The Dan Le Batard Show with Stugotz - Hour 1: Speaking Of Danger (feat. Luke Thomas)

Episode Date: April 6, 2026

"Buckle up because the ride is only just beginning." Dan is very proud of himself for escaping accusations of accidental racism, and Geno Auriemma lashes out against Dawn Staley in a way that we can only describe as 'sore loser behavior.' Then, Luke Thomas is here to discuss UFC Freedom 250, what to expect, and all the ways UFC is tied to Donald Trump's presidency, whether they want to be or not. Also, Tony takes a stumble. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This episode is brought to you by FedEx. These days, the Power Move isn't having a big metallic credit card to drop on the check at a corporate lunch. The real Power Move is leveling up your business with FedEx intelligence and accessing one of the biggest data networks powered by one of the biggest delivery networks. Level up your business with FedEx, the new Power Move. This is the Dan Levator. with the Stucats podcast. Hour one of the Dan Lebitzart show is presented by Draft Kings. Draft Kings, the crown is yours.

Again, I will remind you that we're going to be popping up more and more at odd hours, just doing shows for you that are tied to something in sports. And the next one of these that we're going to do is tomorrow night, beginning at 6.30 p.m. where we watch the last of the Panthers season together, the two-time defending champions deserve a better burial than Keith Kachuk calling them soft and them losing 9 to 4 and 5 to 2 at Pittsburgh to be eliminated from the playoffs. So we will celebrate the Panthers tomorrow night. I don't think there's any dishonor in getting a bunch of injuries and your best player gets injured. Then all of a sudden the conference is very good.

And so you're merely a 500 team trying to get Barkoff back and you can't get the season to Barkhoff. so he decides to not come back at all. I suspect that if they made a playoff run, he might have tried to do something, but we'll watch Heat at Raptors. I'm not optimistic with that. The Raptors aren't very good. They're actually the same team. Both the Heat and the Raptors are the same team.

They've got the same point differential. The difference between them is that Miami lost a game at home to Utah, that Utah was trying to dump. But they've got to play both games in Canada, and so I'm not expecting anything from the Miami Heat. And that's at 630 tomorrow. Tomorrow, 305 Equinox, presented by Never Miss Your Shot Golf. Thank you.

And then also the first place, Marlins, who were hitting and then beat the Yankees, fended off the Yankees to win one of three in New York yesterday. But the video team has found what I was looking for. I was not accidentally racist. I was not confusing a Japanese player who caught a home run ball from Major League 2 with this play. Major League 2 was stealing this play. And I'm sorry, audio audience, I suggest going to YouTube. tube so that you could see.

Submariner. Drive to left field. It's almost, oh, he climbs the wall and it's caught. On top of the wall. He's got his, that was an excellent call. A little sad, though. It was also sad. Oh, he hit it.

It was also sad. We didn't have any crowd noise, crack of the bat. He didn't have it. What was his motivation, really? A Japanese baseball game for 30 years ago. Yes. Can we talk about that for a second? Good times.

No, but what he just said, at the beginning of the pandemic, ESPN had local cable contracts that hadn't accounted for, what do you mean there are going to be no sports? And so to fulfill those contracts, ESPN was airing at 5 o'clock in the morning with Boog Shambi in a closet somewhere, South Korean baseball. But the best part of that is that Boog would be studying for that game, okay? And what would happen is right before the game at 5 o'clock in the morning, 10 minutes beforehand, they'd say, hey, Booke, that's not the game.

You have this game over here, and he's like, are you kidding me? I don't know any of these players' names. I'm already in my closet. How am I going to call South? Hits it to the guy. And number 10 hits it to 32. 33. Boom goes the dynamite.

