet, but you know, he needs to not miss again. Well, don't book him around Thanksgiving, all right?

How about that? That's a good idea, actually. I think he said he skipped Thanksgiving dinner, though. I think he said that, but. He's lying. He's lying, too. He's a liar idea, actually. I think he said he skipped Thanksgiving dinner, though. I think he said that. He's lying. He's lying, too. He's a liar, and he's tactically missing weight. That's what we have discovered on The Crack this week.

Shaheen, are you surprised by Anthony Smith missing? 207.5 here for his fight against Dominic Reyes. He was the last guy to hit the scales. Are you surprised at all by that, the former middleweight Anthony Smith coming in heavy? Real quick, I've got to give a shout-out to Tyson Uppercuts in the chat. It was just the comment hit the scales. Are you surprised at all by that? The former middleweight Anthony Smith coming in heavy. Real quick, I got to give a shout out to Tyson Uppercuts in the chat. It was just the comment of the day. Thumbs up in the chat, first of all.

Thumbs up in the chat. I know y'all didn't think the butcher was going to make weight for this fight. I know y'all didn't think the butcher was going to make weight for this fight. I love it. I love it. Fair play, fair play. Anthony Smith, a little surprised by but i it's i mean if you've heard him speak at any point this week it does feel like this was a difficult one for him and he and you know he experienced a loss very recently in his life and so god it seemed like he's using

this week and this fight in particular is a chance to sort of channel some of that anger and get some of that violence and aggression out right now so you know that's one of those where like this guy has done it for so long he's such a professional on every level in this game like sometimes you give guys a pass and in this one honestly i give anthony a pass it does seem like this was a very difficult camp for him just emotionally i don't think he's missed weight before has he like he's he's been around forever um i don't recall if he has i don't recall him missing weight before so it's just a complete anomaly and you got to think that there's some uh circumstance that created this right like he's usually such a professional yeah absolutely you'd have to give him the benefit of the doubt and benefit of the doubt and obviously what Shaheen said they're a very very tough camp for him we

saw him talk about that at the media day of course um lads obviously everyone's buzzing for these top two fights and we've talked about them to death all week on this fantastic channel but um before i get into it because everyone knows what mine is i've been talking about it all week um what is your favorite fight outside of those top two chuck outside of the top two probably the uh the adelaide fight only in the sense of i love the chip on the dude's shoulder um i think it's funny that you know you kind of have a the black sheep versus the pariah in this situation like you have two guys that the ufc is sort of like ah and just put them on the prelims one's a former champion the other guy's been eight no in the ufc um it's a crazy stylistic

matchup there's a lot of like subtext through this fight you know i see i see uh evilev elso is a guy who's probably the biggest threat to ilia toporia so like even though he's kind of being submerged on the on the uh on the prelims there's this feeling of like well eventually right and we're just talking about like the the meritocracy being what it is eventually he's going to have to break through and be in that conversation too there's just a lot to love about a fight like that it might not be the most um it's going to be a tactical it's a very skillful fight but it may be may not be the best entertainment and i think both guys are well aware of that and therefore they may try to make it more entertaining you know what i mean so there's a there's a there's just compelling

features to that fight that i really like shame what about you man what are you looking forward to i mean look like obviously on its merits it's that fight right like that fight realistically should be on this main card i kind of understand everyone's narrative with that's in that sense of like this is ridiculous that it's not and what are we actually doing here like al jermaine sterling is not a prelim fighter and it's very bizarre to see him in that spot if it's not a ufc 103 style card and like i respect chuck for his opinion and pick there because again that's probably the correct pick but but like we're all a bunch of ridiculous savages here we're all a bunch of of morons who

just want to see people punch each other in the face and you think and you got nate the train land where's that on this main card and and you're not going to pick that guy? The most entertaining man in the game? I know we all didn't. I was going to try to cut a Brian Battle, but it didn't work out. It's Nate the Train versus Doohu Choi, man. First of all, Doohu Choi is already a UFC Hall of Famer. While competing.

