The Ariel Helwani Show - UFC 319 weigh-in & press conference reaction, Conor McGregor’s not cut, more | The Craic

Episode Date: August 15, 2025

With UFC 319 right around the corner, Petesy Carroll joins forces with Ben Fowlkes to break down the card’s biggest talking points.After reacting to the weigh-in results (7:23), they dive straight into the main event. Is this Khamzat Chimaev’s coronation, or are fans once again underestimating Dricus Du Plessis? The boys tackle it all (11:03).UFC 319’s co-main event, Lerone Murphy vs. Aaron Pico, is another intriguing matchup. Petesy and Ben debate whether UFC debut jitters could affect Pico and if Murphy is being overlooked as a betting underdog (28:14).Next, the duo break down their favorite matchups from the rest of the card, including Carlos Prates’ bid to get back in the win column against Geoff Neal (35:30) and Michael “Venom” Page’s move up to middleweight to face Jared Cannonier (38:28).Wrapping up the UFC 319 talk, Petesy and Ben share their official Uncrowned picks (44:28) before shifting to how the UFC–Paramount deal could impact fighter pay (47:52).To cap things off, Petesy and Ben react to the highly anticipated announcement of Paul Hughes vs. Usman Nurmagomedov (01:04:28) and the news that Conor McGregor is back in the testing pool (01:09:17).

Crackheads, it's Friday. It is a pay-per-view weekend. It is very, very exciting to be an MMA fan right now. My God, what a week in this wild, world, world sport, the broadcast deal. it's all out there. What's happening with these bonuses? What's happening with all this new revenue? We're going to talk about all of this later on. But of course, there happens to be a big fight happening in Shaitown. And my God, do they like them some Hans Achimov over there? He got a hero's ovation yesterday at that press conference. And DDP, on the other hand, not well liked in Chicago, you could say. And in fairness, not really an Aaron Pico town either by the sounds of things, and Lorone Murphy getting some love, I felt anyway.

It is an absolutely huge fight. I mean, we've been talking about this one since it started, since it was announced, DDP, the most unlikely hero of the middleweight division against Hamza Chimoyev, the guy we've been counting down to becoming a champion since July 2020. It is so, so interesting. Unfortunately today, my usual hatted friend is not here. He, you know, he has to take this vacation once a year, as we told you. guys last week, where he goes and picks out his head, picks out his hat, should I say,

for the next 12 months. And that's where he is today. But fear not. I mean, he's been missing a few weeks here and there, but this man who has just been nominated for journalists of the year, and no, I'm not speaking about Arilewani. I'm speaking about the beautiful, the talented. Mr. Ben folks is here with me to break it all down. Ben, folks. How are you, sir? I'm doing great. I really feel like this is my year on the journalist of the year. All I need is to develop some sophisticated hacking skills, stuff the ballot

box, and finally, it will finally be the year that someone other than Ariel Helwani wins. At what point does he have to just, we call it the Ariel Helwani Award. He removes himself from the running. Because no one but him has ever

won, have they? No, it's incredible. If someone win the first one, no. I don't think so, right? No, I think I'm wrong about this. Yeah, this has been my idea for a long time. If they just name it after him, then, you know, it's always there. The Ariel Hawani journalist of the year, he gets it every year, essentially, right? This is the move if you were at the MMA Awards.

But what I think is, like, you know, they want the big ones out there. You know, they won further of the year sharing out these nominations. Of course, they want the man with the biggest following in MMA media, sharing this stuff out and being like, yeah, I'm still the man, baby. You know what I'm saying? I'll just say this to anybody listening to the sound of my voice right now. I'm going to look right at you when I say it. If you don't go over there and vote for uncrowned as the best media source of the year,

you're dead to me. You hear me? You're dead to me. Don't ever ask me for anything. Don't ever come up to me in the streets. Oh, Ben, my kid's sick. Can you give to our go fund me? No.

Not if you don't vote for unground media source of the year. Come on. You know we deserve it. You know that in your heart. look in your heart you know that this is true we're keeping this whole fucking shit alive to be honest with you you know like we don't need to go off at a tangent here but i mean who else is doing this shit out here you know what i mean it's crazy it's crazy what we've been doing and shout out to the great sheen al shuddy who's enjoying a bit of a vacay this week and thank you

definitely definitely and thank you you've been editing all my beautiful words have you been inspired by what you've seen i love i love editing your stuff for the same reason that i love these conversations with you because I know every time I'm going to hear or encounter a phrase where I'm just like, I feel like through context, I kind of know what that means, but I've never heard this ever in my life. Spanner in the Works was a new one there for me. It's just there's always something, always something to appreciate and to learn, frankly. And I enjoy that. I'm glad though you mentioned at the top of the show, because I was just writing something

about watching that press conference, the USC 319 press conference, and poor DDP, man, he shows up and they just showered him with booze. He got about five or six words into his first answer to the first question and they shut him down with booze. And you could see the look on his face.

Like he rolled with it after that, but there's a good three to five seconds when they start booing him where you can see a look on his face where he's just like, what did I do? What the hell did I ever do to the city of Chicago. And what the hell did Hamzaa Chmai have ever do for you people?

They were just all in for Hamza and just hating on DDP. And you could just see that he was just kind of like, I am the champion, you guys. I didn't, I don't deserve this. And I felt sorry for the man, honestly. Man, it's crazy. And we do. We'll have the footage to show you guys this later.

We should probably start with the wayans. But I mean, I am completely captivated by this dynamic as well, Ben, to be honest with you and I will I do want to talk about it later but we do have a title fight um bit bit of a weird situation with the scales there today a lot of people jumping on like MVP needing the old box of shame but here is hamzat shimaev who was 183 um he certainly didn't think that he was going to be 183 based on his approach to the scales but uh quite a low way in for a man who struggles at times to get down or so we believe but look at this i mean he didn't let those Chicago booze dampen his spirits band. Look at how chipper the champion of the world is right here. He is having the time of his

life. Look at him. Amaciated, dehydrated, but a big smile. You got to love it. Well, yeah, I mean, you can see it in his face that, you know, that's a man who has cut weight, but he seems to have lots of energy, you know, he doesn't, we've seen people practically crawl up there and be trembling as their body is wondering where all the nutrients suddenly went. This guy, he looks, looks excited looks enthusiastic looks ready to fight i do like when you see some people like especially when they feel like maybe i'm gonna miss weight maybe i'm not and they will approach the scale as if like if i just step on it gingerly enough like like as if they're they're stepping out onto a raft you know in a swimming pool and they're just like ease on there everything will be

fine this guy just all smiles jumping right on there hitting the flex on you that's the guy's ready to fight man i'm telling you i think we're doing it to him again where we're all looking at this and being like all right here comes the underdog champion but he he's the last person to be convinced that he is not good at fighting that's a guy who seems like he's pretty confident headed into this oh absolutely absolutely and i think that is the big intriguing part of this for me it would be both so on brand for both of these fighters to win this fight right like so on brand for Drickus Duplessy to win it and also saw on brand for Shemoyov to come in and just destroy him within a minute and all of us be like well yeah this guy's pretty fucking good at fighting um before we move on

to break down this main event further we should mention and we don't have any video of this but um mr brown battle obviously has struggled with weight in the past and moved up to middleweight to avoid such issues uh for 319 came in four pounds over at 190 uh uh uh an unholy miss for his prelim bout. Not a good look for Brian. And we know, Ben, that the UFC, they don't take this shit lately. Especially if they lose the fight and we're right on the cusp, bro, of a, I think it is going out. I think there's discussions happening now.

I will actually check this as I'm talking to you guys. But the UFC can get really pissed off if things fall through at the 11th hour. Yeah. I mean, this fight, this fight card, I guess. The good news is it started with a ton of fights. It had like a big, big lineup here. And so you already lost a couple to injury earlier on this week. This one seems like from what I saw just floating around online,

seems like Brian Battle going to give up 30% of his purse. That's right. Yeah, I see that. But the fight will go on. And to me, I always think too, when they usually do the 30% of the purse, depending on the say, Athletic Commission maybe, but it's like 30% of the guy's show money. It ought to be 30% of the total purse Because if he goes out there and beats you

After showing up four pounds overweight Then you should get 30% of all his money Because like to soothe you a little bit for And to say thank you for taking the fight anyway When you didn't have to It is wild to miss weight at welterweight And be like, all right, learn my lesson Going up to middle way

Miss weight there too in the very next fight Back to back fights like that In different weight classes That's where we start just be like, hey, do we need to make a rule at home about no ice cream in the freezer? Do we need, like, what is it? You know, what's going on? Because I get it.

