The Ariel Helwani Show - UFC White House reaction, Arman Tsarukyan, Bo Nickal, Anthony Smith, Action Bronson, KNICKS ARE CHAMPS!!!!!; news and notes

Episode Date: June 15, 2026

Ariel Helwani kicks off the show by discussing the emotions of his New York Knicks winning the NBA championship (01:56). The Boys in the Back and Petesy Carroll join Ariel to react to the UFC White House card, including the impressive production, Tyson Fury’s bizarre appearance, Justin Gaethje shocking the world, Ilia Topuria’s corner stopping the fight, Ciryl Gane dominating Alex Pereira, what what’s next for both, the night’s biggest winners, and more (21:01). Bo Nickal is back after his White House win against Kyle Daukaus, giving behind-the-scenes insights, revealing his conversations with President Trump, and talking about what he wants next (1:29:50). Anthony Smith joins to weigh in on the UFC White House card, dissecting Ilia Topuria’s game plan against Justin Gaethje, Gaethje’s toughness, the main event stoppage, Ciryl Gane’s next fight, Topuria and Pereira’s ability to bounce back, the rest of the card, and more (2:02:01). Action Bronson joins Ariel in celebration of the Knicks title win, laying out his watching habits, how he reacted to the clinching game, his longtime fandom, and more (3:01:39). Ariel touches on the continued promotional battle between Dana White and Eddie Hearn (3:26:20). Arman Tsarukyan returns to discuss his RAF win over Tony Ferguson, before giving thoughts on the UFC White House main event, his friend’s winning bet on Justin Gaethje, believing he’s next in line for the title shot, still wanting to fight Ilia Topuria, wanting to be UFC champion above anything else, and more (3:46:18). Ariel covers news and notes (4:21:09) and answers your Super Chats to end the show (4:30:09).

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the Air Hawaii. June 50, 2000. And 26, hello again, everyone. I sure hope you're doing well. It is absolutely positively great to be here on a beautiful Monday morning in New York City. And, you know, I was thinking about this earlier. I was thinking about the person who was sitting. in this chair on Wednesday when I said goodbye to you and the person that is sitting here

right now in front of all of you because I really do believe there are chapters in one's life and I'd like to think that a chapter ended in my life on Saturday and a new chapter has been born because for the first time in my life I can sit here and certainly for the first time in my professional career I can sit here saying to all of you on campus. that my New York Knickabockers, your New York Knickabockers, the world's New York Knickabockers are NBA champions. And I can't even believe that I'm saying this. I've been doing this show since 2009.

And there have been a lot of dark years. And I've tried not to interject my fandom into the show. But you know, especially over the last six or so years, as two of my beloved teams have had great runs and great teams, you know that I've come on this show distraught, depressed, down every single time. And I've asked others on the team. I've asked Rick about the 2016 Cleveland Cavaliers. I asked GC about the back-to-back Georgia championships. What does it feel like? What are the emotions? Can you describe it? What's it feel like afterwards? And deep down inside, I never thought I'd feel it. And what I experienced on Saturday, first of all, waking up

and noticing that it was June 13th and noticing that that that's six, that six, that's six, 613 and noticing, like seeing all this stuff. Obviously, I didn't come up with it first. But 613 is the number that's in the rafters because of Red Holtzman who won the two championships as a coach back in 70 and 73 and starting to feel like, is this actually written? Is this in the stars? And then the jail and tweet and all.

And then right before tip off on Saturday, I'm so nervous, so nervous that I have to go for a walk around my whole neighborhood. I went for a walk for an hour, just listening to Wu Tang. Because Wu Tang started to become a, I don't know, a soundtrack for this team. And listening to Wu Tang made me feel better. And then I go and I sit down and I tell my kids, this is the first time since June 22nd, 1994, that I'm able to watch a game in which tonight,

the Knicks who means so much to me that I can't even possibly verbalize, tonight they could be champions. and the game starts off awful, and they can't make a shot. But they're only down five at the half. Or maybe it was seven and five at the end of the third. Whatever it was, you kind of still felt like they were in it. And then slowly but surely, Jalen takes over in the fourth, slowly but surely, slowly but surely, slowly but surely,

drip, drip, drip, drip, stop, score, stop, score. One free throw, one out of two, one out of two, one out of two. And then it happens. this moment that I swear to God I've been dreaming about. You ask any kid that I went to school with. Fourth grade is when it kind of like really, I started to truly love them in the second grade. Fourth grade, it exploded.

92 season. 94 season, I'm in sixth grade. And then you ask any kid that knew me from that point forward, the amount, I looked at my phone, five minutes, I had 118 missed text. and that team, for whatever reason, means so much to me in those players. And to see Patrick Ewing and John Starks and Charles Oakley all in the building, I prayed that they were going to hug, but they didn't.

But just to see them celebrate, it meant so much. The words that come to mind are euphoria. The words that come to mind are relief because we'll never have to wonder. And the word that comes to mind is healing. I feel like a part of me has been healed. I've talked to you about the torture, my brother throwing a clean Xbox, making fun of me. And I just feel so much love and happiness in my heart.

I feel so much love and happiness. And to know that the story actually ends in a good way, that all the heartbreak actually leads to a championship that we got to see it, I was certain I would never see it. Not because I didn't believe in them, but just because it never broke our way. And so I say, look at this picture. Jim Dolan on the microphone,

the much maligned owner of the New York Knicks, Nails it on the microphone. New York, I'm sorry it took so long. Hopefully we don't have to wait this long again. Breen nailing it. Tyler Murray on the radio, nailing it. No lead is too big, no guard is too small. The most unlikely of championship teams.

Every time we win, all this just to lose to those guys. All this just to lose in the finals. All this, never again. I can't even possibly tell you how it felt. I cried. I don't even know. I don't even know how to describe it. I think my kids were shell-shocked

by the amount of which I cried. It was, I didn't want it to end. I stayed up till 4.45, just watching, reliving, thinking, pondering. I can't believe the Knicks are champions. I can't even tell you what this does for my soul. I can't even tell you. And I know so many others feel the same

and all the footage, all the celebrating, all the happiness, years, I can't get enough of it. The commercials, the Nike commercial, unbelievable. Josh Safdi apparently did that. The Michelob Ultra commercial, this one, legacy pass, God, I can't believe it. I can't believe we live in this timeline. Can't believe it. Can't believe we live in a timeline in which the Knicks are not the butt of the joke, in which the Knicks are the champions, in which the Knicks are going into the offseason as champions. I cannot believe it. I can't even wrap my head around it. And so, the

last 24 to 36 hours for me, whatever it is, have felt utterly surreal. I will be there on Thursday at the parade. I have no idea what to expect. It's probably going to be a shit show. We're probably not going to be able to move. I need to feel that. I need to feel that energy. I need to feel it in my bones. The New York Knicks are NBA champions in my lifetime. My kids got to see it. And the fact that I got to witness it with them is a gift and an experience, a shared experience that I will never, ever forget. And I got to tell you, there are going to be days where I'll feel down. I'll be, it'll be January, and I will feel like shit.

And I'm going to think about these guys, the gift that they gave us. These 15 players, that front office, that coaching staff, everyone affiliated with that team. To anyone out there who is a fan of a team that looks to be million miles away from a championship, if you are a Hornets fan, if you're a Pelicans fan, if you're a Browns fan, if you're a Buffalo Bill's fan, hold the F on, hold on, because I got to tell you, it feels amazing when they finally reach the mountaintop. It feels unlike anything. Every time I ask people, what they told me, doesn't feel anywhere near as good as this. Anywhere near as good as this. And I get it. I didn't do anything. But you know what? I spent a lot of freaking time and effort worrying about

these guys who don't know me, who don't care about me, but there's something about this effort that you put in and this time that you put in and this energy that you put in, that you want it to feel like it was worth it. And now it feels like it was worth it. And now it feels fulfilled. I feel like I'm flying. So you fast forward 24 hours later and I'm sitting there watching this sport that I've devoted my life to at the White House in these scenes that feel like they are also out of a movie. It just doesn't feel real on a Sunday. And now I'm going to bed at two and waking up, I am sleep deprived, I am emotionally and physically exhausted, but I feel like a massive weight. If we were going to game six tomorrow, I don't know how I would have reacted. And then game

seven, I would have been shot, my nervous system shot, the relief, the happiness, the joy. I will forever be indebted to these people. I wish I could hug them. I wish I can hug them and just personally thank them all. And I know I speak for so many people when I say this. It is just a feeling and an emotion unlike any other. I was, you know, some of those pictures of through the years, like it's literally my life. And it's the one constant. Like, you just have this team that you hope

that allows you to escape, that allows you to think about, when I'm in Syracuse and I'm watching the Stefan Marbury Knicks, I have nothing. I have absolutely nothing to be excited about. It takes you away. It takes you away. And it just felt like a healing thing

and seeing Patrick, hold that trophy, it was just unbelievable. It was unbelievable. I have to say it was, it was unbelievable. I pray, if the bills do it, I'm done. I'm done with sports. I can, I can finally rest. I will stop caring. I'm never going to care again. I don't want a dynasty. I don't care if it's backpack, back back, back, great, I'll take it. I don't need it. We got the one. And I can't get enough. I spent, happy to say, $3,000 in merch already. At the card, at the card, add to card, Add to card, add to card, add to card, add. I need that Snoopy Knicks collab t-shirt.

I have to have it. That replica of the trophy for $150 on Fanatics, I have to have it because I kissed it last year. I kissed it. And that trophy now belongs to the New York Knicks. And today's show is sponsored by Kalshi, the largest prediction market in the United States, who I do believe had the Knicks as underdogs,

or whatever you say in this world at the beginning. and we freaking did it. We did it. All of us collectively. Here's what Kalshi does different than everyone else. You're not playing against the house. Kalshi is peer-to-peer trading. You buy yes or no contract on whether a certain result will happen,

and you're trading directly against other users. Think of it like buying or selling a stock. The line isn't set by some algorithm working against you. Public opinion sets the price. Cali is F, CFTC approved, federally regulated, which is why it's available across the entire country. including California and Texas, download the Calci app, and use code Helwani, H-E-L-W-A-N-I to get $10 off

when you trade $10 with Calci. K-A-L-S-H-I-C-T-E-T-T, Trade, what is next? We're going to talk about a lot of things on today's show. White House card. Trust me, we'll get to it. I left a lot of space at the top. Bo Nichols is going to join us.

Anthony Smith, who did such a great job, previewing the card for us late last week on X. We'll join us. Armin Sarukian is going to join us to talk about the change in plans, so to speak, and Action Bronson's going to join us. And so I will spend a lot of time with action, as you can imagine. I wanted to hug him. I wanted to have him in studio.

Not going to happen, but it doesn't matter. We'll talk a lot about the next year, so I don't want to spend. I know, I know the White House guys, but please indulge me for a moment. On Air Jordan, let me ask you, lifelong Nick fan. What was it like? What was it like? Honestly, like, the thing is, a lot of times you are very emotional about these. things. And I'm always like, you know what?

Like, I get it. It is sports sometimes. Then I'm like a little more grounded. Saturday night. Watery eyes, hugging people, I don't know. Just like the time of my life, honestly. If they go 0-182 next year, I wouldn't even care. Wouldn't even care. I want to be in the building. I kind of wish I touched the trophy last year now. It's fine. It's fine. You'll get an opportunity.

The Knicks are champions, man. The Knicks are, is PT wearing the hat? He better freaking be wearing the hat. You're down right. Let me tell you something. You walk around the streets of Dublin wearing that hat today, and you're for sure getting a head nod. You're for sure getting a fist bump.

Am I right? I got four. I was in Dublin this morning. Four of them. Yes. All Americans, by the way. That's good. Even better.

That means they know that you know ball. That's the acknowledgement. You understand. You stay up, PT. I did. I was the first in the message group. You think I remember anything? Do you think I remember anything?

I was just like, I was on the can. couch just watching. I was like, it's going to happen. Oh my God, it's going to happen. And then it happened. I forward that message off in the group just rolled off the couch and in the bed. But, do you know what? I didn't realize until I happened that I was actually looking forward to your reaction, which I'm glad that you posted more than it was the games. Like, it was just, ever since I know you, you've been talking about this. Ever since I know you, you're having that same debate. Well, sorry, ever since the Nuggets win, you're having that debate with Chuck where you're like, now you've won one. I have to go and win one now. I don't.

don't want to hear you complaining again. I had to see the absolute relation the next morning. Fantastic, man. I'm delighted for the reaction. Like, there was like some, I had some, like, saliva. You think I was looking at any of that? Who gives a fuck? I couldn't give two fucks.

Chuck texts to me, and it, a lot of things have broken me. And just spontaneously start crying. I just spontaneously. Of course. What did he say? He just wrote, and now you know how it feels. Wow. Chuck Vandenhall.

What a fucking gee. It's just, it's a lot. It's a lot. It's a lot. It's a lot to process. I just can't believe it. How would the lads? How would the lads?

Like, as you're, like, this is such a big thing for you. And they're huge Knicks fans as well. I'm not, I'm not trying to say. But it's a longer road for you. It's been a longer road for you. How did they react to you losing your mind? Can I tell you, can I tell you another thing that broke me? So we're watching the game.

And they're, I told them, like, you're not wearing anything. So I have. I wear the same thing. I have my good luck thing that I wear, my good luck outfit. And it's actually my action t-shirt. They never lose when I wear the action t-shirt. I didn't wear it to game three, and they lost. So I brought it back for four, and then obviously for five, same shorts, same sweatshirt, same everything.

They were not, they were like shirtless. They were just sitting there. I'm like, why aren't you wearing? Why aren't you wearing? Oh, don't worry, don't worry, don't worry. Half-time. So at halftime, and we had played an awful first, they go take a shower. Because it's late.

And usually they'll come down with either Josh Hart, Carl Anthony Towns, Brunson, or OG jerseys. And my son, Walter, comes down wearing the Ewing jersey, and my son Oliver comes down wearing his Ewing t-shirt. And it's just like, I was like, why are you wearing that? And they're like, trust me, this is the one. And I was like, holy shit, man, like, they get it, you know? They get what it means to me. They get what that guy meant to me. They get what this team means to me.

And they just sat there. And then I was like, oh, my God. God, they're going to do it, they're going to do it, they're going to do it. And like, Josh misses the free throw. That's my son's favorite player. And I was like, it's okay, they're going to do it. And then I don't remember anything. I just, I just, I just, I fell to the ground and I just started crying.

And my wife was there who sat with me in 99 watching that team. And I just couldn't believe that they finally did it. It just, it was, it was a lot to handle. It was, I wish my daughter was awake, but we woke up the next day. I went to bed at 445 and we woke up at 6.30. and she came with me. We didn't brush our teeth. We were wearing our PJs.

I put my crocs on, and we went to the nearest grocery store, and I got the post and the daily news, and I bought three of them each so that each one of us can frame it. And I said, I'll never forget that there was not a soul on the street. Just a couple people, go Nix. I'm wearing my hat, and I'll just never forget any of it. I'll never forget any of it.

I'm just so thankful and grateful. And so to be honest, I tweeted this last night. Like, I know there was a lot that you could be upset about about that card last night. I don't have it in me. I don't. And I'm sorry if that doesn't make me a good journalist. I don't have it in me to be upset about anything right now.

Anything. Life is just too happy. Life is just too happy. It's just too great. And most people believed, but New York, New York Creek did not believe. New York Creek. Wait, time out. Time out.

Tell me. The lots are still in their gear. We never left, Pete. We slept here last night. You guys, fuck. Kudos to you guys for doing that on a Sunday and coming back on a Monday. Incredible. There's a lot of kudos.

The set look great. Rick's shaving the mustache is just insanity. Lim it to the bit. That's what it is. I was looking at the video. He looks like Humsat. Listen, brother. You thought he was about to shoot a double leg on you, Pizzi.

Now, we're going... It's absurd. It's an absurd. Look, when you see him in person, you think even more absurd. It's different on camera. Has it yet either? Now the soul patch is really coming through right here.

It's the whole thing. By the way, Connor did a great job. You know? Connor got this all this stuff. The receipt of me posting the wager on the New York Knicks is in the group chat. I didn't believe. I feel like I was the only one. The money was there.

Not a small wager. I didn't even see the wager. You're never beating a Western Conference team. Did you not at the beginning say, you don't want to hear what I have to say. You did all that. Was that all a ruse? And there was there was bad juju that had to be exercise. The bet was bigger than any bet I've.

ever placed by several folds. So I get him being cautious. You know, you gotta just... And then when they went up 3-1, he was like, it's over. It's done. It's wraps. It's curtains. Yeah. I was not accepting that. Where did you watch, Rick?

Home. I was home for every game. You were just chilling. I had... Were you not... My brother-in-law... Were you moved? Who flew in from Hawaii?

Yeah. Was at game four. Like, he stayed at my house. He's like, I'm going to game four. I'm like, shit. I'll be here watching on TV. Enjoy it. It was incredible. My buddy Amman, who had gone back and forth, he lives in Texas.

He went to game three. No, he went to game four at the garden and then went to game five in San Antonio. I wish I was there, but also I don't think I could have handled it. I don't think I could have handled it. GC, you were on the streets, right? I was on the streets, baby. Where? I was my boy, Jake, shout out to him, who was also a diehard.

He immediately started crying. He had to go into the bathroom because he got embarrassed. He was crying so hard. Let it out. Yeah. Hit the streets. It was chaos. It was a madhouse, but it was amazing.

The energy was unmatched. Any incidents? No, no. Everyone was, like, pretty friendly. I felt like there were a few things that got, like, viral status, but the rest just seemed loving. It was very loving. At one point, some big dude did come up to me, and he was just like, yo, yeah, go, yeah, give me a hand. Like, support my foot up on this.

I was like, on what? He's like, this car. I was like, is it your car? He's just like, no. I was like, no. All right, fuck it. Nah, I helped him up. He got up.

dancing on the car. Who was I going to say no? Everyone's going crazy. People are hanging from scaffolding. It was wild. It was wild, man. Every time I go online, I just can't stop. I can't stop watching everything.

Oh, I can't stop. That sushi is going to hit in Vegas, huh? It's going to hit, especially after we hit the fatty boombadi. Oh, the fatty boom body is going to be... I'm thinking solo cones for everyone before... I want one like... Before the meal. I want one now.

I want it to be this thick, you know? I want to be... I want it to be... I want it to be... I want to be... Are there ones that? paranoid and socially awkward that I can't look the chef in the eye. God.

When he's like, and this is... Wait, is the move before or after? Before, are you kidding me? Empty stomach. Bro, that doesn't have anything to do with you're spoken. Come on, man, it's like alcohol. You want the munchy. We need to all be dying of laughter, them threatening to kick us out, all very socially

awkward when they were drinking. It's going to be great. The last time, the last time I smoked a family move out, August of 20, 2003, Brad Wilkerson, walk off Grand Slam, and the next time is when the Knicks win the championship? Did we make this public on the show, or was that a behind-the-scenes thing that were... I don't know.

No, we did it on the show. Okay. Free rolls all around, Omicasse. I don't wait to Troy, this marijuana. Oh, yeah. First time, Pici? We're going to Summer League. We're doing everything.

Oh, there's also going to be a fight that we'll be covering there, too. We're also going to be doing a show, a live show, July 10th. Anyway, we're going to talk more about this with action, so I'm not going to bore you all. All the haters out there. I don't love you. I love you Celtics fans.

I love you Boston fans. It's all good. We're champions as well. I can't get it. I can't wait to get home and just sit there and watch more content over and over and over and over and over and over again. I can't get enough of it. I can't get enough. It doesn't feel real.

Just looking at the graphics. Nick's champion. It doesn't feel real. It doesn't feel real. I don't know what to do with myself, but we're going to talk about other things. It almost feels like I'm not giving it the justice that it deserves by not speaking about it for the next five hours. But there was a big event. There was a big event that happened last night.

And it wasn't your ordinary event. It was a very important event for this country. It was an important event for the UFC, obviously for the sport as well, for the fighters involved. And in the end, this card, how many times did I say, by the way, how funny is it that I said, I can't wait till June 15th? Not knowing that I said this as of last year, not knowing that June 15th. not knowing that June 15th would be this celebratory show talking about this. Obviously, I was talking about the fact that I was just going to be happy that this event was over. Not because I was wishing bad upon it.

Let's be 100% honest. A lot of people were wishing bad. A lot of people were reveling in the weather issues, reveling in, you know, a potential disaster, a delay. I was not doing that. As I said last week, I just wanted the fighters to get this opportunity. And in the end, this event that we had been hearing about for almost exactly 12 months, 11 and a half to be exact, I think was a grand slam for the UFC. Now, will we nitpick things?

Will we criticize things? Sure. But on the whole, you look at the sights and sounds. You look at the production. You look at how it all played out. You look at the fact that they were staring at a storm. I'm watching this at home. I texted Pizzi about this like co-made event.

There is a massive storm, like loud like it's like That's how the rain sounded. I'm like, holy crap, we're obviously not in Washington, but is this thing coming? It sounded so loud. And that would have been a disaster. The lighting, the walkouts, the visuals, the entrances, and the fights. You go seven for seven, all finishes. Again, this will trigger people. I get it. I understand it. But as far as the actual pulling off the event, this once in a lifetime event, it was, I mean, to me, it was a grand slam. It was a home run. It was A plus. They nailed it.

There's no infrastructure in place there. There's no blueprint. I mean, a massive tip of the cap to the production team. The presser look great. The wayans look great. The event looked great. The fights were great. And by the way, where do I sign up for more seven fight cards?

Nice, tidy. Like, this is surreal shit. I'm sitting there, sleep deprived. I slept for an hour and 45 minutes, Saturday, going to Sunday, and then I'm sitting there watching the UFC at the White House, cage fighting at the White House, and Diego Lopez starts the card off like that, and Hoofee fights like that,

and Surreal Gan fights like that, and of course, Justin Gaichi fights like that. I'd love to know, does anyone feel otherwise? Does anyone feel like this was a miss? Does anyone feel like this was the White House, excuse me, Times Square Part 2? I thought, look, were there times where, now we can pick, were there times where the crowd seemed subdued? Yeah, absolutely.

That's going to happen. Were there times where I was like, yeah, you know, the history stuff, okay, I get it, or the Trump's, yeah, sure. But if I'm being 100% honest, I thought there'd be more Trump stuff. Like, correct me if I'm wrong, guys. Was there any sort of, there's a chance I dozed off here and there, not going to lie in between fights. Was there any sort of Trump, like, happy birthday, like that we'd be.

joked like Marilyn Monroe type of thing. No. Right? No, we figured beforehand, right? We all kind of said, of course there's going to be more of that because we've seen the other events. I always referenced that event that I was at with Rick at the Prudential Center. So we just fully expected there would be a lot more than that.

And there wasn't. You know, that was one of the concerns of many people that said they were watching. But I don't think, of course, you've mentioned the entrance and all that kind of stuff, but the spectacle was insane. And I genuinely don't feel if you've seen the other events that this was any more. than they've ever done with him at these events. I thought it looked better than the sphere. Like, if we're going to compare special events to special events,

do you agree, GC, or shaking your head? I can't tell if you agree. Of course I agree, yeah. I don't even think it's close. I think when we left the sphere, we were like, that was pretty cool, but then, like, once the fight started, it was essentially same old, same old, and I know that was the same here, but, like, you really felt them being at the White House

throughout the entire event, the walkouts, when you got to the cut man, you could see behind it, the special entrances from the Marine Corps band, which were incredible. Let's give a shout-out to your brother. Shout-out. Unbelievable. This guy's brother, those entrances were amazing. The best ever.

There's your brother. Gunnery Sergeant Birx, is that how you say it? Gunnery Sergeant Birx. What does gunnery mean? What does gunnery mean? That's just a ranking within the Marines. Unbelievable. Your brother was there.

There is. What an honor, by the way. Shout out. Never sounded it better. Yeah. Shout out. There he is. Thank you for your service.

Shout to Harrison. Your brother's going to be a part of the entrance of the year word. has to accept when we give out the awards. I always rep the merch of different things. Reping the president's own Marine Corps band. Shout out to it on the hoodie. Yeah, they absolutely smashed it. Like the Sean O'Malley walkout was

so good. Like, all of the... Eric Lewis. Can I ask you, how long did they rehearse that? Oh, a lot. A lot. Yeah, when I was hitting him up, he was there essentially... No, but was it a month out? Like, that's a lot of songs. Longer. Yeah, longer. And they had to get, like, approval and everything, but he...

Was the hobby the only one that didn't that treatment? Yeah, but like I was talking to my brother about it beforehand and was saying like you know it's you have to pick and choose. Yeah, you have to pick and choose on like what you can play orchestrally. Okay, okay, okay, okay. You gotta you gotta from the bottom could have been a good one. Yeah, felt like a bit of a shot to my people if I'm being honest.

It was amazing. It was incredible. They absolutely smash it. They always do. I mean, they are really, they're run like the military because they are a branch of the military. But yeah, they absolutely killed it, man. So shout out. You know I'm a sucker for landscape lighting. It's like one of my things, I'm not a big, like, decorative persons in other word, decorations, but I love landscape lighting.

Do you know what I'm talking about? And the White House has tremendous landscape lighting. Yeah, of course. So them walking out. You come with the uplighting of the. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It was just like, it looked like they were in some magical resort and these, walking down.

It was just, Rick and GC, you guys are American. Like, true, like, this, you learn about this place. this place, no doubt, means something different to you than it does to PTC and I. Did you feel like it was desecrated? Did you feel like it was disrespected? Do you feel like it was inappropriate? Rick, let me ask you.

Did you feel any of those things watching that? No, I did not. G.C.? Sorry. No, I didn't. I didn't feel that. This was an event that I was looking at. Because obviously, I'm seeing that sentiment, right?

I'm seeing some of that. That was going to happen regardless because of who's involved. Is there something further on that? I have not seen that sentiment. What is the crux of... Oh my God. So what is the crux of what the desecration was? The fact that it happened at all.

Can't believe, can't believe you're not calling this out. Can't believe this is happening. Can't believe... The investments that Trump has and TKO and everything like that. Okay, so their objection is with the ties, right? Not necessarily. The ads on the cage. Okay, that's fair enough then.

There was a lot, but like to me... This looks like a celebration to me. it really like I was expecting a lot of Donald Trump saved the UFC Donald Trump was there we didn't get any of that right we didn't get any of that commander-in-chief stuff that we've gotten in the past to their credit they avoided all of that

pretty seemingly intentionally intentionally like it was not it was not that which we all expected it to be for where it was like at the White House you knew there was going to be some like it was no different than when Trump walks out at the paper views they were going they were always going to walk out from the Oval Office and do all that at the very beginning of it. But throughout the fights, it didn't feel like it was overkill. As I said last week, when Trump walks out in Jacksonville,

Florida, or Utah or whatever, I'm just picking random like UFC locations, that feels out of place, right? There's a reason we have that initial jolt. Trump walking out at the White House does not feel out of place. That's exactly what I would expect to happen. And the fact that that was the the kind of minimal presentation of it. Obviously, there were fighters who went over to him cage side. There was the moment

where he entered the cage after the event was over. But like, it was not a commercial for Trump to the degree that I thought it would be. I will say that I didn't feel any of those things. I didn't love,

like Anthony Smith was talking to us about the packages before. Hate it. Yeah, yeah, stuff. The packages for the sphere, I thought were better. Way cooler. Right?

Not even comparable. Yeah. This was the lone miss for me of the card. I thought the packages were added nothing, didn't, weren't particularly patriotic, seemed cobbled together. A lot of the AI weirdo stuff. AI shit. It was all AI. Yeah.

It didn't evoke emotion. It didn't, yeah. It didn't feel special. Like I didn't need it. I will tell you this, though. And going back to the seven fight cards, you know, I remember, so they did, okay, so they did a package and they did for most of them, but they used the My Way. limp biscuit song for Zahabi O'Malley. I would argue a rivalry that didn't necessarily like deserve the right to have that song.

What? That was great. To me it's like, my way or the highway is Ilya Gaichi. My way is Rock and Austin main event. It's not the third fight fucking fight. That has no heat whatsoever attached to it. That should have been Ilya or Gaichi, my way or the highway. Like that was the perfect song for it.

Anyway, it made me feel like if they have the time to give. us those packages, these cards would be so much. I'll tell you, I'm going all over the place here. Those packages in general were much better. Oh, yeah, the historical one. The individual fight packages were fantastic. WW had to be involved in that, right? The production that...

They're all together. The takeaway, for me, one of the biggest is, when the UFC wants to care, they do it better than anyone. Do you know what I mean? Like, a lot of it is so formulaic and cookie cutter now and just the delivery of it, it feels like it's always so flat.

That felt special. That felt different. That felt unique. That felt big. It felt important. And it's because they cared so much. They put so much TLC into that event. It just was radiating off the screen.

I was exhausted. It's a Sunday night. I can't imagine how many other people were struggling as well. And it was enthralling because of the visuals. And of course, the fights were fun, and they all delivered, all that stuff and more. And so I would say the packages were a little bit of a myth. I would say there were like three major misses in my opinion.

If I'm allowed to be somewhat critical here, because again, I said grand slam, there's no greater sort of endorsement that one can give. That's an A plus plus. The packages were a little bit of a miss, in my opinion, because they just didn't, as Rick said, invoke any type of emotion. The other little bit of a miss was it felt like a lot of people

were being propped up except for UFC fighters. And Connor McGregor noted this on Twitter, and I thought he was 100% right. You know, it felt like there were luminaries there, There were dignitaries. There were politicians. There were important people there. And there were other members of the TKO stable there, Roman Reins, Triple H, Terence Crawford, Gio Pataya, Connor Ben, and obviously the big Tyson Fury walkout, which we'll get to as well.