That's pretty wild, isn't it? That's pretty wild. Yeah. That's pretty wild. But man, every time Nate's out there, he is just an absolute maniac i i remember the first time i talked to nate lanwear and normally i would never do what i'm about to do but i can almost guarantee that he would absolutely not care so i'm just gonna go ahead and do it it was when me and you were still at the athletic chuck and we were doing that anonymous fighter survey right for that yes

of course yeah so we at our whole team, we talked to like 200 fighters across the game, almost just anonymously asked them a bunch of different questions, like very serious questions about pay and how the UFC treats them and things like that, but also very dumb questions about like, you know, what's your, who's your favorite referee? Who's the worst referee, et cetera, et cetera. And one of the categories of questions was like,

in terms of MMA rules, like what do you think in terms of MMA rules, like, what do you think about the specific MMA rules? And more specifically, what would you like to see not banned? And among that group was eye gouges, groin shots, things like this, small digit, like finger and toe manipulation. And so we asked 200 people these questions of like, hey, do you want people to be able to hit you in the balls? Do you want people to be able to hit you in the balls do you want people to be able to scoop out your eyeballs i think almost nobody i think it was like 199 of those 200 said no to those specific questions who do you think was the one that said yes nate landwehr my man i was i asked these questions and nate lay where he's like yeah of course of course i want to hit guys i said i got you did you hear me he's he Landwehr, and he's like, yeah, of course. Of course I want to hit guys in the balls. Wait, I said I count you. Did you hear me, Nate?

Of course I want to scoop out some eyeballs. I count you. He is a lunatic. He is the best kind of fight game lunatic on the planet. People like Nate Landwehr are why this game is so much fun, because you can get characters like him. You can get a character like an Ian Gary who's just a fight IQ genius who's going to go out there and point fight,

but then on the same night you can see Nate Landwehr try to, you know to go Keith Hackney on some of these dudes. I'm here for that. And also the story of Doohu Choi is so forever just interesting to me, right? Because this kid comes up very young, very explosive, and just is really making a mark very early in his career. Seems like he's on the precipice of really becoming a legitimate title contender, and then has that Hall of Fame fight with Cub Swanson again already a hall of famer i was at that fight that was one of the most incredible scenes i have ever been at just like live that crowd was so under every punch it was crazy yes unbelievable unbelievable stuff and then he just kind of disappears completely just falls off the map because of the south korean military service

and ever since he came back it just it has not been the same right like he has just not been able to refine that momentum and now it feels like maybe he's gotten there maybe he's sort of found something within himself again and it's it's and it's summoning it back but also maybe not because you're about to run into nate the train so like i love everything about this fight and i just can't wait for it wow and and that if you don't if you haven't seen the Onama fight with Nate Landwehr, you've got to go watch that. The dude is almost decapitated and taken out in the first round. I mean, it's a 10-8, right? If I'm calling this correctly, it was like Onama was the huge favorite.

He takes it to him. And somehow the tides turn in this fight and then Landwehr at the end. It was just one of those crazy things where you're like, how in hell is he still standing much less kind of building momentum towards the end of that fight that was a ridiculous uh example of what you're saying about how sadistic and how deep he runs man and by the way you could there's a guy in phoenix esteban what was his name do you know i'm talking about esteban we talked to him in the survey too and he was the other guy so you mentioned that there were there was at least one or two guys he was the other guy because I interviewed him I asked him about eye gouging he's like yeah it's a fight man it's a fight you should be involved

yeah oh my god um I love that fight too the duo Choi one um and Lan where but I will say like you've made me you've made me kind of sidestep here, Alshadi, because obviously I was going for that one as well. But I love the, I love the, Cyril Gann and Volkov is very interesting to me. No, you don't. You love it. I do. I really like Gann. Cyril Gann should actually.

I feel like Cyril Gann's setting himself up for a title fight here. I'm just going to throw that out there. But that's the issue, right? Like, Gann, Gann, everyone's just looking at this fight going like, oh yeah, Gan is going to fight Tom here. Jones thing won't happen and Cyril Gan will be right there. But Volkov's been on this tear, lad. Since being stopped by Aspinall and I was at that fight, stopped Jairzinho Rosenstruck, Alexander Romanov,

tied to Ivasa and Sergei Pavlovich, well, didn't stop Sergei. He got a decision win. I think he's a live dog too. Alexander Romanov tied to Ivasa and Sergei Pavlovich well didn't stop Sergei he uh he got a decision win I think he's a live dog too like look I'm going with Cyril no doubt about it but he's been out for a long time Volkov looks like a different fighter he's an incredibly awkward dude like the size of Volkov alone so hard to get around right or something like that yeah when he gets that jab going it's just a nightmare to deal with i've seen him just jab the face off dudes it can be horrific and of course we know that cyril likes that style of fight at distance coming in and out very very slick i think that's a really really interesting fight too um we need to talk about chuck's record here i'll shout out

you thank you thank you just real real quick tangent before we glaze Chuck for like five minutes at least five at least five among like the ranks of former Bellator champions who we don't consider former Bellator champions is Alexander Volkov number one because I feel like no one at all thinks of that guy as a former

Bellator champion because like when we talk about these guys we always qualify for that Michael Chandler three time former Bellator champion even like when we talk about these guys, we always qualify. That never crosses my mind. Michael Chandler, three-time former Bellator champion. Even Eddie Alvarez, who became UFC champion. Former Bellator champ. We always just qualify with these type of things. It feels as if no one knows that Volkov was a former Bellator champ.