Hey, if that ice cream's in the freezer, I'm going to eat it. I know that about myself. And so I keep it, I'll make a rule for yourself, Brian, battle that the ice cream has to be an out of the house thing. You've got to make a special trip to get it. You have to run to get it, right? Yeah, you go on a 5K jog to get the ice cream. Yeah, it's crazy.

really insane situation like it must be awkward as fuck right like walking back after missing that way when everyone knows you've just moved away like oh how to go man you know whether they're at that rehydration table they've got fruit there

and water like do you even take do you even take a quarter of an orange after that or you just go you know what it's gonna fucking mosey on over here yeah because you know what people are going to be thinking if you're cracking open that PDA light everybody's going to be like well we know you didn't get that dehydrated man we don't know if you were in this

And I also think, shaking up there, you know? It's always a question, what do you do on the scales for your little pose when you miss weight? Because sometimes some guys will still, they'll still hit the double buys flex and you're like, no, no. Oh, no, you don't get to do that. Not after missing weight by a few pounds. And then other people just kind of like, we'll stand up there and make like the sad face kind of where there's like, hmm. Like you might as well at that point be just like shrugging in all the photos like, sorry, I'll do better next time, I guess. I think the sad face is the move, though, right?

Like, you know, take your pound of flesh, like, oh, maybe the shrug, I don't know. I think I'm going sad face if it's me. Obviously, I would be sad if I was topless in front of a room of photographers anyway. But I mean, if I missed, wait, it would make it so much worse. But, yeah, well, that's all the breaking news we have from the wayans. But it just so happens to be a very, very big fight here. And look, Ben, you mentioned it.

I mentioned it. The Chicago people are feeling some kind of way about this. And I believe we have some video footage. Andy is with us today on Air Jordan. Yeah, no, I can see it in the comments already. Yes, he is on vacation. Once again, Honor, Jordan has enjoyed sun holidays for the eighth time this year, which has ruled him out of producing the crack here.

But here it is. Get a load of the Chicago people and their reaction to this main event. Oh, Joe's going to go and fuck him up, bro. That's it. And for trickus, trickus, you said this week once again, you don't do this for the money, you don't do this for the fame, it is for the greatness. How fulfilling towards your greatness will beating this undefeated Challenger B on Saturday night? Absolutely everything, I mean, oh, here we go.

Let's see how long you can go this time, almost. You've already lost half your tubes, guys. You've already lost half the tubes. Oh, no, that's disappointing. America, come on. Let's hear the boom. Here we go. Yeah, there we go. Oh, no, short-lived, short-lived, I thought so, I thought so. This will mean to me exactly what it meant to beat every other guy before this. It's not about the opponent. It's not about who I face. It's about defending that belt every time somebody steps up to try and take it from me. That's all that matters to me.

Oh, Ben, just before we get into this, we've got some devastating news. On Air Jordan, from his son, Holliday, from his son, lounger has just contacted me to say, he sent me a tweet from Aaron Bronsetter, great journalist Aaron Bronsetter. Brian Battle v. Nerseltan Rizoboyev is off. The UFC 319 card per the promotion.

That ain't going to go well for Brian Battle, I don't feel. No, it won't. I think they still have like 12 fights on this car. So it's not, it's not as of like, you lost three this week. You lost this one. You lost the welterweight tough finale, which I'm sure was devastating news for both people who watched that season of tough and we're looking forward to that fight. You also lost King Green, his fight with Carl's Diego for the era.

That was crazy. Yeah. He said he couldn't walk. Yeah, he's in the Instagram video holding up his crutches saying he couldn't even walk. So, you know, that's a rough one for him. But yeah, you still have a very full night. of fights, so it won't be so bad. But yeah, they're not going to thank

Ryan Battle for doing that, certainly. The thing about this press conference video, for one thing, I guess I kind of get people being super into Hamzaa. You know, I didn't expect it maybe to that extent. When you step back, you go, all right, this guy

has all the pieces in play that MMA fans love, where he's just a super aggressive fighter, always talking about smashing people, goes out there, fights like, You know, he's double parked outside, and he's in a hurry. And they love that. They love, like, the confidence.

They love this, the sort of menace that he seems to have. And he has felt like a champ in waiting for a long time. So I guess I get it. People being so hard on Drinkus, though, I guess, like, if you're saying that that's just because they're so into Hamzod, they're such Hamzot fans that they have to turn around and hate on Drickas. Because you're just like, I don't understand. Hey, he seems so unoffensive. as a champion, you know, he's not out here hitting pregnant ladies with his car, he's not out here getting arrested for sexual assault, he's not doing any of that stuff. And don't you have

to feel some, I don't want to say pity, but some kind of like way about the fact that he's the champ who is most consistently discounted in this sport. Every single time he shows up to fight, we go, all right, he won't be able to keep this up anymore. We've seen him. He looks awkward. He, he, he's not good. This is kind of, this got to be the time where he gets exposed. And then he doesn't, he wins it. And we turn right around and we go, okay, but the next one. The next one is the one where he's exposed.

And we're doing it here. It's like, imagine if after all this, he goes out there and he wins that. Imagine, like, will that finally be it? Will it finally be the point where people have to give him his respect, do you think? I think it will. But I also think it's interesting how. I think when Hamzaa first came in, we were kind of like, this guy looks like a bond villain. You know, if you were casting like a bond villain, this guy is perfect.

He speaks. He seems like a, he seems like the wario to Habibh's Mario nearly. You know, like he's the evil one. He doesn't really have the same charm. But what I'd make the case for now, and especially after seeing that image of the booze coming down on Drikas at this press conference, he doesn't look it he looks like a superhero some kind of Drix Duplessi

but is he the greatest supervillain in the UFC right now because look at what he's done this guy that nobody is expected to come along and do what he's done look at the guys he's beat it's like all fan favorites like Sean Strickland was beloved he's beat him twice

Israel Adesania was beloved by a lot of people too he beat him seemingly in a round where it looked like things were going very bad actually. I can remember Israel Adestania, a beautiful takedown stuff at the very start of this round goes on to beat him. You have Whitaker, who everyone, exactly like you were saying just moments ago, everyone was like, well, this is the one, knocked him out cold. And even the Darren Till fight, when Darren Till pulled this amazing second round out of nowhere, after being really battered for the

majority of the first round, pulls an amazing second round out of Azars. And you're kind of like, well, this is going Till's way. Till is all the momentum. He comes along and crushes his soul. Drick is too plesi, even though he doesn't look like a bond villain, for me, is the biggest supervillian in the UFC right now? Is that too far, Ben? I've gone too far with that. I don't know, you know, it is crazy. I guess you could do it to his record if you wanted to, the thing we love to do, where you go back through the winds and you go, okay, these aren't actually impressive. Israel, Asana, we, you know, he was past his prime. We see that now. Robert Whitaker also seems to be on the downslope of his career.

You beat Sean Strickland. The first one was debatable. The second one was not. But also, we were never all sold on Sean Strickland as the middleweight champ anyway. But if you win this one, if you win the Hamzot one, there's not a damn thing anybody can say to take that one away because he comes into this feeling like a ton of momentum, a runaway for a train. Everybody is already right there, ready to celebrate Hamzot as the middleweight.

champion. If you shut that guy down, come the first person to beat him, stop all that momentum. Everybody just has to shut up and give you a respect at that point, I think. Like, you will have basically done a speed run through the ranks of anybody we thought mattered

at middleweight over the last 10 years. And that, I think, the fact that people seem like eager to boo him, I guess is surprising, but maybe not the worst news for you. Because it's like, if they felt totally indifferent to you, that would be bad.