And it didn't feel like there were any sort of notable, correct me from wrong guys. Like, I saw pictures of fighters at the ellipse, but I didn't see like a Champions Row, so to speak. I didn't see any super duper famous fighters getting that shine. And I didn't feel like any of the packages were about how far the sport has come. I know at the beginning they had this thing, but it didn't feel, it felt like the UFC fighters didn't get the same TLC as some of the other entities involved. Does that make sense? Here's what Connor tweeted.

The platforming of our athletes within the business was not capitalized on enough, in my opinion. I don't know who the F these guys are that have never fought MMA, yet were visibly all over the show. It should have been a celebration. This is my words. Now his. strange how not one MMA legend at the fights tonight, yet a load of little scared of an MMA fight boxers were. Like, I would have loved to have seen Chuck Ladell,

Randy Couture, obviously, issues there. Former champions, legends, GSP walking out with the hobby, was great, but I even feel like that wasn't made of a big enough deal. John Jones should have been there. Where was John? Where was Demetrius Johnson? Where was Ronda Rousey? You know what I mean?

Like I felt like that should have been on display as well. Does anyone agree or disagree? I thought the Tyson Fury walk out. and then the no announcement thing was very odd. And then you had the row of him, Jayapataya and Connor Ben, Terrence Crawford was there as well. And when I was scrolling on Instagram this morning,

I saw different UFC fighters like Natalia Silva was in attendance. I was like, oh, I didn't know she was there. Was she in attendance or was she at the ellipse? Because I saw Giuliana Pena look like she was there, but it was so far off that I was like, oh, she's at the ellipse. No, if I'm not mistaken, Natalia Silva, it was a picture of her, like, in like, a formal gown at the event. Was she shown on TV?

No, I did not see her anywhere. I also saw Sean Brady was in attendance at the FD event. Now you have me doubting myself because of the potential ellipse thing, but I saw pictures of them at the event. Yeah, I saw him with his dad, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. He didn't get highlighted at all. Yeah.

So, yeah, I felt like that was kind of odd. And, like, obviously, Volcanowski's there. He was cornering for Huffy. But, yeah, it didn't feel like, was there any UFC fighters on the broadcast that weren't actually fighting? They didn't show anybody that I could have all. That felt like a miss. Like, this should have been an opportunity to put. over some other athletes, to put over the sport, to put over the organization.

And I didn't feel like that was done enough. Certainly the winners on the card took advantage of the situation, but I would have loved to have seen other fighters, both present and past, highlighted. I think that could have been good, but I don't know that you use the airspace for that. I don't know that you waste the real estate on it. When the focus is the White House, the focus is America. Parents Crawford, Jayapitaya, Connor Ben. In contrast to the boxing part.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's where I'm like, I don't get it. They gave the real estate to Zuba Boxers. Roman Reigns, Triple H. Yeah, and other TKO entities. I agree. It's bizarre that it was, it was them over the fighters, but I don't feel a super... Listen, if no one was shown, then I wouldn't even bring it up, but I was sitting there being like, yo, where are the, the MMA luminaries, you know? Tyson Fury getting a full walkout to and announce nothing was bizarre. What happened with that? It felt like he was doing John, John Anick a little bit dirty there. He's like, yeah? Second time this happens, right? Second time. We're told that there's going to be an announcement, and it almost feels like it's teed up Netflix card in April, and they don't announce the AJ fight.

And now here's the big walkout. And John Anick asks all the right questions. In fact, I felt like John even doubled down to be like, are you sure you're not going to tell us something here? The last question is just like, one more opportunity here, if you got anything to tell us, Tyson. And he walks out to not the biggest pop. My first reaction was, wow, Tyson Fury is in America because we know about the issues of not being in America. also that was addressed to their credit. Like that was somewhat of an elephant in the room.

Tommy Fury can't get into the country, at least for now, Till we've talked about this with him. And it seemed to me like they were going to announce that he has joined Zufa boxing, right? I think that's what everyone thought. That was the assumption, yeah. He doesn't announce that. He says, I'm not going to take away Dana Shine. At the same time, Turkey Al-Shake hints at something on social media as well regarding Tyson.

And it feels like what they're trying to tell us and what they're eventually going to tell us is that he's either A, joining Zufa Boxing, or B, they will be the promoters of Fury Joshua in this continuous battle of who's actually going to be promoting it. I don't doubt, like, what people have to understand is, in particular, like Zufa Boxing, TKO, Nikon, and Turkey, they're all very tight. There is no way this fight is going to be happening on Netflix without their involvement. And so we have seen situations where like AJ's on Netflix and like Eddie's not there.

DeZone is not there. What did he tweet? Sorry. You are welcome my brother, Tessifuri. Welcome back to America. Big announcement coming by us about your next fight against Anthony Joshua or about your fight against Anthony Joshua. So to me it was like it was a confirmation without a confirmation.

I don't know why it didn't seem like they were on the same page. I really felt for John in that moment because I think no one told him or I don't know or or Do you think part of it is like they're on Paramount Plus doing this giant event? No. No. And here's Turkey tweeting at Netflix. No. I don't think that's it. It's all incestuous.

No, I don't think so. He's walking out and they just commentary saying nothing. Yeah, it was, uh, yeah, it was, it was interesting. It was certainly interesting. Like it felt like a moment that felt like it didn't quite deliver. Um, but they're in a war now with Eddie. They're in an absolute war with Eddie. and I want to know what Frank Warren feels about this,

not just Eddie. Like, Eddie has his guy. So to me, what does Frank Warren feel about this? But someone texted me like, did Tyson join Zufa Boxing? I was like, well, they've always been pals. Like, I remember being at Clash at the Castle in Cardiff. Tyson shows up with Drew McIntyre, that whole thing. And he's shown up.

He's a big wrestling fan. And Nikon was involved in the top-rank deal with ESPN. like this goes way back. This goes way back. If you think that these individuals, this company is not going to be involved in that fight, you are kidding yourself. I know what Eddie is saying, and I think it's going to be an interesting road to get there. But it was just so that to me felt like, wow, he gets his own entrance,

which, you know, God bless, got your own entrance, well deserved. You're one of the greatest of all time. But I'd love to see Alex Volcanovsky get an entrance like that or announce, I don't know, Holloway like that. I was going to say, how about Cona McGregor walking down there instead of Tyson Fury, right? like ahead of July. That would have been the move. Yeah.

I don't know if he wants to be there. I don't know if he wants to leave or whatever. I know he's going to be in New York tomorrow. He's going to be on Fallon, I think, in person. So I actually thought that the announcement that he was going to do an interview with Rogan on the broadcast was really smart. But then in the end, it was just a preview for the post show. Yeah. And it's like he's immediately screaming.

Yeah, it was not really like. Give us the unedited. It was hard to, it was hard to. So anyway, those are those are the two items. And then the third. You know, just unnecessary from Josh Hokit. Unnecessary, man. Unnecessary, man. It's like what I said earlier. You don't have a feud with Iliate Tuporia. Nothing is going to come of this. Don't waste the airtime. Pereira, fair game.

Lewis, fair game. Obviously, I personally think there's a line even when you're fighting someone, but it's all fair in love and fight promotion. You are not fighting Ilya. You don't need to talk about him. The Michelle Obama line was very distasteful and useless. Does nothing good for you in that moment. There's no one that sees that. I'd like to think it says, that's my guy. Like, it does nothing for you. All it does is bring unnecessary attention to you. All it does is bring scrutiny, criticism. And it apparently is pissed off Dana White. We've always asked, what's the line? Well, here's time that reached out to Dana White, who said in response to the comment, I understand that the Obama's are public figures, but I'm completely against saying nasty and false things about people's families.

Thank you. And that's exactly what he should be saying. Everyone knows my position on free speech, but I hate that kind of nonsense. Does he say anything else? The White House did not immediately respond to Times requests for a comment about Hokit. I had a friend of mine who works at the business like, I hope you blast Joe Rogan for that. Why? What did Joe Rogan have to do it?

That to me was Josh Hokit and Josh Hokit only. I don't blame the White House for that. I don't blame the UFC for that. I don't blame Joe Rogan for that. Why? It was just, he was doing well. You know what I loved? He wins the fight and then he gets on the microphone.

He's like, I was sitting next to Jacqueline, my wife, and I'm like, okay, here comes, watch this guy. He's going to give you, he's going to do a poem, which is impressive in its own right after a fight. And then he goes, ah, forget it. And I'm like, wow, this is great. We're going to get a real freaking promo from him. And then he drops that.

Unnecessary, man. He's very talented. Why allow yourself to be held back? There's no payoff. There's no payoff. And I ask a devil's advocate question. Yeah. Is he going to be held back by this?

No, but it's just, dude, you just won on the White House. I'm with you. Don't, like, this was self-inflicted. But it was so self-inflicted. Inflicting it implies that this will harm him, right? If there are no repercussions, is the UFC going to do anything about this? No, no, no. But I could, look, they determine everything, right?

There is no meritocracy. So I could see Mark Shapiro or Ari Manuel being like, oh, man, we can't. Like, yeah, I could see that. Sean Strickland's the UFC champion. I can't. I just can't see it. Josh Hokit is too good at fighting to have that happen to it. Anyway, I don't even want to get into a Josh Hokit thing.

I just thought that those were like the three sort of like dark spots, if you will. I don't know what do you say. Like just like sort of clouds hanging over the event. But in the end, it ended up being a grand slam, like I said. So let us acknowledge that I don't often make predictions. I don't. But I said multiple times sitting in this chair talking to that camera or to a guest that I question why the UFC would have an event which was being billed as a celebration

of America and book a main event in which an American was going to be knocked out in the main event. I said it. And so I have to eat crow. I have to apologize to Justin Gichi. This is the business that we're in. You make picks, you pick aside. Justin Gaichi, what he did on Sunday is the highlight of his career, obviously,

and apropos, given the fact that he is nicknamed the highlight, a most unlikely career culminates in the most unlikely of venues. A guy who, early in his career, was not looked at as a can't miss prospect, was not someone that we talked about, even in World Series of Fighting. I noted yesterday when I did my wrap-up, I remember being at a way in, I think it was in Toronto in 2013, and he walks up to me and he says, yo man, can you put this on Twitter?

Like, say, like, Justin Gichi is one of the best lightweights in the world. Like, he needs to get some shine. And I'm like, here we are. He has all these bonuses, all these moments, all these victories. And now he's undisputed champion. Imagine telling someone, as he's getting knocked out by Max Holloway on the grandest of stage, his UFC 300, that he would then come back and beat Patty Pimlet, handing him his first UFC loss, and then beat Ilya Tuporia. Ilya to Porea at the White House? I mean, just an absolute

unbelievable performance. We're on fast right now. Stay with us on YouTube. We're going to take a quick break and talk more about Justin Gaci. Look at these pictures. Look at these pictures. surreal stuff. Ilya was always going to get heat once he lost his first fight. And everyone loses, unless you're a Habib, because he puts himself out there. He takes risks, he's overconfident, all these things and more. So when he puts in 18 and 0 and he celebrates 4,

it was always going to at some point explode if he lost. I don't think he thought he was going to lose this one. I didn't think he was going to lose this one. And I know a lot of you out there didn't think he was going to lose this one. And early on, it looked to me like he was not going to lose this one because he was landing those big shots. But Justin Gichi, holy shit. I don't know. Usually when you get knocked out the way in which he got knocked out by max, the chin deteriorates.

Goes down to zero. It seems like something else has happened. It is like strengthened because he took the hardest of shots from Ilya and he kept on coming. And in the end, Ilya can't get off the stool for the fifth round. It appears as though his corner and it appears as though his brother, Alessandre, is the way. one who says no more. Ilya's face. It was shocking.

It was absolutely shocking. The beat down. The damage. It was shocking. And then you start thinking about the past year and everything he's been through. And you wonder, I will say, he looked much smaller. The thought of that version of Ilya fighting at 170 against Islam, he just looks, he looks like a small lightweight, not to give him any sort of excuses whatsoever. He fought the fights.

He walked the walk, talks to talk, all that stuff. but Gaichi looked big out there and Gaichi did the job and I am shocked he deserves all the flowers all the praise all the platitudes in the world all the accolades

that was unbelievable from Justin Geichi you cannot say a thing he just derailed a guy that was looking like he was going to go down and he could still but as of last night he was on that trajectory of going down

as one of the best fighters to ever fight in the UFC he was not there yet obviously, but he was on that trajectory with the confidence and the knockouts and the moving up and wait. And Justin Gichi at the tail end of his career, after multiple blistering knockouts that he suffered, did that to him. One of the more unlikely outcomes and one of the greatest performances that we've ever seen from a challenger in a title fight. Pizzi, what did you think? Absolutely incredible. Just an amazing fight equal to the venue. And from the second he hit the screen

for that walkout and he's reading what I believe is the Declaration of Independence in the Oval Office and he walks out to Johnny Cash ain't no grave gonna hold my body down and that's what he's all about because he makes people meet him at the edge of misery

you know like he doesn't when he when he fights guys he takes him to a place that they've never been before and I've said this many times about you can never rule him out of a fight because he does things differently and there's a moment in the second round towards the end where he eats this flurry of body shots, which I think any man would drop any man in the world. And at that point, I'm just like, he's fighting as if this is

his last fight ever. He's going to leave absolutely everything in there. And what was interesting was on the flip side of that, Ilya fought like a man who'd never been defeated because he's walking straight into this blender. And he's like, I'm going to find a way to do this. But Justin Gagey, it's actually working in his favor because like, keep coming in here. I'm going to bring you to the edge of living. That's where I want to bring you because I've lived here for many years and I know you can't live here with me. And I thought it was absolutely insane.

I thought it was complete cinema. And even just to contrast those entrances, you look at the composure of Tupuria on the way out and he looks every bit the guy we've been saying he is. This is the new superstar of the UFC. Look at this guy. He's perfect. This means nothing to him. The grace he has at the top when he just comes out into the south lawn.

And he's looking at the garden. He's like, you know, he's like, all these people is like, oh, thank you so much. You're about to witness what I do here and what I do so well. And then forget you to have that moment. It's just one of the most incredible things I've ever seen. And one of the most brutal fights I've ever seen. To talk about Tupuri's face, his bones were coming through his face. I think his brother makes the right decision there.

He is getting damaged in a way that he has never before in his life. he can't see there was that there was that situation and I think Mark Goddard was put in a very awkward situation

he had two different doctors speaking two different languages with people tell them two different things and I think that took a lot in that moment

Did you think of that moment where the doctor is like shaking his head and it seems like he's... One's shaking his head one saying he can fight and he's going

what the fuck like we have to fight if this fight is happening it was a and then they had this horrific situation where the coroner

seemed to be saying one thing and then you have another doctor just alone with Tupuri in the that is the worst position you can put a fighter in.

You've removed everyone else who can make the call now, and it's just on to pour you. I thought that, like, I don't think God I could have done a better job with that because it was a complete cluster fuck, two different doctors saying two different things, a coroner saying one thing, a fighter saying the other.

It was absolutely wild. But I think they made the right decision because that was extreme damage. That was extreme damage. His face was absolutely, it was like a butcher's block. And John Anick was saying, you can see his bones protruding to his face.

unbelievable. That's the kind of fight. And that's where just in case he joins in hell. Essentially, I'm going to drag you into hell because you've never been here before and I fucking live here every day. It's honestly the kind of fight that changes you as a human being.

Like he's going to have to be gone for a long time in my opinion after that fight. And he had been so invincible for so long to see it then revert to this. Again, someone like Gehchi, who like this wasn't Armin who did this to him with ground and pound or Islam, it was the one, it was like the, you know, the speed bump on route to two megafights. Like, did anyone, we know, but I think this is the best case scenario for him.

Best case. This is, or Ilya, Ilya, Eliot Seporia. Best case. This is, this is, this is, this is, this is the Nate Diaz fight. No, this is the Nate Diaz fight. This is Connor McGregor's Nate Diaz fight. This is the one where everybody thinks you're invincible. You think you're invincible and you get brought back down to reality and you have to figure it out and you have to reset it. And if it wasn't going to be Justin, it was going to be Armin or it was going to be Islam or it was going to be whoever it was. This could not last forever. It never lasts forever.

Unless you are Terence Crawford, unless you're Habib Narragha Medov, unless you're Floyd Mayweather, the guys who are just the ones. It never, it does not happen this way. It is it is too brutal a sport. There's too much that can happen on the night. Ilya Teporia seemed like he was pressing and now he has a real opportunity to rebuild himself. I think he's, we were talking about this on Thursday and boys

in the back, I think he's reached a level where even a loss does not sink him, right? There's a time when you're on the way up where a loss all of a sudden it's a quote unquote fraud check. I don't think anybody thinks Ilya Teporea is a fraud based on the body of work he's done so far based on the resume. We've seen this before. We saw it with Sage Northca, we saw

with Connemaguer, the boo-birds, if you will, came out of woodwork. There's going to be people saying bullshit. What I'm saying is they don't actually believe that in their hearts. They know how good Ilya Tupori is. We're about to find out how good he is. That's why. I think this is the best case scenario. I don't agree with. Listen, we've seen how

people rebound and we see what happens. You know, we're about to find out Victor Wembenyama. Same thing. Like when the going gets tough, we see how you rebound, right? How you deal with the adversity. But that was shocking. Oh, yeah. Like, can I tell you, I don't have, there are some fighters that I have

a texting relationship with, right, where it's not just like transactional and like, hey, here's the Zoom link. I don't have that relationship with Diego Lopez. Seconds after the fight's over told you with a smiley face. He did say it last week on the show. He said it, and I didn't believe him. I did not believe him whatsoever that Justin Gaci could pull this off. Not at this point in his career, not with Ilya looking so good.

Is it okay to ask the question? Is Ilya not suited for 55? Yes, it is okay to ask that question. That has to be a thought. Is he too small? GC in your opinion because he looked considerably smaller right? He did. We obviously saw the success against Charles Olivaura in a striking battle that's going to favor him, but when he fought an incredibly competent, powerful striker and Justin Gaichi, who's, you know, has that chin that Charles

Oliver, I don't think has, we saw him struggle and it almost felt like after round two, he was kind of gassing out as well. It felt like he was sort of wilting to the damage a little bit in there. So I think, to your point, we're going to have to see how he bounce. is back. I imagine he's going to stay at 155 for his next fight. Who it's going to be against is to be determined. But yeah, I think his next fight is going to be a massive, massive moment for Alia Taboria. I know Rick is saying this is best case scenario, but hindsight is 20-20 and that we were able to, you know, that he beat Nate in the rematch. And then he gets the double-champ status at MSG against Eddie Alvarez. He was able to have that essentially. We don't know

where it's going to go from here for Elliott-Tuboria. The pressure is off for this. Now he can, now he can, he doesn't have to press. He doesn't have to be the guy. He chased the knockout against Justin Gaci to a degree that I think was to his detriment. He was entering a war with Justin Gachi in a way that he had it in the past, and I don't think he needed to. Because he wanted to knock him out, because he had built the expectations to this level, he now has the opportunity to not have to worry about that. He now has the opportunity to say, I've suffered defeat, I've made it out of the other side.

I'm all good. I'm still a gangster. And he's going to rebuild himself. I'm very, I'm, I'm, if anybody's selling Iliate's a poria stock, I'm buying all of it. I will buy every single shred of it. I agree 100%. And I guess here you are looking at the, the percentages, the odds. Yeah, this was over the course of the fight.

Yeah, that's an incredible, like, cross section there. I agree with what you're saying. It would be absolutely insane to sit here and be like he's broken, he's never going to come back. When the guy who beat him face planted and got. knocked out not that long ago by Max Holloway. How many times we've seen someone suffer a bad loss in the sport and then come all the way back? He will be back. He is too good. He will figure it out. He will be champion again, in my opinion. There's zero doubt in my mind. But just to see it play out like that was shocking. It was absolutely shocking. It was shocking because of where it happened.

It was shocking because of how good he looked. Shocking because it was Justin Gachie. And, you know, Dana White is the ultimate gambler. He touts this all the time. He's always talking about the gambling. And I've said time. and again, it just always feels like when it comes to the UFC, the House always wins, right? It always breaks in their favor. And in this case, they rolled the dice with Gaichi versus Sepori at the White House and Gaichi wins. The night ends with the American winning? Like, who predicted that? How many times that I ask, I guess, like, could you believe they put that fight in the main event? I mean, the American's obviously not going to win. And it works out in their favor.

Unbelievable. I mean, what is a greater symbol of the American dream? to have Ali Abdelaziz in the Octagon at the White House holding Justin Gaghi on his shoulders. Is that not the American dream? That's it for sure. Is that not it that anyone can come back from anything? I mean, when they went to him in the Oval Office and he was reading the Declaration of Independence, I was like, wow, this is crazy. I can't believe it.

He's stars and stripes, and he's walking out Declaration of Independence from the Oval Office to fight on the White House lawn. And then the walkout then gets infinitely sicker when you know that he comes in and he pulls off one of the biggest upsets in UFC history against this undefeated guy that no one thought could be beat and he absolutely thumps him. Systematic beatdown other than that second round, it makes the walkout and everything that much cooler for him.

Very funny moment at the press conference. He was asked about that and he said, yeah, the language was different back then. I didn't really understand anything. But it made for a great moment. I like to think that he's just looking at it. He's like, what the fuck? Yeah, what are they talking?

Oh, I got to go? All right, yeah, yeah, it's cool. That's cool. It's like LeBron sitting with the book in the locker room that he's not reading. It was just for show. So as we all predicted, the next UFC lightweight title fight is Armand versus Justin Gagee, right? As we all have been saying, I thought it would happen. Back when he got the patty fight, I was like rightfully so.

But is that it? Is that it? In my opinion, yes. Armin is going to be ready for the rematch. Armin is ready. I think I think I think Elia is going to need some time to recover. I'm not sure just winning the title and not defending warrants the immediate rematch. Yeah, I think it should be Armin.

There is the wild card, though. What's the wild of McGregor's return? Wow. This is been, yeah. If he can win the fight against Holloway and he's a big underdog, if he can win that fight, let's not pretend that the UFC wouldn't move everything to make Gage v. McGregor for his life. I don't think they would.

The only problem is, like, it's his last fight. Yeah. Unless they sign him, here's Connor saying afterwards, Holloway flatlined Justin, face down, out cold. It was, it is a glorious time to be in the McGregor fight business. I think he's implying that like, you know, this guy beat that guy, I beat this guy. But they ain't giving him a title shot on the last fight of his deal. Unless he resigns, then it's different.

Gachey versus McGregor would be a nuts, nuts fight. But no, it's going to be Armin. I think he wants to test free agency, though. I think that's the problem there. As he should, it makes all the sense in the world that he would. By the way, we were speculating. I don't think Ilya versus Connor McGregor is off the table. And I'm interested in that one just as one.

Wait. Up at 170? Yeah, who cares? He barely makes 155. Wait, you're talking about Connor. Ilya. Ilya 170 against Connor. You're saying Ilya's too soon.

If you haven't got an indication that maybe Ilya needs to rethink things after that fight last night. Fiting up weights. This is the one who was saying Islam Makachev versus Ilya Teporia was a joke of a fight. You guys were all high on the supply. Don't get me wrong. I think Iliate Tuporia is undersized.

But Connor McGregor versus I'm a striking fight. Like, I'm totally down for that. I won't be surprised if we don't see you there for a year. God, he just took a year off for a year. It's impossible. Oh, here's, okay, I didn't see this. Did this just come out? You just posted a 15.

Okay, this is from Iliate's Poria. Justin, congratulations. You said you'd leave your mark on my face and you did. Class. You took the sight from my right eye in the first round, and by the second, by the end of the second from my left two. No excuses. At one of the best camps of my life. I came in sharp, prepared, and ready. Last night was your night. That's the nature of this game. Glory and Pain walks side by side. I'll heal, I'll rest and I'll return stronger, wiser,

and far more dangerous. And trust me, this story between us is far from over. We will have our rematch. I mean, that's as good as it gets, right? Credit at the top. Roy and pain walks side by side? Unbelievable. Still, still giving out bars. Unsurprising to me. I imagine that he was going to be gracious in defeat. You know, I know he does the predicting everything, celebrating beforehand, showboating all of that, but it doesn't surprise me that. That is amazing.

He's carrying himself with class throughout this. I mean, you see it with all the great champions. Alex Pereira does the same. Israel Adasania does the same. These great champions, when they do succumb to defeat, they handle themselves well. I can't shake the McGregor stuff. I think he's going to be back sooner than later.

I think he's going to be in there as soon as he possibly can. He took more down. damage than McGregor said. Oh yeah, no doubt. I mean, you know, Connor got choked out by Nate. It's not the same level of damage that he took. But if you're guiding Ilius career, you're probably telling him to chill, man, you've been through a lot, right? Yeah. If you care about this guy and we'll never know how much the past year. I mean, the pain that you feel when your family goes through that has to have an impact. The uncertainty, the changing of life. Like, that has to play some kind of part. I'm sorry. No one

is immune to that. So I feel for him. I feel for him. And that's class. You know who could learn a thing or two from that message? You guys know who could learn a thing or two from that.

Young victim Wembeyanama. Jesus Christ. Shout to skip that. Shout out to skip. No, it's disgusting. You walk off, you don't shake hands. First thing Jalen does is shake Mitch Johnson's hand. He doesn't even celebrate.

He's shaking the coach's head. And Victor won't even give him props. Won't even shake a single player's hand? Disgusting. That was a flagrant one, by the way, huh? That was a flagrant. He should be suspended for game six. Oh, yeah.

No game six. Disgusting. Absolutely disgusting. No, that is disgusting. I'm sorry. You don't walk off like that. Is it better for Ily and try and keep on edging his conversation towards? Is it not? Is it not disgusting? I'm not surprised by it. He's a kid in his young 20s. Enough with the excuses. He's dirty. He's dirty. Almost took Naz's reed head off with that elbow to the head. Is it better for Ilya to sit out for a year and stew on it or is it better for him to get it back in there?

Only he'll be able to answer that question. To me, I suspect his mental makeup is that of somebody who wants to write that wrong immediately. I just need to see him get right, like health-wise. Yeah, it's going to be a... Well, he needs to figure out where is he going to fight? Like, is it going to be back of 55, 45? It's a lot more than just... Let's get this back.

Let's get back in the wind column, I think. I don't think 45's in... You remember the videos just came out of him, like, crying when he made 1.45 the last time he did it. Yeah, I don't think 1.45 is over for him. Well, you know, it's interesting because there was a... theme with the main and co-main other than the fact that there were two titles on the line. Because throughout the course of this fight, or the buildup to this fight card, it seemed like Ilya and Alex, who are two of the best pound-for-pound fighters on the planet, developed some

kind of bond. Not only at the press conferences, but the Josh Hokka stuff, but they traveled together to the White House. It seemed like they became like actual pals and, you know, extended members of each other's team. And so we talked about Ilya. And now we talked about about Alex, who also dared to make some kind of history. This history in his own right, trying to go for that third belt. And in the end, he didn't take as much damage, but it was the kind of damage that we've never seen Alex Perey take before. Like, when he got knocked out by Izzy, it was sort of flash. He was on the offensive, and then Izzy hit him with the kill shot. This was different. This was him getting beat up. This was him getting actually beat up by a guy

who looked bigger. Again, watching that, I felt like Alex Pereira is not a heavyweight. That to me, that looks like Gregory Rodriguez, by the way, to the left. That does not look like Alex Pereira. That looked like Robocop. And there's more similarities. Sur O'Gahn, after he gets somewhat embarrassed by John Jones, let's be honest, like he did not show up for that fight. He has since turned his whole career around. Like, how many of us thought after that John Jones fight, that's his last chance fighting for any kind of belt, this is his last chance to in the main event, a big time fight, and he's never going to, like, really get to the mountaintop. Now I know he's not undisputed champion, but if you couple the way he looked

against Tom in October and this performance against Alex Pereira, Cyril Gan showed up, and now we get to hopefully write the wrong of that fight back in October. And what I mean by that is some conclusive finish. We need to know, for Tom Asperol to move on with his life and career, he needs to beat Surreal Gan. And we need to know who's the better of the two. And for surreal guy and he gets the opportunity now to finally become undisputed champion just like gaichi got that opportunity yesterday and he could beat that guy that he was looking so very good against and we get that fight he mentioned september he mentioned september in paris well here's tom aspinall on his youtube channel this morning believe it or not saying he's down take a look well sir congratulations

Paris in September, right? I'll do that. I'll do that. Let me know. You're not the boss. You're not the landlord, like AJ said. I don't mind. I'll go to Paris. Let me know. You're up to the rematch. Let me know. I'll be there. That kind of gives me chills in its own right.

Let me know, let me know, let me know. And you know what? There are a lot of fighters who say that, and it's somewhat performative. I believe Tom 1,000 percent. In fact, I reached out to him and I said, would you really fight? Absolutely. Would you really do Paris since September? Ready to go? Let me know. Now, do I think they're doing it? No. It's not a numbered event, even though it doesn't really matter. They're all the same at this point. But that to me is a great sign. I feel like we're going back to Abu Dhabi for some reason. I feel like it's October again, right? It just feels like it. But Pizzi, it pains me to see what happened to Alex. It's all gravy at this point for him. He dared to make history. No harm, no foul. We get a conclusive finish to this fight. I think for both Tom and Cyril, they need to fight each other to move on with their lives,

and I don't think this is a bad result. I know Pereira, I know Jones, I know the sexier names and all that, but I don't think that was a bad result for the UFC. You can make the case, Gaichi winning is somewhat of a bad result for the UFC because he had Ilyan Armin right there. I don't think this is a bad result for the UFC.

Do you agree or disagree? It was unfinished business, and the reality of the situation was, if you've put the interim title on the line, if Alex Pereiro wins that fight, there's a good chance that Gant and Aspinall just lays unresolved. Like, we don't get back there for some kind of reason.