But I can't think of a similar comparison to that just in the way that we sort of see them. Yeah, that's a really good point. Yeah. As soon as you said that, I was like, oh like oh shit yeah i didn't even think about it myself i swear i hadn't thought about that in a long ass time so like that tells you right there like you just kind of forget but he's he's had a ton of fights and this is you know the best i would say that this is the best he's looked right over because he's won one he's won the four in a row but he would kind of have these

hiccups or he would let down his guard. The Lewis fight back when that happened where at the very end, you know, he gets clobbered and, you know, snatches defeat from the jaws of victory type thing. I feel like he's put it all together. So it is an interesting point. And it almost feels like the Bellator thing was such a different lifetime ago for a guy like that, because I think he's evolved and everything else, but it is a crazy thing that you mentioned that. Cause I, I have not thought of him that way since,

you know, three or four years ago. It's been a long time. Yeah. That was the Bjorn Remney era. Like he is a relic. He has been around this game for so long. And like we said,

like he is now sort of becoming, coming into his own, right? Like reaching his final form. It's, it's heavyweight such a different beast than the rest of these you guys uh see the word mexico every time you say beyond revenue i still see it mexico yeah i still see that yeah it's gonna be good it's a

rematch of course gone uh he beat him back in 2021 uh can't wait for john jones versus zero gone too i know that's what i'm saying that's what I'm saying. That's what I'm saying. He's got a new haircut as well, Volkov, which should be noted. A far more floppier kind of thing going on. A bit of an overlap, I've noticed. And we've got to remember, too, and this is something that's swept under the carpet. Not swept under the carpet. Something that's forgotten about the Aspinall fight.

And not that the fight would have went different. You know I'm a big Aspinall mark. But that was when Russia was basically closed off do you remember the adventure he had to go on to get to london that time it was crazy that's right yeah he went through eight different countries to get to london like by the time he hit the media day we were like how did you get here and he's like honestly man i don't actually know uh what what way i went to get here because he's just like on different flights. Some people would take him.

Some countries would take them in. Some people wouldn't. Absolutely insane stuff. Are we going to get to the Mendenhall Glaze? No, probably not. Because Sean's probably like, no, no, let's address this other thing first. He's going to try to avoid it. Let me set this up here.

So Al Shadi, our fearless editor fearless editor at one crown we all do the pics there's about eight of us maybe 10 of us how many of us are doing the pics i'll shoddy about i don't know i don't have an answer for that anyway you were going to see the graphic in a second anyway um and he said to us really it's just one guy and a bunch of duds if we're saying what it is but this is insane how. How dare you speak about Mysterious Frank in that way? 12-0. His record's like four and eight or something. Only man with a losing record on the set.

Mysterious Frank. The difference between first place and second to last place is minimal compared to the difference between second to last place in Frank. It's wild. I respect it. You get your roses here, man. If anyone's gambling, form would say, go with whatever Mendenhall is putting down on paper it's been this way for years yeah i don't know if you

heard what alshadi said to me about this he said you know he's definitely gonna slip up soon he can't keep this perfect record going i did say that with that said jordan let's have a look at these picks here because the man with the golden hand, what is he going for here? This is incredible. Gentlemen, start your parlays. Here they are right here. This is incredible. We have some very different picks here, Chuck, as well, I must say.

I, for some reason, cannot get this graphic. I cannot see this. I'll try my best. I'll have to get nice and close. But where... Chuck, bend chuck benden i'm sorry boys do you just do you not know how to pin one of the zoom tabs you know i don't know how to pin this you don't know i've pinned it but it's not big enough but anyway chuck mendenhall 12 and 0 who's he going with he is going with in the main event pantoja in the co-main event he's going with Rachmanov

that's right he's he's going with Gann he's going with Mitchell and he's going with Landwehr your face is so close to the computer people can't see how close to your face I think I have the graphic on my phone that I'm gonna have to go to instead of this interesting oh man I've picked different to you I'm I'm 10 and 2 i think it's a respectable where did you differ here i can't i can't see the graphic it's like a tiny little box now everyone can't see the graphic okay so let's not you know what i mean it's not just me i shouldn't have said that we can't i shouldn't have said that now go ahead but tell me tell me where you differ on this well i went for a vibe selection in the main event and Okay. Pure vibes. That's hipster stuff. What else?