The fact that they're ready to boo you and that, you know, he knew how to roll it a little bit where he's just like, come on, America, you know, like, let's see, let's see how enthusiastic you can get for hating on me. That's the only thing you can do there. But it is surprising to me that people are just like, how do you show up with a negative opinion of that guy? Honestly, the worst thing, I guess, that I thought people would feel about him is, We feel like he's gotten away with something.

We feel like he's not as good as the record suggests that he is. And he doesn't look as good in moments in these fights. But it keeps working at some point. You have to just be like there's something to it. Even if it's not pretty, there's something to what he's doing. Absolutely. But like even, right, if we're talking about his record, if you were playing the MMA math game, what middle, middleweight win has Shemoyev got that you could put against

DDP's body of worker he's beat Usman he's beat Whitaker obviously in dramatic dramatic fashion I think if you go but I'm just trying to take a quick look here John Phillips and Jared Mearshert

like I mean it's if we're playing the MMA math game I think DDP is out on his own here but you're right in everything you're saying in that this whole week feels like a coronation moment for Hamza and it's always such a weird situation When you've got a champion, like we're mentioning here, DDP is doing great things, although people aren't expecting him to do great things.

But here comes a challenge of where I'm is like, ah, he's going to do this. You know, it does feel everything about this week. I even put myself through the embeddeds to prepare myself for this episode. That's right. That's commitment, guys. Yeah. Watching all those haircuts, watching everybody get their bags from baggage claim. Man.

I mean, I always asked Ariel could be, please make a segment of the Ariel Oani show. where I just kind of give everyone get up to date on Embedded with Peecey Carroll. It's just like, you know, at 30 second, this is what happened on the latest episode. He doesn't like it, but you mentioned Pizzi watches embedded so you don't have to. Yeah, and I'll be like, this guy got his haircut,

this guy was packing his bag, this is what he packed, here's someone at the P.I. You know, it's all great stuff. I could maybe even zoom in and see what the refreshment tables are like at the various media obligations. Oh, yeah, the signing the poster guy, well. That's a very important person. That was it. That was featured in the episodes.

You mentioned haircuts. Our great audio producer, Oscar Loseva, said there is a conspiracy theory going around online because Shemoyev is bald and it's a different beast apparently. Remember we used to do this with Conn McGregor as well? Oh, the Mohawk is back. This means something. Oh, his beard is here. This is also very significant. Are you more afraid of Hamzat Shemoyev when he's bald or when he has hair. I mean, I don't think you want to see that guy anytime no matter what what the hair situation is. Like you see that guy coming down the street like just a look that like his he has like

resting malice face where he always looks like he is ready to do something terrible to you and doesn't even necessarily need a reason. So I think honestly totally bald and big bushy beard, that's that's kind of a carry combo on anyone that'll make almost anyone look tough and he already looks tough and seems tough so yeah there's there's maybe something to that it is a resplendent beard you got to look at it's it's just like that's a beard that there must i know he's a tough guy there must be product involved somehow there's no way you walk out looking like that that's not a just woke up kind a beard. That is a man who has put some thought and effort into this beard. He may never admit it. We may

never get to find out what beard moisturizer he uses or something. But that's a guy who gave some thought to this. I think it's not only an oil. I think there's, I think there's some hairspray in there, dude. Because the volume, I mean, it's just not, you're not getting that naturally. You know what I mean? It has a fade. His beard has a fade. That's incredible stuff right there. That's a guy who knew, like, all right, I'm getting ready for my big close-up moment on TV. I want to make sure I get right, beard-wise. And, you know, it's not, I guess, surprising that MMA fans have gotten all on board for Homsak. Because we were having this conversation.

And I saw you got you and Chuck having this conversation in your roundtable article this week where you're just like, does the UFC have a preference here? I think you come out of that press conference. And if there was any doubt, the UFC is definitely going, we might like to see Humzot win. People seem all into the idea of Hamzat. So if that guy's the champion, we can do some business here. Is it making you, because I've noticed at the start of this show,

you're talking a lot about, you know, if he does this, if this guy does it this time, you know, why aren't you guys watching, he keeps doing it? This might be a, it appears to be his most stringent test, is most, you know, a guy at the peak of his power is kind of test compared to some of the others. Is this making you feel differently than the masses in Chicago, everything you've seen this week, Ben, and I know you love embedded on the rest of it? You know, what makes me, I still maintain, if you want to be a person who doubts Hamzaat,

like if you want to pick against Hamzaa, the thing you can always say is, if the other guy gets out of the first round, we're going to have a different fight. That's a Menlo. That's a Menlo right there. That is a Manzanol classic. I said it when he fought Robert Whitaker, and I still maintained that for all anybody knows I was right. You know, I guess it's like, you go out there against this guy. Somebody posted this thing and I retweeted it this week where it was a compilation of the first like 10 seconds or so of every Hamza fight in the UFC so far. And they, except for the one where he knocks out Gerald Muirchart, it's, they all look shockingly similar. It's walk out to the center of the cage, maybe touch gloves, and then boom, take down to

like shooting in and shooting in sometimes from far away, not a whole lot of setup, not a long feeling out period, just like, look, you know what I came to do. I don't need to mess around. Let's get to it. And he fights at that pace so intensely for the first round. But when we've seen people who can get past that, who just are not overwhelmed by it, who don't get caught in that, like, the roiling sea that he creates for you where he is just constantly attacking and you're constantly defending and you find yourself just gradually sinking and drowning, if you can get through that phase, he does, from what we've seen when that the few times it's happened, start to slow down. He starts to turn into a different fighter. We also know that if he can't get you out of there early and can't wrestle.

you in the first round en route to a submission you get later in those fights like we saw in that gilbert burns fight if you can call him into a brawl he will answer that call even if it's not a good idea for him even if it's not his best chance to win he he cannot resist that i think and so if i'm dricus man i got to see round three i got to don't even worry about winning rounds one and two get through those make it you know make him work we know dricus is the the guy you who looks the most tired but somehow does not seem genuinely tired. It's incredible how he does it because you see him in some of those those fights when the pace is really high and you're going, no way.

There's no way this dude can last. He's going to gas out any moment. He looks stiff. He's moving like a guy who's tired. And then 10 minutes later, it's flipped. He is still going, still looking awkward, but still going. And the other guy is looking tired. Like if he can get into later rounds against Hamza, I think.

that it becomes a completely different fight. Yeah, it is one of his great superpowers. Like, I often think that DDP looks tired after round one. Yeah, like, genuinely, I'm like, he is gassed. Like, this is not going well. And I can remember I was re-watching his fights this week, and it was a part, I can't remember what fight it was, but it's like, one of the commentators is correcting Bisping.

And he's like, Bisping, he told me to tell you. He can't breathe through his nose, so his mouth's going to be open in the first two minutes. Like, you know what I mean? So he's breathing, like, he's fighting it looks crazy but he's always in there as I said

there are so many examples of this I think the Adasania fight is a great example of a guy looking like he is spent Adesania looking like he's in the ascendancy

in that fourth round where he stopped at the very start of that round he stuffs a takedown DDP gets up and he just looks all right well that was my big that was my big shot

and Adasania suddenly starts chewing him up and you're like there's no way this is going to go well for DDP and two minutes later he's submitting him and the same again with the Till fight

Till had a horrific first round came out, had a lot of success with kicks to the leg with his big beautiful left hand that he throws that backhand and you're suddenly thinking DDP this is not looking good for you comes out in the third round and just demolishes him so it is something

that is very unique to him I can't remember seeing that in any other fighter where it's like this guy is completely spent but you can pull it out of his arse it's unbelievable and cannot wait for the fight But there are other fights on this card on. The co-main event stars Aaron Pico. And Aaron Pico has had one of those careers that has been under the microscope since day one.

I still remember Zach Freeman with that guillotine choke in his debut. And suddenly Freeman is like, you know, on Ariel's show. This guy who was kind of brought in as fodder against Aaron Pico. He has lost to Henry Corales. He's lost to Adam Barks. He lost, there was a shoulder injury. Jeremy Kennedy, he lost via shoulder injury. he is the favorite going into this fight.