Yeah. It's not good situation. I feel exonerated. You guys were desperate to accuse me of conflating major. League 2 and a Japanese left fielder with a play I had seen in Japanese baseball. It was insulting to me. It was demeaning. It

underestimates me. I'm offended that our show would believe that I would think. You can't act like you've been there before if you've never been there before. Guy gets one thing right. They get a victory lap. It's just offensive that my team believes

that I just grab random things from the movies. We're all as surprises you are. And make them my own. Like, do you remember during that Anaheim Angels game with Gwyneth Paltrow's head was in a box? The story from the weekend, I thought, and I know UCLA just won the championship, and I know that Don Staley was very, very happy for Cory Close in a way she would not have been for Gino Ariema. But to me, the story of the weekend from basketball, men's and women's, was Gino Aureeema making a fool of himself as a poor loser after an undefeated season where he gets his head wiped on the floor by a South Carolina team that beats him by double digits and then is whimpering afterward about how Don Staley wouldn't come and say hello to him that he was waiting for her three minutes to say hello before the game and then after the game decides to say something to her about it and she could be seen mouthing I will beat Gino

ass. She says it twice, and I believe her. I believe that if Gino Arie Emma had tried to fight Don Staley, she would have suplexed him. She would have suplexed that sore loser old man. What a baby, Gino Ariema, was after losing. No grace whatsoever after losing and should be embarrassed by the way his team performed, by the way his team got dragged and should be more embarrassed by the way that he represented his sport there in a moment where he takes away from what South Carolina did by making the show at the end about himself because that's the punctuation he puts on their season. Just a true embarrassment. One of the great stains on a really truly legendary pioneering career.

One day later, Yukon put out. out a statement from Gino Oriama, saying, quote, there is no excuse for how I handle the end of the game versus South Carolina. It's unlike what I do and what our standard is here at Connecticut. I want to apologize to the staff and the team at South Carolina. It was uncalled for how I reacted. The story should be how well South Carolina played, and I did not want my actions to detract from that. I've had a great relationship with their staff, and I sincerely want to apologize to them. I never says Coach Daly's name. He said that they're not friends.

He said they have nothing in common. And it isn't terribly... High head kicked there. Surprising at all that a man would come in and ruin a celebration for women. Don Staley muttering in a way that was snarling and everyone saw, I will beat Gino's ass. Gino's 72, Don Staley. She mouthed it multiple times.

Like, I need this to get clipped. What do you think the odds would be? What would be the Draft King's odds on Don Staley against Gino R.E.M.? I think Gino R.E.M.A.M. would have a burst of crazy at the beginning, but then stamina would be a problem. 72 years old. Be like me during the street hockey game where I come out strong and then about two minutes in him, like, I need a break. I don't want to handicap it. Except he's twice your age.

That's right. He's 70. He's 72. It is, to me, instructive, funny, amazing, and a symbol to the competitive spirit of what Don Staley is, that she would say that, feel it, think it, and know it. Like, that she would, that she would mouth that, that it would be in her because she believes it and because the ferocity and the rage and the competitive nature of the moment grabbed her, it was a startling thing for me to watch. Basically, her, have inside her the kind of rage that would want to fight an old man.

Well, and we've seen coaches get physical with each other before. Well, it was Joanne Howard and who was it a few years ago? I forget the coach, but they put hands on each other, you remember? Did you want to take a swing in them, actually? You've seen it before where there have been coaches who put hands on it. You haven't seen it when it's a man and a woman. That would be crazy. Dan, something you said earlier, you think this is actually going to be a stain on Gino's entire legacy and stuff?

I don't think we'll ever talk about this ever, like 10 years down the world. Oh, wait. I'm not saying it's a stain on his entire. legacy. I'm saying it's a stain on everything he's done today. I'm saying that what has just happened here leaves a mark on who he is in a way that people will

remember that he was this sore a loser. Of course, the greater, look, man, I've heard Conan O'Brien say this. He's like, look, we're all, you know, dust moats. It's been a long time since anyone mentioned the name of Calvin Coolidge, who used to be

important. Like, Conan O'Brien was standing over the grave of Calvin Coolidge and wondering, like, we're pretty small and irrelevant, all of us. The history of Gino Aurema will be a great leader and pioneer, but I will not unsee what a sore loser he was to ruin this for everybody this weekend. Like, it is just such bad form to have that little grace that the reason you're trying to fight somebody is because she didn't show you the king of college basketball the proper respect, and you had to wait for her for three minutes,

and the only reason we know it is because you volunteered it afterward, because you would be in such a big baby about the fact that your team got dragged. You haven't lost all season. And the way that you lose that one, you have so little dignity and grace about the frustration of the moment that it leaks out and just sore loser stuff

that then you have to clean up with a bunch of public relations and statements the day after. Again, it's supposed to be a celebration of the women. What are you doing? I'm going to be an ally here. I harping on this and saying stuff like that. that's not being a true ally. We see guys go at this all the time.