I'm actually using your theory here, Chuck. Everybody is saying Pantoja. As soon as you say, as soon as you start talking about this guy, is this the guy the greatest? Is this guy the most underrated? Shouldn't we all just love this guy more? Is Pantoja in that space? I guess he is.

People are not saying, is he the greatest right like that's not an actual conversation well they're saying where does he where does he rank in the pantheon i'd say a lot of people saying things like he's a pretty good flyweight you know no i'm kidding they are they're giving him more praise it's somewhere in the middle of what we're talking about they're giving them below they're arguing should he be just below demetrius right that that is the conversation like Is he the next in line under Demetrius as Floyd Wade grates? Alshaddy disagrees with this immediately.

I've noted that. No, I mean, I think there's a conversation there. I think he's the only guy to defend the belt twice outside of DJ, right? Like, I don't think anyone, I think, what's he had, 11 fights? I mean, Figueiredo had two over the course of the the reigns, but he had like so many breakups in between. But he had the win and then a draw with Moreno, right? Yeah. It's a defense.

Yeah. It's a defense. Not wins though. Right. We like wins here. Pantoja wins. Right. I'm giving him the edge.

But I have gone for Asakura here. Saying all of that. I know. He's great things about him. I've gone for Asakura. It's going to be huge. It's going to be a lot to overcome. Like he's, he looked big already.

I'm like, he's just, he's going to be huge in there. He's like five foot eight. I know. For a flyweight. That's. Yeah. It's insane. Now I could nearly see his beating heart while he was on the scales.

To be honest. He looked like a white walker or something. But yeah, so I've gone for him and I've gone for Choi against Landwehr, which I think I'm regretting. Again, just a massive Choi fight. That was the hardest one for me. Yeah, DeLong is very close as well, isn't it? I kind of went back and forth on that one, but there's like everything that Sean just detailed.

I was like, that was the reason I was like, nah, I'm not going to pick against Landwehr in this fight. I just feel like he'll be willing to die especially at the the curtain they call it the curtain jerker when they the first fight they want to set the yeah they want to set the table for the rest of the night i feel like he's gonna he's gonna be bringing the fireworks y'all silly y'all silly i see nate land where i pick nate land where easy it took me two seconds tell me what you i where, what, do you differ from Chokoro here?

What are your picks, Salchati? I mean, I don't know that I differ very far. It feels like a lot of us were pretty, you know,

aligned with a lot of these, these picks, right? The one that was most difficult for me was honestly the main event. Because, like,

Kai Asakura is a mystery man for a lot of people, but I don't know. I've really enjoyed him for a long time. Like he's a very violent man and he took, he took like very good use or he applied very good use of the Japanese skillset or I'd say rule set in terms of, you know,

the, the allowances that allow to allow with grounded knees, stomps, soccer kicks, things like that, like that man supremely violent with his knees and kicks in that respect. So like,

he's a little bit hamstrung over here with the Western Western rule set, but man, I am just so fascinated with what he could become if he becomes this guy. Because again, I said it at the top of the show, like we just really do not fathom how popular this man is in, in, in over in Japan. Like if you look at his YouTube channel or his brother's YouTube channel, his brother's YouTube channel is even bigger than his YouTube channel. He's almost like the Jake Paul to his brother's Logan Paul in that sense, where like, he's the, he's the less famous brother,

but he's probably the more successful brother just in terms of the fight game. Our own Drake Riggs wrote a phenomenal piece, essentially detailing this week of like, who is Kai Asakura and like his road and things like that. Like there is not a fighter with a social presence that sort of matches Kai Asakura in like championship contention right now in the UFC, just in the sense of like the level of following and like

people paying attention to this guy. Like we just don't see it because it's not in our purview, but man, like the UFC has been trying to unlock, maybe not even trying. They've kind of been like leaving Japan, the Japanese market alone for 31 years. There's been intermittent moments where they're like, Hey, we'll, we'll try to do something here. But for the most part, they've kind of just acquiesced that to Pride or Ryzen or whoever, you know, ends up being the dominant scene,

promotion in the scene over there. If Kai Asakura comes in here and captures a UFC title, and all of a sudden that guy, that is the guy who is sort of your first Japanese champion ever in 31 years, I think the ceiling for what that could become for the UFC and the way that market could open up is immense. And really, I feel like we don't begin to fathom

what that could mean for the sport, for the UFC, for all of it. So that fight, to me, was incredibly difficult to pick because there is so much riding on the line in this fight that almost is flying under the radar. That historical context, which still stands to this day. i remember doing a feature for fight magazine back in the day that was uh how japanese fighters have fared basically when they come over on u.s soil and fighting the ufc and it was atrocious like they were the record was horrible like uh this is and you know even not even just there but just what you know, Yushin Okami, who got a title shot against Anderson Silva at UFC 134.