It's a fight game. You never know what happens. I thought GAN looked tremendous. I know a lot of people have been talking about the fowls and everything like that since the Aspinall fight and in the aftermath of the afternoon fight. And, you know, first look on the tremendous performance, everybody's in my blood.

Look at the back of the head. He's in him in the back of the head on the way down. I think it's in the heat of the moment. Can we just say those were back of that. Like, oh, 100%.

Like, elbow to the back of the head. Yeah. On several occasions. Yeah. I will say he appeared to have Praira in a shit state before any of that went down. It's a situation where they're moving on the ground.

And he does. He clearly hits him in the back of the head a lot of times. But to your point, it's the fight that the heavyweight division needs. We need to see Aspinall and Gann. I wonder how. Andy Aspinall feels about that watching here. If you go back and you watch the lead up to that for it.

Remember they did the blog afterwards where it's all in the back and Habib's there, everything like that. Jason Herzog comes over and he makes that statement that went viral afterwards about what fells because they work. Just before he says that, Andy Aspel says, watch him on the back of the head. Watch him in the back of the head. So I'd love to hear what Andy thought about that finish when he was watching it back. But I thought Gann looked tremendous.

He made Alex look like he was not meant to be at heavyweight, to be honest. And it sets up this massive fight. One request. Big fight going down September 5th in Dublin. Let's move with Abu Dhabel. October sounds great. October sounds great. I heard about that.

Yeah, I don't think so. That's not going to be. I mean, it would be great. It would be gangster on Aspinall's part as the actual undisputed champion. But, you know, I give him a lot of credit for saying yes and I believe him. but I don't think it happens then. It was a little jarring at first. Maybe it was the state that I was in.

When I saw it gone holding two belts, I was like, what are these two belts? What's the second belt mean? And then I forgot, I forgot about the American belt or the Freedom 250. But it was just like the visual. I was like, is that Daniel Cormier? What's going on? Him holding two belts, also having not been an undisputed champion.

Wild. What a wild scene. It's an odd visual. Alex Perez next fight. Heavyweight or light heavyweight? Sheesh. Hopefully light heavyweight. Yeah.

Against who? Oldberg? I'll get to pour you. Listen, Alberg, I don't know how long he's going to be out for, but I just, look, God is a big, big boy. And by the way, credit to his team as well. We talked about this with Anthony and all week, like I thought bringing in Vakitav, bringing in Mori Kroma, who we spoke to last week, who won, who had an incredible knockout in his own right at the glory event. Like, I thought it was smart.

I don't know if they learned lessons from Ussig versus Verhoeven because this happened, obviously, very recently as well, that fight, but to bring in kickboxers, it seemed like they, he didn't do a lot media. It seemed like he was just hell-bent on proving that the Aspinall performance wasn't a fluke, that he is that guy, that he can win the big one, and this was a pretty damn big one. This was a

big one on enemy territory. And he looked great. And so if I were in charge of Pereira's career, I would say let's go back to light heavy weight. And is it to re-get that belt? Is it to recapture? Nothing left for this guy. I was about to say, I don't think there's fights left for Alex Pereira outside of John Jones

that I'm like dying to see. Are you dying to see the Jones fight now? Yes, that's a great fight. I'd rather see Aspinall versus Jones. I mean, if that's on the table, fuck yeah. I'm just saying if Jones is coming back, to have him fight Alex who got beat up by Cyril Gaon, is it, it's sort of like the Joshua AJ. It's the two best light heavyweights of

the modern era. Like, it's, I'm interested in it. Now, if you're, am I rejecting it, no, but if Jones is coming back, I'd love to see him again. If Jones and Aspenol's on the table, that's what I want. No doubt. Number one, I'll take that. But if it's not, then I'll take Jones and Pereira.

Sure, of course. By the way, let's not act like, you know, John Jones hasn't done contortions like this in the past, talking about how great Steve A Miochich was when he was not anywhere near the caliber a fighter that he was in his prime. Like, there's legacy conversations. Having Alex Pereer's name on your resume means

something, and he has continued to talk about how Alex Pereer's name on his resume means something, and Tom Aspinall's doesn't. So, if he's amenable to that fight, if the price tag is less, I could see a world where that one happens. You have might be more motivated to make that one. And especially with considering Tom and Cyril

have business to settle. I'm just saying that that's the only fight on the Alex side that I care about. On the Jones side, there's more. On the Joan side, there's more. Sure. Alex Perrier, Josh Hokka, completely did? No. Is that the fight you won as Alex, though, at this point?

I don't think, Hoket, to me, feels like a small heavyweight. He's not... Pavlovich v. Hoket. Let's go. You bring up Hoket, like, A, I think it does make sense. And B, I don't think it's egregious, but I'd rather see Pereira as a light heavyweight.

But maybe that's the one. Like that, that makes a lot of sense. For Hokeet? For both guys. For Alex? Yeah. How? If he loses this, that would be...

It stays at 265. Who else can he fight? He's a small heavyweight, and he's not a top contender yet. He's getting there, but he's not a top contender yet. I don't hate it. But in general, I would rather Alex stay at... go back down to light heavy weight. Let's talk about Amon Zahabi and Sean O'Malley.

I felt like Amon looked nervous walking to the cage. I don't know. That was just my feeling. Felt like he looked nervous. Felt like he looked a little stiff. Sean did not. And Sean felt like someone who had been there before, so to speak. A lot had been said of, you know, Sean, you know,

guys a superstar. And what a great walkout. The, you are. What you say? It was just the dude. The dude is made for these moments, man. He has made for these moments. Great finish.

Great everything. The hair, the whole thing was great. You know, they kept showing, and repeatedly they kept, I obviously wasn't there. He knocks him down, beautiful barrage of strikes, and then he starts saluting the crowd, and then the fight was stopped. But the replays were so tight that I couldn't quite get a grasp on whether or not it was premature. Was it premature? The stoppage or the celebration?

No, no, the stoppage. No. It's not fine. The slow motion, man. He got rocked back. He was standing up. O'Malley hits him again and like, sure, he wasn't like eyes rolled to the back of the head out, but like he did not need to take any more damage. Like he was far gone at that point.

It was hilarious. Knock him down and going to everyone. As you said, he's built for this. O'Malley is the guy for this. What a performance, man. Unbelievable. He called a shot. He said he was going to get his first knockout since the Aljo fighting.

He did just that. That too. It must have felt like a relief, like a weight. lifted off his shoulders. Afterwards he said, Peir Yan, do you think there's any chance that they leapfrog Marab? It doesn't seem that way, right? I don't think they leapfrog him, but I wouldn't be shocked if O'Malley said, let me sit out and see if Pejorian can get that one done. Oh, I agree with that. Especially considering, like, let's say they do Marab, Peter Yan.

I saw a video of Peter Yan shadowboxing in what appeared to be the hospital. Did you guys see this afterwards? it looks like he's in like a hospital gown or something, unless it's old, but I saw it last night, or maybe this morning. It seems like the timeline would be like, let's do Pierion versus Marab, I don't know, September, October,

and then he just waits. Oh, that makes a lot of sense, yeah. That's what I would do if I was O'Malley. Yeah, I wouldn't be surprised because, I mean, he's got the win over Yon. I think Yon is, entitled to it. Yon makes sense as a next fight for him, whether Yon wins or loses.

That's a great fight. Yeah, but especially if he wins. right? If he wins, then it's like the best possible outcome, yeah. Worst outcome for Sean would be Marab wins and then... Yep. Well, you think they'd give him a third? You would think they'd do a trilogy, but maybe they do O'Malley in between. Wait, wait.

O'Malley in between? Trilogy. No, I don't think they do a trilogy. No, no, no, Marab trilogy for O'Malley. No, no. I'm talking about for Yon. Oh, John Maraub trilogy. What would that be?

I'm saying if Marab wins, yeah. Do you do Marab versus O'Malley for the belt? No, you do Yonrob versus O'Malley. I understand, but he wants a title shot. Oh, well, I mean, yeah, you can't. He can't fight Marab again. I don't think it's Jan that's, like, his target. I think he wants the belt back.

Yeah, you're not getting another fight with Marab. Yeah. So that's what I'm saying. He sits out, Marab wins. Now you just sat out for naught. No, you get a Peter Yan fight, which is great. Yeah, but he wants the belt. I know he wants the belt.

He's not getting the belt. I know. We keep talking about it like it's his choice. He's not getting a fight against Marob. I feel like it is his choice, to be honest. I feel like he gets... If he got another fight against Marab, you think people are signing up for that?

No. Do they care? Yes. Yeah. Yeah. Yon is the fight. No matter what happens. Rick's points hit harder since he shaved the mustache.

I don't know what it is. Yon is the fight. Yon versus... He looks like a mix between Zabit, Hamzad, and Abe Lincoln. I'm dying for Yon versus O'Malley. It's finally here. It makes sense no matter what happens in the title fight. It's time.

Yon versus O'Malley. Best point in the division. I know O'Malley has like unlimited self-belief as well, but like I can't imagine he would want a third marab fight. Oh, he definitely would want it. He ain't getting it. I know he would want it, but you'd have to be like, please let it be Yon. Oh, yeah. I've beaten

this guy. He's Yon's biggest cheerleader right now, as he should be. Is this a fair statement? I was left more impressed with Josh Hokit post-Curis than it was post-Darick Lewis. No. Yes, that is a completely fair statement. That's not crazy at all. I wasn't, like, blown away by the performance.

I think, I think, talking about common themes, I think common theme between that fight and the Chandler Hoofee fight was like, we have reached the back end for Chandler and Lewis. Absolutely. If you didn't believe they just looked old. They looked older. Like they just looked at their bodies looked older.

They're fighting. Their reaction. And this is now the second straight time where we see Derek just kind of, you know? And they're against the next gen too. The next gen is proving they are a level above. Yeah. If both of them hung it up, I would be completely content with that. Do you think either of them hang it up?

No. But this was a weird... Like, he couldn't finish the arm bar there. That was weird. Yeah, his jiu-jitsu needed some fine-tuning. He's still so raw. Yeah, he's raw, but the athleticism is unlike the other heavyweights. He is going to have a good time against guys like Curtis Blades and Derek Lewis.

what is going to get interesting is once you start cracking that next level, right? What is the next level? The guy above him is Waldo Cortez-A-Costa. He could beat Waldo-Cortez-A-Costa. It's the Volkovs. It's the Tom Aspenols. Those guys, it's the Cyril Gond.

It's Pavlovich, Volkov, Cyril, Tom. Yeah. Can he hang with Pavlovich and Volkov? Yes, you should find out. I think so, but he's going to be outgun. The size is going to be a factor. A guy like Tom or. Cyril, I don't think he can hang with

just based on the physicality. I think that line all the way up to Cyril is where he can hang with anyone. He gets one of those guys. This is my Gable Steven thing. It's the same thing. If you're an athlete of that caliber, you can basically be a top three heavyweight just by existing.

And that's what I think next year. Match him with Hokka. I was going to say Gable Stevens wins the debut. No, no, don't kill off a contender with that. They need to build up some contenders at heavyweight. Do they not? I mean, come on. There's nothing going on. who get his fast-tracked right now. His walkout, he got, he came out to the Hulk Hogan song.

Yeah. I am. It was like, all right, Josh, here you are. Tucks the sweat, the hoodie into the sweatpants. Yeah. And then he does that. If Tom, it's just, if Tom can't go. Every person's a nightmare what he said, right?

Like, that's exactly what the opposition to what this event. Oh, yeah. Yeah. When I heard it was I like, fuming, no, it's like, ugh, why? Oh, exactly. Okay. Can we go back? to this.

Yeah, yeah. What, I think we're all, everybody here is in agreement. Didn't need to be said. Yeah. Unnecessary, incredibly offensive, should not have been done. But if there are new repercussions, if the environment that has been created by the UFC is you say whatever you want, Dana White goes, ah, he probably shouldn't have said that. And then no repercussions and it gets all this attention.

Is there a negative outcome? or is he doing exactly what he's supposed to be doing? When I say negative outcome, I don't mean like he's going to get fired or anything like that. I'm not talking about you in particular or even the people who have a problem with what he said. Jake Tapper is talking about Josh Hokit. We should all have a problem. That's my point. Jake Tapper is talking about Josh Hokit.

Did he do his job? If there's no consequences, if this idea that it's like, I let everybody, Dana White, I let everybody say what they want, him personally saying, I don't like it, but I let everybody say what I want. If there are no negative consequences and the entire world is talking about him, clearly Josh Hokit doesn't care if they talk well or poorly about him. That's the entire part of his gimmick. Is this what he wanted and does he win? I think Josh Hokit has got a few loose screws. Yes, he definitely does.

And he doesn't care. I don't think he's in his feelings today. I just thought it was unnecessary for the moment. It was just unnecessary. I believe get on the microphone, use that real estate to call your next shot. If he would have gone out there and been like, hey, Waldo Cortez, I'm going to do this to any other. Be like, all right, okay, that makes sense. Or hey, Tom Aspin, I'm going to do this down the other.

Or hey, Cyril Gunn. He did, he called out of Alex. This was obviously before the Pereira fight. So, like, that's who he was gunning for. Like, he got on and said, fuck the poetry. Oh, yeah, Sean on your mama. Honestly, I forgot. Yeah.

Because of that. I forgot because of that. So then is that good or bad? That's my point. So it overshadowed. Well, I guess you also have to forget about because Pereira a lot. It worked because I don't even remember it. No, the other.

one worked. Did it work though? The one that we're saying is horrible is the one that everybody's talking about and the one that everyone remembers. If there are no consequences, you have to, he's pushing the envelope as far as it'll possibly go. I'm talking about Sean Strickland too, right?

I'm banned from the White House. Now I show up and now... What was that? What was going on with that? Can someone who's smarter than me? I actually don't know either. From a psychological set. What was that? Like, barefoot. Like, he was dying to be arrested, right? Like, he was just... I think so. It seemed that way.

I think he was begging for. for it. Was he not? Because here's my thing. Like, you're at the, like, what is going? I don't, what is happening here? I don't understand what's happening. He was loving. Look, see? Look, he's dying for it. This is like an, I don't know, I don't know what to say about this. What was going on with this? Can someone explain? Seriously, from a psychological standpoint, what is happening? I have no idea. This is my first time seeing this. I don't even know what he's doing. Oh, he's getting kicked out. Yeah, yeah. He got kicked out. He got the team. Secret service. Yeah. goes on let me tell you something you guys they had cash Patel coming after me like I don't get the

whole thing is just bizarre are we led to believe that he was not allowed like even at the ellipse like he was not allowed to just I think because he's such a star it just creates a massive disturbance okay but he's not doing that he he's selling it like yeah a lot of things that it that it isn't what it actually is it's just a lot it's like oh gosh this is so uninteresting Look at this. What is this? Why is he not wearing shoes? I think he was probably in the ring, yeah? You think he took off the shoes? He was in the wrestling ring? You got to respect the mat.

I suppose, not a wrestling mat, like pro wrestling. I think he frames that picture. You know what I mean? Like, I think he loves this. What was the wrestling ring doing there? TKO. TKO, bro, the activation. Yeah, come on. No, but it was just like, it's just a display essentially, right? But you didn't see the Riyadhs season Zufa boxing ring as well?

I didn't know. No, but like there was, was there an event on? No, no, no, no. No, this ellipse thing, which, by the way, fair play, there were a lot of people. It looked good. I was like, where are these fans coming from? All over. All over, yeah.

Yes, all over, man. Look at this. It looks like freaking Woodstock. Was it Glastonbury? Yeah, I guess, like, respect to him that it, like, it was so close to the White House that, like, you kind of feel like you're part of it. Like, I think it was Sean O'Malley, who was like, thanks to those fans, man. Like, you're really... What about that scene with Diego Lopez?

Yeah. He comes out of the cage And then all of a sudden he's on the stage Like everything about it was so different and unique Yes It felt Look what is this He looks like he's pulling up at a music festival

Yes Like they're like, and now Your main act Yes Diego Lopez Lopez came across as a star In the fucking rock slides as well That shot of him on top of the cage

But this is look at this I know Dana doesn't want to do the outdoor thing But man can we figure this out Like could we get this once a year In some way shape or form it just felt so big and important. The production team nailed it on a level that, like, I know that are great.

We always say this. They're brilliant at what they do. But it felt like they were just having so much fun being let off the leash a bit. Yeah. You know, like, look what we can do here. Like, it took me about two hours to get my job off the floor after the introduction. Like, I was like, fuck me. Like, I can't believe.

And then the entrances started, I was like, for two hours, I was still in the, I can't fucking believe this is happening. And it was because of what it looked like, what it sounded like. The entrances were like the best entrances I've ever seen. It's unbelievable. Rogan's wearing a shirt and tie? I mean, come on. Tie was tough, man.

It could have gone a little longer, maybe a little skinned. White shirt for Rogan? White shirt for Rogan's a big deal. It's like maybe like a stylist or something, man. He's Jonah as well, Dana with the, I think he had the Travis Scott Nike dunks on as he's walking out. It's like, let's throw on some loafers. Yeah, it's tough.

It's got some more shows. It wasn't, didn't the fact that it like, they nailed it, like, it was the fact that all the buzz was like, oh, the weather. Oh, there's swarms of mosquitoes. Oh, like, this, this, everyone getting up about the, the Carmier and Trump thing. And then it's like, it just happens. And you're like, everything's fucking okay. Like, this is just happening.

It's not the end of the world. It's going to be all right, guys. The emotions were so high. Like, like, I, I, I, I tweeted something like, Vina White's worst nightmares playing out, and people thought that I was, like, hoping for. I was like, no, this guy has told us repeatedly he doesn't want to do outdoor events because of the weather. I'm not willing this or wishing for it.

On the contrary, you think I wanted to be sitting up there until 2 a.m. watching this? Oh, my God. I wanted this shit to fly through. It brought out so much emotions. The Trump, Eric Trump, D.C. thing, which, you know, briefly talking to D.C. on text, like, I believe he was hacked. And I think everyone for a moment, wanted to believe it was real.

It didn't seem like DC, by the way, who wrote that. That initial tweet that everyone was freaking out about. What kind of an idiot would actually tweet that? Like, I don't know anything about Eric Trump, but he surely isn't that dumb. And then there's further tweets. What a hack job that was. Kind of scary to be honest. The further one, Wiley's on the broadcast?

Like, you expect him as soon as they give him a break? Yeah. It's kind of scary, to be honest. Like, how, like, pointed the whole thing was. So it starts off with that. It starts off with the weather delay, the rain delay. They're sitting in that room there, and everyone's like, yeah, you know, this is the deal with outdoors. And you get bism being going to like, listen, let me tell you guys something.

This thing's going to go off at 9 o'clock and it's going to be the greatest event of our lives. And I'm like, that's right, B, LB, you tell him, you tell them right there. You, you, you, you, you, you, you stump for the weather. And it was fine. Come, actually a little bit before 9 o'clock. I was going to say, who's our boy that said 9? Who's the boy? Who's our guy? Yeah, Greg Rosenzstein, you know,

missing us. No, no. In his defense, Brandon Fitzgerald did say they were shooting for a round nine. Oh, good. And so what did it end up being, like 840 something? 840. Yeah, it's fine. It was fine.

In the end, it was fine. They get the big elaborate. Not for me, Greg. Not for me. Yeah, I agree. They get the big elaborate walkout. Lopez kicked things off. Seven for seven?

Seven for seven knockouts, not just finishes. No subs on that. Were they mismatches? is that a Netflix MMA Were they all mismatches? No, I'm kidding. Marisa Hoof, yeah, I didn't feel like they were,

I didn't feel like they were mismatches. There was some big favorites here. And look, at the end of the day, there was a mismatch by the odds in the main event, and we saw what happened. Like, we have to get over this idea that, like, MMA is this sport where it's like, everything's a squash match.

Anytime somebody's a favorite, a big favorite, everything's a squash match. Justin Gachi was a huge underdog. to Ilya Teporia. If that went the way it was supposed to go, everybody would be saying that was a squash match. And it was not. And it ended up being a real fight

that Justin Gaci beat the brakes off Iliot Teporia. This idea, like every fight is a foregone conclusion in MMA, and it's just crazy. We need reminders. Hamzat versus Sean Strickland, Ilya versus Justin Gaei. These things happen. That's what makes this sport so incredible.

Quick break on fast. Stick with us on YouTube. Mike Brown's face Mike Brown's face after the Bo Nickel, anyone catch that? Mike Brown was giddy. Mike Brown, I've never seen Mike Brown so happy.

Mike Brown was so happy after the Bo Neckle win. Bo Neckle was a great win over Kyle Dawkins as well. In the end, what was the American score? Let's see, I mean, it's only seven fights. They won the big one,

and they won the main event where it was American versus a non-American fighter. Gichi, O'Malley, as far as fights that Hoke at won Giaci O'Malley An American

Garcia loses Chandler loses Where there was So two and two It's not bad It's gonna happen Yeah man It felt different

It felt special It wasn't over the top With the Trump stuff In my opinion If you hated it Already going in You hated everything that you saw If you were somewhat

like indifferent to it Like I think we all were just being like at this point it's been 11 months let's just see how this thing plays out. I think you left that thing saying like, all right,

that was pretty cool. That was different. Now back to your regularly scheduled programming. What's this weekend? I can't even remember. Does anyone remember? Cop Horaguchi come on? Oh, yeah.

Let me tell you something. When it's Manel Cap versus Kioji Horaguchi at the apex, I'm going to be longing for your brother playing, you know, started from the bottom now here, whatever the hell they were playing. To be honest,

when you just mentioned, Mike Brown, that we were going back. to Knicks talk. Oh, what's that? Say it again? You said Mike Brown. I thought we were going back to Nickstock for a moment. I thought we were going back to Knicks talk, too. No, we weren't going back to Nix talk about to Nick. We were talking about Coach Mike Brown for ATT.T and Bo Nickle. The smile on his face

was unbelievable. And so let us speak to the one and only Bo Nickle. First guest of the day, still to come, Action Bronson, talk about the Nix. Arm and Sirukian's going to join us to talk about what transpired in the main event. And Anthony Smith, who did such a great job of previewing the card for us, but let's talk to a person who was actually there and competed and won and had his hand raised on Sunday night, the one and only Bo Nicol. What a win for him over Kyle Dachas. In the car, the man, always kind enough to squeeze us in. Hello, Bo. You just fought and won at the White House. I don't know if you know this, but it's a pretty big deal. I heard, I heard it was a big deal. Some couple people told you that. Does it feel like you did that? Like, does it, has it sunk in that you actually accomplished that, that you were part of that? I would say it's tough because you train, you know, for me for seven months, wanted to put a good performance out for minutes out. It's obviously exciting and this was the most unbelievable event,

but it's just like a weird also letdown when it's over because there's so much buildup and excitement. Yeah, I mean, overall, I'm just grateful for the experience. Yes, and I loved what you had to say about gratitude, about the way in which you are living your life. You said that in the post-fight interview, which I thought was incredibly well said. Can I ask, did it live up to your expectations?

Did it exceed your expectations? How would you describe how you felt about the experience going in and how it played out? Definitely exceeded expectations. I came in, just wanted to enjoy it, have fun. And I think that through all my experience competing at a high level, that I was able to do that. But not let the moment get too big. Nice toes there, looking good.

But yeah, it definitely exceeded expectations. It was just an awesome week, one that I'll never forget for sure, and grateful for all the people that helped make it happen, and grateful for my team, my family, everybody that supported me through it. I kind of wanted to move chronologically here. That press conference on Friday, was it stressful for you guys? I really felt for the fighters because of the rain delay, knowing that you had to wake up the next morning to cut weight.

Were you stressing about that, or was the work already done? everybody handled it differently for me it's no big deal you know you just control what you can control and if you're worried about other stuff then that's out of your control and not just take wasted energy so for me

you got to roll with it and luckily after a wrestling you know 10,000 plus matches and now having a few fights you can experience a lot of everything so you're able to just you know make the best of it

that supreme athletes like you You guys are so locked in when it's time to compete. I'm wondering if you did allow yourself moments to be like, that's the Lincoln Memorial. I'm on these steps. There's thousands of people. Did you smell the roses at any point? Yeah, definitely.

I felt like I was kind of going back and forth between, you know, trying to focus, then trying to smile and have fun through it. And I think that what really helped is being with my coaches and my friends and seeing my family and just kind of like keeping everything in perspective. but like I said, just compete as many times as I have in high pressure situations. You learn to enjoy it and embrace it and have fun. And I'm really appreciative of the experience that I've had prior that helped me, allowed me to do that.

I think most people probably don't have that. They're not able to really, like, fully be present in those moments. I said at the beginning of our show that I thought it was an A-plus-plus event. I thought the UFC hit a grand slam, the visuals, the production. It was amazing to watch. but I don't know how the sausage was made, so to speak. And obviously you guys are the ones, you know, like we kind of treat you guys sometimes as like just little toys and all of this.

Like, oh, yeah, they can wait if there's a rain delay? Was there anything that was more stressful than usual as a result of the unique setting that you say like, okay, that was great for once, but I can't wait to just be a part of a normal fight week the next time? Yeah, I mean, of course it was more stressful than a normal guard. There was a lot more that went into it, a lot more buildup, you know, especially for me with seven months of preparation, knowing that I'm on the card and knowing that I need to be dialed

and this is going to be the biggest moment of my career. So, yeah, definitely more stress. But in my mind, I just, you know, was kind of doing a lot of self-talk and ask myself, like, yo, are you that guy? Like, are you going to deal with it or are you going to be a baby? Like, figure it out. And, you know, you just deal with it. And again, like I said, try to have fun through it.

And that's really, I think, where my experience kind of, was being able to have fun with it and enjoy it and be loose. I think a lot of guys seemed a little tense, you know, during fight week and stuff. But I felt like I was having just a blast the whole time. Can you tell us about yesterday? What time did you get to the White House and what was like the warm-up slash locker room experience like? What room were you in? I'm dying to know, like, all those little details.

Can you tell us about it? You want the tea? Yeah, give us the tea. Give us everything. So I forget the exact name of the building that we were in. It's right across from the White House. It's Eisenhower building maybe. And it was like, if you saw any of it on the show,

it was like the most unbelievable, unbelievably decadent cool room that had probably 50-foot high ceilings and crazy molding everywhere and all this and that. And it was just like an awesome spot to be and just like looking at the architecture and stuff. And there's American flags everywhere, barble floors. So, you know, it was really, really unique and really, uh, yeah, unusual for a three-fight experience.

And, you know, it was kind of cool, too, because everybody in Red Corner shared a locker room. So there were seven guys together that all were kind of in there, um, and ready to, uh, get out there and scrap. And so that was fun. But yeah, I enjoyed it. The walk from the Eisenhower to the White House was pretty cool, too. like a whole security team around you and then your coaches and stuff and you know you just kind of roll over there maybe three 400 yards walk to the white house and then get to meet the people you're

walking out with uh doing that whole thing with a medal of honor winner and other service member and um that got me hype because i was talking with my my uh medal of honor winner and he was like you're ready to go like kind of just typing me up and stuff which was fun um but yeah the walkout was insane the live music. The president's band knocked it out of the park. And yeah, it was just like a crazy. It's like a movie. Like, people use that saying too much, but this definitely fits.

Were you emotional at any point? I was a little bit emotional in the, in the rehearsal on Thursday. Just doing it for the first time. I mean, kind of seeing everything, being in the White House, seeing the service members, the band. kind of being in the cage with nobody there. Like, I was in emotional in a very spirited, excited way where I was just like, wow, like it got me so pumped up to fight. I felt like just dialed in and excited and ready to rock.

At the very beginning of the broadcast, it starts at 8 p.m. and they tell us there's a rain delay, and you're the second fight on the card. Was there any part of you that thought you have to taper off with the warming up? you can't do certain things was that uncertainty, any kind of inconvenience? I mean, it just saw your perception, right? Perception is reality. So, you know, for me, I didn't really give a crap what happened with the weather. I was going to go out there and whoop that dude.

So that's all I was worried about. And, you know, stuff happens. You know, once in a while, you know, things don't go as planned. And you just got to roll with it and figure it out. Like I said, just smile through it, have fun, enjoy it. And yeah, don't be so tense, so tight. Like a lot, I think a lot of guys I saw, like I say, seemed a little tense, but I guess it's a fight, so it's hard not to do that. And could you tell us, you know, a lot was made of the bugs, the weather, this, that?

What did it feel like out there? It didn't seem like any of that was an issue, but for you, what did it feel like? Oh, well, the weather was perfect. Yeah, it was unreal. I think, like, right when I watched, and it was... Oh, did we lose you? Do you see me? Do you hear me? We may have lost them there.

There's a great moment there that he shared with the president afterwards. Shall we reconnect with Bo? Absolutely. Okay, it seems like we're going to reconnect with Bo. His fifth career win via knockout. He ended the fight in the first round, of course. 434 of the first round against the guy who had been looking quite good as of late, Kyle Dachas, still unranked in the U.S.

UFC's middleweight division. Now back-to-back stoppage wins, of course, he won in November at Madison Square Garden. And it was about 13 months ago that he lost to RDR in May of 2025. That was in Iowa. Doc is, by the way, on a six-fight winning streak. And, well, was on a six-fight winning streak going into that fight. So he had been looking quite good as of late. A lot of been made of the fact that Colby. Oh, yes, okay. We'll go back to Bo Nicol here. There he is. Hello, can you hear me, Bo? Yes, sorry about that. No problem. Yeah, it's a little choppy. Obviously, you're on the road, so I appreciate you joining us very much, and I won't keep you for much longer. As far as the fight playing out, the way in which it did, first round finish, now two wins in a row since the RDR fight. Can you tell us about how it played out? And was that how you expected it to play out? Yeah, so I always do a lot of visualizations for my fights, and that was one of the things that I visualized as a possibility for getting the finish,

you know, front kick to the face and then, you know, finish them off from there. It wasn't, in my mind, the most likely. But, yeah, I mean, I felt like after we popped up, after we were stood up, that he was a little slower, not reacting as quicker, and I was like, I think this will land. So moved around a little bit and then went for it, And it worked out. And yeah, I mean, like I said, definitely, I visualized that one pretty clearly the night before.