We have talked a lot about whether we are sleeping on DDP or not. Are we sleeping on Manchester's own, Lorone Murphy, Ben, folks, given that, as I've mentioned, he has lost to these different guys. I know he is a very highly-tailed prospect. He looks absolutely tremendous at the height of his power as Aaron Pico, but Lorraine Murphy, Roan Murphy's looked pretty fucking good since he's been in the UFC. Yes, and I think stylistically he could present some problems for Aaron Pico,

because Aaron Pico will fight really aggressively. And Lorone Murphy seems like the kind of fighter who has a style made to deal with that, made to frustrate that. And I would be lying if I said I was not partially influenced by the recent history of how, like, the Bellator PFL transplants have done in their first fight in the UFC. Because you don't want to put that on Aaron Pico in a way. He's not those other guys. Those other guys aren't him. Also, you know, guys like Pitbull come in much older than him, much later in their careers. He's, you know, 28, I believe.

You look at him and you go, all right, this seems like a guy making the move at the right time. And yet we've seen people just look bad in their first UFC fight, even when they have experience in some of the other big shows. We've just seen people, like, let's say this, we've seen very few people who look to be their best self in their first UFC fight coming over. And I think it's already a tough matchup, already tough stylistic matchup for him against Lerone Murphy. You add that on top of it. I could very easily see Lerone Murphy probably went in its decision in this one. And that wouldn't mean that Aaron Pico sucks or that Aaron Pico is not going to turn into something in the UFC. I could just see this one being the one he loses.

It's a baptism of fur, and I know Evluf was probably a tougher fight in that, you know, their boat extremely good wrestlers. but, you know, Lorone was one of these guys and it happens very rarely and it usually happens when a guy doesn't go about the conventional way of building themselves through the European market. Like they don't go through a cage warriors. We've had Bama back in the day, things like this.

He came up through Manchester top team and Carl Prince has done a uniquely very impressive job of building his fighters in unconventional ways like Lewis McGillan is another Dakota Ditchva. These people were never on cage warriors which everyone thinks you must go through age warriors, if you're from the UK or Ireland, to get to the big dance, to get to the UFC. When Lerone was handed his debut, it was that Habib v. Porriot card in Abu Dhabi.

And of course, everybody wants to talk to him because I hear this amazing story about how he's been shot in the face. He's still here. Of course, Lauren hates that fucking story. He is the miracle, of course. But having to say it every time you're interviewed for a decade, must get tiresome. His debut that day was Zubaira took hug off. Zubbara took hookoff, who was taking on Artem Loboff on this Hughes for Usman of Magum

off rematch card, but Suburba Tokugokov is a really good wrestler, and I can remember thinking, feel sorry for this kid from Manchester coming in and having to fight this guy. He did a brilliant job that night. Obviously, very hard to go and fight one of Habib's boys in Abu Dhabi.

He came away with a split draw, which was a tremendous result. He's obviously won every fight since then. But one thing I mentioned in the roundtable article that maybe a lot of people wouldn't be familiar with, and look, certainly a decade ago, Ben, And you'll know this.

There was a massive gap between particularly UK, Irish fighters and Americans and Russians when it came to wrestling. Like there was a huge gap there. That has been closing. And I think a big part of that is because a lot of, a lot of Dagestan guys are in the north of England. As we've seen with McCoyev, there also happens to be some of them in Manchester top team. One of them, Ibrahim, Ibrahim, Ibrahim, I hope, I can spell it. I can see it in my head. Ibrack him off. There we go. My God. He is a brilliant prospect. He is undefeated. He is in Carl Prince's

gym. He is a featherweight. His wrestling is unbelievable. He has taken down every opponent he's had. He dominates every opponent he's had via wrestling. And he's obviously going to be helping Lorraine Murphy prepare for this. I just feel as though he has shown us a lot now, man. And I think it's almost disrespectful. And I know Aaron Pico and I know I know how story he is and maybe I'll end up with egg all over my face, but God damn it, Lorone just feels like it's Leon Edwards all over again. And it's like, no matter where you put this guy, everyone's going to be like, oh, well, you know, I don't think he's that good.

And then he keeps winning. It's basically a DDP situation all over again, Ben, is what I'm trying to say. I also think there's a part of it where Aaron Pico is one of those guys that he brings a certain magic of potential that we get very excited about in this sport. When we see a guy show up, especially a guy show up at. a young age and we go, oh, wow, there's a lot to get excited about here. Where's the ceiling going to be? This guy seems like he is always just about to be great. You can only pull that off for so long, though, at a certain point, you get to the level where we go, all right, let's see it.

And I think this is, honestly, while it is a baptism by fire, it's a good test to see where you're at for Aaron Pico, because early on his career, it seemed like they at times undermatched him, you know, put him in these sort of squash matches where he's just going to run through people, but then overmatched him. Like, they kept overcorrecting too much in one direction or another. And it was, they kind of had to realize, like, all right, you're still dealing with a guy who's got like two pro fights, even if everybody's excited about him, you know, pump the brakes a little bit. But it's really hard on a guy who comes in like that because the expectations are so high, so early that we look at him fighting guys who make sense for a dude three, four,

five fights into his pro career to fight. But we also, since we have those high expectations, turn around and go, he hasn't fought anybody yet. And we just don't do that to people where we don't even learn about them until they're 12 and 1. Those people don't have to deal with those expectations. And to come in now with that on your shoulders, he's had some experience dealing with that, but it's going to be a different level in the UFC. And against Lorone Murphy, he was just like a tough guy, I think, for a lot of people to figure out. Aaron Pico fights so aggressively. I expect him to go right at Lauren Murphy early on.

But Murphy's got that kind of style, man, where I could see him managing the distance well, frustrating some of those Aaron Pico attacks, and the next thing you know, we're in round three. Maybe it's one round apiece, and Aaron Pico has spent the best stuff he had. I could easily see that being the outcome. Yeah, I'm speaking about potential, Ben. Carlos Pratchez is back after that fight against Ian Gary. How much has that

fight and just the opening four rounds of that fight he just looked like he could not figure Gary out and Gary deserves all the credit in the world for that. He is a very tricky guy. I mean I say this every time he fights everyone has trouble figuring this guy out. Yeah. Pratchez

certainly did that night. I know he had a great finish to the fight and I know a lot of people were giving Ian a hard time about how that finished up but this is a three round for you against Jeff Neal, who was a savage two, another man who has lost to Ian Machado Gary. But has it taken a bit of the luster off process for you, how we performed against Gary? Yeah, not really just because I feel like it's way more common that people struggle in that way against Gary than they don't. You know, we, like Chavcott, yeah,

he struggled, I thought a lot more than we expected him to against Ian Gary. I think a lot of us thought that he was just going to roll right through. He might have been dealing with some injury stuff going into it But I was surprised at how the Ian Gary style worked even on him And so at some point you got to just say like This is happening to enough people that it's not necessarily a knock on you That you couldn't figure this guy's style out inside the distance, you know And I think you come out of that team, a team that we're excited about the fighting nerves