You had guys like Hatsuyuki, remember the Iron Broom, and Yurushi Tani, and the Fireball Kid. Like, you could go down the list of guys. Kawajiri, Kid Yamamoto. Yeah, there were all these dudes. How many guys came in here at the wrong moment? Yeah, they had all this hype and momentum, and somehow it just did not get over the hump. And I feel like this would be the weird moment? Yeah, they had all this hype and momentum, and somehow it just did not get over the hump.

And I feel like this would be the weird one, right, because he hasn't been in the UFC's flyweight division. If he comes over here, pulls off this upset, and I guess if you want to call it an upset, like you're saying, maybe people just aren't onto his prowess. But if he comes in here and wins it and becomes the first Japanese champion, I do feel like you're going to see a kind of crazy aftermath with that because it's been a long time people aren't acknowledging how big of a deal it is but i i agree with you i think it's a it's a huge deal

31 years and there's been japanese fighters sprinkled uh throughout the the whole time and we've never had a japanese champion so that is a big deal i mean it's not even like ufc specific either right because ben folks wrote a tremendous piece as well this week lots of good stuff on that is a big deal. I mean, it's not even like UFC specific either, right? Because Ben Fulks wrote a tremendous piece as well this week. Lots of good stuff on Uncrowned, by the way, great website. You should check it out. He wrote a tremendous piece on just like the history of Japanese fighters overall coming out West and just trying to succeed. And a big part of that was Shinya Aoki. If you remember back in the Strikeforce days, Shinya Aoki at that point in time was probably considered a top three non-UFC fighter in the world like he was on an absolute tear out in Japan and he comes over he fights Gilbert

Melendez in Strikeforce and Aoki himself had a great quote about this at the time of like this means a lot for my country if I come out here and lose Japanese MMA is essentially going to become another colony of you of the United States and obviously there's some tongue in cheek there to it but like he wasn't wrong in in some sense either right and in he that wasn't like he didn't perform well in that fight he never really found success out west here it's just there's a long lineage of all these great japanese fighters just really failing to make it uh in the western you know skill set western rule set just western promotion set it's very, I dunno, like Japan, Japan has such like a long lineage of, of mixed martial arts and martial arts history.

It's not something you would expect, but I think the idea of what this could be is very cool. Yeah. He's I feel like if he wins, it's going to be dramatic too. Like we we've seen that all of the seen all of the highlight reels. The UFC have done a great job of kind of putting that together

letting the fans know what we're about to witness with this guy. He's not a boring fighter. No. But at the same time when you so heavily put that weight

on his striking prowess you can clearly see what Pantoja can do to this guy. Like he knows how to cook dudes. Like he is so good at timing takedowns. He is so good at time and takedowns.

He is so good at wearing people out. As we said before, Asakura hasn't made this weight in a very, very long time. We know how draining weight cuts can be. I just feel as though like there's part of Pantoja watching this going, you know, this is an ideal situation for me in many ways. Like this guy, obviously very very tall i think that the height the height advantage that asakura has although it helps him in the strike and i think

it gives pantosia a lot more room to get underneath and take him down as well which i think we're definitely going to see at some point um it's a it's a strange thing by the way like you're pantosia now fighting for the second time a kind of left field contender earlier because he had Steve Irseg right last time we kind of had three fights and then he fights him in he kind of gets thrust into a main event in Brazil really showcased well I think he's he's got that dog and we were talking in our little round table that we did but I he's it seems to mean more to a guy like that it It's just there's something inside of him. And I remember the whole, you know, the thing with his father and that, just, you know, kind of glimpse into his emotional motivations

and stuff like that. It means a lot to him, you know? And I feel like when he kind of taps into that, he's a savage in there, man. So I think even though it's a weird setup, like he's fighting, now he's fighting a newcomer to the UFC. It's like nothing like you'd see um anywhere else in the ufc i think that this is a it's kind of a crazy eye-opening time for for pantosia and for him to really distinguish himself

but also like the peripheral sense of this too is very interesting to me because it pantosia very much seems like he understands this is no walkover like he he understands sort of like that what he's up against here and he did great detailed in his piece like he has put together a verse veritable avengers squad out there at att a former uh asakura opponents essentially to help him prepare for this whole entire camp kyoji horiguchi manel cop and uh i believe there was one more as well, Yuki Motoya. Three dudes who have fought Kai very recently were helping. A couple of them beat him too, so that's helpful. Yeah, both Manel and Horiguchi have beaten him recently.