What did you say to the president afterwards there? Yeah, I just told him thank you for opportunity. Thank you for making this possible. It's just such a cool thing to do. And I just said I've been such a huge fan of him since I met him in 2019. And he was really kind to me. And look at us now. Look at where we're around now.

Do you think they do this again? I don't know. Probably not, but if they do it again, I'll get back in there. Yeah. Afterwards, what do you do? Like, where do you go afterwards? It was a lot of media. Well, the one thing that was really cool, actually, one of the coolest parts the whole event was we got to go to the ellipse after. And in front of 85,000 people, I tossed some shirts in the crowd, did a little interview, and just kind of, it was like the biggest live crowd I've ever been. in front of and just to like kind of interact with the fans there was really special we got some cool content of it as well i love that i saw dago lopez like did you did they take you guys from the cage to there how long of a walk was that it was uh it was a little bit of a i think the car ride

over to it okay um so we went yeah it lit or we went fight a little media and then jumped in the car popped out at the ellipse and uh yeah i got to do the fan fest thing yeah The visual was great. I also love that they brought back, I don't know if you've ever experienced this because you're newer to the scene, the old school press conference where all of you were sitting up there with Dana.

Did you enjoy that? Yeah. Or wait, post flight? Yeah, afterwards. They don't do that anymore. No, I hated it. I hated it. That sucked.

Oh, why? Why? Because you were sitting there and no one was asking you stuff? No, no, not that at all. I thought it was interesting to hear the questions and answers and stuff. But I felt like I finished my fight

and I'm just like sitting around waiting for the, you know, co-main main event, Dana to get there. And I'm like sitting there for four hours. I'm like, I just want to go hang out with my, I mean, I was hanging out with my coaches and family and stuff, but you're just in a little room and watching the fights and stuff. So you kind of just want to be free. You're like, I did my job.

Like, I smashed this dude up. So I kind of just want to be done with it. But, yeah, it wasn't too bad. It just you get held up. I mean, we didn't finish until 2.30 in the morning. Got it. And I fought. I was done a lot earlier than that.

I understand. I understand. Did you happen to share a moment with your old college, your old college opponent, Josh Hokit? Yeah, we talked for a little bit. I like Josh. I think, you know, he's a tough guy, really, you know, good fighter. He's been able to blow up here in his last couple fights, which is exciting. And I hope he continues to do well.

Are you shocked at how well he's doing? I wouldn't say so. I mean, the guy is an NCAA All-American wrestler. He played in the NFL. He's a freak athlete. And so, you know, I think that he's committed himself to fighting. He definitely trains hard and works hard. So I'm sure he can go far in the sport.

How quickly do you want to return? I'm ready to go. I got to get back home, see the family, and then I'm going to start training again here ASAP. And we'll see. We'll talk with Hunter and with Mick and figure it out. But, yeah, I'm ready to fight again. Anyone in mind?

What do you think? Who do you think I should fight? Well, are you going to get ranked now? Do you think you're going to get ranked? Maybe. I don't know. It's not my job. No, I know it's not your job.

I don't know. I mean, I feel like there's a ton of... Hey, I'm not in the speculation business. Sure. Chatting about it. I think you're better at this, so I would defer to you. I appreciate that. Or jail or somebody like that.

You know, you guys tell me. What about like a, I don't know, a Jared Kennanier type? Are we ready for that? I think he's booked, I'm pretty sure, but I mean, yeah, is somebody not booked around that, like, you know, in that same ballpark up down? Yeah. Well, I presume, like, if, you know, he moves on and then, you know, you're probably coming back in three, four. You have to wait a long time for this fight, so I would imagine there's a party that wants to make up for a little bit of lost time, right? Yeah, man.

I mean, I love fighting. I love the training and improving and getting better, but my favorite part's going out there and fighting, so as much as I can do that, the better. So, yep, that's some definitely down. Highlight of your career, would you say so far? It's up there. Okay. And by the way, I know you were busy, but did you watch RAF on Saturday?

No, I missed it. I like to watch, like, actually good wrestling, so, you know, I heard the main event was some guys that didn't really know how to wrestle, so I didn't watch that. I watched the, I watched the early matches, some of the lead-up. I was curious, since you're so invested, like the Chamsa Dillon stuff, do you feel like that's going away from what will make RIF special and successful?

How do you feel about that? Man, you know, obviously there are two guys that generate a lot of buzz. I think that they do their thing. I'm not surprised with the way it turned out. But what RIF's doing really well that I think is flying under the radar is they are putting together an amazing matchups, fun, exciting match. Like every time I see the matchups that they're lining up with the really high-level wrestlers, I'm like, oh, let's go. Like, I got to see that.

Like, that's epic. So, you know, that stuff, I think it flies under the radar, but it's really special. And the real wrestling aficionado is appreciated. And I think those matches are more entertaining to me. Last thing, you said yesterday that Kioji Urauchi was fighting this weekend has been critical of your striking and you were hoping to get some praise. Did you hear from Kiyoji about what you did out there? Not yet. He's focused on his fight. He's going to go beat this dude up, and I'm pumped for him, and then we're going to have to get back in the gym and train together some more.

And he's a tough dude. He's a, you know, the Japanese culture, they're very, they're perfectionist. So I think, you know, to get some praise from him, I got to keep getting better. Fair enough. But you are on your way. Tremendous stuff. Congrats, Bo. And thank you for doing this on your way home. Really appreciate it. Enjoy the victory. Enjoy everything that comes with it. And of course, your summer with your family as well. Thank you, Ari. I appreciate you. Always appreciate you having me on. We're getting close to me, uh, not responding to your text. So I know, Matt. This one, I thought this was the one. I thought this was the one. I thought this was the one that you were

going to ghost me like. Did you really? Wow. Yeah, I mean, you're fighting at the White House and I'm asking you for a 12 hour turnaround. And I was like, there's no chance. And like, like always, you respond with a smile on your face. I didn't see your face, but I presume there was a smile when you were responding. Of course, of course. Yeah. But, uh, that they will. They come, so be ready. I'm not, I don't want to hear about this. Please no. Not yet.

Not yet, Bo. Thank you so much. All the best to you and congrats. Thank you. Appreciate you. There he is. Bo Nickel, victorious, beating Kyle Dachas. Anthony Smith is going to join us in about 12 minutes.

Action Bronson. I got to talk to action. I got to talk to my guy action about the Knicks. And, of course, Armant Truckean, if you're watching on fast, quick break. If you're on YouTube, stay right there. All right. Let us go back to, and for the YouTube crowd, we've got to, to do this. I know it's a little bit awkward, but am I doing it well, by the way, guys?

Am I doing it well? Am I pausing long enough? Nailing it. Life is good today. Am I pausing long enough? Yeah, yeah. You're doing it. It's so weird when you go back, when you go back to your face looking like that. It's so weird. Can I tell you something that I'm debating right now, guys? I actually need your help. Please. It's on my mind. It's actually quite stressful. So I'm going to the parade, right?

Sure. It starts at 10. Yeah. What that means, I don't know. Like, it's not like I'm just going to stand there and I'm going to see everyone be like, hey, guys, here's the question. How early do I need to go? Yeah.

And where do I go? Thigh die. Well, yeah, Canyon Heroes and Fadai. But, like, where do you set up shop? Wherever you can. Can I tell you? You realize there's going to be people going earlier. Whatever time you choose, they're going to be people going to be people going.

Okay, so here's my thought. Sleep in the city night before. Absolutely. And what time are you going in, though? City? No, no. What time are you showing up? Sleep in the city night before.

I'm going to have my kids with me, obviously, clear to 6 a.m. Yeah, I think lining up at 6 a.m. Oh, I was going to say wake up at 6 a.m. People are going to camp out the night before, I bet you. So if you get there, if you wake up at 6, you're not going to be closed. It also depends. Do you want to hear the speeches or you just want to see them going by on the flow, celebrating? That's a good quote.

I don't know. I don't know. What am I? Here's the thing. Is there any chance I regret this? No. Right going? Yeah. No way.

Is there any chance to be? Such a shit show. You can't move. It's like we tried and fuck it. This is like one of the staples the city offers, I think it's cool. Tick or tape. You're going to be amongst a bunch of people who have that feeling that you have. No.

Did you know that this is the first ever Nix parade? In 1973 and 1970, Mayor John Lindsay felt like it was, um, It was an inappropriate use of funds to put on. That's that bullshit. And they didn't get a parade. They got like a gathering at City Hall, but they didn't get an actual parade. There's no footage of them on floats, on buses of any kind. So number one, you guys think I should go?

Definitely. Do you think I should go the night before? Yes. I think staying in Fidei the night before is a swarm move. I think it could be disaster trying to get in from your house. Yeah. Okay. So did you stay in Fidei?

Yes. Yeah. There's a couple of cool hotels right by where you used to work. Is it? Oh, man, that's the old office, huh? Where is the Canyon of Heroes? I believe it starts in, like, Battery Park and goes all the way to City Hall. I think that's where it's going to end.

How many miles is that? I think it's only, like, one. It's all up Broadway, right? From what I remember. Is Dan Housen going to be involved? That I can't tell you. One thousand percent has to be. You uncursed the Knicks?

I'd like to think so. I keep going on Twitter real quickly and seeing stuff, and I'm like, wow, the Knicks are on GMA doing like that team interview afterwards. I think McHale Bridges is very drunk, but it's unbelievable. He is definitely all of it right now. He's just...

It's just unbelievable. All of it is. I know all out. Speaking of Twitter, all right, let's take a look at the people who reacted to Ilya Tuporia's loss. I think there's like, an absolute avalanche of reaction.

This was kind of expected with how much, like he puts everything on the line. Yeah. You guys give it to me. Here's Alexander Taporia, obviously his brother, proud of everything you do and have done my brother,

in victory or in learning, always grateful to God for everything. And it's still unclear. Who called it? Who didn't call? I don't know. Marab says, proud of my warrior brother,

I know he will come back stronger than ever. So these are the positives one. positive ones. Here's maybe not so positive. Islam Achachev, to quit in the biggest fight of your career is something not everybody can do. Real Le Leilanda, which is the nickname that I think he gave to himself prior to the Olavera fight. He who, this is more from Islam, he who exalts himself will be humbled. There's levels in this game. Congratulations, Justin. You deserve this belt more than anyone. So Islam enjoying this. Here's Patty Pimlet.

quote tweeting the tweet that Ilya sent him or about him when he lost, Patty lost to Justin back in January. The only thing, and I'm going, I'm going side by side because I think he like used the same words, right, almost to a 100% degree, but not quite. The only thing you had to do was beat a 38-year-old coming off a five-round war with me. Instead, you quit on your stool like the little bitch you are I'm a real fighter and went five rounds your typo there

a little pretender chorizo congratulations Justin rematch for undisputed I'm not sure I get the the victory lap of like I went around longer than you while also losing

yeah I think the judges had a 3-1 right family shouldn't be in the corner whatsoever I mean some of the great duos in combat history were father's son. He quit himself, sad to see. He earned a nice stripe, however, tainted. He will get stronger from this beating. What a sport. So somewhat, you know, what Rick was alluding to. Here's Terrence Crawford. This is the guy that said he would knock me out

and whoop me and Shakur at the same time. Laughing, laughing, laughing. Terrence was in attendance, by the way. Sort of like an honorary Zufa boxing member. Here's more from Connor, quote tweeting to Terrence tweet. What the effort you say? saying you can wrestle, yet you are afraid of an MMA fight. That to me is pitiful. The kid was beaten in an MMA fight, of which you don't have the courage for. What the F was with all these

little boxers at this show, yet no MMA fighters, hashtag these boys ain't man enough. You all see them, though. Right, a lot of builds. Here's more from, Terence. Shut your drunk ass up, or does he mean ass? And get ready for your fight.

He got his asswop like you did running yo mouth. I don't have to come and fight in the cage. That's the joy of boxing. Y'all come to us. We don't have to come to y'all. I mean, he's got a good point there. It is true.

Here's Chris Eubank Jr. Sick fight. I think Tuporia would actually do well in a boxing ring, and Gachie's a bad man. So he actually thinks Tuporia will do well after that performance. Francie says, never count Justin out. Congratulations, champ, Justin Gachi. You never let me down.

All right. Hamza says, Those who rejoice at the defeats of others will never see greatness in this sport. Wait a second. Is he talking about Islam? Seems like he was rejoicing. Here's Lil Wayne.

Too happy for Justin right now. Congrats champ. Hashtag highlight USA Bish. By the way, hashtag highlight. Did he mean to actually put in the hashtag and he just kind of spelt it out? Who's to check? Lest we first.

Forget, Armand Sarukian seem to have bet on. So did he bet on him or not? What's the deal? Okay, so I think the clarification has finally been made that his friend bet on Justin. And if you watch the full video of the wager being placed, the friend is the one that's replacing it. Anyway, Justin, by the way, what did you guys think of the old school press conference? Yeah, I thought that was interesting. I kind of dug it.

Caught me off guard. It reminded me of the old days. I kind of dug it. But I do understand where Beau is coming from. Anyway, here's Justin reacting to the Armin bet. The last question. Speaking of betting, Armand Sarukian earlier this week. And apologies, I know your mind has been everywhere. Some money.

He made a bet on his friend bet. His friend bet. He didn't bet. Wanted to know if you knew about that bet at all? Is it true? Is it false? Oh, yeah, yeah. His buddy bet. Yeah, his buddy bad. And his buddy made some cheddar. And on Justin, and on that same note, Justin, Armand said that if you win. 5.5.7? Yeah. High point seven. Who took that bet?

I think his name is Pucho. Who'd they bet it with? Polymarket? Let me double check. Got him. It's a big hit for Polymarket. I mean, Armand also said on the stream where he made that bet official that if Justin wins, he's buying you a pickup truck or any truck. What type of truck do you like and what's your message to Arm on?

I don't really... Ram. You need a truck. Buy him a ram. I'll take a ram. I am due for a new truck. My truck is in 2020. I bought it when I beat Tony Ferguson.

And it's got about 65,000 miles on it. So send it. And just for clarification, it was on jack.com. Don't know. What's that? Jack.com. Oh, yeah, jack.com. They got Jack tonight.

Here is, by the way, what a wild thing to see that again. Those press conferences feels very old school. I kind of dig it. Armand tweeting, what color do you want your truck to Justin Gachi? And here, oh, what was that? I think that was Volcanovsky tweeting. Wow, absolutely insane ending to a crazy night. Well-played Dana and Trump, U.S.C. White House.

Here's the actual scorecard, by the way, in case you're wondering. Obviously, things ended in the break there between the fourth and fifth rounds. Ben Cartledge had it three to one for Justin Gachie, giving just the second round. to Ilya, Derek Cleary had it same, Sal Damado had it same. So there you have it. It would have required a stoppage by Ilya to win the fight. Had it gone the distance, which is pretty remarkable. We talked about Aspinall's reaction to the co-main event. Here's John Jones's reaction to Surreal Gilgan beating Alex Perea. No audio. Congratulations to the new heavyweight champion, Gan. You look great out there. Signed the goat. How about that? Franz Zenganu reacted.

Congratulations, Bong Gamet for the wonderful performance. Sincerely, the lineal heavyweight champion, the LHC. Crazy. Crazy, crazy, crazy, crazy. What a time. And also, by the way, shout out to Tom Aspinall who was at the misfits event in Manchester hanging out with Phil Foden America isn't for everyone. A nod to Foden not getting selected to the English team.

You guys locked in on the World Cup yet? Locked in, bro. Are you really? I can't get into it yet. A bird forcing a draw against Spain to them. For real? Holy smokes, that's shocking, no? Yeah, Spain was minus 1,500.

Whoa. Yep Yep Congratulations to the U.S. What a performance Former Nottingham Forest Sone Giorana with the

Trevella Yeah like 97th minute That was nasty Like with the right foot It's like 12 hours for Spain Oh That's a good Yeah

Waria goes down Is it Cape Verde or Verde? I actually think it's Cabo Verde Damn Canada Underwhelming I have to say

Yeah it wasn't I wasn't impressed It's all right It's game one Argentina lost the Saudi Arabia in game won. Well, you know it's huge. Qatar, Swiss, Tying. That was a crazy game.

Had her in like the 94th by Qatar? So everyone has a point in that group. But you got to be Bosnia at home. You're opening the World Cup, Bosnia. Come on. All due respect. I know they beat Italy all that, but like, come on,

it wasn't a good showing. It was a very underwhelming performance. I'm going to get into it now. Are you going to a game? What's the verdict? Yeah, I'm going to a couple games. I'm going to one. In Jersey or all in Atlanta?

One in Atlanta on Sunday, Spain, Saudi Arabia. This Sunday? Yeah. Holy smokes. I'll be there. And then, yeah, in Jersey as well. Going to go to one. Quarters or?

I don't remember the date. England? It's knockout. I can't remember the date. Oh, so you don't know who you're seeing. Yeah, yeah, don't know what I'm saying. All right. Well, still to come, Armist Surukian's going to join us to talk about what transpired in the main event,

Action Bronson in an hour as well to talk about the Knicks winning the NBA title. What is this universe that we're living in? But without further ado, I really wanted to have. I really wanted to have Anthony Smith on because I thought on Thursday his analysis of this card was amazing. Like a really, really great analysis. If you watched it on our Facebook or X, I thought he was on fire with some of his takes and a lot of them came to fruition. And so I wanted to get his reaction to what transpired in the aftermath. And he's now kind enough to join us once again.

There he is, Mr. Lionheart himself. Hello, Anthony. How are you? What's up, Ariel? How are you? Life is good, my man. I'm an NBA champion. There's nothing.

You are. There's nothing that can be said to me that will upset me right now. I feel like I don't even know what universe I'm living in. You know what this feeling is like as a fan of the chiefs. This is very foreign to me. So I'm very, very, did you ever go to a parade, by the way? Did you go to any of those parades or were you too far, far out? No, no.

It's like a three hour. It's like a three hour drive. So I never made it. Actually, I think at the last parade, there was a shooting too. So it's a good thing to go. Oh, God. Because I'm deliberating this right now. You have to go.

Okay. Despite the fact that there was a shooting at the last one? Yeah, it's fine. Okay. Well, I'm going. Duck. Okay, okay. You asked me, when we were talking last night via text, what did you think of the event?

And I didn't reply to you. And truth be told, I fell asleep, but I'm happy that I didn't reply that we did not talk about it. You don't know my thoughts unless you've seen them on Twitter. I think you're off Twitter, by the way. You deleted your Twitter, right? I did. Yeah. It was a dumpster fire.

I was looking to tag you and I couldn't find it. No, you got to get out of there. That's a dumpster fire. When did you pull the plug, by the way? Oh, it's been a couple years. Oh, it has been that long. Okay. And by the way, what's going on here with this part of your, what is it, your left?

What is that over there? Oh, right here. Yeah, what is that? It's one heart for everyone in my family. Wow, and why is one colored? That would be me. Okay, all right. Wow.

Wait, so did you get your whole arm black? Yeah, yeah, the whole thing. When did that happen? Oh, midlife crisis was at its peak, probably. I don't know, three or four months ago. Oh my gosh. What does that represent? Nothing.

It's a cover up. So I, instead of getting it removed, which is a long, painful process, I just blacked it out. And then it doesn't have to be perfectly blacked out because then I'm going to go back over it with a color sleeve. Oh my gosh. And why did you want to cover it up? I don't know. It's just a bit of a midlife crisis, I think. I think tattoos sometimes for people that are heavily tattooed sometimes represent less about.

the tattoo and a lot of times it's where you're at in life when you got it or what kind of mindset you were in or whatever and I'm just trying to I guess evolve and grow and I just it wasn't in a great part of my life when I got that stupid-ass tribal so I'm just trying to erase it wow do you regret him no no not really you can always cover it and remove it and it's a process but no I don't regret it I mean it was I was there. You know what I mean? It was like it was a time in life and I just, I'm somewhere else now. Both arms are blacked? No, just one. Okay. Why not the other? Because I haven't got there. Okay, okay, but you're eventually going to do it. Probably. Okay. That's not why we wanted to have you on,

but I'm just an inquisitive person. Now going to the event. What'd you think? I thought it was absolute cinema. Like just the scenes, just how cool it looked with the White House in the background. I thought it was amazing. They had like veterans and first responders walking each fighter out and they recognized them, put their names up on the screen. I thought that was cool. Just the visuals were absolutely crazy. So overall, I thought it was a great event. It was just hard to imagine like that we're here, like that the UFC is in this place right now. It was, it was just, I think, I think Cormier said it at the very beginning. He just couldn't believe that he was a part of something like that. It was just, I couldn't. I couldn't

believe I was just in my basement watching it with a couple friends. I just couldn't believe what I was watching. Yeah. I think we sometimes take for granted how this stuff comes off. I was thinking of people that you work with and know the Zach Candidos of the world, the Craig Borsaris of the world, the Michael LaPlantez of the world, Ritchie, like these guys who are like, they live and breed this stuff. And I kept thinking like, I can't imagine how they are feeling. These are producers, by the way, for the audience. I didn't mean to get all inside. seeing this play out the way in which it was because I thought it was beautiful. I thought it was breathtaking at times.

I thought it was beautiful. I got the chills. I just got the chills right now thinking about it. I found myself getting the chills the whole time for the same reason as you. Like how proud those guys must have been of just themselves and each other to pull off something just so. I think breathtaking is a perfect way of saying it. It was just it was a beautiful sight. Do you think it's one and done as far as that type of event?

is concerned. Do you think we ever see that again? Yeah, it's probably just a one-off, I would imagine. Because I don't, I don't imagine that there was any money made. You know what I mean? It's like the sphere event is kind of a very similar thing. It's kind of just a, I don't know, it's like a just a moment in time, I guess, and they're doing it to do it and just because they can and the UFC is one of the only organizations in the world that could pull something like that off. But I don't imagine that it's, you know, financially sustainable. I am curious, though, there were a bunch of, this is a whole other topic, but there were a bunch of ads all over the cage. And I was told that because it's on federal land, you can't have advertising of any

kind. So I don't know how they got around that, but that's a whole other topic for a different day. As far as the actual fighting was concerned, we talked about Gaichi and Ilya and we'll ultimately never truly know. We talked about everything Ilya's been through. over the past year and whatnot, but like for the fight to play out like that, I have to say I was shocked. I was giving Justin a very, very small chance. You were not, like you gave him

I don't know, like a strong chance, but like you definitely laid out the case for him to pull this off as you saw it play out. What were you thinking? I just could, I was hoping that that Gachie was going to stick to what he was doing

because I think I said when we were on here talking before that we would I would have a strong idea of how the fight was going to play out in the first two minutes. And in the first two minutes, I really liked what Gaichi was doing. Even the fake shot, you know, like the fake single to the uppercut. Ilya's approach was confusing at first. And I don't know if it was a lack of respect or if it was an overbelief in his power. But he had this weird kind of stance that he's never really had before,

where his hands were really high, right hand tucked really, really close. And every time Gachie would throw, he would, like, hinge backwards at his waist, almost like his head was out past his heels. And he's never done that before. And he wasn't countering initially. He kind of just pressured, took space, forced Gachi back, and Gachi was just laying in that jab right away. Like, I feel like Teporia was hit cleaner in the first round of that fight than he has his entire career combined. So I don't know.

He just wasn't as, his volume wasn't as high as I expected it to be. And he let Gaichi get away with a lot early. But once I've seen Gaichi kind of, he was just unorthodox in his approach. His jabs were oddly timed. Like if you look at that right hand that dropped Ilya, the first one, it's like there's a tempo that everybody fights that aerial. So like usually if, you know, Trevor Whitman calls for a one-two. 99% of the people out there,

it's going to go boom, boom. It's going to be one, two, right behind it. Like, we're taught once your jab is out, the faster you pull that jab back home, the harder and faster your right hand is going to be. And that's, so that's the tempo. It's boom, boom. They're supposed to be really quick.

But Gaichi went jab, one beat in between, and then the two. That's something that's kind of notorious for, like, Justin Gaichi. It's a very odd thing. He fights at a very weird tempo. It's even just one little beat off makes a big difference because everyone's used to parrying the jab covering for the two or parrying the jab, slipping the two. But if someone throws the jab and you parry it or you eat it and then there's one beat in between, you don't expect that there's a two coming down the pipe. And that's just something that Gaiji's always.

And I don't even know that that's anything he's ever been taught or learned. I think it's just a thing that I think it's just natural. that's just his instincts is to have that beat in between those two shots sometimes. But if you go back and look at his career, most of the time when he hurts people, there is a weird tempo from the punch that was right before that. Wow, wow. Okay, great insight once again. You know, I'm not trying to offer any type of excuse for Ilya here. As I said at the top, Justin deserves all the flowers.

He won that fair and square. It was an unbelievable performance. I was struck at the size difference. It wasn't as stark as it was when he fought Olivera. Ilya did. Do you think this result will cause him to rethink his position in the lightweight division and think about going back to 45? No, I don't think so. I think he was really struggling to make 145. I had a lot of shades of Connor Nate Diaz watching that fight. And Chale says this all the time. The worst place

you want to be is in a fight that's harder than you thought it was going to be. And I do think that there was a level of underestimation for Ilya. Like he had Justin in a couple bad spots in the second round, had him mounted. You know, it just, you know, he was trying to attack submissions, potential arm bars. He was looking at arm triangles.

He was trying to take his back. I think he's just so used to finishing people that I think there is an element to, to, you know, being in that second round and being a bit flustered and disheveled, maybe is a word, when he didn't get him out of there and then realized this guy's way tougher than I thought he was going to be. And I thought that if Gachie could take a big shot from Ilya and be okay mostly, I thought that he would do really well. I thought that the whole fight was going to be based

on if Justin Gachie could absorb the damage. Because what we've seen him hurt, we've seen, we've seen Charles Oliver drop him, we've seen Max Holloway knock him out. I mean, we've seen him hurt before. And seemingly, Ilya Tepore is as powerful as any of those guys. So I thought if he could take a shot from Ilya and be okay, that I thought he had a great chance of winning. You know, you're 100% right. And I think that happened quite early, right? I think he realized that very early in the fight. Like, I could take this guy. And I thought, like, that's what I was picturing. I was picturing a car crash, a la Olivera, Ilya, back in June of last year. And Gaei just, we've seen him fall face first against Max Holloway. And I thought, this is what, you know,

I'llia does to everyone. It's going to happen again. And once that didn't happen in the first round, I was like, holy shit, Justin is live. And then in the third round, the one two that he hit him with, that right hand. I mean, we've never seen Ilya get caught with something like that before. And so we get to that moment, fourth to fifth. Actually, can I ask you about the third going into the fourth, that moment with the doctor and Mark Goddard? What do you think happened there? Because it seemed to me like the doctor was waving it off. Like he was like, nope,

he can't see. He got bullied. Yeah, what was that? He wanted to stop it. And then they brought in another doctor. And then it seems like they, they hit it behind the guys of like a,

I don't know, like a language barrier is how they kind of played it off. Like, but credit to Ilya for walking back out there. He had an easy out. He had an easy out. He had someone that was right there going to save him. And he wouldn't have made it look like he quit.

it would be easy to blame it on the doctor. That was an early stoppage. I could have kept fighting. He had an out. And there was a wide open door. And not a lot of people would have given him any shit for it and he didn't take it. So you got to give him credit. And I got to give him credit for how he fought.

He took some big shots. He took some, you know, he got pushed to a level that he's never been. He was in deep water that he's never seen before. So not only did he, I guess, show up and find himself in a dog fight when he had never had to before. But I think that he, I think that he really showed his heart and his will and his determination. It just, it was, the mountain was too high. And, and that's okay. That's fighting. That's how it goes. He'll be better for this once he heals up, though. Okay. I'll ask you about that in a moment. I'm just curious, what did you think of the decision to call the fight off fourth going into fifth?

Oh, that's a good call. Yeah. That's a good call. I had seen enough. We knew that the, we knew where this was going and it was headed downhill quickly. And I don't, I don't think that there was reason for him to take any more damage he was battered and and we we want all these guys to go home and we don't need to take any more like is five more minutes of that beating going to do him any good is it going to take his career any further are we going to take time off of his career and i just you know sometimes you just got to get your ball and go home and so you talk about him you know you make the comparisons to mcgregor diaz um i see those comparisons mcgregor russie didn't take as much damage but you know we've seen people come back uh let's not forget

Gachi was getting knocked out by Max Holloway not that long ago and look at how good he looked in this fight. And then, of course, back in January, what would you suggest would be best for Ilya? Because I would imagine the competitor in him wants to get back as soon as possible, but he took a lot of damage. And so how long do you think he's out for? And who should he come back against? As long as he's healthy. I mean, he definitely took big damage, but I didn't feel like he was wobbled a bunch. I've really felt like the damage at the end was

that knee to the body um you did to I mean facial cuts and lacerate they look terrible I don't know how I bet he heals quickly I bet in a week he's gonna look almost new so I'd like to see him at the end of the year though you don't want to sit on that too long you don't want to because it'll fuck with you little mess with how you feel about yourself

you know especially when you're the the level of superstar that he is and the attention that he has and you know he's gonna be he's gonna be eating that one for a while, especially with the shit that he says. I mean, he had a celebratory dinner before and had a funeral for Gai Chi before. Like, you're going to have to eat that. You're going to have to eat that shit for a minute. So the quicker you can get back and be healthy and 100% and try to get that monkey off your back, the better. Is there someone that you would like to see McGain's? Um, no, I don't know that it matters. I don't know that matters. He's good and he can beat

anybody. He's good enough to beat any of them. So I don't know that we need to protect him. or move around and get a specific matchup. I think something that motivates him. Patty. Win or lose against BSD? Win or lose makes sense. That's a good one. Right?