We're ready to think anybody who comes out of the fighting nerves is going to be somebody, right? I love his absolute commitment to never stopping smoking. God bless him. I love that, because you know it's what people are going to say, especially when you lose a fight,

whether you lost it for anything to do with that, people are going to be like, this is what happened, you should quit smoking. And I loved when he was on Ariel's show and like the way he phrased it at one point was something like, yeah, I know I should stop smoking,

but I really enjoy it. That's so true. There's something about that. that I feel, God bless him. I want to see him somehow go out there, get a big win, and then just step right outside the arena, like, go right out of back door and stand by a dumpster in like a shallow yellow light or something

and light up a cigarette, take that first puff and just, man, enjoy the ecstasy of it. There's got to be nothing like for that guy, like a cigarette right after a win in the UFC, right? That's got to be a great. He's probably in the shower, in the locker room. with a darting hand just man really living his life and i i love that for him one of my favorite things ever is when he went in australia and he's up doing the press comments and they're

like oh so you know they'll ask him something about smoking out obviously and he's like oh yeah they're really expensive here do any of you have cigarettes like he got some cigarettes off the journalist there and he's like thanks so much out he goes he's a fucking legend you gotta love that shit. Um, when MVP was announced against Jared, uh, Jared, uh, I was like, oh, well, you know, this is a very different fucking story than, um, Sherrill Bullet. This is a very, very different story. And Canineer is 41. But I got to say, and he, and he, he is a charismatic guy and he's done this his whole career with me. MVP's winning me over this week, man. That man is glowing. He looks very excited. Even at a, I don't know if it was the

weighing scales, but I mean, he had to get the old hoop of shame out there to, to, even hit 186. I mean, have I been sleeping on MVP the middleweight? Perhaps I have. I'm definitely warming to the idea. Now, obviously, there is every, there is a good chance that Jared Cannonere just sprints at the guy and manhandles him to the ground. He is a savage too, but I got to say, I'm feeling a lot better about this fight than I did when it was announced Ben. Do I need to, to cool, to cool my optimism here? I don't think so. I, I, this is another one of those if fights where you go, if cannoneer can get his hands on the guy, if cannoneer can can can land clean or if he can just manage that distance well and get in there,

get where he wants to be against MVP, then you could absolutely see him winning it. But MVP is tough for a lot of people to figure out inside of three rounds, man. Like, it's just not enough time for a lot of people to even understand what is happening in there and figure out where he's going to be. Because especially it's just like, you get, give that guy so much room to work in a cage, you're never quite sure what he's going to throw at you. He's got so many different ways to attack you. And so you've got to respect that. You can't just go charging straight in on a guy like that. He's going to make you pay. But at the same time, if you sit back and let him start doing his stuff, then it's also hard

to win that. He's an expert at chipping away at people, winning these fights where you can see the other guy just getting frustrated and going, will you stand still? Will you just plant your feet on the floor and fight me for just 20 seconds? And he won't, you know, he's especially at this version of him. I think that he knows who he is. He's not trying to be something he's not. And he knows what kind of fight he excels in. And it's up to the other guy to force him into a different kind of fight.

And that's a lot harder than people think it is. Yeah. No, absolutely. The final one I want to touch on before we go, at Susser Koev, the new show. Shemoef, a teammate of Shemoef, he's trying to best that 10-day turnaround. I know, look, who am I to tell you? You're one of Contender Series' greatest ever coverage givers. I mean, you are locked into every single one of these things.

Road to UFC, Contender Series, that's Ben's beat. We always know, knows it inside out. Sousa Koev wins by a beautiful body kick K.O. On Tuesday night, four days later, he's on this card against Eric Nolan. Are you buying or selling? Are we in there? Is it getting the juices flown, Ben? I mean, let's say just for, for the sake of argument, say this guy did not train with Hamzat, say, you know, say this guy was just like a dude out of American top team and, and you, but you knew all the same things about him and about like what you'd seen of him, his record, his style, all that kind of stuff.

Would we be, would we be this sold on the guy this soon? Not even a little bit. not even a fucking little bit no one would be making the comparison the 10 day four day thing no it would mean nothing it would just water off a duck's back essentially I do think it's interesting when people make like a quick turnaround off a win

and I remember doing a story about it years back I mean like I think Chris Lieben had done something similar where he had won a big fight like on short notice he turned right around fill in another one and I was talking to some people Was it a Bistbing in Vanderlay or something didn't he beep Vandalee in that fight where he turned around real quick

Maybe it might have been around like the Akiyama fight that he had, but I remember talking to a few people who had done it and they were saying like that it's such a delicate balance because on one hand you got a ton of momentum and confidence. You just came out of that fight, especially if you didn't feel like you got hurt really, you feel pretty unscathed coming out of it. You feel unstoppable in a way. And a lot of people depending on how their mindset is just generally, the best thing for. them is to have a fight that they don't have a chance to overthink, that there's so little lead time for them to let anxiety get the best of them. I remember the late Robert Paulus was saying that once about Brian Carraway, where he was like, if you could have Brian Carraway just always in the gym training, and he doesn't know when he's going to fight, but you just pick him up, throw him in a

van, and drive him to the arena and be like, 15 minutes, you're on. He'd be undefeated. He'd be a world champion for sure you know and i've heard like the same thing people say the same thing about donald saroni where he you know uh gregg jacks used to say like if every fight were basically you come up to donald saroni in a bar and pour a beer in his lap and then go time you know he'd win them all it's having that time to think about it that where he gets in his own head about it and gets in his own way so like i can see how that's a benefit for some guys it also kind of depends though like that other the flip side of it people were saying is that you've been training and trying to get your body to peak for that time trying to get your body ready for the weight cut ready to turn

around and fight your body gets used to those rhythms and then you're disrupting that rhythm by turning right around after there's been like a little bit of a letdown and saying like all right do it again and your body may not be prepared for that and it may not react the way you think it is so like i do think that that's a little bit of a question too eric nolan looks pissed off that he's been asked to do this he looks pissed off the people are excited about this guy maybe he is the guy. Just stay in there. You know, if you can stay in there for a guy who was peaked earlier this week and is now trying to peak again, Lord knows what could happen. Bring up the picks, Andy, because we've got some picks here from the Uncrowned team. Connor

Brooks is leading the way. Then Drake Riggs, Mended Hall is there and myself and Benner, towards the end, to be honest with you. Pacing ourselves, just pacing ourselves to make a big run late in the year. Yeah, like a coiled spring. if you will. Just like a experienced race horse. Just kind of biding our time and then we're going to make a move. We're waiting for you guys to put more money on us so we can make you more money basically like these horses. That's what I was going there. Ben, you're a man of your fucking word. You've gone with DDP. I mean, he is swayed. Like I feel like I feel like we talked about this like eight weeks ago and we were kind of planting the seeds like, oh, this is going to be

the fucking one. You've shown the balls here. You've gone, do you know what? Fuck this. I'm gone with DDP. He's going to fucking win this fight. Is this one of your game playing situations where you're like, I need to start taking risks here? Or is this a belief situation? You know, I'm at a point in the picks thing where I'm not, I can't think about what anybody else is doing. I need to think about what I'm doing. And I also, I don't want to be out here all the time being like it's unfair the way people refuse to give DDP his respect. And then when it comes time to make a pick to be like, but I think he's going to get his ass kicked on Saturday. Like, I, I wouldn't feel good about doing that.

I need to put my money where my mouth is and be, and I can see it. I still maintain if, if you can get out of that first round, I think his chances go way up. I want to see, you know how you'll see, I'll love to show you the live odds at the start of a round or something

and see how they shifted. I'd love to see if we can get to round two to see what the live odds look like, to see if we see a big shift and, you know, especially if we get to round three or something, you know, and Hamza starts the slow. I really love to see that because I think that a lot of people have this in this ed where it's like, Hamzaat, terrified for three to five minutes. After that, starts to become a little more of a regular mortal man. So I feel somewhat comfortable picking DDP, although if Hamzat does go out there and two and a half minutes in, he's on DDP's back, flatten him out and is trying to crush his entire dental work, I'll be like, well, yeah, we knew that that was possible too.

well look we have only got uh we only we only have differing picks on that main event i've gone for shemoyev and then it is we have both gone for murphy we have both gone for pratchez we've both gone for mvp and we have both gone for kaias kore up at the top of the table connor brooks shemoyev arin pico carlos pratchez michael page and kaias akura and our hatted friend who was away shemoyev piko pratchis page and Asakura. You can check that out. We will be posting that on the uncrown socials.

And I'd love, I'd love to get, you know, a few back on all shoddy. I'd love to climb ahead of Mysterious Frank there. I mean, a perfect week last pay-per-view for Mysterious Frank has put him in this situation. So kudos to him. But we can't have this, Ben. We can't have Mysterious Frank ahead of us in this. I got to say, I don't, I don't feel super comfortable realizing that me and

Mysterious Frank are the only ones picking DDP. That does, it gives me a. moment of pause, honestly. He's coming off a perfect week though, remember that, remember that.

Look, there was some other news this week. I don't know if you're aware of this, Ben. Big time broadcast deal signed by the UFC.