So it's like the level of preparation and sort of just like access almost they have to his game is just, I'm so fascinated by this fight. It is such a difficult fight for me to pick, but it feels like the stakes are really there. I've got to say, you've also picked exactly like Chuck. Smart man. Very boring picks, I'd call them.

That's just me. That's just me. All of the favorites again. Alshadi, 9-3. No, but not last time. The last time I had a couple of underdogs, they just happened to come through. Yeah, you did.

All right. This time it is the favorites. I did acknowledge that. I was looking at it like, did we not praise you enough, they just happened to come through. Yeah, you did. All right. This time it is the favorites. I did acknowledge that. I was looking at it like, ah. Did we not praise you enough, Chuck? Did we not tell you how great you are and how unbelievable this was? One more lap around. So some of my process when I'm thinking, no, I'm just kidding.

Go ahead, guys. So Alshadi's nine and three, right? So he can catch. He's not bad. He can catch. I was trying to be fun with it, too. Like my first event, I kind of did some like vibe off the wall picks because I was was trying to be fun with it, too. Like, my first event, I kind of did some, like, vibe off the wall picks because I was just trying to be different.

And as soon as we all decided, like, we're doing records, it's like, okay, we'll have to take this seriously. Sean, we've been through this rodeo before. We used to do the locks with the man of the myth and all that. And I think I batted 1,000. I'm pretty sure. Yeah, when you pick in, like, Valentina. Oh, my lock is Valentina Shevchenko to beat Jessica Ai,

like, hey, great. She did beat her, go look it up. Two times I was on that show, he did pick the most obvious favorites every single time. A man of nudity is going to do it again. So look, you have got Pantoja, Rachmanov,

Gann, Mitchell, Landwehr. Now, I've opened myself up. I've picked two underdogs. I've picked Kai Asagora. I've picked Duhu Choi. But if these come true, lads, that means me and Shook will be head-to-head. That's what I think is going to happen here. That is what I think is going to happen here. Conor Brooks

also holding second place with me. He's a 10-2. Pantoja, Rachmanov, Gann, Gracie. Sorry, GC. and Landwehr. I think the last time Chrome Gracie fought a hoist was fighting alongside him like in UFC one wasn't it? That's it man those Gracies huh? Also I guess I guess this sort of like because this is the last pay-per-view of the year we're not going to have another pick series until January until 2025 I guess this is sort of for the title for the year yeah we started late but like we obviously should reset for the new year the

one we would have gotten some some clear i think balance on would have been the eval out fight right don't you think some people would have went sterling and so that would have been fun to kind of throw that one in you should have said something a couple days days ago. I'm a buck short of dealing now. Well, lads, before we move on, I just want to have a quick word from our partners, Averon. And let me tell you, I have visited Ariel Helwani's house and I have seen, he has this stuff everywhere, man. He is into this working out stuff.

I'm going to eventually get into it myself too. This exercise thing everyone's talking about, but Averon is absolutely quality. You're a unit, man. I've seen you in person. If you've seen the shows during the week, have you seen these competitions the lads are doing? They're absolutely incredible. The GoPro on the bike, I'm absolutely loving it. So with Averon, your workout routine shouldn't feel like a grind. That's why Averon makes exercise more fun and easier to stick to using gamification. That means you can actually play video games or watch different apps while you are using these machines. It's fantastic. Powered by their award-winning Averon World Software and

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quite a deal, my friends. That's A-V-I-R-O-N active.com slash uncrowned to end boring workouts. I need to get over there. New Year's coming up, man. This is the right time for that. I'm turning into quite a fatty and I need some Averon in my life. I will tell you that much, my friends. Can you still put your leg behind your head? I can't, man. The weight, like that was 15 kilos ago. So about 35 pounds ago. It's not happening anymore.

What are you talking about? I must have missed something. And if I do that right, the rig, the way it is here now, the great Andy has helped me rig this place out to make myself not look so translucent due to this Irish skin. But if I tried to do that now, I'm just going to basically kick over my whole set. So I'm not going to do that right now. We've got Elaine's lovely advent calendar she's made me here in the background too,

which has been fantastic. So I'll be opening them at some point. I'm actually opening the one today already, unfortunately. Would you go? I got a stress ball because I'm so stressed out all the time. I've got a little basketball hoop. I've got a bit of lip balm. I got these Santa Claus chocolates.