That's a good one. Win or lose, you're right. Yeah, I don't think that it matters. I mean, that's the one. A win against BSD is going to be hard to convince Patty of that. But if he loses, you know, a little grudge match there. Two guys don't like each other.

I think that's a good matchup for Ilya. Patty's got power, but he's not a crazy. clean technical strikers, so it's someone that he can probably be a little more comfortable on his feet. You know, even as bad as he knocked out Oliver, Oliver is really dangerous. It's got to be super stressful to stay in front of that guy. Justin Gachie's the same way. So I like the paddy matchup, actually. I think that's a great call by you. We'll never know the answer to this question, but just curious when you were watching that fight play out, how much were you thinking about this guy has been through a lot? You talked about this on Thursday. Like, no one is immune to behind

scenes issues, family issues and whatnot. How much you think that came into play here? Well, it's his first time fighting with his life totally different. So I don't know that he was thinking about it, you know, very specifically. But it's, I think there was a lot, I think that these fighters aren't getting enough credit for how much different this event was. The walkouts were different. The music was different. This isn't a locker room. You're inside the White House. The, the, the travel to get in there is, hard. You got secret service all over the place. I mean, they're under a lot of stress because everything is different. We're creatures of habit. So that's why you won't hear a lot of fighters

complain about fighting in Vegas all the time because it's comfortable. It's normal. Every once in all you hear someone bitch about the apex because they want to be in an arena. But in terms of how comfortable you get there and how familiar you are with the spaces and the people and the, you know, just every, the system and the schedule. It's all the same. The White House is drastically different. Everything was different about that. Then you throw in, the Ili's entire training camp was different for the first time in his whole life. Like, I'm sure the people change here and there and the lengths of it change here and there, whatever, but he's not going home to his wife and kid anymore. He's not, you know what I mean? He's not used to. He's not hearing the same noise in his house. He's

probably alone more than he's ever been previously. It's, everything is different. So I don't know that he was very specifically thinking about it, but it had to have had some sort of impact because he was doing something for the first time on several different fronts right um as far as gaitchie's concerned are you as shock i i said it i don't usually make picks i was completely dismissive and i want to give him all the flowers and i eat the crow and i apologize to him i did not think he could do this and quite frankly i didn't think he could do it against patty either i thought he was being served up to patty i can't believe how he's rebounded from the max holloway loss like most guys don't come back like that, but this sport is a little bit different, and he's a little bit. See, I thought the Patty matchup was

perfect for him. Really? Okay. And so you're not shocked by all of this? But no, not at all. Really? He's a fucking monster, dude. I've seen that guy in the gym. If you spend five minutes hanging out with him, you can tell right away, this is a different human being. He's, he's, uh, what is, uh, what does Goggins say? He's uncommon amongst uncommon men. Yeah. He stands out amongst the baddest motherfuckers in the world. He's different even in rooms with those guys. So it's he's just he's built different. He really is. So it's not that's not surprising.

I thought the patty fight would have there was a good chance to go like that. Patty's he's got natural power in his hands. He's a big guy for the weight class. He's a great grappler. But I think a lot of his success does come from the threat of a takedown and people not wanting to end up on their back. We've never, other than Habib, we've never seen Gachie really just taken out and controlled and held there for a long period of time. So, uh, I didn't think that Patty was going to be a good enough wrestler to, They were like truly threatened Gachi on the ground for long periods of time.

And Patty's hitable. And so even if you can't knock him out, you put enough damage on him. It's going to affect him for sure. What kind of a chance do you give Justin to continue this hot streak, if you will, against Armin, who we suspect is going to be. I don't hate the Armistaruky in matchup for Gaiji. Wow, wow, wow. Why not?

I don't hate it. Again, he's a great wrestler. And he does a great job using it defensively. And he's like we just seen, he's he's live with anybody on his feet. And I think that the way that he's evolved at this point of his career at this stage of it is commendable. I mean, if you're just a casual fan, you just want to watch chaos, you're not going to notice it. But I noticed the small changes in his game. He's really cleaned up a lot of the bullshit.

He's gotten away from the lake kicks a little bit. And I know that like Daniel Cormier and Rogan hate that. I think it's genius because people are always going to think about it. If he throws a couple, it changes the way that they think about anything. But he was getting hit a lot. He was becoming predictable. He just rounded out his striking game. At the beginning, he was kind of, he was very, he had to lay in the lake kick to be successful.

But now he's rounded out the rest of his game and Trevor's really cleaned a lot of it up where he doesn't need to rely on it anymore. So I don't know. I've loved watching this Justin Gaichi experiment just watching him at the later stages in his career makes small really, really beneficial changes in his game

because he looked a lot different than we've seen him before. When's the last time Justin Gage even pretending he was going to take somebody down? Yeah. Just in the way that he mixed it and turned, like, remember I talked about this controlled chaos? Like, collar tie to a single leg

to force Ilya to pull his hips back. Well, when he pulls his hips back, Gatchez got a hold of his head. So he pulls his head back and now he's bent over at the waist, ripped the uppercut, and then just close the distance again. It was fucking genius. And he just kept doing it over and over and over again. And then when it stopped working, he went to something else. It was just super smart.

It looked like a bit of chaos, but it was, that was very, very tactical. And I couldn't fucking get enough of watching it. Yeah, it was interesting in the post fight. He said to Rogan, I promised my mom I wouldn't make a decision about whether or not I'll retire tonight or in the moment. I'm like, the retire, man, it's all coming together for you. Why the hell would you retire now? There's no chance, right? The only thing Gaichi loves more than fighting in golf is money. There's no goddamn way he doesn't get one more. And then he got that, I mean, I think it was like $825, $825K in bonuses, which is wild because he was the one saying

before the fight in January, I haven't even made a million dollars worth of bonuses. you know, all these years, 14 or so, whatever it was, and he almost makes it in one night, given all of this. Yeah, it's crazy. It's crazy. Do you think, but do you think the performance, the seven for seven on Saturday or on Sunday, excuse me, still feels weird, do you think that that had anything to do with the bonuses being up, the fact that we got these, these finishes in every single fight,

or do you think it was just the matchups? It's just the matchups, man. They put, they put 14 of the biggest savages in the UFC, that someone's getting finished. Like even, you know, Diego Lopez and Steve Garcia, those are two prolific finishers. Like someone's getting out of there. Derek Lewis and Hook it, you know,

the same thing, just two big finishers. I mean, and the list just goes on. O'Malley's a great finisher. I mean, I think Amos a hobby's finished like 14 out of 20 of his wins. And I think like 11 of them are in the first round inside the first three minutes. I mean, they did a good job of just putting a hardcore finishers on this card.

So I don't know that the bonuses made it. And to be fair, I've got a lot of bonuses. I've never once thought about it in a fight, though. Okay, fair enough. Because obviously I saw that being written about and you wonder if it's in the back of their mind, but obviously you're out there fighting, you're not thinking about bonuses.

A lot of people gave you... Just trying to survive. Right, of course. A lot of people gave you... Kind of go home the same way you left. Right. A lot of people gave you props for your... analysis on Alex Pereira, given your history, but you were very complimentary of him going into the

fight. You said it was the easiest fight to predict, and in the end, it didn't go his way. Were you shocked? No, no, I mean, that's fucking Cyril Gaon for God's sakes. I mean, I would never be surprised if Cyril Gaon beat anybody. I was a bit surprised by the speed advantage that Cyril gone had over Pereira. I thought, so Alex was a faster kicker, which I thought was surprising. Like his kicks seemed to come at a faster rate than Cyril's. But I thought that their hands speed would be very close. And it was night and day.

Cyril was significantly faster. I went into this saying that Alex doesn't cut people off a lot. And it's essentially what got him burnt because he did cut him off. And that's just something he doesn't. do often. I'm not saying he never does it, but he doesn't do it often. He kind of follows. I think him cutting him off was probably part of the game plan to try to trap him and then tee off on him once he gets to the fence. And it just, because of his style, he's not crazy mobile. Like his feeder are very heavy and that's where the power comes from. He's always grounded. But as he's, he's not used to moving laterally super quickly and trying to cut people off like that.

it's not something he does often he kept getting caught square so it was kind of shuffling and then Cyril would plant his foot and throw like a laser and Alex was just there for it and he got dropped with a jab I mean that was goddamn crazy

that's crazy Cyril Ghan's a monster dude he looks like a monster out there so I asked you about Ilya going down do you think based on off of this experience Pere's move to heavy weight should be reconsidered do you think you should go back to light heavy weight. No, I think he should stay.

Really? I think he should stay. That's a winnable fight. I mean, he did get knocked down, but we watched him get flatlined by Israel and, you know, and things change. So, no, he waited at 251. He put on a lot of weight. It's going to be, and I think that his, and I've said this from the beginning,

I think his chin is drastically compromised when he cuts all the way down. I think he's got a better chin. I mean, he didn't really even go down. like after that initial first shot, he took big shots and never, I mean, he was kind of stumbling it out on his feet, but he was still upright. And he, I mean, he dipped his foot into the pool

with the, you know, with the most dangerous shark that's in it, you know, arguably. So I don't think losing to potentially the best heavy weight in the world is a reason to leave. I think that he bites down the rankings a little bit and one or two wins, and we see him right back in a title shot,

in a title shot. Seril Gunn said he wants to fight Tom Aspinall in Paris. I don't think that's going to happen. It's not a numbered event. But Tom Aspinall said on his YouTube channel, like, yes, I'm in. And I believe him. I believe Tom, when he says that, he's not that type of guy to just say things and then say something else behind the scenes. That being said, now that you've seen Searle look like this on Sunday, and look the way in which he did back in October against Tom.

If Tom is back to 100% with his eyes, who do you favor in that fight? Cyril. And I picked Cyril in their first fight. Wow. Wow. Wow. And does this give you even more confidence in that pick? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, unfortunately, Tom's just been sitting and feeling. And so I'm not giving him shit about that. It's just he hasn't been able to continue to get better.

And you work on new skills and then you try him in a fight. And that's how we get better. You learn it. You drill it. You try it. You spar it. You try it in a fight. and it doesn't work or it does work. You come back, you fix it, you drill it. You know what I mean? He's not doing that. Again, I'm going to steal it from Uncle Jail. You don't get better at something by not doing it. So Cyril's grinding. He's working and he just took out one of the more dangerous guys in the entire UFC. He's on top of the world. Tom's kind of still sitting on the with that bad taste in his mouth from the last one. Cyril's kind of erased that and moved on. Mindset matters. They're in two different places in life. 100%. 100%. And we don't know where

Tom is, it seemed like he was ready to go. I asked him, would you be ready for September? He said yes. But again, there's some similarities. You say you're not surprised with Justin. Like, I think even with surreal, I mentioned this earlier. When he lost to John Jones, the way in which he did, it seemed like the moment got too big for him. And obviously he's fighting John Jones. It felt to me like we'll never see him back in this position. And now look at this guy. Look at this guy. It's unbelievable. Yeah, everyone wrote him off big time after that. Ben, just candidly, I never did because I know what it feels like to be in there with John. It's he's an alien.

It's different. It's like nothing else you'll ever experience in your entire life. So I'll never judge anybody off of what they look like versus John Jones. Like you can't judge people off of how they look versus Habib. I mean, look at Gachin now. Look at Charles Olivera. Look at Porier. He smoked them all.

It doesn't mean that they're not great. It just means they're not Habib or John. Those are one of a kind type human. I ask you this next question, knowing that you went through this very recently. You went through the sort of internal dialogue of like when is it time to hold them and when is it time to fold them, so to speak. And so I'm wondering, what do you think both Derek Lewis and Michael Chandler are thinking on this Monday?

Do you feel like they are thinking that's it? Do you think that they're thinking, nah, you know, I got something left in it. Because to me, watching those guys, great, great respect for both of them, it does feel like they're on the other side of it. And Chandler in particular, I thought, looked, you know, he's been through so much. He's no spring chicken. He looked up there. I don't want to be disrespectful. He looked older, right? And Derek didn't quite look like the Derek of old. And so what do you think they're thinking on this Monday? Well, I found myself feeling really, really sad for both of them, because I know what that feels like. And I hope that they have people around

them they can put it into perspective because it doesn't mean that they're not great like and you've got to not listen to the comments you can't read the comments you can't listen to the fans like they're going to tell you that you should and you suck and you should never be here and you need to retire and go kill yourself or whatever they're going to say they'll say all of those things but i hope they have someone smart in their ear and say you've had a very long career you've had you've taken a lot of damage you've entertained millions of people you've made a fucking fortune you've put your families in better positions. Derek Lewis came out a goddamn prison aerial. And look

what he's doing now. He's a multi-millionaire big old fat house, Lamborghinis, Ferraris, beautiful wife, beautiful children. Derek Lewis won the game of life when it comes to MMA and he used MMA as a vehicle to do it. So as much as I know he's, he woke up this morning feeling like shit, I lost in front of

the president, I was supposed to be his favorite fighter. Who gives it up? You're a goddamn legend in this sport and maybe you can't just do this at the highest level anymore. And that's okay. It's like this bad joke I tell all the time with, you know, those like dudes in college to stay there for like 10 years. And the joke is that they're getting older, but the girls stay the same age.

It's kind of how it is with fighters. Like we get older, but then the people, if you're good and you're at the top of the rankings and you're making a lot of money, there's no more easy fight. So we get older, but I was still fighting 25 and 26 year olds. So I was fighting the same.

same age people and you start getting close to 40. We're just, this is a young man's sport. We're just not, we're not built to do that anymore. It's, it's nothing negative towards Derek Lewis or, or Michael Chandler.

It's just the circle of life. Those dudes did the exact same thing to people that were their age and those positions making that kind of money on those type of fight cards on their way up. And, and now it's their turn. So this is how it's going to look until you decide that you don't want to do it anymore. And so, you know, you don't want to sit around and think, oh, I just got to fix this or I got to do this or I got to work hard. It's not. It's not going to work. You either need to fight somewhere else

or significantly much lower opponents or that's likely what the fights are going to look like from here on now. And that's a hard pill to swallow when you're sitting at home. It's hard and I've done it. I've done it. It's hard sitting on your couch. Like, even watching, the fights like watching watching watching gaichi and watching hoofy and just watching these guys and like are just so happy for them but there is a part of me watching that stuff to get sad thinking i could never do that again like i couldn't do what they're doing anymore i just can't not at the level that they're doing it and there's there's a sadness there's like a realization that at one point in time in your life you were one of those guys and you're just not anymore

And that's fine. Do you think either of them fought their last fight in the UFC? Chandler maybe. Chandler maybe. Because he's got, again, he's got a lot going on outside the UFC. He's got businesses, got a beautiful family, wonderful kids, wonderful wife. He's got a lot of opportunities. I think he would be a great analyst.

Yeah. You know, I think that if he really committed himself to a YouTube channel or something similar, he would blow up because he's very smart, he's very well-spoken. He has a lot, he's got a lot of other things that he could be doing. And I just feel like his family is going to be the one that says, I don't know, we want to watch that anymore. Derek Lewis, I still see him rolling out there knocking out some dudes. Yeah.

Because he's working his way down the rankings too. Yeah. So the fights are going to get, especially at heavyweight. You can go a little longer and a little older. I could see Derek fighting a few more times. I said earlier that I walked away from the hokey, Blades fight more impressed with Hokit than I walked away

from Hokit Lewis yesterday. Impressed. I didn't say that correctly, but my point is I was more impressed with Hokit after the Blades fight than I was after the Lewis fight. There it is. I nailed it. Agree or disagree? Agreed. Totally agree. So it was a cleaner performance.

But I think it's hard to look good beating Derek Lewis, no matter what. He's just so dangerous. I thought his hands looked good. I was happy to see him wrestle. I think he showed a few glimpses of his game. They're just, that double leg was fast and powerful.

I was a bit cringy on some of the jiu-jitsu things. I think that that's probably really good for him because now his team has some really good criticism of him. Just as the fucking arm bar attempt, I couldn't believe it. Like, Derek not defending it, him not being able to finish it. What was he doing wrong in your opinion? A better question is, I'm trying to find something he did right. I'm telling you put Derek Lewis on his back.

I got a nine-year-old. He gave me five minutes with her. She'll finish at Harbaugh. Wow. But that's good because he got some lessons without having to take a loss. That's great for him. That's great data. He should have finished Derek in that first round when he was on his back.

and the fact that he didn't, it means he tells me he's got a little bit of growing and some, some cleaning up of his jiu-suituituit game. But again, Derek Lewis is just a pain in the ass. Freaky, freaky strong,

he's awkward everywhere. It's a tough guy to beat and look good doing it. You have said that you're not the biggest fan of the Hokka gimmick. The heat that he's getting today because of the Michelle Obama comment, you know,

like he's getting it from it. I can't believe that's the one that's blowing people away. Okay, tell me. After all the shit, After all the shit that he said, the Michelle Obama comment that's been floating around the world for years. I've heard people say that a thousand times. I don't agree with it.

Like I don't necessarily like that he said it, but I'm more confused. Like that's the thing that was too far for everyone else. Now it's a big deal. That's crazy to me. Well, I think it's probably because you have people who don't usually watch this stuff, who probably weren't watching this, but our political commentators or whatever that are looking for a reason to be upset about this. They see this and they think it's disgusting

that it's being said at the White House. And so now, as opposed to it happening within our MMA bubble, it's being talked about outside of the bubble because most people who aren't MMA fans aren't watching Josh Hokid fights, you know? And so they're turning it on and they're like, wait a second, there was a fight at the White House. They're pissed about that.

Oh, it was on Trump's birthday, pissed about that. And one of the fighters got on the microphone next to Joe Rogan, pissed about that too, and said this about Michelle Obama, there's like a million things that is upsetting to people. And so I'm just wondering, it was cringy. Is the juice worth the squeeze? Like, it's what I said earlier. I'm not asking you. You have to win. Yeah. You have to win. That's the scary part. Is it taking away from the win? Is it taking away from the win? Like, it's one thing to call out Pereira and say the things that he said, but this this leads to

nothing other than I guess maybe saying, oh, people hate him now and they're going to tune in to see him get his ass whooped. yeah, I don't like it. I don't. It's it's not tongue in cheek. It's not chale. It's not.

Even Colby, people were like, yeah, well, we know he's an idiot. Like, we understand that this is, you know,

an annoying gimmick or whatever, but this is different. And again, I love watching the dude fight. It's, I don't, I just think that comment was too far, uh,

for where he was. You know, if he said it, if we were at the apex and he said it, then nobody gives a shit. No, but just for, where he was.

It's just, there's some bad situational awareness, that's all. Yeah, I don't think he cares by it. And he's hyped up. He's pumped, he's jacked,

he just beat Derek Lewis. At the end of the day, who gives a shit? Like, say what you want, but I don't necessarily like it, but he's a grown man. He can say whatever he wants.

Yeah, and I don't think he's bothered by any of the backlash or anything like that. I think he's just a little bit different, I think, fair to say. That's a nice way of putting it.

Well, when he had that moment with Joe, and he's like, you know what, forget the, beach. And I was like, oh, I was excited when he said that. Yes. I was like, we're going to get the real one. Yes. Like, fuck all this. Let's just be honest for a second. Then he was, then he was like, oh, fuck. Never mind. Yeah. Would you think of Bo Neckle? That's a great win. That's a great win.

That's tough, man. Docus is tough. And back back to Bo Neckle hurting people on his feet. That's crazy. That's interesting. It's interesting. It's a great win. It's a great win for him. It really is. I really don't got a whole lot on bone-nec. I'm a tough fight. Thought he fought his ass off. And, man, I'd like to watch him and he'll fight each other. I wish they were the same size. Yeah.

Run that one back. They did once, yeah, in college, way back in the day. I think 2019, if my memory serves me, correct. And I was wondering, you know, you said what you said about the bonuses, and I completely understand, and I would believe what you're saying. I was wondering, I felt like Garcia in that first fight, Steve Garcia, like we don't usually see him fight that way. And I was wondering if he was trying to do something spectacular. Maybe not for a bonus, but just to kick this thing. He had a chip on a shoulder. We spoke to him

last week. He felt disrespected. First fight, let me get this off on the right foot. And I felt like he played with fire and it cost him against Diego. What do you think? I think that's spot on analysis. I think he fought a little bit outside of himself, which we kind of seen Ilya do the same thing. I don't know if it's the location, if it's the crowd, if it's the people in attendance, the the juice that's on this card, a couple of the guys on the card fought outside of themselves a little bit in ways that we hadn't typically seen them

fight and a little more aggressive, a little more pressure-based. I think if he would have sat back a little bit more and not been so overly aggressive, he put so much pressure on Diego, which is untypical of him. I think he would have been better, but that's a, you know, hindsight's 2020,

Ariel, if he'd have clipped him with that crazy pressure, and put him down, we would be praising him for it. So, yeah, that's the game. I thought he looked good up at that point, though. I thought he looked really good up to that point. Sure, yeah, I thought he won the first round. But yeah, the second round, I thought just a little bit outside of himself, as you said. And also, by the way, I don't know, well, I'll have to ask him.

I thought Amin Zahabee looked nervous walking to the cage. Again, we're just watched, but he just seemed tense to me. And Sean seemed like cool as can be superstar. He's been there before. I felt like Zahabi wasn't quite himself. what did you think he seemed he seemed tense generally yeah uh not just in his walkout because he's you know i i kind of thought that at first but he's pretty reserved and controlled and and not very emotional um but even in his you know in his approach when the fight started he was

he was hesitant uh i don't know if that's the moment if that's you know kind of this big big lights kind of feel or if it's maybe just who he's in front of i think we don't always take to account that these guys and girls of human beings and we're throwing them in there with like when you fight a big name like O'Malley until they were probably matched up he'd probably never really been around him very much or or been in his presence. There was one of the things that threw me off at the beginning when I first started fighting like former champions of big names like I'd never been in a room with a guy like Rashad Evans before. So like I remember being like face to face with him like just weirded

out because you see these people on TV, you see them in film. It's like a lot of times you don't ever see them in person until you're about to fight them or you're at a press conference or your weigh-ins or whatever. So he just seemed hesitant and he was uncomfortable with the length and O'Malley did put a lot of pressure on and was very, he had a vintage feel to him in that fight and that's that's tough. I'm sure they spent a lot of time in training camp like, well, if he does this, we're in trouble. If it gets in this flow, we're in trouble. And then you see in front of you and you're thinking oh fuck i'm in trouble you know you can't like i kind of felt the same with chandler like once chanler even reached for the leg one time you could just tell like he kind of

started throwing you know the kitchen sink and and kind of hill a mary type of shit because it was just uncomfortable and he just like you try something it doesn't work but that's one thing we keep going back to it keep going back to it and get closer and closer and closer but sometimes you try something and you're so far away from it and it's just not a thing you know there is a a bit of a panic and forcing to reset and does cause you to be a bit tentative and hesitant. It's too bad you're not on Twitter, by the way. You missed Eric Trump asking DC if the fights were rigged. Okay, tell me about this. Is that for real? I don't think. Was that shit real?

I think it was an unbelievable hack job is what it seems like it was. Because it seemed like it was spaced out to where someone had, this is my read on the situation. I don't know. Did it actually come from D.C.'s Twitter? It did come from D.C.'s Twitter. Yeah. And then they deleted it. So it looked like he had posted it, which apparently did. But then there was a follow-up tweet later on, which leads me to believe, like, did D.C. not change his password? What the hell happened there? Because then there was a follow-up tweet.

Like, I think my read was that the hackers may have posted and delete it, hope it gets out, then say, oh, though, that's fake. Make the whole thing up. And then later do subsequent tweets about Eric Trump, while D.C. is on the air so he can't necessarily attend to it right away and then deleted those bizarre stuff what was the what was the second tweets it was it was it was more eric trump stuff it was someone who clearly wasn't a fan of him in particular crypto stuff nothing about the fight anymore but it was just right try to like you know see i didn't see any of it until i started seeing reports on instagram that they were pulling dc from the broadcast no and putting in felder i was like no way No, no.

That's not how, honestly, that's not how it works. I don't even think he felt there was there. No, that's what I mean. It's not like an hour before. They're like, all right, Paul, you're in. Like, just waiting in the wings just in case. Like, he's in Philly. Like, he's not there.

But a weird one. And I don't know what's true. I thought it was weird. So I looked into it to see why. Yeah. And then I seen these tweets. And I was like, well, first of all, D.C. gets himself into some shit.

But he's not that stupid. Yeah. He's not. Even if that was a real thing in Air. Trump did ask him those things, D.C. would say no, and we'd never bring it up again. 100%. The way that tweet was written, I've texted with the guy enough. Like, I know you, you've got great punctuation. You're always got periods. And you could tell how someone texts. You know, that didn't read like him. I know the way when he writes stuff. It didn't look like

him. And he would never be like, oh, I got this weird DM. Let me run to Twitter to tell the world about it. No, he would tell the bosses. He would tell, you know, UFC staff. production, he wouldn't do that, but it was weird. He's not going to jeopardize his job. Between that and the weather at the beginning, the whole thing was like, this is off to a weird start, and then by the end, it was, it was. Okay, before I do get out of here, what, you know, we had talked about hoping that people gave it, gave it a chance and didn't just automatically from the beginning think that they

knew what this was going to be about. How do you think that they did at kind of the celebration part and not making it like a Trump party essentially. Yeah, I want to give them credit for that. I was worried, we joked that it was going to be like, you know, Marilyn Monroe and JFK at MSG, happy birthday, Mr. President. I felt none of that, to be honest. Like, I may have been in and out.

It was a Sunday, you know. I don't remember a lot of mentions that it was Trump's birthday. So to me, it didn't feel like a love letter to Trump. And so I was happy about that. You know, there are people saying he's going to put the belts on the guys. He didn't do any of that. And I don't think the president should. should be doing that sort of thing, to be honest.

They showed him a few times, but I think that's just part of being at the White House. You showed the president. I was actually fine. Sometimes I think the walkouts are a little much at the event. In this regard, it's at his house, essentially. So I was fine with it. Totally fine. I thought the walkouts were.

I think they have to at some point because the fighters want to go talk to him. Yeah, yeah. No, all that I expected. You kind of have to go to him. You can't just not put the camera on the fighters that goes and talks to the president of the United States of America at the White House. No, no. After they went to fight.

All of that was expected. You have to pan the camera. I expected that. But I did, I was, I was happy that it wasn't what everyone says that, or what everyone thought it was going to be. People are still going to be pissed about it. No, I know. I know.

I got hammered after I came on to your show. I know. They don't like, they don't like that story. They don't feel like it's appropriate. They don't think that it's accurate. And that is what it is. Everyone has their take on that. I didn't want.

the event to be like Donald Trump saved the UFC and Donald Trump is the reason why we're here because it didn't feel appropriate and they didn't go there. So I was happy about that. Personally, I'll just say, as we're keeping it real, I didn't love the packages. Like I said that, I said that my three, I gave it an A plus plus grand slam. Just get that out of the way. But we're always allowed to have criticism. I thought that my three sort of low points, if you will, were I didn't love the packages. I just didn't love how they were put together. Number one, number two,

I thought that there was a lot of attention paid on WWE guys, boxers, and I would love to see more UFC stars, UFC legends, UFC champions, get that shine. This is, after all, a UFC slash MMA event. Champions of yesterday year, current champions. It just felt like there was a lot of the boxers,

the WVE guys, a lot of the TKO types, but not the actual UFC stars. And the Hokka thing was just like an, unnecessary own goal that I thought could have easily been avoided. Rogan's getting crap for his. I don't know what Rogan has to do with it. He was just holding a microphone. Like, I don't know why people are coming after him.

But as you, there was, I felt on Twitter again, so much emotion and so much like tension. Every single thing that I tweeted about it, I felt like there was so much pent up aggression about it because you either thought this was unbelievable or hated it. There was no in between. There was no like, I'm just going to sit back and watch the sights and sounds on a Sunday night. And I'm kind of glad that it's over now and we can move on with our lives.

Totally agree. Totally agree. Because anytime you could just talk about one of the fights on the card and be like, oh, goddamn White House. Yeah, yeah, it was a lot.

About fights? Yeah. We're just talking about fights. So overall, great event, a lot of stories to talk about a lot of fights. By the way, when are we going to see you

in GameBrett MMA again? Sounds like September. Okay. Miami. Yeah. So we're doing this. Yeah, I'm excited. This is the thing.

Well, I'm back in retirement now. I'm going to pop back out in September and we'll go back into it again. You go in and out of retirement. Yeah, that's what I'm doing. I don't even know if it counts as being out of retirement. It's just doing something. It's still competition. That's semantics.

It's a bullshit way that I think about it in my head. But I just don't feel like I'm coming out of retirement. I'm just doing something new. But this isn't you doing the RAF thing. With all due respect to RAF, like, that's bare-knuckle MMA. This is different. Yeah. I like it actually a lot.

Wow. Yeah, I like the bare and uncle aspect of it. It forces you to be better. Power slap? I tried. They told me no. Why? I told you, I'm on a full midlife crisis. I know, but why say no?

Ariel, I got a, this is what happened to me last week. Okay. I got a new Harley and a CPAP on the same day. Wow. I am in full midlife crisis right now. I'm trying, I tried to do power slap. Hunter told me no. I begged, he told me no.

I said I would do it for free. He told me no. What was the reason? I don't know. I don't know. I think they're probably the last thing they want is to see UFC fighters going over to power slap. One, it's probably a bit unfair. Okay.