7.7 of those billions, 1.1 billion per year going to the UFC. And I don't know if you heard this. And I'm sure

you're going to be very excited about it. The bonuses are going up. And we have some video of Dana White confirming us much. And the fighter pay stuff, obviously that's going to go up and the fighters are going to get money.

Do you guys look at that as a case-by-case contractual basis with each fighter? What's the question? I'm getting there. Do you look at it case-by-case with each fighter or do you go, right, we're going to... What was the first part of the question? Fighter pay? Fighter pay, yeah. So do you look at it as like case-by-case on each fighter, or do you go, right, we're just going to up the base pay and maybe up the bonuses?

How do you sort of figure out the fighter pay rising? Yeah, yeah, these are, listen, I'm not going to have any comments on that yet because we still got to get together and figure this stuff out. You know, it's August, we have till January to figure all that stuff. But, you know, the low-hanging fruit that's easy to answer, bonuses are obviously going up. So, you know, that'll be big. And forget about the tide rising with all the other fighters.

I mean, just the number that the bonuses bring to a fighter is. I've told a bit of a lie here because Ben actually definitely knows about this because he has a fantastic article up about this where he goes back in time and casts his mind back to various bonuses. Leonard Garcia being a key feature in this article that you've wrote about here. And you've also converted olden days money in the UFC bonus world to today's money. And correct me if I'm wrong, some of those maybe 10 year old bonus. that Garcia had would be worth up to about $110 in today's money.

Is that correct, Ben? $110,000. Yeah. Sorry, that's what I'm sorry. The, I mean, the interesting thing is that I kind of like Leonard Garcia in 2011 was making bonuses that even before you adjust for inflation, beat the hell out of the UFC bonuses that they've been given for like the last 10 years. And when you compare the UFC's profits and revenue now compared to 2011, it's a joke, man. Like, they're so much more profitable now. Even before this TV deal kicks in, the UFC that is given these guys $50,000 bonuses and making them feel grateful to have it is doing so much better than the UFC that was given people $70,000 bonuses that are worth, you know, $110 grand in today's money.

back when it was not doing nearly as well. And that is one way it makes it easy to manage fighters when it comes to fighter pay and keep it so that it does not ever become a real issue that the UFC has to address because you cycle people in and out of this sport so much and so fast that everybody is in the UFC now, hey, 50 grand, that's just what it is, man. They don't even question that. They don't even think about that. They're just like, how do I get my hands on that?

50K bonus, man. Even in my memory when I was thinking about Connor McGregor asking Dana for the money and it becomes like this iconic line. And in my memory, he's saying 50 Gs, Dana, like 50 G's baby. And then I go back and I watch the video. He's saying 60 Gs because that's what it was then. And again, it's like the UFC revenue today crushes. Not just like we're doing a little bit better. Absolutely crushes what the UFC was making then. And they've somehow gotten away with paying the fighters less than they were paying them then. And it's the fighters just kind of have rolled over and decided like, all right, that's just what it is. The question for me is when he says like, all right, obviously the bonuses are going up. Notice that when UFC signs

these deals, they got hard numbers. They know exactly what they're getting. When it comes to what the fighters are going to get from all this, it's we'll figure it out. You know, the same way John Morgan asked in this same press conference, what do you do for the guys who are champions who get points on the pay-per-view? And they have that in their contract. And that's big reason why. why they wanted to become champions in the first place. Now you're basically just taking that away from them and not giving them anything. Like, what do you have to do to compensate them so that the money still works out right for them?

And Dana White's answer was like, the smart kids in accounting will figure it out. And you're like, that ain't an answer, man. If I'm, if I'm DDP, if I'm one of these guys with the belt, if I'm I'm I'm I'm Elia Toporia, especially where I'm a star, I'm selling big pay per views and you're just being like, don't worry, man. The egg heads in accounting will figure out how to make your money right. I'm going, no, no, no. we're going to talk about this now.

We're going to talk about this before I put on another pair of gloves because you just took millions of dollars away from me and put it in your own pocket. How do we make that right? And the bonuses, the question is, how much of the bonuses go up by? If they don't at least double, it's a joke. They have to at least double to even just sort of like keep pace with inflation over the years. And even that, even doubling them to 100,000 each wouldn't really represent a true increase

to like be on par with you're getting a fair. or even close to fair portion of what you are making for the UFC. Like the number I threw around was just because it was the last time the bonuses went up was for UFC 300 when they gave 300 grand bonuses to everybody on the card or all four, you know, four bonuses. If you did that every card, four bonuses, 300 grand each, you get to 1.2 million. If you did that for, you know, 43 events, you get to 50-something million. I did the math.

It's in the column if people want to see. And people are going to look at that number, be like, that's insane. No way we're giving on 300 grand bonuses every time. No way we're giving that as some prelim guy on a UFC fight night. 50 million and just in bonuses over the year. It's crazy. It represents less than 5% of what the UFC is going to average out per year on this deal. Less than 5%.

And that's just this one TV deal. That's not ticket sales and site fees and sponsorships and international TV deals. It's just this one TV deal. deal and it's still less than 5% of it. They absolutely could afford to do it. I don't see them doing that. I think we probably end up, like, I wouldn't be surprised if we end up with 75 grand.

You know, like 75 grand, maybe you get to 100 grand. I don't think you get higher than that. And even that is, that fighters will rejoice at that and not realize that they're still getting screwed by that. Look, like you mentioned a pay-per-view thing.

Tom Asmel's on the show. Not a phone call. Like, you know, nothing like these guys who a substantial amount of their income is determined by pay-per-view boys not even a fucking phone call like I mean it's it's their own fault right

the fighters they're in this situation because they haven't collectively bargained like I mean it's literally a punch line now was talking about the idea of a union it's not it's not a real thing it doesn't feel like it's ever going to be a real thing and look the bonuses thing to me it's a lot of

bollocks because you get four of them per card. There's 24 fighters on a card. It doesn't matter to fuck if one person goes off with an extra 100,000 or whatever. I was kind of saying this on the show the other day. Most people, like,

up until recently, like recently being because of Contender Series has sped along careers to a way which I don't think is actually very good for regional scenes because they're taking these guys before they've made names for themselves, before promotions who need.

need to, who need, need regional names to make money to, to create like, scenes. Like, you know, there used to be a lot more scenes in MMA back in the day because these guys weren't rushed into these situations. It would get to the point where a McGregor in Ireland, people in the street are like shouting at Dana White. They're on social media. You don't get it anymore because lads are rushed in. But for the most part, like a few years ago, goes to be going to be working for 10 years before you got to the UFC. And then you get to the UFC and you're on 12 and 12. You're going to get three fights in the year. Well, apparently they're going to have you three fights in a year. If you lose those first two fights, you're gone. And then you've earned 24,000. You have to pay your

manager. You have to pay your coach. You have to pay the tax man. You're all out probably at about 10 grand. And your career is essentially over. Like, I think Ariel kind of said to me, like he thinks the middle, the middle kind of pay packets is why he's more concerned at guys who's, who've kind of proven the word, who've been there. Like, he believes that they should be bumped up to the point where, you know, they can make substantial money being in the UFC for a number of years. But I honestly feel like that base level, that really needs attention to because people working for a decade of the lives to walk away with 10 grand after two unsuccessful fights to me, it sickens my ass. Honestly, Ben, it makes me, it makes me feel very, very bad about

this sport. Because I've seen this happen to countless, countless fires. I know the fans, maybe even people in the comments, like, well, they aren't good enough. yeah, okay, I agree with you, but really you climb to the top of the mountain, the pinnacle of the sport, and you're walking away with like 10 grand after everyone's paid? I mean, that's fucking crazy. It is, but I agreed with what Ariel was saying there.

I watched that one, where he was saying, the starting pay in the UFC is not bad for combat sports. When you compare it to boxing, when you compare it to other MMA organizations, for what those guys bring, you know, if you're a guy debuting in the UFC, for the most part, you didn't sell a single ticket.