Can we see these? Look at those. Oh, look at that. And what else did I get? I got a face mask because, you know, you can't look this good by doing nothing, boys. You got to moisturize. You got to make sure those pores can breathe. I've gone off on a tangent.

Let's get back to these fights. I wanted to know. Real quick, real we get before we get to our next one yes uh again coming from the chat i can't get over this i need i need opinions uh pat dorgan saying shaheen is a dylan dennis lookalike and i can't get past it i don't know i've never heard that in my life do i look like dylan dennis whoever said who said that see i've been this is one of those unspoken weird elephants in the room for a long time, man. I feel, I feel mildly insulted.

He is offended. I've never heard that. He is angry, dude. I'm sure he is pissed. I've gotten a lot. I've gotten like Junior Dos Santos. I've gotten other ones.

That's not like super, eh, that's not flattering, but you know, whatever. I don't see it. But Dylan, I'm not,

I've never heard that. He's very upset with Dylan. He is very upset with that. Why don't see but dylan i'm not i've never heard that he's very upset with dylan he is very upset with that and you chew me i've actually seen i've been both around alshadi in person and danis in person nothing like each other uh in fact alshadi is a lot taller than danis damn straight more damn straight to Damn straight. To be fair, more ripped. And yeah, but I will say. Also true. He is ripped.

Way cooler. Alshadi way cooler. Also true. That's like that land wear thing. I'm like, it's 50-50 on that one. But yeah, the rest

is. I wanted to know boys, did you see the moment that took over MMA internet yesterday? It starred one of your Danbury locals, Chuck Mendenhall, the great Alex Pereira and Jamal Hill.

The internet was ablaze last night with this. Offering the gloves, Jamal later did a video on his channel and he was kind of saying, well, I don't want to wear the gloves, but this isn't what this is about, I wanted to throw down right there. We'll get to a reaction to this in a second, Alshadi, all right? My God. A lot of people seem to think it's a bad look for Jamal Hill. I don't.

I'm open to interpretation. But Alshadi, you seem to feel very strongly about this. You don't think it's a bad look for Jamal Hill? In the interest of conversation, I don't think it's a bad look. I don't know how I feel about it. How do you feel? Well, no, no, I'm not going to gloss past it. I want to hear your explanation for how it's not.

Terrible, terrible. Because you're obviously walking over to the guy. It looks like Pareda is like, oh, how's it going, man? How are you? Yeah, he is. And then there's an element of aggression put in there by hill so prayer very casually throws these gloves at him and then suddenly the dynamic shifted i would say and i'm just basing off this video i looked at the reaction online and

it was a big l for jamal in terms of how the people reacted to this. I was just trying to say, I'll shout you up because I've been doing that throughout the show. If you haven't noticed, I just keep on throwing him the turd and going, here you go. Sign of a good host. So I wanted to do it again. But, you know, bad luck, I'd say. I listened to Jamal's comments on Air Jordan, sent them to me last night. He had a few things to say, but obviously he was saying that he said, we don't need gloves for this.

And then it was kind of like, we should get, I don't know if he was saying we should get paid for this as well. Your reaction anyway, Alshadi, now that I have bore my soul. When you, when you are like that guy, right? When you're the guy who's sort of been keeping this going, stoking this fire repeatedly, and then you are the one who starts this interaction by essentially walking over to him and being like, it ain't Twitter anymore, right? Or like whatever it was. It was something about like, this isn't Twitter.

That's right, yes. What are you doing? Like, just genuinely, like what was the goal there? Right? Because if the goal is to like start a thing you succeeded but then if you're not going to follow through with the thing you should have never started the thing because you know alex is going to follow through with the thing like alex has already beaten you my guy if pz if you and i have played you know 20 games of street

fighter and i'm 20 and oh against you which i would be regardless like and you're coming at me and you're coming at me and you're coming at me talking noise i'm gonna be like oh yeah let's just do it again i just beat you i don't care i'll do it again it's just like a bad like the game plan from the outset was very baffling to me but this is not like a first time thing for jamal right like he's his public relations uh strategy it's very puzzling to me yeah the place is going crazy on that last knockout and he's over there yawning you know what i'm like dude there's tone deaf and then there's like this other level of whatever the hell he's doing right now um it's if if i could really attribute a strategic

value to what he's doing you'd be like well sure you should plant the seeds that this fight needs to happen but i don't feel like it's hitting like that because I feel like he just looks like kind of a, he's hanging on to something that's not near. Like, it's really not in the discussion. People really aren't pining for this. You know what I mean? And I don't even feel like he kind of generated that kind of heat. So I think that's part of it.