Do you. The aesthetics of it probably looks bad. Like, I'm sure people are like, damn, Anthony's so broke, he's got to go to power slap. He's down bad.

I mean, Paige Vantan was in there. Yeah, she has been doing some of the weird shit, though. Yeah. I don't think she's hurting for money. I don't think that was like... She's definitely not.

No, it's definitely not a money thing offered for free. Right. I just, I don't, I keep calling it a midlife crisis. I don't actually know what it is because I'm not like unhappy. You're 37 by the way. You're far from midlife. I'm seven years past midlife probably.

No, I hope not. Come on. The way this C.T. is kicking in. I'm going to make it barely past 60. No, no. Well, the way this, what is kicking in? CETE?

You feel it. I'm just joking. Okay, gosh. No. You just depressed me. Okay, okay. Thank God. Thank God.

All right. Yeah, I don't know. I just wanted to try it one time. I thought it would be fun. Hunter was hardcore, no. Okay. Was it an absolute fucking looting not.

That's, it was not just a no, maybe not. It was no fuck yourself. I tried. Well, you could do, uh, you could do bare-knuckle MMA, so that's a nice, like, soft landing. Yeah, it's a, it's close. Uh, amazing stuff, man. Thank you. I urge everyone to check out the YouTube channel.

Great stuff there as well. Great analysis. Great job breaking down the fights. There you have it. Anthony Smith. Appreciate you. It's, uh, you. You're going to be getting out anywhere soon?

What do you mean? Out in the public? In the community. Yeah. I'm going to the parade on Thursday. No, we'll be at International Fight Week. Will you be there? I'll be there.

Yeah. We'll see you there. Let's link up. I'll see you in. You're the man. All right, bro. There he is. Anthony Smith.

Great job, as always. Enjoyed the insight. I feel like he, the greatest thing that I could say is, you know he has a history with Alex Perea and look at what he said about the Pereira fight. The Pereira fight on Thursday. Easiest fight. gave them all the praise. Great analysis.

Great analysis about the Gaichi fight. So enjoyed that very much. Armand Sarukian's going to join us in less than an hour. Can't wait for that. I know a lot of you are excited about that. Action Bronson. I can't wait for this one. Can you give us this?

All these years. All these shows. All the moments. Can you give us this? Do I do this one with the hat? He's not here yet, by the way. But can I do this with the hat? I like the hat.

Yeah. Do the hat. Quick break, by the way, on Fest. If you're with us on YouTube, please do stick around. Can I wear the hat? I bought a lot of merch. I got a miniature,

a trophy. I got a banner. It's a trophy, the one that comes in the little locker-looking thing. You betcha, Jordan. I was just looking at it. You saw it.

Jordan, I was like, I'm having trouble. You know, I'm going in right now, not obviously during the show because I work hard. Of course, of course, yeah. You know, I'm looking at things, and I'm like, oh, shit.

But Lorge is sold out again on everything. Large is the most popular side. You had to do it on Saturday night. I'll be okay. Dan Housen shirt, though. Dan Housen. I bought. Now, we talked about this.

Can't all be positive. The shirt. Trash. It's a little Ed Hardy affliction-esque, circa 1999. The bedazzle was wild. I saw it. I was like, I was so euphoric.

I was like, ooh, that shirt. That's an interesting shirt. it actually felt more like a Spurs shirt than a Nick's shirt. You know what I mean? The color way, the vibe, yeah, for sure. I needed something classic. I will say all my friends want the bedazzled shirt. Yeah, because it's kind of ridiculous.

Ordered it, of course. I had to get the one that they were wearing. Now, are you building like a museum? I don't know what I'm doing. Yeah, how do I'm doing? No, but here's the best part. Yesterday, go to the mall with my boys because they're going to camp, I had to get some socks and stuff.

There I am, Foot Locker. The shirt's there. Bought it. I just felt like I had to buy it. Is there any Nix merch you don't have? Nix championship merch? But no, now there's like the New York or nowhere stuff. Oh, yeah.

So I'm saying you gotta wait for these old brands. Well, wait, I'm getting that too. Is everything you bought for for like the fanatics stuff? Has it arrived? No, no, no. Is everything you've gotten like Fanatics? No, no. In fact, if I'm being honest, I'm kind of searching for the non-fanatics.

Yeah, that's what you got to do. The Fanatics. How about that trophy from Fanatics though? Yeah, well, okay, but that's... L-O-B little... Guys, I see them, though. Do you remember...

Keth dropped a sick. By the way... Kith, Scott's... There's a $1,700 leather jacket on Kith that is, like, so unbelievably safe. I'm not a leather jacket guy. Haldi's got an AI bot that's just bought that jacket. Guys, could we remind ourselves that in December,

I bought all the NBA Cup merch? That's true you did. Because I thought this was the closest I would ever get, and I would say... I got it? I got the picture. There is a picture hanging. I said that you guys on my son's wall, NBA Cup champions. Nick Spurs

and I said wow, this is unbelievable if you actually squint and ignore the Emirates Cup logo it looks like we're the NBA finals champion now we're actually the NBA finals champion but what we got to acknowledge is Jimmy Dolan being like nah

no banner and then all time or again is that not the all time of both bro I got to be there they're going to hang up the Summer League 2025 banner the NBA Cup banner 2025 and the NBA Finals banner Summer League one I made up, but we did win Summer League back in July.

Do you buy replicas of the cup and the finals and then hang them in your house? Oh, I would love that. Banner? Oh, you have the banners in the rafter somewhere? Oh, my God. In the living room where you watched all the games. We should put a, can we put like a banner up here? Oh, in the living room.

In the living room, in my actual living room. I bet, yeah, I bet they're also going to sell replica. We could get one for the studio for sure. Oh, my God. I can't believe it. By the way, we're expensing all this. Knicks March, right? Like that's an expense report? I did it for the show. Oh, you? Sure, go

ahead. Me, I don't know. All right, so let me get in on that, actually. Sure, everyone get in. All right, deal. We're going to the Omacaste expense that. Vishal, Lisa, Victor, I'm on. I'm buying all the Nix merch on Helwani for you. I need to, we need to stop by to see our boy, Richie. Shot out, Richie. Lucia. Lucia. Lucia. I know he was losing it. Lucia. Lucia. I keep messing that up. I checked in with him. Can I be honest about something? want you to be. Please. 118 text at one point. It then swelled. I took one line and just copy

paste. I had to. I had to. I've got too much OCD to leave 118 unread text. Respect. I felt bad about it. Yeah. I mean, I'm sure people listening right now are like, oh, that shit was just canned. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And then I was like, oh, it was nuts, man. It was nuts. You think Bronson's going to design a sick next championship? Oh, probably. Oh, my God. Probably. Could you get a Bronson? Like, I need a. I think it's going to slowly trickle out. Just sick shit. It's going to keep dropping.

Oh, my, it's going to be. Paintings. And I can't wait. There's little things that come to me like, oh, like the NBA draft, the Knicks are like the gold standard. You know what I mean? Like, you know the NBA draft? It's like, oh, they'll mention, oh, now coming up at 29, da-da-dan-dan-dan-da-da-da-da. The NBA champion New York takes, I'm like, what?

You're heading to the home of the defending champions in New York. How did that feel? Yeah. Summer League? I'm dying to go to Summer League. My boy Jake's getting name. commissioning a painting of the OG Tippin.

Oh, that's a great one too. You know what I need? I need the two New York magazines. No, New Yorker, New Yorker. The one of the people, did you see the one where it's like New York celebrating orange and blue skies and then the one of like all the legends

with Jalen on top? There's so much I need to get. I need to frame those newspapers for sure. I have to frame the newspapers. It's just, there's a lot. We're going to sign off right now in the Yahoo Sports Now. network. Stay right there on YouTube. More to come.

And we're back. We're back. Is this good? Am I doing well, guys? Crushing. Fast has never been happier. Oh, my God. The question is, is the chat being like... What does the chat? Every hour you toss for two seconds? W's in the chat? W's in the chat? There it is. BITB on Thursday. Am I the special parade correspondent? Absolutely. You must, but will it be over by the time we're on the air? That's the question. So maybe you're just sending videos. You think so?

10 a.m.? I mean, the party won't be over, but like they can only close that street for so long. Guys, I'm standing here live at the New York Knicks parade, the first ever parade, of course, back in 1973 and 1970, Mayor Lindsay, he decided against it. This is the first of its kind. We never thought this would happen. It is pandemonium as the ticker tape parade. is off to City Hall. I should do that, right? Yes, and you'll have to hit us with one of the live news report delays. Ariel, what's going on down at the parade? It's an unbelievable scene out there.

It's absolute scenes out here, Connor. I mean, there are people here crying, kissing each other, like World War II just ended. There's confetti coming from, I don't know where the skies. Who the hell knows? What a time to be alive. That is it.

That is it. Armitrudecayin is going to join us at 445, but there was one guest that I had to have on today's program and one guest only. My brother, my brother who I have been to, I've been to more Knicks games with him over the course of the last few years than my actual brother. And I will never forget him calling me after game four, tears streaming down his face and mine. And then I think I lost him at some point after game five, but we did reconnect in the early morning of Sunday, June 14th, and now here we are meeting and speaking for the first time as NBA champions, as NBA freaking champions.

Truly unbelievable, my friend. This is, I've never had this feeling before. I don't even know how to feel. I'm just letting it sink in. I'm just letting it all just like digest. It's just already surreal. I'm already getting phone calls about what the fuck are we doing about the team. We blowing it up or getting Janus.

What's going on? I'm going to get the fuck off the phone, bro. Yeah, what the hell? Who's asking you about this? Don't worry, don't worry. I'm not going to expose, but I'm telling you, just let me relish. So I feel pretty good, man. I'm not going to lie to you.

I've cleansed in waters near and far. I've got down on my hands and knees and thanked whatever's out there for letting a team. team win a basketball game from New York and championships. I truly don't even know. I don't know how to react. I don't know how to act right now. I'm just trying to be humble. I think we all feel the exact same way.

Can you take me back there you are? This is you after game four, right? I'm still there. I'm in total shot. That was one of the most shocking things I've ever witnessed in my life. I've been through some shit. I've seen some shit. That was crazy, man.

I was, I don't never like to say this type of thing. I'm not a cocky fan. I'm not like one of those guys that likes to predict the future, but it was hard for me to fathom them coming home from San Antonio without the chip after that. I wasn't even totally locked into the game. I'm not going to lie to you. How about that? Really?

I was, I was, I was grabbing my head. I was making love. I was making love for the whole game. I'm dead serious. I stopped making love with four seconds left. What? How? I'm really good with timing.

But we started, first of all, I was so nervous, man. I was listening to it. I had it loud. I was so nervous. I was just like a fucking psychopath walking around the block. Listen, I thought these things happen. You got to just sometimes do unorthodox things. I had to do something unorthodox to get my mind off of it.

I'm that kind of guy. So three hours? I took the Ahmed pill, the one from Ak. Okay, okay. I'm not familiar with that one. It had the Brahma, it had the rock sign, had the Brahma bull on it. Oh. Did you even have it playing?

The rock is everywhere. Did you have it playing in the background? Yes, loud. Okay, okay. So Mike Breen is the soundtrack. And legs. Yeah, shout out the legs. And RJ.

I had dinner with, I had dinner with SVP, Legler, this dude Nick, like a new guy. He's like, he has the long black hair. He has like a Greek look. I like him. And Stiller. It was a wild dinner. What? When was this?

Nick Wright, by the way, I think you're talking about, right? Yeah, yeah. He's the man. I like, yo, his knowledge is sick. I fuck with him heavy. I feel like him and Connor would be friends. Yeah. Well, okay, sure, yeah.

I mean, he's a Syracuse boy like me. They like gambling things. They do like gambling. I've had dinner with them. You wouldn't be able to keep up with the gambling talk. I wasn't. I was like, I was in La La Land. Was this post game five?

No, this was this was prior. This was prior to four. Wow. This was night before four. What a meeting there. Yeah, it was just a nice secret dinner. We had a nice little meeting of the minds. Did you cook for them?

No. Okay. No. We went to a beautiful little place unknown. So can I ask what was the emotion? When it struck zero and you see them celebrating, this thing that we all dreamed of that we thought would never happen, Jimmy Dolan. At this point, at this point, the tacos had showed up. Okay. And they were on the table and we had sat down to eat tacos. So I was standing up dipping guacamole. I was having a chip with guacamole as the clock shrew. truck 12 and Cinderella, Cinderella was back home. Wow.

This is unbelievable. Yeah, it was truly sick. I feel like I'm, I needed to pull out some sort of art project for this. This was like my, this was my magnum opus. I did this. Did you feel any sort of healing? I felt healing when I saw Patrick hold the trophy. I just feel, it's not that it's a healing moment.

He didn't win. I love him, but he didn't win. And I want to get to this I don't really, you know, I was like, I was watching the game the end of the game and at the, at the conference like Brunson's sitting with his pops there and he goes That was weird.

To the guys like, yo, you're sorry, but Pat's the best Nick ever like, yo, dude. That was weird, right? That was weird. It's wild. First off, I'm the first one to tell you, it's not true. Jalen is now the best. You know, it's just like, it's really not, there's really nothing to say at this point.

I agree. I agree. And I never thought I'd ever say it. I couldn't even say it. I've been wearing a fucking you in Jersey for half of my life's time on earth. You know what I mean? Like, it's, you know, I get to say that. 100%. I couldn't believe his dad said that right next to him. I don't know if that was like. It was a wild. It was a wild scene. It was like he was like a little kid around everybody. I really didn't feel that because that's a man right there. Yeah. Great like a man. He handles himself like that. So it's fucked up. What'd you think of Wemby? I mean, listen, I don't I don't particularly like his his antics. I don't particularly love his game.

I don't like that type of game, man. Like, I don't like watching that. Like, his body bothers me. My body might bother him. We have total opposite spectrum and bodies. You understand this? That's why we conflict. But him not shaking, him walking off, pouting.

That's how you do. First off, he's tight. He's not their friend. He wants that shit. I'm happy he plays like that. Fuck that. I don't want to see him like dapping up, smiling after that.

Did mad shit to try and hurt everybody. Like, it was serious. It was a serious thing. You didn't take this as a joke. This wasn't fun in games I have playing in the park. I was for the chip. That was it. I was to a race many, many years.

of people's whole entire lives they could die now. Old people could die now that never saw that shit. Amen. Did you go out in the streets? Hell no. I don't know. I've been in these streets for 42 years. I had enough of that.

What am I doing out there? I'm not a brand new fan. I'm not a newbie. I'm not going to ruin someone's vehicle. How do you feel about all that? I mean, bro, I'm trying to be in the crib. I'm not the kind of guy that's going to be out anywhere anyway.

Unless it's diagnosed and specific, I'm not going nowhere. No parade? Definitely not. Do you think it's a mistake? I'm deliberating. I mean, my brother, do not do it. For real, mistake? Big time.

Hold on. What the fuck? Why is someone always got a fucking call, man? I don't even know how to turn that. Don't call off because then I wouldn't be able to get the proper connection. Why do you say don't do it? Why do you say don't do it? What are you going to do?

I don't know. I just watch them roll by on a thing and then go home. Come on. Grow up. Get it together. I'm not together. This is parades are not for you. Enough for guys.

Come on. It's not that type of thing. For real. I really wanted to. Oh, we're in the board room. We're looking at salary caps. We're looking at matchups. We're moving on.

That's it. What else you're going to do? How long are you to hold on? It's Monday. What? Bro, I've been waiting my whole life for this. Me too. Me too.

We're going to have a fatty boom baddie in Vegas. I mean, bro, why you have to wait till then? Come through. I know. I was hoping you'd do it here. I told you I had the hashish ready for you. You don't have hashish ready for me. I was going to get.

I was going to secure the bag. Where were you going to procure the hashish? I got people. I got people. You let me bring the hashish. This is like when you fucking, when Tony Soprano takes Meadows boyfriend out to dinner. You don't fucking pay for it.

I pay for it. I bring the hatch. I was trying to entice you. Hash doesn't entice me. What does? What was that like? Diamonds. There was a gummy type of thing that I saw one time. Nothing entices me. Okay.

A man of free thought. So that's it. So you're not celebrating anymore. I'm celebrating deeply inside. Like you can't believe. Like I'm celebrating in my way. I don't want to be judged for my celebration. No. I wanted to know. I just want to... I want to let you know. I want to celebrate with you in a way. I would like to have a nice little glass.

Have like a gentleman's. We're fucking gentlemen here. What are we doing? Yeah, I know. Are you... Put on nice outfits. We're going to put suits on. I already bought like five suits. What happened to the tucks for game four? It wasn't a closeout. I had to be close out. Had to be a closeout. What was I doing? I had a guy to come correct.

The suit looked great over in Italy. Thank you. Thank you. I was in Sicily. Sorry, sorry, sorry. It's all right. Specifically, yes. You look fat. How did it?

Look at Paragamo. That's purple label shirt right there. Wow. What is purple label? I never wore so many labels. Look at that outfit. Holy shit. I look like the rock.

You do. I keep on mentioning the rock, but that's the look. Circa 98. How crazy is he used to come out looking like that, like Tupac and Vegas. That was the inspiration. Tupac walking through the Vegas lobby. That was rock's entire inspiration of life. The pants?

How did they feel? Oof, flowy and linen and soft. Like, yo, it was like, gentle in every way that I'd like to be touched. And I was dancing to the midnight oil. You don't even know. No, I don't. What does that mean? I fucking, I was the talk of the dance floor.

Oh, damn. Yeah. And where was this? I was the king of the dance hall. Was there any part of you that was, oh man, are you driving right now? Bro, I'm going three miles now. As long as this fucking guy doesn't try and cross on my signal, we're good. We're local.

Yeah, of course. I thought you were going to retire the jersey. I can't give it up yet. I have to get everyone's signature. Then I have to wear it again, and then I can retire it. Okay, so by next season starts, starting. Yeah, next season. I'm already there at game one.

Bro, this outfit. Full outfits in Sicily. They've never seen that look before. for. This was hard, man. I never seen it. Yo, dude, I had people fucking like, yo, they were, it was like I was the King of Zimunda. They were like

begging, they were like I was on the money. It was amazing. Did you always have the shorts? I've always had the shorts, of course. Oh, my God. I used to wear just the shorts. No pockets whatsoever. I come outside holding everything I had in a plastic bag.

It is annoying. It is annoying. I just... Sometimes you gotta wear... You gotta like tuck the underwear up at the top to like fold the phone or fold money up in there. I don't like money in a sock. I'd rather it in the waistband of the underwear.

I agree. I agree. What about that... It's definitely much more like secure in that area. For sure. The dive off the boat, I saw that too. You look like a young Michael Phelps. Thank you.

I don't know if Michael Phelps is as good of a diver as me, but off the block, he's all right. But me diving specifically, I'm like the 14-year-old Chinese girl. Oh, yeah, okay. Did you see that? The one who made me cry. I forgot her name, as I usually do. The ones who make me cry.

She made you cry. Why? Because her dives were she had fucking six tens, perfect ten dives at 14 years old in the Olympics. She made you the job crying. Yeah, I cried. Wow. I only cried at sporting events. I've been crying like a baby.

I don't even know. That's why I can't even, like, my celebration, it's been so extreme, it's crazy. As a man, I've cried 45 times already. I know you've cried. Oh, my God. But I've cried, like, legit, like, like, weeping with noise, you know, like there was noise involved. It was like, ah! Full on, screech.

Actually, my kids, I think, were shocked at the state of their father because I was crying with such pain involved. It was like a pain, happy, emotional release. It felt like a release. Yeah, no, I've released. I feel fully relieved. I'm not even going to lie to you. Yes. I know it's just one and everyone wants to downplay or whatever.

I got, we got it. It's it. This journey right here, this season, has been satisfying enough for all the years of bullshit. I promise you that. That's how I feel. I couldn't agree more. You know, like this has been so satisfying to watch and to witness and to be a part of and to be there

and see things firsthand and in depth and behind the scenes even at times it's like 26 has been really nice really fucking tremendous what about that Justin Gachi win who oh my God what about that hero shocking

not at all you believe not at all first of all that's my man it's like I'm never going to pick against Justin Gachi he sent me some fire-ass on his gloves I've been using for three years now I love Jesse Gaetia I think he's a great ass fucking

he's a great guy and I think that he's a tremendous fighter with he's like he's like hendo but better it's a great comparison but to do that to Ilya to beat up I mean bro he fucking he beats up everybody

he's got hands it's crazy how good his boxing is sure he uses his head but you know it's like Brian Dennyhy from Gladiator. He just knows how to fight. He doesn't give a fuck. I don't think he should be roasted. He's just, you know, he's fighting.

That shit's not perfect every time. This time he fought someone. It was also the White House. There was lots of, there was lots of, like, fire and lots of, like, lots of shit behind this that could have fueled the man in a different way. What did you think of the whole scene? I feel like they both had like juxtapositioning vibes in life at the moment. You know?

Yep, yep. So I feel like there was some extremes in both sectors. I feel like, I don't know. Like Justin's back was against the wall. Everyone's picking against him. He's the big underdog. Like, fuck that. Everything is everything.

He's fighting at the White House. He had to show out. It's a real American hero. What did you think of how it all looked? It looked phenomenal. It looked like a great. It was tremendous. Except the Tyson Fury thing was weird.

Yeah. That was the only thing that I thought was like from what I was watching was off. And what about your... In fact, there was a delay. Yeah, your boy, Paul Ton. I have to watch that fight over. I didn't get to watch. I just woke up and saw it and I was not happy, but surreal is not something to play with.

You know, it's a real heavyweight and has been moving his side. of body in one of the most athletic ways that's humanly been displayed at moving 265 shredded. You know what I mean? Like 265 naturally shredded moving in that manner, it's a thing of beauty. Going back, and I'll let you go in a moment, but going back to the Knicks, you would be the best person to ask. You know the heart and soul of this city. You feel the heartbeat of this city.

Why do you think this has resonated so much with these people? This city, this is a basketball town. At the end of the day, there's a basketball court on every single corner in this city. There's no, there's no, like, this is the game. You go outside and you play ball. Everyone is locked into the Knicks. Baseball is baseball. It's an older man's game.

It has to be sent down to you. This is like basketball resonates in a way where it's like, It's how you settle street problems at times. It's how you settle things. You know, you go, you play one, I'll play you right now. You can't just go, I'll play you right now in baseball. I'll go play you right now in football. It's the ultimate one-on-one skill game.

It's like, it's pretty much fighting with all kinds of moves. That might not be the best way to represent the answer of what I'm saying, but who the hell knows, man? I've been a Knicks fan since I came. out. What a stretch for you. Dominated on Wheel of Fortune last week. Congratulations. Oh, thank you so much. I do it for the children.

Oh, my God. I really do. Unbelievable. I really do. Yeah, man. Like I said, I'm better at Jeopardy. Is that in the works? It could be. I'd like to be. I'd like to be on dancing with the stars as well. That catapulted Emmett Smith's career.

Yes. Maybe it could do the same for me. And you just said, did you announce a show on Wednesday. Yeah, I got a show at LPR. My little residency that I do a show a month. But I'm doing a couple shows in Europe. A bunch of them already gone.

Doing some London gates. Just like some fun stuff and just come home. Just get out there, exercise the old muscle. The Poisson Rouge. Yeah. Maybe do a nice little dinner out there. Give everyone a nice little full spectrum experience of the Bach. Any, uh, any Knicks pulling up?

They're in celebratory mode. see Mikkel Bridges today. He's, uh... He was on one, huh? Yeah, he was. He was off that yak. Yeah, he was. He was off those four locals.

Something like that, yeah. They all were. Ariel Huck Pardy. He was off that Cisco. Can you just believe that Ariel Huck Porty was on the floor for the final fucking moments of the game of the Knicks championship, 2006? Can we just acknowledge that? Jeremy Sjo-Cham.

Bro. Huck Porty started the year any end of the year. I feel like it's poetic justice like Janet. Bro, he was plus four in this game. We won by four. He got a massive block. We don't win this thing without Ariel Huckporti. He'll go down in Nick's lure.

I want the Huckporty jersey. I'm not going to lie to you. It would be incredible. Him, Anthony Bonner. He's like one of those legends. Oh, my God. Let's just, I want to talk about Alvarado. Oh, my God.

You're coming out of nowhere and just perform. That layup was strong. Straight up Harlem Globetrotters, 1970 Bob Coosie type move. That's why that shit worked. That was incredible. No one expected him to keep the dribble. Like he did the spinneroo.

He did a spinneroo on him. Change the entire face of the game. I feel like each player had their moment where they changed the game. Each player had their solo. 100%. Mitch getting that offensive rebound? Bro, Mitch. I mean, Mitch is a,

Mitch is Mitch, bro. Mitch is Mitch. I don't even want to think about how this team is going to look again, but let's just relish in this, enjoy this, not get too ahead of ourselves. I'm not going to lie to you.

I'm not in the boardroom. I'm just fucking around, but... No, we can get ahead of ourselves. We've earned this, my man. We've earned this. We've watched some shit teams. We've watched some bad seasons. But I hear you saying that this is enough for you, man.

It's not enough. Why? It's not enough. Why? It's not enough because you want to fucking watch next year get smashed by the Celtics? Is that how you want to, you want that? Right now it's enough.

Would you be feeling okay? We got the one. With this same team? Yeah, we got that, but I don't want to get smashed anymore by the East. I want to be the fucking beasts of the East. Can I tell you my line of thinking with that? My line of thinking is these losses hurt so much because it always made me question, will we ever see it?

So I don't think it will be the gut punch that it was back in the day. Now I look at Halliburton going like this and I'm like, whatever. We know how the story ends. Yeah. I mean, listen, the good guys won. You're in these streets, huh? I'm always in these streets, babe. Yo, you're the man.

Thank you, action. Congratulations. I love you. I love you. I love you. Thank you so much. I got the hashish waiting for you. I'll be there.

All right. Peace out. Don't tempt me. Don't tempt me with a good time. Go next, baby. Peace, brother. You're the man. Action Bronson.

What a guy. What a guy. We're the champs. We are the champion. My friend Do do do do And we'll sing with me, Jordan Keep on fighting

To the end Yeah We are the champ Yes, go ahead Last week we're driving Me taking the little daughter to daycare And I'm like, I'm feeling myself I'm just like in such a good mood

And she's just sitting in the back No idea what's going on Because she's only seven months old I'm like, we're going to listen to Basketball Jones right now. We're going to listen to Go New York Go. Like any basketball song before the game, it was playing, and she just sat there and enjoyed it all. I was like, couldn't have been happier. And there's a moment where you're looking around and you're like, my life is incredible, right?

One of the best days of my life I can think of. Yeah. That is it right there. That is the secret right there. You have these moments where a lightning bolt hits you and you're like, holy shit. It all came together. And honestly, I'm in the car. I'm just having a good time.

Don't care if anyone hears me singing basketball Jones poorly. Go New York. I don't care. Got my daughter. Nakes are winning. Life is great. I was singing New York, New York at the top of my lungs. Windows down.

Start spreading the news. I'm leaving today. He has made... What a juxtaposition there? You guys tell me got to go to the parade. Anthony Smith tells me got to go to the parade. Action.

Cool. guy in the world says don't even think about it. I'm now torn. That's that bullshit. He is the coolest guy in the world. So like if you're trying to, if you're trying to be cool, then I agree with him, but But you're going for your kids. You're going with your kid.

Yeah. Why are you acting like you wouldn't go? You're going. What is this? We're going. Just for the, just for the story, right? They're going. Yeah.

This guy's also the mayor of Madison Square Garden. He pulls up the street to stop and it's not for the race. This is the classic Helwani. What do you think about? No, I like, I like to take the temperature. No, you don't. I do.

No, you like to pretend. He does enjoy taking the temperature because he wants the temperature to be what he has. Yeah, 100%. You don't take the temperature. You determine the temperature. It's like me asking everyone, who you think is going to win? You look at the thermometer. You look at the thermometer and go, is it 98 degrees when you're looking at 98 degrees?

It's just, it's just, it's for gone. What do you think of it being 98 degrees? Yeah, what do you think about that? More 92. Okay, what do you think of it being 98? 98? Cool, cool, cool. Really? Ninety eight?

Nick Lecée? Shout out. Shout out to Nick Lechay, bro. I can't wait. Should I go? Can't wait. No, I just can't wait for everything. Thousand percent.

Okay, back to the White House car. 20 minutes. Armistruchian joining us. Oh, wait, wait, wait, right quick before we rip into it. We got to do the results from our White House draft. That's right. And thank you, great. I can skip it.

I mean, it won't take long. Honestly, I don't remember anything. Tell me, tell me, tell me. Okay, so just so people know, we did the draft on Thursday. Thursday night. So we each had to pick a winner, snake draft. We each four guys. Geez, look at me.

Oh, my God. It's tough. Holy shit. I was just going one at the time. I had Ilya, Pereira, Garcia, Chandler. Oh, for four. Scoring system is, win is three points, finish is four points. First round finishes five points.

But if your guy gets finished in the first round, it's negative one. Oh, my God. Chandler first round, Garcia's second round, Perey. second round, Ilya. Fourth. You finished with negative one point. All right. I'm going to skip you real quick and go to Rick because he didn't seem so into it.

O'Malley win. Hokit win. Doc is lost. Lopez win. Yeah, it did all right. All points. 12 points for Rick. What time did it end?

It ended past 1 a.m. So I got the tiebreaker. Yeah, okay. Hoofee, win. Huffy win first round, five. Nickel win, first round. Five. Gone win second round.

Four. Lewis lost. 14, Lewis lost. But second round, so I stay at 14. And I had the tie breaker. You win. Wow. Look at this guy.