You didn't, nobody is turning on the TV to watch you. They haven't even heard of you, you know, and that's only increased now that, you know, we, there's so many shows, like you said, there's a lot less of a ramp up to the UFC. It used to be, we'd see a lot more guys debut in the UFC, and we already knew who they were because we'd been hearing about them and reading about them or seeing clips of them. And so we were excited and there were some anticipation. There's hardly any of that now, even with the contender series. There's very little of that.

Also, interesting to note that from the reports I've seen, this deal with Paramount does not include the Contender Series, Ultimate Fighter, Road to UFC, stuff like that, which, you know, shows that there's a little bit of, a little bit of retail up on the shelf. Discernment where Paramount was like, nah, we're good on that. We don't, you know. But I do think that it is, like, it's those guys where they've been in the UFC for seven, eight years sometimes. And they really do bring you something, whether the UFC wants to admit it or not. The UFC, I know loves to think of these guys as just interchangeable parts, but a lot of those guys, like a King Green type guy, he is, he allows you to fill out an undercard with someone that people have heard of. And they go, I know this guy. I know that he usually puts on exciting fights.

I know that he's worth tuning in for. And he individually might not be feeling like he's moving the needle a ton, but you have a stick. collection of those guys at any time in the middle of the UFC roster. And you do need those guys. And those guys should be well compensated. Those are the guys I think, you know, obviously the top guys are the beings the most underpaid. Because a guy like Tom Aspinall or a guy like Ilya Tuporia, if he occupied that position in any other major sport could be a multimillionaire. If you were as good at NFL football as Ilya is at fighting people in a cage, you know, your Patrick Mahomes at that point. You know, you're Lamar Jackson. And that's the crazy part to me,

because the thing that I've always tried to explain to people, especially like friends who aren't really fight fans, is that the reason the UFC pay is so bad, even though, you know, people look at some of the numbers and I think, like, I don't know, I'd like to make 300 grand in one night. And you're like, this is the lowest paid athlete you're going to see on TV, you know, like, especially major sports-wise, like back when they were on the Fox network, one of the jokes that me and Chad Dunniss used to make is that the only people you see on the Fox network making less than a UFC fighter are on cops, you know, like that's it. And it's, that part is kind of crazy, especially because it's like the UFC loves to tell us, to tell the viewing audience, like

these guys are stars, they are big professional athletes, they are elite athletes, they are absolutely worth your money. And then when it comes time for the UFC negotiate with them, hey, you're not, you're not somebody special. You're not worth our money. You're worth the money we're telling the fans to pay us in order to see you. And like, that to me is a part where a lot of guys should look at this number. It's an eye-popping number. I mean, the 1.1 billion, the, from what we hear, the deal is backloaded so that we're not really getting 1.1 billion in the first years of it. But you're still, it's a huge increase. They're doubling their TV money, essentially. And they were already getting a ton of money just to put on

these shows from ESPN. So the fighters should be looking around right now and being like, I know they got it. The question is not whether they can afford to pay us all more. The question is like, what leverage do you have to force that? Tell me, is this a good thing for the PFL, then moving to Paramount, ESPN deal for PFL at the end of 2026, I believe I already this week. What way do you think this kind of shakes out for them? You know, I've been talking to some people just around the industry this over the

this past week, just because this is a big enough news story that, you know, a lot of people wanted to talk about it. And one of the things, the rumblings I'm hearing is that PFL is feeling very encouraged by it because they feel like, all right, look, ESPN got a taste for MMA. They don't want to go just completely dark on MMA with the UFC leaving, especially you still got, you're launching your own big thing. You're going to be asking people to shell out for. You need as much content as you can get on there.

And PFL is still a budget deal. for them. You know, it's still like a, as you want to be in the MMA business at all, it's not like you're paying a ton for the PFL. And so they think, all right, now the 800 pound gorilla is out of the enclosure. It's just us here. The ESPN has an incentive to, you know, give us a little bit more spotlight, make us into a bigger thing.

And especially, you hear Dana White talking a lot about the exposure. Oh, man, the exposure that the USC fighters are going to get from this deal. And it's like, are they, though? are they on Paramount Plus, you know? And if you tell me like, all right, hey, CBS is going to be broadcasting a lot of these events. UFC's been on a few different networks at this point. They're on Fox.

They're on ABC as part of the ESPN deal. It didn't make a huge difference in terms of like mainstream star power for most of these guys. And so it feels like the exposure argument has been made every single time they switch platforms. It was made when they sold the UFC to endeavor in the first place. Remember that where it was like all these entertainment. in industry contacts endeavor has man these people are going to be on late night talk shows uh UFC fighters are going to be mainstream stars and you flat out have fewer stars now than you did in 2015 when you sold the thing so that didn't that dream did not come true and if pfl is sitting

around there going ESPN is still the thing that people can look up at the TV when they're sitting out a sports bar you're you're you're shoving wings in your face down at Bdubs you'll look on the TV it does sound great right about now you got a cold domestic B ear in one hand. You got, you know, out of control hot spicy wing in the other hand. You're looking around for your celery sticks. You glance up at the TV and it's PFL fighters. You see it's a PFL event. You see that could make a real impact for the PFL. It could lift them up at least a little bit. And so I could see why they're feeling at least somewhat encouraged. But the thing is, ESPN has a long track record of getting real excited about MMA for a short time and then being like,

nah never mind we don't see it it's not really taken off the way we thought and back and way off asked john annick about that back when he was on mama live where he was doing a great job and we were all like here it is m m ms getting the big time now and then they went nah never mind and ESPN also has a track record of going around scooping up a lot of different rights to a lot of different stuff and then going oh shit we overspent where can we cut back and mMA is one of those things that often ends up being first on the chopping block in I don't know, I don't have to tell you that. Oh, yeah.

Oh, yeah. We know that all too well. Of course, you might be enjoying a domestic beer tonight. You might be enjoying some super spicy wings. And you may look up at your screen at your local bar and you might see the PFL world tournament finals happening. That's right at Gadsie. Rabadanoff against Alfie Davis of the UK in the 155 pound lightweight, well, obviously final. Liz Karmouche v. Gina Bishop.

And then we have Alves v. Justin Wetzel in the 100. 35 pound final. A bit of big news for PFL earlier this week. It's one I've been talking about it a bit. Mr. Paul Hughes is getting a second crack at Usman and Magamatov. He was on with Ariel O'Anne. He was also talking to me. Oh, there it is.

Thank you very much, Andy. Me before Ariel, let's not make a big deal of this. I just thought I should point it out. But he did go on Ariel's show and let's hear what he had to say to Ariel, if you'd be so kind, Andy. Usman was just refusing to fight me. And that is just the reality. like I could give the whole stories and this and that

but the reality is he was just straight refusing to fight me and they probably just had to look for other options but then I think push come to shove and they were like no this is happening and here we are the fight's done and I don't know if you saw this Ben Ali Abdel Aziz didn't take kindly to a narrative that Paul Hughes is putting out there about said ducking.

It's embarrassing that you've built your name off losing two other men. I didn't even think he deserved a rematch, but Usman made the call. He told me you're the only one he wants to smash because you can't stop running your mouth. Now that he's beating you, nobody's ever going to mention your name again. Ha ha! Sorry, you didn't laugh.

You brought this upon yourself. What? Ali going fucking absolutely dark noise. of Paul Hughes, they're fucking crazy, right? I'm just surprised that he remembered to log into the right account. Well, he was doing that. You know, he got a lot of him running. It's easy to get confused when you do that. But Paul thinks he may have been trying to do it off another account,

but I think it's clearly an Ali one because he's saying, Usman, asked me. I said, I think, you know, this could be a changing of the guard. I think maybe he's just going to go with his own shit from now on. Here's what I want to talk about with this, because I, you know, I saw your story earlier and then I saw this, the press release that PFL sent out when they're like, okay, here's the official announcement, here's the date and everything.