You know, it's just, it's a bad look just because it feels like he's offbeat from whatever the popular consensus is as to what's happening right now in that division it doesn't feel like jamal actually should be in that position yeah it just feels like when i was watching it was like it just feels like as much as perera wins this guy is losing all the time right we keep on talking about perera keeps on having these effortless wins. And that's another one of them. Like he didn't actually do a whole lot there, right? Like he's training and this guy comes over and he's like, it's nearly like he's like, oh, perfect.

Here's the gloves. The perfect reaction, wasn't it? You know. It's like, come on. You want to do it? Let's do it. He can't put a foot on. He's so casually doing just like it doesn't even throw the gloves he just kind of like dumps them onto him just like all right bro let's hear we're literally in the spot where

we can do something about this it it just and look nobody's terrifying too man i've seen him over at glovers like i've seen him training over at glovers i i mean the dude doesn't play around i'm like he's everything is like he means it you know what I mean and I'm like I I don't know but I love his attitude that I think that's why he gets the W right like it's just his attitude is always like yeah sure why not let's do it yeah it's just the forethought there's no forethought in this man like again what was the best case scenario if this was your game plan like I'm gonna go here start noise but I'm not gonna follow through on it if anything does happen like what's the best case scenario for you?

You're just going to kind of come out looking silly. Like, six months ago or four months ago or whenever it was, like, this man made you, like, a forever meme with that knockout. And then the following ensuing reaction. And then, like, ever since then, it's just, like, everything we've seen from him, just like, oh, man, he wouldn't do it again.

It was a fluke. Like, I'd get him next time. And it's like, there's no demand for this fight no one's out here calling for jamal hill versus alex perera too and especially not now like the idea that like oh all press is good press and you know now you're keeping your name in the headlines with this guy like i don't know does anybody is anybody more interested in that rematch now than they were yesterday no because i wouldn't be surprised if nevada issues a six-month suspension for knockout, even though he didn't even throw a punch this time.

Jesus Christ. That's brilliant. That's brilliant. Yeah, and it's also like, you know, like I can remember before Pereira got, like he debuted in the UFC, there was videos of aspiring footage going around all the time.

And as you said, Chuck, like the way he goes at dudes, you even see him showing up in random schools, right? This guy's traveling the world. We've seen all these airport receptions. He gets everything like that. And he'll just match the level of intensity that that's brought to him. And it doesn't seem to bother him.

If the guy is like 20 years of age or whatever, he's like, Oh, you got me with a good one. We are now fighting. And the, the switch that goes off in him, you see it. like you can see

it he goes into like kill mode during sparring sessions absolutely crazy one of those idiots is like hey kick me with your full force he's like okay yeah but what i was trying to get to is like even if he had one of those sparring sessions with jamal hill and he and he like he wrecked him again i still don't think he could win more than he won just off of this footage that's my like i think it's just it's too perfect right everything is just perfect this guy does and i get it i just don't get it like do you think alex is not gonna call your bluff like if this is a bluff do you think he's not gonna like obviously he's going to i mean everybody right now everybody within like a weight class,

like a weight class either way wants to fight Alex Pereira. Or if you want to, like, you know, if you want to, you just want to be in the biggest fight, which would be against Alex Pereira. So it just feels like out of all of those that you could circle that could potentially fight Alex Pereira right now, I'm not even sure Jamal would be in the top 10 maybe. I mean, it's just like, I'm not even sure Jamal would be in the top 10 maybe. I mean, it's just like, I'm not even sure I would pick him in the top 10.

You could have gone 20. You could have gone 20. I could have gone 20 maybe. I don't know. I'd have to really look at that. But yes, that's my point. So it just feels like it's kind of a forced thing. Yes.

Well, look lads, 310 just around the corner. An absolute pleasure to have you guys on the crack again. I love you both very, very much. And big thank you to our great sponsors, NordVPN and Averon. We had a great time with that today. Also tomorrow, make sure you're here on this channel because there will be a watch along.

There will be a post-fight show. Uncrowned and this channel, The Ari Lawani Show, going to keep on bringing you those hits. Thank again boys i love you very much thank you to oscar locef thank you to on air jordan thank you to mysterious frank thank you to everybody we will see you at ufc 310 with the lads with the watch along and then we're going to be reacting to it afterwards we'll see you tomorrow lots of love.