Congratulations. Oh, wow. Congrats. Oh, wow. Same photographer that took the NBA finals pictures. Oh, yeah. Tyson Fury looks pretty good there. Oh, wow.

Shout out to my guy, Tyson Fury, bro. That is amazing. And so who's last place? Me? Yeah. So you got to pay for lunch. I got to do it. What, lunch and the dinner?

No, Rick's got to get dessert. Oh, yeah. are... That's easy. You just get a cake or something. You agreed to... You created these terms. I know, I know, I know.

You just didn't expect... Listen, it doesn't matter. Add it to the list. Yeah. Uh, merch. How much merch can I actually get from my boy? That AMX bill's going to show up and you're going to be like, huh? Oh, I know, I know.

It's a problem. Oh, he's not. He's going to be fucking thrilled. I need the damn patch. I need the patch. The patch that they had here. I can't find the patch. If anyone has the patch, I want to put the patch right here.

America 250 patch? No, no, no. That one came off. That wasn't the best Here's Josh Hokit Talking about not breaking Derek Lewis's arm I think he said this on

He wrote this on Twitter Anyone remember this? Yeah there it is guys Trump likes Derek Lewis So I didn't want to break his arm in front of him I wanted a TKO anyways There you go Alex Fokinovsky

was in Maricio Hoofi's Corner Which was a pretty cool co-lab They're now boys engage boys and also kind of sometimes training partners. Here's Volk reacting to the hoofie win. He's hurt, he's hurt. You think he understands what they're saying? Absolutely no chance.

And Chandler was hurt for sure. Right? They're screaming in Portuguese and voice like, yeah, he's hurt. This is amazing. Ah, this is great. That's one of the best fighters in the world. Came all the way from Australia. How about it?

Afterwards, Maricio Huffy proposed to his girlfriend, and what about Fabiano, huh? Fabiano, what a guy. He did the proposal with such like, umph. Ben Davis saying UFC translator Fabiano Buski just proposed to Hoofie's wife,

the dog, and he writes Benjamin. But that was good. I love that. That was amazing. Like he didn't just translate it. He did it with the same passion and emotion. Amazing stuff. Anyway, we talked about Tyson Fury.

Big reveal, if you will, but stop short at the actual announcement. Here's Dana White on the Tyson Fury news. Yeah, I mean, for the last couple of weeks, I've been hearing from the media and other people that I'm not involved in the fight. I've been hearing that Tyson Fury couldn't get out of the country and couldn't get into the United States and it just seems like everybody's always wrong. He's loving this.

Bro, look at him biting his lip, man. He's getting this. He's giddy. Whatever this is, he is loving this. We're literally beating up babies. It seems that way. His face, too, when they did the jet flyover, and he just had his hand over his heart, and he was just like,

he was loving it, dude. And, you know, as he should. What a victory. This guy was out there stumping for the UFC when they couldn't get into the smallest of venues. This is all coming together for him. And there is no doubt that he is more passion about boxing than he does about the UFC right now.

And I say that only because he hasn't conquered that. He's conquered this. He wants to conquer that. And you just see it anytime the boxing stuff comes up. Tyson Fury wasn't the only boxer there. Obviously, Connor Ben was there as well. Jaya was there. They're really pushing.

You know, the boxers, we know this. Alexander Usik also there. Is this a sign of things to come? Alexander Usik was with Donald Trump. I don't know if he was at the event, but he was there that week. They're getting everyone. They are getting everyone. Eddie Hearn was asked about the A.J. Fury stuff last week as he was promoting the Bam Rodriguez

fight in Phoenix. Some thoughts on that in a moment. Here's Eddie Hearn's latest take on A.J. Fury. First of all, I never said matrim boxing with the promoters of the fight. What I told you is, and this is absolutely categorical, the fight won't take place because it's written very clearly in the contract. Dana White, TKO, Zuffer or anybody associated will not be the promoter of that show. I mean, he got all, it was very zesty at the press conference where he was like, I know where that fight is. Ask Eddie and started doing all these weird sort of shaking about. Just part of his...

Did you know where that fight is? No, because it's not egregious. Listen, this is what's happened. Dana Wyatt has said to Turkey Alashake, you should do that event in Vegas, right? He's reached out to MGM Grand, trying to, I mean, again, not even has the right to even be involved and trying to convince Turkey Alashake

to look at Vegas for that fight. And he thinks that he could get Turkey Alashake to do the fight in Las Vegas. What Dana White doesn't know, Dana White said, Eddie Hearn didn't negotiate that contract. I mean, this guy, it's all about lies,

he's either completely deluded or the biggest compulsive liar I've ever met in my life. Of course, we negotiated the whole contract. By the way, those negotiations went on for three or four months. What Dana White doesn't know is in the contract, not only does it say Dana White, Zuffer, TKO can have nothing to do promotionally with the event. It also says at the desire of Anthony Joshua and Matrim,

that fight must take place in the UK. How is this going to play out? One side is adamant. They're in control. They know everything. The other side is saying they're not in control and we know everything. I don't know what's going to happen here. But it's fascinating to watch.

It's really fascinating to watch it all play out. Along the same lines, Connor Ben, Ryan Garcia. Ben's obviously a Zufa boxing guy. Ryan Garcia's a Oscar Delahoya guy. Delahoya now at odds with Zufa boxing and TKO. Here's what Eddie had to say about that. It's probably a little bit of an exclusive. I shouldn't even say, but I'm going to say.

say it anyway because actually he didn't just receive a cease and desist from golden war yesterday about three or four days ago he received a cease and desist from the zone saying excuse me you need to understand Ryan garcia is exclusive to the zone therefore if you want to procure his services you need to be having a conversation not just with oscar de la hoya damn right is his actual promoter but also with the broadcaster that holds that exclusivity but they think they can just walk in and right now It's a really interesting situation because if that doesn't get resolved, there will be no Ryan Garcia-Connor Benfire. And the zone kind of hold the keys to that. Oh my.

He also said that Dana White got his bum slapped recently. Take a look. Zuffer got told to remove all their posts regarding what he said at the press conference. No one even mentioned it. Do I mean? I even put it on my story because I said, good boy Dana. Take your posts down. Because as soon as he made those, I went to Turkey Alashe.

I said, what the fuck's this guy talking about? And he was like, oh, don't worry about it. And then next thing, the team said, don't worry. They've all been taken down. And he got his bum slapped again. Because this is a thing with Dana. This is what... Well, what's going to happen here?

I'm actually fast... Is it okay to say that ultimately, I don't really care who's promoting the fight as long as the fight happens, but I'm also fascinated to see how this plays out? Like, on the one hand, it's just another chapter in this ongoing feud. I don't actually care about the actual thing that they're arguing about,

but they're both so confident in what they're saying, I just want to see who wins. And is it possible that the winner is just going to be like, yeah, it's a ring event and they're going to be doing the production, just like the Fury Mahmoudov fight.

TKO was kind of running that too. It just wasn't made as such a big deal. I really don't know why they're both so obsessed with this. Yeah. Because they know that at the end of the day, regardless of what the optics of it are, they know what the reality will be. They're both too smart to think that the optics are all that matters.

It's a schlong measuring contest. I know, but... You love that, bro. I mean, I don't want to say... The other word, feels like a more sanitized version. Schlong? The sex. It almost sounds worse if I'm...

Does it? Shlong is sanitized? What should I say? I'm saying shlong around my mother. Frank, you? Yeah, Frank. Definitely not same. Easy.

All right. You could say Frank. Yeah, let's see. I mean, they're both supremely confident. The Fury walkout yesterday was interesting. Like, if you're not as tapped into this story as we are, you're watching that, and you're like, what was that? You know what I mean? The biggest problem was the commentary team said nothing until he got down to John Anick.

So we're just watching Tyson Fury walk out and nobody's explaining what's happening, nobody's talking about it. And then when he does get there, hey, Tyson, you got a big announcement. Yeah, I'm going to let Dana do it. All right. Tyson Fury at the UFC White House event wearing a Donald Trump for Prime Minister hat walking for 90. Was that supposed to be a joke? I didn't get that one. Like meaning he wants him to take over the UK as well?

Okay, got it. It's obviously a joke. Yeah, I mean, a 90-second walkout, no words at all. Tyson, go ahead, man. Yep. I'm gonna let Dana. You sure? You sure, man?

I'm pretty sure you have something to announce. One last chance before I let you go here, Tyson. Sure you don't want to make an announcement. I would love to see what was going on in the production truck. If they were like, what the fuck is he doing? Maybe that was all part of the plan. Did your brother play that song? Yeah.

Long, long time ago. Man, the stories your brother must have. Was it not surreal that your brother was at? a UFC event like your whole life is now that too dedicated to this and he's just sitting there playing out Ilya da-na-na-na-dan-dan-dan-dan-dan-dan-dha-da-na-da-na-dha. It's the crossover is crazy. My parents were watching their first UFC event ever last night.

They were like hyped up. They were dual screening it. They had the watch party and the UFC on. We were catching glimpses at the side of his head. We were like, oh shit, there he is. He told me about like rehearsals. He told me Trump, Joe Rogan, Dana White, Bruce Buffer, all of them came to rehearsals.

Bruce Buffer was taking pictures with the band. He said it was very cool. Unbelievable. And now, like, what's your typical event that he's playing? Like, what's he usually doing? So, like, they obviously do a lot of the events at the White House, like the Easter Egg Hunt. They'll perform at, like, Fourth of July,

they're performing that. But then they also tour around the country. Okay. Old people love the Marine Corps band. Sure, sure, sure. They love it. And his level of interest in MMA? Like, he'll go to the bar and watch pay-per-views from time to time,

or numbered events. Okay. He's not a diehard. Like he knows, he knows Sean O'Malley, he knows, Eli, he knows Alex, but like, he was like,

man, this Canadian guy looks like Ariel, huh? I was like, I actually never noticed that, man. Yeah, wow. Good shout. Shout out.

Yeah, I was actually watching that with, with Jack, my wife, and she's like, wow, he really does look like you. Like, she's like, even his love handles are like yours. I'm like,

what is that supposed to me? Wow. What is that all about? I'm like, first of all, this guy ain't got no love handles. Let me tell you that. He's like a younger, more handsome, man-shade.

I was like, yo, yo, yo, chill, chill, chill, chill, chill. The walkout was cool, cool that they came out to O Canada, right? Yeah. GSP there. I'm assuming they pumped that in. Yeah, I don't know what that was. But I feel like he was the only one that didn't get. No, no, there were others.

There were others? But I did wonder that myself. I asked G. I was like, why did they, like, the Shona Mali Walkout superstar is just a Lupe Fiasco song. Whereas, like, the Drake song, they're choosing not, like, I didn't know what the... I feel like superstar is much more, like, singable. Like, it had that... She sang the shit.

That great vocalist singing it, whereas you're rapping for started from the bottom. And I just don't know if that's a band style. Do you remember Ben Whitaker a couple years ago? Yeah, with the violins and everything. Yeah, because they could have just done... They could have just done instrumental, which... And it was pretty damn sick. Yeah.

Then... Marine Corps bands started the show. Yeah, 100%. They crushed it. Bam Rodriguez fought on Saturday as well. I noted this. I just thought it was weird that he was... Look, they can't know

that it's going to be Spurs in the final, game five, deciding game five and all that. But I feel like as a rule, you should just stay away from certain events. And when the NBA Finals is on, you know what's going to be on a Saturday. You know that. The schedule is out.

I feel like you should just stay away from it. I don't know. Maybe I'm crazy. He did look great. He beat Antonio Vargas. And the reason I say this also, by the way, is that it's just bad luck for DeZone. He's one of the best fighters, pound for pound, one of the best fighters in the world. He is the pride of San Antonio.

This fight wasn't in San Antonio. It was in Phoenix, where he usually draws pretty well. I think it was about 10,000 fans. But it's a big deal. Like, he's getting to be like Holly Home-esque over there. You know, like how Holly's the home team in New Mexico or Stephanie Hahn in El Paso. him going up against Spurs game five is just tough. The schedule is out, so I just feel like there's certain events,

certain sporting events that you should just sort of stay away from. We were talking about would they do this again? Well, here's Dana White talking at the old school post-flight press conference about whether or not they'll do this and whether or not he liked it. Outdoors, that is. Do you feel like this is an event you can ever top? Or do you just think, man, this is as good as it's going to get and we just have to write it into the history books?

I mean, that's what I thought about the sphere. And then here we are now. So I don't try to overthink that kind of stuff. It's just sort of the sphere happened. This happened. And, you know, I'm always looking to go to great arenas with, you know, good technology and give fans that show up the best experience I possibly can.

It was an amazing experience. This was a one of one that will never happen again. And for all of us that were involved from the fighters, to my staff, to the media, to, you know, their families and everybody. It's just, this was a unique, cool experience. You don't think there's a chance. The president says, that was good. Let's do it again next year.

I can't afford it. There's no fucking way we can do this again. This was, I'll never do the sphere again and we'll never do this again. I still feel like they made a lot of money off it. You see all those ads on that cage? What happened to no ads? The time and energy investment, though, has to know, I know, quite a bit. He's got to be, I mean, I mean,

I feel a sense of relief. He's got to be feeling a sense of relief that this is over. It may a fucking break. What about when there was the weather delay at the presser? People were mad at Dana. The F-U-Dena chant? Like, it's like the Rogan thing. Like, you think he wanted this to be delayed?

He's literally anti-outdoor events. Listen, listen. Fuck you, Dana! What? I mean, like, come on. Weird one. Fuck you, Dana. Fuck you, Dana.

The highlight of the week was this moment at the pre-fight press conference. Diego Lopez being asked a question, answering the question in English, and then they'd be like, whoa, whoa, we need a translation. Take a look. So I look for the finishes, knockout, soon, mission. How is I look for this? This is happy Sunday night. Yo, what's...

Vic Blenz here. My question is for... Hey, wait, man, we translate, no, we translate, matter what? Where's the translator at? He's good. You did? It wasn't English. That was English?

That was English. Oh, shit. All right. It was Spanish to me. Incredible. Biggest pop of the night for me when I saw that. It was absolutely all the time. Also, Vic Blends getting ready to ask a question there.

Oh, was that him? He's like, uh, Vic Blends here. And then Dana's like, ah, we got to translate that. It just makes me think that, like, he's just up there and he just can't hear shit, man. he's just like he's just smiling through it all just has cannot hear anything we had a couple good you know what's going on what was that last night yeah oh yeah uh the scenes at that presser were amazing perera in front of the lincoln memorial

just whatever your take is amazing surreal like these were just i mean they should make a copy do we have this the prayer in front of the lincoln memorial uh this is like coffee table stuff um the stuff from last night unbelievable. A lot of great photographers on hand. I know Ed Mulholland was there. The whole UFC team is unbelievable. I mean, look at that. That is amazing. Look at that. Look at this. That's breathtaking stuff. That's that's that's McGregor pre-aldo stuff. Very, very memorable. I wonder what they'll do with it. I could see a coffee table book being released. the sights and sounds from UFC Freedom 250s.

So I wanted to speak to one man and one man only in the aftermath of this event. He told us he'd be here on June 15th, and he has kept his word as usual. He is the man that we expect and suspect is going to be next in line, finally, for the UFC lightweight champion. But that champion is not Ili Tuporia. It's Justin Gajian. So without further ado, let us say hello to Armin Sarukian, who's kind enough to join us right here and now to react to it all. There he is. Hello, Armin, how are you?

Hello, I'm good, how are you? I'm doing great, my friend. Great to have you on. And congratulations, by the way, on another successful evening for RAF. That one seemed relatively easy, if I do say so myself. The rest thing was easy, but I have to cut weight for that one. Oh, you did? What was it at?

It was 170. Okay, and what did you start the week at? 182. And usually you don't have to cut weight for these I usually like wrestle 175 is easier And why this one? Why did you have to cut weight for this one? Because Tony he didn't want to wrestle 175

Okay He said only 170 That's why I was the hardest preparation with weight cut Okay and how did you feel How was the weight cut? Way cut was good So It was good but like

It's not like easy because the last last time when it's 175, I didn't like a cut so much. You know, I enjoy all week. But this time I was like a eat less, you know, count how many water I drink and like, you know, I was worried a little bit. What did you think of the Hamza Dylan brawl? I mean, it's a freestyle wrestling. Hamza won him, he was still like a hole him and trying to choke him. But it's illegal in wrestling how you can do that. And that's why Hamza just push him and then the bro started.

Were you there? I didn't see you. You weren't there, right? Or were you? Yeah, I'm there on the, with the hoodie. Okay. Did you get hit or anything? No, no, no. This time I was trying to like stop. Because the D-Lennys was like with two guys But Hamzad was like maybe with 10 guys And my guys was like 15 And like

You know, it's it's so easy That's why we're trying to stop the Hamzaz guys So it was like 25 against two Against three probably Wow Not very yeah Do you think Hamza will do this again I mean

Like everybody going to do that How you can choke. If someone's going to chalk me, I'm going to kick as well, like, or like a punch or like, bro. Like, if you come to wrestle, wrestle, why you want to choke me? And to be clear, I... And like, listen to whistle. A whistle is done. Like, get up.

Like, why you still, like, a hole his neck and trying to choke him. Of course, and especially to Hamza, he did on purpose and he got what he wanted. And also, to be clear, I meant, like, will he do RAF again? Me? No, no, him. Did he like it? Oh, he liked it, yeah. I mean, he competed on the high level.

He was competing on the highest level in freestyle wrestling. And so when he was like even 20, 21, he was competing in freestyle wrestling, you know? Okay. So for him, it's more natural because he was competing a lot. And he wants to wrestle as much as possible. But he's focusing on the rematch. She wants to get the bell back and between them do the REF as much as possible as well. Okay, RAF out of the way.

Now, dying to know your thoughts on Sunday night. Ilya loses to Justin. He doesn't get off the stool going into the fifth. Unbelievable performance. Justin was up 3-1. What did you think of the fight? I couldn't watch fight on the live. I was flying.

and I thought like British Airlines going to have the internet but I was flying business class and they don't they don't have a they don't have a Wi-Fi on the plane

and I was like just sitting and saying no way how I can miss this fight and eight hours I was thinking like what happened what happened and like when we land my internet still didn't work

but my friends' internet work and he's like, Justin won. I said, what? I thought he's like a kidding, you know, just make me like, and like, yeah, he like, he won't buy TQ or something. And like, I say, no way, show me. And when I saw that, I couldn't believe, to be honest. And, yeah, I was happy.

So, okay, so I have a few questions about that. Didn't you bet on Justin? Yes, we did. So why are you surprised? My friend did. Sure, okay, but he was part of your crew. Why are you surprised? Surprise because we won a lot of money.

Okay. How much did you win? 5.7. Wow, 5.7 mil? Yeah. U.S.D? Yeah, but we split with my friend, but still. That's not bad.

But in your heart of hearts, you didn't think he was going to win, right? No, I'm not that stupid. We're not that stupid, you know, to put so much, man. Because like, you never know, because he was super underdog for the fight and he could beat him. You know, and that's why there is a chance. And Justin, on the main fights, he always win almost, you know. And stylistically, Tapura was a good match up for him too. He's not wrestling.

He doesn't wrestle. Guys like me, Charles Olivera, Islamahech, Habibn Maghamedev, like these guys for him is dangerous because he has no ground game. Have you had a chance to watch the fight? Yes. So what did you think about how it actually played out?

So on the first round, Justin one, second round, Ilya, third round, Justin. And yeah, and the last one, Justin as well. Did you feel early on, I thought that Ilya was going for like the knockout. And once he didn't get it, everything started to change. He felt so confident that like, I'm going there and knock him out. When he was like a coming close decent, he doesn't, he didn't even use his jab. He was just wanting to throw his right hand and knock him out right away.

But like Justin, he's a dog, you know, and like he has a good chin. And he always stopped him with his jab, you know. And Justin's jab was so good. And like, I think he's like a canella and like has like the best boxing. But it didn't work, you know. And like Justin did a good job. And so was there, like in your opinion, was it more about what Justin did or what Ilya didn't do? No, Justin would

Right And like how he handled that Pants, body shots He didn't give up You know It's not easy Third round going into Fourth round

It seemed like the doctor Was calling it off But then they let it go What did you think of that? They should stop him On the third round Because his eye Was closed

And he couldn't see But he wanted to fight you know because he's he's a warrior you know like yeah he wanted to fight but like round number four that his brother said no that's enough you tweeted that's the right that's the right decision you know because when you have a one eye it's so so difficult to fight and especially like i heard he he like a like broke his orbital

yeah the bone yeah you tweeted no mas you tweeted no mas which is the old Roberto Durand quote Ilya no mas to pouria that suggests that he quit

do you feel like he quit I mean of course he did what do you mean because you said it was his brother that did it I mean like if the brother said just say no I'm going to fight. Right. Yeah.

Connor McGregor tweeted that he doesn't think family members should be in a fighter's corner after this. Do you agree or disagree? I disagree. Why? If I was on the same situation, either I'm a brother or a corner, I would do the same problem. Because you can see like you're losing, your eye cannot see and why you should go and someone going to knock you out it's better just to stop it because Justin could knock him out so bad on the fifth round.

When I saw Ilya shove Justin, that made me a little bit worried for him because usually he's very calm, cool and collected and I felt like the emotion of the week and everything being said was maybe bothering him. Do you think that came into play at all? for you yeah yeah no it's just

he was too confident he thought he was over he was just relaxing like he he didn't use his job like he always used he was he felt like I'm going there like he likes to say

I'm going there break his jaw in the first round yeah he knows just only one thing I'm going to break his jaw in the first round And so let me ask you, you said you were happy. No, I know.

You were happy. Obviously, you're happy because you won the belt. Excuse me, the bet. But I feel like you versus Ilya was a massive fight, so are you a little bit disappointed that he didn't win? No, for this fight, after the bet, after the bet, I wanted to get you won't win. Okay. Do you think you're next for Geichi? I think so.

Who else? I mean, I've felt that way for a long time. Have you been told anything? No, the fight is done, but it has to be me. Who else? Come on, like, what are they going to do? They're going to put the Charles Olivera versus Gagee or Connor McGregor if he wins,

but I don't think so. He can win Max Holloway. Yeah, but... It's me and I want to beat Justin Gage, I want to beat everybody, and when I'm going to be ready, if I'm going to be a champion, I would do the same, I would like to do same as Justin did even work. So it's interesting, I saw Charles Overe, just like an hour ago, tweet BMF and lightweight title on the line, so he's campaigning for it as well.

Is there any part of you that's worried that they'll give it to him over you? you see can do whatever they want to do sure it's it's it's a I cannot control if I could control that I would I would fight for the title

like one year ago even more two years ago right yeah so they didn't give me two or three times fight for the title yeah I don't know what happened

if this time they're not going to give it to me so maybe I picked the wrong sport. Were you ever told, though, explicitly, like, when this fight is over, you're next? Yes. Okay. They told me even the date

approximately when I'm going to fight. Yeah, when's that? It's after summer. Okay, September maybe? Close to. That's soon, though. That's in three months. No, no, no, not September. Okay, maybe October. Abudabi.

Who knows? Who knows, brother? Okay, okay, okay. This is exciting. I got to talk to Hunter first. I understand, I understand. Watching that fight did it make you excited to fight Justin? Because Justin is peaking. He's looking better than ever.

What did you feel? As you know, I'm super confident. You know, like, if you're not confident, you shouldn't fight. You got to think you're better than those two guys. And I know I can beat Eli, and I know how I can beat Justin. So it's, it's, it's. pretty simple and after fire i was just uh i was just watching what's what he has the past you know where he's what punches he does and how i can beat him uh yeah he's gonna he's gonna wait for my

resting that's why i gotta like uh do something different you know like be smarter and like to show something new, you know, to have a good, good game plan. I need a good game plan versus him. And yeah, but it's my title. Because it was so personal with you and Ilya, did you take joy out of seeing him lose? You know, like me versus Ila would be great, big fight bigger than Justin and me. But right now on my year, I just want to become a champion, no matter who is going to be in front of me. Maybe Justin going to say I'm going to retire and they're going to put me against Charles Alware or somebody else.

I'm just going to take it and fight for the title. And I want to break a record in lightweight division and to be the best lightweight fighter ever. Who do you think would have been a tougher matchup for you? Right now, nobody. Only one guy who was tough for me and he moved up to 170. Islam. Yes.

Nobody in Lightway Division can beat me right now. Maybe like in a couple years the new names coming up. I haven't watched the guy from Australia, the new one. Quillen's all killed. Yeah, I haven't watched him. I haven't watched his fight, so maybe he's like a new blood. We'll see. What do you think would have happened if Ilya fought Islam last night?

Was like this shape? Yeah, same guy. Islam just, just finish him in the first round, chock him out. Bro, he was talking about his wrestling, like how like a gaugey, like take him down. like the school technique you know like five points in the school technique that's crazy he doesn't wrestle anymore you know he's just like what he does he was watching the Conella's boxing and like the heat pads it doesn't even like a train with like good good fighters and wrestlers it's just probably the train with his

brother and Guram, that's all. Do you think he can rebound from this? Do you think he can recover from this and get back to the belt, be back to the phenom that he was going into this fight? Yeah, he can come back,

definitely. And I think this the lose is going to give him a lot of lessons, not to be like a overconfident. respect your opponent, you know, and keep grinding, you know. So you think like those celebrations before and the Instagram record and all that,

he's not going to do that. Yeah, he was, he was, I think he was more focused on his media stuff more than training camp. Okay. I suggested that it would make sense for him to fight Patty next, regardless of what happens in the Patty BSD fight, win or lose. Whenever he's ready to come back, what do you think of that? I mean, Patty is not the best matchup for him. Why?

After death loss. Because Patty has a good chin. It's difficult to knock him out. And like five rounds, it's going to be tough with Patty. So who do you think? Michael Chandler. Oh, wow. Okay.

Wow, I didn't expect that. Really? Are you being serious? I can't what? Yeah, why not just giving Michael Chenner comeback, knock him out? Oh my gosh. Yeah, like, they like, they got to protect him, you know. Did you think they were protecting him in the third round going into the fourth with the doctor stuff?

You tweeted something like that, right? No. No, you don't think so. Oh, you see cannot control. It's like only the judge, only the doctors. Yeah, but you said they're giving him an extra minute. Yeah, but like, you know, the judge came and said, like a stop

and then the second one came and said no no you can if you want you fight yeah that was weird it's like it's not UC it's a doctor no I know that of course yeah commission what about his size

Geichi looked very big what do you think do you think he's too small for 155 or was that just the matchup no he's not he's not small he's short he's short but he's like the how he troll him

what's the the guy name from the Shrek from the Shrek like he's short and wow okay the king

from the Shrek I don't know that one the Gigi was trolling him he's like the Lord Farkard

Fork Fark Oh yeah that guy you like that exactly same same like same

the guy man he looked unstoppable up until that point it was shocking for me to see that yeah me too better

you know sometimes the bad day sometimes good days you know but you never know do you wish him

the best you hope he recovers maybe tomorrow or day after tomorrow starting excuses he got sick he got this stomach

He posted something online, no excuses. He gave props to Justin. Oh, yeah? Yeah. That's the manual. You saw that? That's good, you know? No.

Yeah, he gave him props. So I thought that that was classy. That's good. I like it. Someone not trying to find the excuses, just say, yeah, I lose and nothing. This is what he said. Congratulations. You said you'd leave a mark on my face and you did.

You took the sight from my right eye in the first round, and by the end of the second from my left eye too. No excuses. At one of the best camps in my life, I came in sharp, prepared and ready. Last night was your night. That's the nature of this game. Glory and pain walks side by side.

I'll heal, I'll rest. I'll return stronger, wiser, and far more dangerous. And trust me, this story between us is far from over. We will have our rematch. Yeah. That's good, right? Yeah, that's good. Do you think you'll ever fight him?

Yeah, I think so. What do you think the scenario? is. Maybe this time you're the champion? I'm going to beat Michael Chandler. Oh, Michael Chandler. Oh, Michael Chandler? Oh, how they let Michael Jender fight, please got him, just fire him. Hell, you see, they got to fire him.

Really? Yeah, yeah. Because he's losing all his fights. Was that more about how good Hoofie is, or maybe how much older he is? No, he's old. Okay. Going back to...

40 years old. Yeah, I know. 40 years old. Been around a while. Like, to have a, to have a, like, this physique in a 40 years old, is like, it's something crazy, you know? I would like to have a same body when I'm going to be 40. Yeah, me too. I am 40.

It's not quite like that body. Yeah, he trains probably twice a day every day. Yeah. He has no chin anymore, unfortunately. Yeah. Happens to everyone. Yeah. That's why you got to live on the right moment.

Do you worry about that, about when your time will come? Do you think about that? It's the worst time for me. It's going to be because I love this sport so much. Do you think about it? No, no yet, no yet. I got probably seven years. Yeah.

Seven, eight years. Until 30, until 37 I would like to fight. Okay. I want to fight long. But you were just laying out your plan. You say you're going to beat Geichi and then what? I'm going to beat Geiji. I'm going to beat, I don't know, Tapuria, whatever.

Like, I need a five defendants. defense and a lightweight division. Do you want to go up at some point as well? Up, I don't know. Maybe down. Down? Do you think down makes more sense? Yeah, because I'm not that big for 155. I know, I just thought maybe you wanted to go, you know, get Islam. Maybe like in five, six years they do 165, who knows.

Yeah. Yeah. What do you think of Hoofee, by the way? You like him? Oh. Hoofee. Maricio Hoofee. Rufi. Yeah.

Yeah, I just watched his first fight yesterday. Oh, first time. Yeah. He has a good striking. The question is, his ground game? Ground game, I haven't seen. Yeah, that's the question, but he's with Volcanovsky. But Volcanovsky has no ground game, too.