And this is, I'm having a hard time getting past this. This event is identified in this press release, PFL champion series, colon, road to Dubai, dash, the rematch. Then takes place Friday, October 3rd at Coca-Cola Arena in Dubai. first of all you're telling me we got like three different names to call it's it's unwieldy the shit is unwieldy pfl i need like this is what the numbering convention that the ufc goes with gives you is just like a very easy thing that we're all calling it the fight nights still struggle with this because is it ufc fight night three hundred twenty one is it ufc a pack something is it ufc this guy versus this guy whatever

but this is it's confusing to me but the most confusing part to me is so the event is called NFL champion series road to Dubai, but it's in Dubai. How is it the road to Dubai if we're there? You made it. The road ended in Dubai. The other events that lead up to that could be called Road to Dubai, but once you're in Dubai, how is it Road to Dubai? Like, you made it. It's over her. You got there. I don't understand it. I know I'm focusing on the wrong things. I know that but it just it hurts my brain to think about it how is the espion not having a word at this stage you know like first thing we got to talk about here is what the fuck is this called okay we need to be something snappy how about normaga made off we used to we'll just you know we'll

just fuck it out there on uh pfl on the loin though ben huh exciting stuff you know this is like when your pfl you need this kind of stuff right because you here's a fight that managed to get some interest beyond what your normal events do. People who didn't watch heard about it afterwards. You piqued some curiosity. I think you kind of missed an opportunity to do it sooner, to do the rematch before now, but better late than never.

And now you have an opportunity to hear where people who heard about the first one go, all right, I've heard Paul Hughes becoming a thing. I am familiar with the Nirmigo-Madoff family name. I heard that they had themselves a bang on first time and that it was very close and disputed let me let me tune in for this one so like this is the kind of stuff that you need for pfl the kind of way that you can generate real interests

um listen he wasn't the only irishman making headlines because yesterday yes uh suddenly peter carroll's phone was a buzz like it was 2017 all over again whet whiw whet oh god what's he done what's he done oh no oh fucking god what is it what is it you know you have the you see the you see the huge suspects popping up. I start hyperventilating. I'm like, oh God, what is he? And then it's this little image. It says fighter removed. And I had a certain bold prediction this year, and I was like, maybe, maybe it's just all coming together for Pizzie Carroll once again. But alas, Carter McGregor is not removed from the UFC roster. And we had the great, a big rival of Benfokes, actually, Ariel Hawanee, who came along to clarify that news for us. Take it away, Mr.

Okay. So earlier today, a lot of those social media sites that like to post roster updates posted that Connor McGregor was off the UFC roster, had parted ways with the UFC, something like that. Well, I reached out to Connor himself and he confirmed this is not true. He has not parted ways with the UFC. His team also told me he has not parted ways with the UFC. Not sure what that's all about. I think those sites are usually relevant. relatively correct, for the most part. So I'm not sure what this is all about or why that was posted or if they were hacked, but he confirmed, they confirmed. He even confirmed that he's back in the testing pool, has sent in some tests. The first one came back clean. And he said, quote, all systems ago. So you've seen the training footage.

He has said he wants to fight at the White House. Michael Chandler saying earlier this week, that's what he wants as well. Do we finally get it in July of 2026? the 4th of July, the 250th birthday of the United States, we shall see. But for now, all those reports and those posts, not true. As for the old return, wouldn't be on a ban,

sorry, Connor McGregor has not parted the ways with the UFC. Both the notorious MMA and his team confirmed this to me. He also confirmed he is back in the pool, has submitted tests, and all have come back clean. it's all systems ago he said ben you seem to be absolutely buzzing and i can tell from your face that you think he's actually going to beat tepuri when he eventually comes back on the 250th birthday of the united states in the white house i believe i've got that all right there first of all shouts out to ariel's dog uh matcha furious yeah love to hear it um i was really

surprised when i saw dana white's comments uh i think it was on the jim rome show where they're asking about the White House car and about how he had already kind of said, I don't know if I would feel comfortable putting John Jones on that thing. And then by contrast, he was like, I trust Connor. And I was just like, to do what? To do what at this point? Because he's like, unless he's seriously interested, he's never not shown up. And it's like, that was true of like the early days, Connor when he'd show up to fight Chad Mendez, even though you could look at him and be like, it might not be a great idea for you. He had no legs. Literally, literally the last fight you put him in he pulled out with the with a pinky toe thing man so that could absolutely

have him plus it just seems like it's been so long from at this point he's been out in the nightclubs i i know you got some time for before the next fourth of july so like there is time to get your stuff together there's also time for him to rack up several more arrests and nightclub punches and things like that like there's there's a lot of time still to go before you could be like hey this guy's turned it all around and he's ready to charge like like Like, I wouldn't, it's crazy to even be sitting around this far out talking about who could be at the thing because you know this sport. We could, that's almost a year from now. We could be sitting around just in a completely different situation in several of those divisions.

And who knows? So I don't know, though. I would not, if you asked me to lay a bet down on Connor McGregor ever to fight again in the UFC, yes or no, I'm taking no. Oh, 100% I'm taking no at this point. I've been taking no since he broke his leg against Borier. I've been like, this is, this is, he doesn't need to do this anymore. Maybe that could change. Like, you know, finances come and go in the world of fighting.

He seems to be in a better place than a lot of people, though. Let's be honest, coming out with the UFC, I just don't think he, I just don't think you can get, I've been saying it for years. I just don't think you can get through a company more honestly. Like, let's not, like that toe, he broke the pinky toe. I go out of broke a toe replaced him that night in Pereira. You know, like, we have to remember this. Like, this is, uh, I don't know. Oh, man. It's this White House thing. It's the new Jones and Aspinel, isn't it? And they're even like a subplot of the White House thing. We're going to be talking with the fucking White House. When is the birthday of the United States? July 4, 2006. Is that well how many said? Yeah. I don't know. 1776 was kind of a big year for us. I don't know if you ever heard that one before. But yeah. Well, 1776. Any good football teams made back then? I don't know. Did you just beat England?

you mean in the war not in football oh yeah i mean well i mean god bless america what you want me to say that's why it's all one to bridge you narratively if it weren't for everything else going involved if you could do tom aspinall england's great hope you know the heavyweight champion sent over here by his majesty to write a wrong a historical wrong get some revenge against john jones if we could feel a little bit better getting behind John Jones, maybe. If you could do that, like the narrative would really work out for you really great for that, like, kind of anniversary type event. It's just that you can absolutely understand why Dana White would not feel super comfortable with John Jones in there. Plus, I still maintain, when you're talking about guys like John Jones, you're talking about guys like Connor McGregor.

Look, I know we live in a time where we've decided nothing matters anymore. There's no such thing as good or bad, and we're all just in a, like, sort of cultural free fall at this point. But imagine the mainstream attention that a UFC fight on the White House lawn is going to get on Fourth of July. And then imagine everybody at, you know, CNN and all the mainstream outlets learning who John Jones is and learning what John Jones has been up to. They'd be like, oh, really? this is what we're doing like that that might not be the best look for the UFC

and then on top of that you have the threat that who knows what the hell will happen look what a time to be alive guys I mean it's 319 this weekend we're going to be talking with this White House card for the next 11 months it's really exciting yes I look at it

a beautiful roundtable there me and Chuck edited by the great Ben Folks a nominee journalist of the year. I will mention again. This is everything we have for you today. But don't worry, fair not. This channel will be live tomorrow. That's right. You can watch along with the boys as they lay down those beautiful vocals. As you watch these fights, it's always a tremendous watch. You'd join them for the main card tomorrow. And then immediately after the event, I mean, too busy to do this show today, but Chuck Mendenhall is suddenly back tomorrow to do

the post show. Ariel Hawani, me just doing all these shows with Journalists of the Year nominees. Ben, folks won't be there. He's too good for us. You know, too good to do the post show. You know, he wants to do his own thing. He can do his own thing. It's fine. I'm not offended at all. Anyway, no one asks me to do the post show. I'm around. Listen, Ben. I'm around. I'm a bell. No one asked me. Listen, Ben. I'm not going to take this one. As soon they'll be kicking me off the show. I'll be like, whoa, what the fuck. Don't anyone comment that you'd like to see that. Anyway, we love you very much.

UFC 319 tomorrow, the beautiful band folks, me, Pizza Carol, Oscar Losa. Andy here and said of Jordan who's off sunning himself as usual. We love you all. We will see you tomorrow. Here's a big kiss for me. Mwah.