He's the most striker. Yeah, he's, you know, he's well-rounded, I think, good IQ. Yeah, he's well-rounded, yeah, definitely well-rounded. But I feel like he looks like most striker. Sure, yeah, yeah. But I like his style. He, like, kicks, box, you know. He looks, like, sharp, like, Pereira, but way faster.

Did you like the event? Yeah. How it looked and everything. Not enough fights. I would like to have more fights, you know, because it was six fights or seven fights. Seven fights, yeah. Yeah, for me, it's not enough. When you were watching it, were you like, man, I wish I was there.

I wish I could be a part of this? Yeah, of course, of course. Yeah. I wish. And I didn't even get invited there. Yeah, what the hell? I'm not allowed. They said that?

They didn't say that I'm not allowed. They just, I ask, can I go? They just, my manager said, most likely you're not going to pass the security. Did you see Sean Strickland? He was getting stopped everywhere. Yeah. He's a rebel. What he's doing?

What he's doing? Why they arrested him? I don't know. Honestly, I think he was trying to get some attention. At some point, it's good. Sure. People are talking about you, right? Man of the People.

Yeah. So are you going to get Justin a truck? Yeah, of course. Of course. I just feed what color he wants. And I'm coming back July 12th. I'm competing July 18 at St. Louis. and after St. Louis, I'm going to bring him a truck.

Wow. What kind of truck? Yeah. ROM. Oh, yeah. I don't know why I said ROM. Yeah, he did. I got to get the ROM.

And like the ROM is a UFC official sponsor. Maybe they're going to give me this count, maybe 15, 10%. That'd be good. That'd be good. Yeah. But you can afford it. I think you're okay. Yeah.

If they're not going to give me discount, it's okay. It's not that expensive. That's right. I can't believe you took British Airways. I thought you only fly private. I was flying from the San Luis. It was long flight and I was my only one friend and why we should throw away so much money

if we can fly business class. Yeah, of course. Smart move. Sometimes you've got to be smart, you know. Did you want to do it, though? Collect your money. Did you consider it, though? About. Flying private.

No, I like a flight private, but long flights is not make sense. It costs so much money. Is there any part of- To get here, it costs like $150,000. Geez, really? Wow, okay, okay. Yeah, but why? For what? It's better like donate that money or like help somebody. And like the same bed, you fly a business class, first class.

Armin, for you, we used to talk about money fights in this sport, and I'm going to let you go in a minute, but I just, I'm curious, There's no more pay-per-view. You know what you're making. Ultimately, does it matter if it's Justin or Ilya for you? Like, as far as what you make, did you want to be, are you upset? Did you want to be the first guy to beat Ilya? Does it mean more money if you're fighting or beating Ilya?

How do you view that? No, it's the same money. I have my purse. I have my money on the title fight and I know how much I'm going to make. And, like, no matter who is going to be. Ilya or Justin. And I just want to become a U.C. champion as soon as possible. Yeah, of course, I would like to fight Ila to be a first guy.

But, you know, Justin did it before me. And maybe, who knows, maybe it's better. Why is that? Because he tested him and now I know, like, where is his... the weak weaknesses. I think a win over Justin Gaci at this point in his career is going to be very impressive if you pull it off. He did allude to something last night saying,

I told my mom, I won't decide if I'm going to retire or not. Do you think there's any chance he retires? Oh, I don't know, to be honest. He shouldn't retire because he looks so good. Yeah. And you want to find him. I think he got maybe two more years. He's on his prime.

He looks like a strong, fast, good cardio, good chin. I have no idea. It's like a new version of Just Engaging. I know. Two years ago, he got knocked out by Max. Yeah, like, and today, like yesterday, he was like missing hard punches from Ilatapura, and he didn't even like a shape, you know. Crazy.

Yeah, it was hard, but like still, you know, like he missed so much punches. and he has no scratches on his face. That's crazy. Yeah. How does the fight go, you versus him? Oh, I'm going to go there, take him down, chock him, and that's it. You think you saw him? Yeah, I can't.

I mean, like, what I see today, what he does on the ground game is like, yeah, Eli was on the mound. He was like, he doesn't know how to escape from Mount. He just turned, give his back, like the Oliver. chock him out, but like for the versus, robbers, like in my level, it's the worst, it's like a worse mistake, you know, that you

are going to get choked out right away. So what are you envisioning? We're naked? We're naked or the arm triangle. Wow. And you feel early, late, middle? What are you feeling? Second round?

Second round. Second third, something like that. And then you realize your dream. And then it really begins. Yeah, and then I start to live, you know, different life. How so? Can't wait. Whatever?

How so? How do you live a different life then? It seems like your life is pretty good. Yeah, but with that goal, I'm going to be way happier. I'm not, I don't know how to explain, you know, I cannot stop myself. So when I was cutting my way, then like, okay, I'm going to like, take the couple of days off. And I just landed

and tomorrow morning I said to the guys at 7.30, we got to train. Oh, wow. Maybe when I become a champion, I can't like rest a little bit. But right now I cannot. You're obsessed with it? You think about it a lot? Or every day, all day.

Wow. All day. All day. Just need that date. and this time I'm going to prepare myself and I'm going to try to be healthy as much as possible, you know. And at what point does your team talk to the UFC to try to get a sense for when this could happen?

They got to talk probably on Tuesday and figure out what's going on. Amazing. Well, because we got to know when I'm fighting because I have REF as well and I got to know what's my schedule. Sure. And because I want to do like maybe six more matches this year for RIF.

By the way, did you see Diego Lopez weigh in twice? No, why? He weighed in at 1.45 and then he weighed in at 55 to be the backup for the main event. Oh, just in case. Yeah, yeah. That's pretty gangster, right? Yeah, Diego, he could step, he could step up. He could step in, you know, he's a dog.

Yeah. As are you. Thank you, Armine. I appreciate it. Congratulations on the win. Good luck, July 18th. That's Colby, right? No, before that I have July 11th.

That's why I'm on this side now. Oh, that's right. You have in Georgia. Yeah. Yes, yes. You hinted that the last time you were on, and then they announced it. That's a huge deal for you to compete in Georgia, right? Yeah, yeah.

I was born there. Yeah. And, you know, a lot of family live there, you know, they come and support me. What do you think the reaction is going to be for you and Marab and everyone? I mean, only in Georgia, probably 500,000 Armenians live. So a lot of Georgian and Armenians are going to come and support me. Amazing. Wow, what a scene that's going to be. That's incredible. Okay, so good luck July 11th, July 18th, and hopefully you get that news.

and we could stop speculating and talk about you fighting for the belt. I have to say, I didn't think it was going to be against Justin Gachi, but here we are. It's a crazy sport. Thank you so much. Thank you, Armist. Appreciate it very much. Bye-bye. Bye-bye.

There is. The great Armant Tarukian joining us. Number one contender has to be at this point. Has to be. And let's see what happens. I saw there was odds released, right? I think there's odds. Wait a second.

Wait a second. What are they saying? on Kalshi. Yeah. Wait. We got the future for the... By the end of 2026, they say that Armand's going to be champ, 40%. 40% of the public. Islam. Islam has higher percentage than Justin Gaichy? How's that possible? People are taking flyers.

Man, no chance. Gachey, then 17% Charles Olivaira. 12% Max Holloway. Welterweight Max Holloway. What about that... Did you guys go to the 11th? on Friday or Saturday. Did you see Zach, what was it, Brian Brown? What's his name? Life is good today.

Did we go to the ellipse? He killed it on the show. I was there, yeah, that was so good. Just a little bit of Jake and Brown. Is that your brother? No. Cold beer on a Friday night.

Connor's not here, but no, that's not as well. Oh, yeah, I was wondering. Where do you go? I have to say the shots of the people around the reflecting pool, It was a lot of people, you know? It was impressive. They deliver.

The best thing you could say about it was they gave us this vision of something. They delivered on what they said they were going to do. They absolutely smashed it. I'm still, by the way, I'm still curious about this Marco Rubio thing. What did they sign? What was that? Some kind of intent to spread U.S. culture through

what is this UFC I don't know what this is the press release all the writing about it was very vague there's no real like action plan yet in terms of how this is going to represent the US nation

but there is some kind of plan but it's not political no I don't know I'm so happy to be done with this I have to what is going on I don't know it's all there's a part of me that sometimes wonders does they actually believe what he's saying with this political stuff? Nope. He just lies and doesn't care.

What about that McGregor Holloway poster? Thoughts? Amazing. Yeah, I thought they nailed it. Just a little bit of chicken back. Like some AI shit. Like, I don't. Covier on a Friday night. Is that AI? I don't know what that is. It's a. Is it possible it's just Photoshop? How do you know the difference between Photoshop and AI?

Just look at McGregor's face. It's just like that picture just doesn't exist. It'd just be so much better. It'd be so much better, man. What is that super file? What is that? Bottom left. Some sort of sponsor. I saw it yesterday as well.

Brendan Chob, none too happy. Week after a five-year layoff and the biggest star in the sport is back, put in effort. I mean, despite the AI usage, it's, it is just objectively a bad poster. Yeah. Yeah. It just doesn't feel big, right? No. Could be so much cooler.

We did have the Tommy Fury Eddie Hall fight on Saturday, guys. Who watched it? Anyone? Frank. Frank was locked in. Frank, you were locked in? Is verifiably false? Anyway, Darren Till pulled a Sean Strickland.

He tried to crash the press conference. Here's what happened. You have to go. Who's going to link me? Who said that? Max. Max. They've got to get two there, though, haven't I?

Can't you get us two there? No, no. I might just jump over in it. When John's in the corner I'm just gonna be screaming at John. If you've seen the way they put on all security around me there? Look, actually, they're saying that he's not been here. It's a public press conference. Are you what you're saying, brother? Do you know it's not me? Hang it but fucking beer you're not yet.

So they're saying they're not gonna come out on stage unless I leave? Oh, I would be saying not and I've just come to watch. Yeah. They're trying to kick me out. What it's Texas? I've got to leave or Tommy's not coming out. Oh come. Yeah.

I'm not going to do any. There's a much many stories. Did he got. Did he go to the fight? Did he actually go to the fight? I can't imagine if he's banned from the press conference. He can go to the fight. Anyway, Tommy Fury won.

Hamza, Dennis Brawl, I feel like I stand by, I feel like on a regular sort of mundane week, we're talking about this like A block. We're talking about it here four and a half hours in. Absolutely correct. Bro, I saw, here's Dennis. Okay, what's happening? This happens.

Okay, he's upset. He's down. Is he holding on to him? Holding onto the leg. Get up, push, kick, kick. And then he's right. Look at this. Look at them attack, Dillon here, off his back.

Who is, like, the designated guy that sprints in there attack? I don't know, but. It's like that it feels like it's agreed upon beforehand. It was weird. I can't remember exactly when it was either fourth quarter or in the aftermath of the Knicks win. and then I see in a sea of Knicks-related tweets, Dylan Daneson comes like getting into a brawl

and I'm like, I'm moving on. Not now. Not now. No interest in this. It was like, oh, yeah, there's other things happening in the universe? Not now. Sorry. Jordan Burroughs signed with RIF.

That's a pretty big get for them. He typically does, you know, a lot of people wanted to see him do a little MMA. Didn't happen. No opponent announced. just yet. I didn't ask Armand about the Tony Nipple face off. Did you guys see this? No, no, this is not my fault.

It was a little purple-nerple action. You think this is enough for a purple-nerple? Hey, Tony, what a guy. Anthony Taylor was involved in a fracas of sorts, also on that Tommy Fury card. All kinds of wackiness on Saturday. Here it is. Let's take a look. That's right there from Maddie Floyd. AT takes me here.

AT's screaming that the eyes are already. This might be it. Gonna take him back to the corner flush his eyes out here. Possibly to clear it, unsure about the legality of it. Oh. He's saying something. It's pretty in my eye. It burns like icy hot.

A peculiar moment here. Wade Plebens, this could be a tactic to buy time. Could be some sort of thing. I don't really know what to say about this right now. AT is talking about something about icy hot. He's slamming the canvas. And it looks. I don't know what to make of any of this.

AT is saying it feels like icy hot. Feels like icy hot. So I'm not sure what's going on here. You've got to flush his eyes out here, guys. Whatever it is. Put the water in his eyes, get it out. Because safety and his health is the most important thing, more so than the fight right now.

So let's get him. He's saying that there was icy hot on the gloves? Yeah. Damn. That would be crazy. Rushing now at the Challenger's core. Whoa. Didn't even make it to Maddie Floyd.

Jesus. Shout to Ben Davis. Ben Dave's doing a whole play-by-play. Just a little bit of chicken fry. Yeah, that's a wacky one. Aspinall was there. Shout to Paul Hughes. Paul Hughes had surgery.

We do have visual proof. Second surgery complete. Golly. I feel better than I look. Kept this one close to my chest. It's been a crazy run in the past two years. from scrapping by, oh, to pay my rent, to signing with PFL having six fights in 18 months, two of them world title fights.

Truth is, my body broke down towards the end of the last year. My mental strength pushed me to try to do the impossible. I got close, not a single regret. He's going to return early 2027. Does he say what he had surgery on? Bottom of my heart, I want to thank everyone. Love Paul, big news, absolute gent. Mench.

Shout to his mom's world. Claire Hughes, wishing him a very, very, very, very speedy recovery. Just a great dude. Just a really, really great guy. Also, by the way, we have no visual proof of this. But do you guys happen to see that post from the PFL when they asked stars of the pfl who they were picking in the finals? I didn't see that.

No. You guys didn't see this? I saw this. You saw it, Jordan. I saw what Dakota said. Dakota was the only one to pick the Knicks. Oh, shot Dakota. Only because she didn't want to upset you.

She said only because Ariel will roast me if I don't. There you go. See? I led her in the right direction. She avoided a roasting and she made you happy. It's great. I appreciated that. I was looking at that thing right before game one.

I was like, spurs, spurs, spurs, spurs, spurs, spurs. Little do they know. Little did they know. What a time. Frankie, do we have any super chats? Okay, so week one, we had intern Josh and intern Jack. And what a summer for these young lads, right? I mean, they're in New York City.

When the Knicks finally do it, something to write home about. Week two, I did it because we were pressed for time. What are we doing week three? I was going to hand the baton over to you. Oh. Because you read them so fast and there's just so many today. There are?

Yeah. Okay. Thank you. I'm down. Okay. Jack Hunter. No, that's our guy. This is from a good start.

Alfaro Danny. Calm the F down. We all knew Ariel going to make a two-hour segment about how the Knicks win is all about him. Chill. We all know that nobody listed to action. Okay? We had to pick that one. Bring up the Knicks more so chat keeps crying.

People were complaining about this. Like, I give a shit. Like, I give a shit about that. Are you kidding me? Who gives a shit? Like, I give a shit. Give me 30 minutes. I wanted to do three hours on the Knicks today.

Are you kidding? I wanted to do three hours. hours. Let's lock in. Let's do more. I can't wait to have Coach Mike Brown on the program.

Ooh. Oh, here's 24-inch dubs. Congrats, Ariel. Every dog has its stays. Soke it in. You know what?

That's nice by him. Class. Yeah. Class. Fatia Gila? Fetchiajali? Did Ariel go streaking after the Knicks win

as promised? I mean, Oh, yeah. You did say that. Negative 1,000 aura for that Knicks spelling. So no one ask me what actually happened. So I'll tell you what happened. Three to one, Wembe, Mrs. Bricks,

everyone's going crazy. I'm freaking out. I still, yeah, anyway. I'm wearing a sweatshirt. I'm wearing my lucky Syracuse sweatshirt. Take off the sweatshirt. Sweating. Buckets, dripping. Everyone's happy going crazy. I can't stop sweating and crying. So I take off my pants. Shorts. Jesus Christ. Take off the shirt. I think I I think I ruined my shirt, by the way, because the neck, by the end of the night, was like down to here. It was, it was, um... So what are you wearing at this point? At this point, lucky action shirt, I should have told him about that, and boxers.

Take off... In my house. Is this what you recorded the video on? Yes, absolutely. Also, I think one of the best reactions I saw to it was like, uh, it was like the awkward kid meme just kind of like staring around it. was like Jacqueline in the background of you recording your video. Is Jacqueline even nearby, or is she? Yeah, she was in the back.

Yeah, at one point you, like, lift it up and you can kind of see her, and she's just sort of just like. She's shocked at the state of her husband. Exactly. They're all shocked at how I'm reacting. She didn't, you know, there's a bunch of people with, like, they recorded their spouse reacting. She didn't record because earlier in the series,

she was recording, and my kids reprimanded her, and so she didn't want to, you know, upset the vibe. They were saying that's not allowed. They were like, you don't do that. Don't do that. Don't do that. Sacred. They were looking out for pops, which I appreciate it. Then something interesting happened. At one point,

bang on the window outside. Neighbor comes in. Wait, are you still in boxers or what? I'm still in boxers. But once the neighbor came in... Expect that kind of relationship with the neighbor, uh? The sex. Once the neighbor came in and you,

he's a huge Knicks fan, I felt like it would be inappropriate for me to strip naked. Wait, so does, what's he wearing? What's the point of streaking down the street if you're? Because then you're like a flash in the middle of the night. Right. I do feel like I owe the neighborhood a streak. You know what I noticed, by the way? When you walk your dog, the camera says, you are being reported on some people.

So then I was like, Dad, could you imagine if someone gets a notification? And it's, I would, I'm too. I feel like that's more appropriate than, you know, the other ones. The slog measuring contest? Yeah. I don't know. Listen. At some point, everyone goes to bed.

I just, I went from inside the NBA. And could I just say, it was pretty damn amazing to have inside the NBA involved. You know what I mean? Like, I've said what I had to say about I feel like, but like to have Ernie Johnson be the one to do that for the first time because historically TNT's coverage ends with the conference finals. To have them involved was pretty damn great. So I went from inside the NBA to MSG, our boy Novak. It was his birthday, by the way, on Saturday.

What a birthday that was. Then I went to local news to see all the reaction. Then I went, then I was watching. MSG just kept replaying it, so I finished up MSG. Then I went to NBA TV with John Wall and Chris Haynes. I was just jumping all around. And then the tweets were just... Cat in his bag.

SVP too with all the triple G Rosley like oh my god yo we gotta get Kat we gotta get Kat on the program Kat went on like a 15 boxing reference run there right he started mentioning like

Hagler Hurns triple G against Canello he was he was Shane Mosley reference Zab Judah reference he was referencing again everyone Remy Suss

Does Ilya need to go back to 145? I mean, I've suggested this, but it seems like no one's in agreement. Jeffrey Raymond. Jeff Raymond, 22, 5.3. Enjoy the championship area. Much deserved. As a 29-year-old from Boston, I'm very happy for you to finally get one. Shout out to GC, my birthday twin, 716-96.

Step your game up. I got five TVs in my basement. Shout out in New York, Rick, a real one. Wow. Yeah. Nice to meet a birthday twin. Five seems like, Seems like overkill.

What are you ever going to need five? When are you ever going to need five? NFL Sunday. Yeah, NFL Sunday. Yeah, good old Buffalo Wildlings. Here's, I'm Famous Warrior. Crazy what happens when they offer proper bonuses. I don't think that that was the matchups.

Here's Alfaro Danny. 100% disagree. Reason so many UFC legends were not dare. Is fear of backlash, cancel culture. Even some coaches didn't make it. No. I think just won't. right, Craig Jackson.

Duncan 9661 Ali Abdelaziz cemented as a true great now. It wasn't already? Yeah, what the hell? CHI, G-U-M-E. Ilya losing reminds me of when Leon Edwards said the belt belongs to no one. Can you think of any other time a great champion

got upset when it seemed like they were untouchable? Yeah, like every great champion. Yeah, like Connor, Ronda. Hamzot. Hamzot. What a stretch, by the way, back-to-back dudes who seem... Americans dethroning him as well. After a lot of talk about no American champions.

You're right. Now we've got three, right? Yeah. Kayla. Yep. Kayla needed to be front center. She was there. She was, but I didn't see it on the broadcast, right?

No, they didn't show like... Yeah, I'm scrolling more and more. I'm seeing like Josh Emmett was there. Like, I'm seeing more and more fighters. Rob was there. Elips or at the event? These were like at the event. I did go back and confirm.

Brady and Natalia Silver were in the event. Ruben Salazar, need a smoke stream or a post-smoke stream? Was that Washington Square Park bumping into New York, or bumping New York, excuse me, and we are young with so many people it felt surreal. Yeah. I bet. This is Cousin Kev.

No more in New York, Rick. It's Dagestan, Rick. Rick from Dagestan. Yes, brother. Two, three years? Two, three years, forget. Here's more on Rick. From Hanashi, New York Rick looks like a sick Dagestani rapper.

His track list would be Help the Bear, Dagestan bands, Caucus Among Us. What I'm Made of. Yeah, Manashi actually cooked on that way. What I'm made of, M-E-D-O-V for the audience. Wow, Hanashi, good job on that. Shout to Rick. Hasn't gone home yet. Slept in the studio?

Yes. Yeah. Just a little bit of chicken wrap. Why is that? at the filler for everything. I don't know. Look at his fucking Rick, bro. What a scene this is.

It's a scene, man. Life is good today. What was I reacting to? They did another show out of there today, if I'm not mistaken. What am I looking at? Oh, the thunder. Yeah, there was like crazy thunder. Yes, that's what I was getting scared.

He was like, someone bringing me my thunder blanket. Yeah, that's what I was worried about too. What's it called? Mariel's just down realizing. Live, good today. No, I knew about the studio, Frank. How was it? It was great.

No? Yeah, it was good. All right. It's good. Here's Dave who says, you've got to get DC on to talk about his tweets. I think he'll talk about it himself. Here's bougie.

Alpaca. Alpaca, shout out. How does the Knicks would affect your feelings towards the bills? Have you ever heard of team boxing leagues seen on TV a few times? And don't understand it, though it could be a good doc idea. To answer that, I have. And I'm just completely turned off by any sort of team. fighting event, so I never really pay attention to it. I think there's a few people involved.

Dewey Cooper's involved. I know that. Yeah, 100%. I think we all thought, oh, maybe they get to the finals and they lose. This gives me hope times 10 that the bills could actually do it. There's a lot of similarities between Jalen Brunson and Josh Allen. They're winners. I could see Josh holding that trophy. And now that I actually saw my team win, and I can't even believe I could say that finally, after all this time, I feel like, okay, now it's not impossible. The Halwani curse

is no more. Not only that, but it softens the blow, right? Like, if they come up short, it hurts, but I was thinking about that too. You're not craving it. After losing to the Broncos this year and last year, Chiefs, like, I was so depressed. Pacer's

last year. And now it's like, I had this euphoria. you. Action and I are very different in this regard. I'm good for now. Obviously, I don't want to lose to the Celtics or anything like that, but I'm kind of good. Salary caps. Let me tell you something. Bill's win, I am done. I will not. You don't watch sports anymore. You're just done. I'll just be a casual viewer. Oh, you know, the finals are on great, but it will never. Is that NBA now? 100%. It will never. When the pastures rip your heart out, it's like, it's not just that one loss,

it's 30 years compounded. Now it's just like, nah, we're defending champs. How many rings you guys got over in Indiana? How many rings you got Reg? Huh? Oh, Hallie. How many rings?

Chill with this. All I do is UFC. A.H. Rick Frank, a new instant favorite, LVL song drops. A real 11 out of 10 single. It's five minutes. You're on solo, 60-minute drive.

How many times do you play it? 12. 12. 12 straight? Yeah. No, we got the podcast Oh yeah. That's in one ear Rick. Other ear? It's the track. Rubin again, please get Nick Wright on the show

or Colin Coward. Seems like action's friends with Nick Wright. He was chilling. Colin, I think, was hating on the Knicks. Nick wasn't. Right? I think Nick wasn't. Oh, Nick was all in. Nick was all in. Yeah. Here's a robot pen. Can we get the drop of GC saying, oh, he got my ass? Why did I even say that? I don't remember. This is on that. It sounded like it was in the wrong part.

I got to be honest. It's like, oh, he got my ass. Yeah. Your ass. It's all caps. It's hard to know. It's hard to know what to emphasize. Oh, he got my ass.

You read it how you wanted to read it. The got is the... What's this in reference to? I have no idea. But he got your ass. Here's 24 inch again. I've seen so many non-fans, media, politicians, trashed m-em-a-called cage fighting like it's a dirty word.

It sickens me. I've seen so many... Anytime I open. of my Twitter. What about Gavin Newsom weighing in, guys? It's like some weird bizarre world that we're living in. Pretty sure Hillary Clinton weighed in, too.

The White House was built to serve the American people. Tonight it was used to promote a company the president owns stock in, sell subscriptions, promote corporate sponsors, push Trump crypto, and enrich the president and his family. The founders warned us about kings enriching themselves from public office.

They did not fight a revolution for this. When you put it like that, what do Hillary say? She said, remember, during today's literal cage match on the White House grounds, no matter what, it's not his house, it's our house. I did not have. Come on, Frank. I will say with that Hillary Clinton tweet, she does push towards a website selling hats that say not his house, our house.

Buttons and pens, stickers, coasters. as well. So make sure to get your not his house or house merch. Ezra, Ezra, Ezra, Ezra says, would Charles Oakley being involved in a Knicks parade

be a good way to welcome him back to MSG or is Dolan set on his decision? I've dug around on this a little bit. You know, I think both are a little bit hard-headed right now and there is a pending lawsuit. And, yeah, I don't... Put it this way,

I don't think Oakley's going to be at any parade anytime soon. I think the dream of him being like the guy who's celebrated if they win, I just don't think it's happening. Could it happen over time? I'm sure. The way he still talks about Patrick Ewing,

I don't think it's happening anytime soon. I adore Charles. I adore him, and I was so happy he was there. But I just didn't feel like last week was the week to do that. You know what I mean? Like, it's not about you and Patrick.

It's not about your history. It's not about any of that. And on game day, he was fine, but he was doing a whole bunch of interviews talking about this stuff. And it's like, not now. Just like, please, let us just be happy. So.

On the nose tomorrow, I'm going to get that post up. All kinds of things. We're going to get to it. There's a lot of things in the works. Just stick with us, all right? I try to bounce it. Every time the show's over, I try to bounce the ball. Where you go, man?

I'm just getting my ball here. Let me tell you something. Frank? Uh-huh. Dallas Stars? Yeah. Stick with them. Buffalo Sabers?

I mean, they've won before. Stick with them. Yeah. Arizona Cardinals? Yeah. Stick with them. What about? Cowboys?

Sixers? Stick with, Cowboys of Rockets. They won in the 90s. These are cities I've lived in. Stuck with them. They won't. I asked Mrs. Mysterious,

I'm like, I might be the common thread here. We're walking through Brooklyn, everyone celebrated the Knicks. I'm like, I'm just saying. You know what she says? She goes to why having the bills won? I'm like,

but you haven't lived in Buffalo. Just because I'm married to you doesn't mean, it doesn't work like that. Did you celebrate on Saturday night? Absolutely. What'd you do? I read all the text messages from you guys. I didn't even get,

woke up, Tracy, to let her know. I didn't even get a, hey man, congrats. I knew you were busy and your boxers. I didn't want to be a part of that. You didn't even go outside? I didn't need to. There was a lot of enough fireworks. I was comfortable.

Wow. You're like action. No, I was happy for you. Oh, okay. And everyone else. All right. Appreciate it. Andy went outside.

She sent us a video. There were actual fireworks in her neighborhood. Sure did. It was great. People were partying? People were partying for a long time. Did you take your son out? No, man.

It's knocked out. You left them in the apartment? By himself? With my mother-in-law. Oh, okay. The M.I.L. was in the house, too, watching? Yep, yep, yep. She was watching, and we decided when they got to 20 seconds,

I finally convinced them that we needed to get out of the house. So everybody got dressed really fast and she had no idea what was going on. She was like, okay, as we were running out the door. You didn't watch the buzzer sound? No, we made it on time. Wait, but you got to watch it on TV and then you go outside. No, man. I wanted to be with the people when they won. It was great. I regret nothing.

All right, fine. Everyone has their. What do what do you say? You're not dreaming, Nick's fans. You can cry now. The weight is over. Unbelievable. I'm going to get season tickets. You think they're cheap? Probably not.

Yeah, now's the absolute best time to buy them for them. I need to be there when they raise the banners, though. Plural. Okay, but that's one of the game. to get season tickets to do that. Okay, all right. I just want to let everyone know. Nothing you could do could ever hurt me anymore.

Nothing you could say can make me upset. This is going to be a 100% positive show from here on out. There'll be no criticism whatsoever. No negativity. We're just going to have a great time celebrating life. Peace and love, peace and love. What else can we do? What else can we do?

The New York Knicks are NBA champions. I never thought I'd be able to say those words Bill's in February Die in peace Bill's in February I retire To hell with all of you Leave me alone

I paid my dues The suffering is over You still pay One year retired How close was I to having an all-time run If it would have been bills J's and Nix Would have been the greatest

Exercising of Demons of all time I like that Nix was first though You know what It feels first fitting. They were my first. My last. My everything.

Our boy Jake, in Indiana football, Arsenal, and a bad run. Six months span, not a bad run. Not a bad run. I mean, Indiana football is impossible. I did talk to a friend of mine who went to Indiana as well, and I was like, okay, so how does it compare?

I'm like, what? You went to Indiana. If you claim to be a lifelong fan, you can't compare the school that you went to. to your childhood team. It's not the same. It's different for you. You grew up in Georgia.

He's from New York. You know what I mean? No one grows up in Indiana football fan living in New York. It's crazy. There wasn't an Indiana football fan until last year. That's a good point.

Thank you to all our guests. Thanks to all of you. Back tomorrow, same time, place until I say peace. I'm out of here.