When Jim Schwartz and Jim Harbaugh are running up the tunnel, where we're not taking five minutes out to say, how could you do that to poor Jim Schwartz? So I'm going to be an ally here, equality for all. Well, but I think the strangest part was the things that Gino Oriema was saying he was upset about didn't actually happen. Like he was saying how originally he said, you know, she didn't come and shake my hand pregame,

and then somehow it turned into he had to wait for three minutes. They show the video of them shaking hands pregame, And he also talked about how physical South Carolina was and how one of his players had her jersey ripped. And the referees didn't even call it. And then they show the video, the girl ripped her own jersey after the play behind the basket in frustration. It's like he was, he was like confused. Bob Sala threatened to kick Liam Cohen's ass to his face. Again, the thing that I'm complaining about is the whimpering afterward, that he just made it all about him in his frustration.

because he didn't like that he lost for the first time this season. Like it was, I'm not even talking about the argument with her. I'm talking about everything he did afterwards. Yeah, he's being a sore loser. I mean, he's just being a baby. That's not a 72-year-old adult. That's somebody who's not used to losing and reacts very poorly to losing. Boar's Head brings to the deli the taste of deep-fried turkey.

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That's what it's like when you take your first sip of Cuervo. Oh, delicious. It's the signal that says, we're not checking the time anymore, pal. It's when small talk turns into stories. Quervo, man, it's at high five a random stranger effect. That's right. The game is popping.

You're hugging people you never met before. That's the kind of energy that Cuervo brings. It's so smooth, so delicious. That's the Cuervo effect. Keep it, Quervo! Hey, it's Mike Ryan, and I want to talk to you about the random midweek hang that you have with your friends. Maybe it's an NBA game. You get a text, hey, come over, you want to watch the game, and maybe you're like,

I don't know, I kind of just wanted to stay home. And then you think about it. After your buddy hits you up, and you know just the thing that'll make that regular hang, that regular midweek hang around the basketball game into a special time, into a Miller time. That's right. This happened to me just last week. grabbed a six-pack of Miller Light, said I was on my way,

and next thing you know, we're arguing about rotations like we're on the coaching staff, yelling about a miss call, and the game's coming down to the final possession. It was one of those nights that you look around, you take a sip, and you think, yeah, this was the right call. And my friendship's stronger for it. Cheers to legendary moments with Miller Light. Great taste, 96 calories. Go to Millerlight.com slash Dan to find delivery options near you.

Or you can pick up some Miller Light pretty much anywhere they sell beer. It's Miller Time. Celebrate responsibly. Miller Brewing Company, Milwaukee, Wisconsin, 96 calories, and 3.2 carbs per 12 ounces. Don Lebatard. John's as Losing teams in the trip for Stugats. These all smiles to Lubbock. This is the Dan Levitar show with the Stugats.

I wanted to talk to this guy, he says, because he does very good work in an assortment of areas. Morning Combat on MMA, the Draft Kings Network. He's a journalist, he's an analyst, he's a host, and his work on combat sports. I'd say is second to none. I put him right there in the class with Ariel Hawani. I don't put anybody in that class. New episodes every Monday and Friday, and he's also very good on politics. Luke Thomas gets political.

Nice seeing you, Luke. Thank you for making the time for us. The place that I wanted to start is the five. on the White House lawn. What are you doing with all of that? Trying to process exactly what it means and how to cover it. It's not exactly clear. This, of course, will take place on Trump's 80th birthday, June 15th, I believe, is the day.

It is essentially, I mean, you have to understand it, it's basically two events in one. And what I mean by that is, on the one hand, it is, if you look at the card, it is a real MMA event. And not just that, you can quibble about the quality of the card in some capacity, but certainly the top two fights have very important relevance for the divisions in which they take place, respectively in the main event, lightweight, and then the co-main event, heavyweight. So I'm going to cover it on one level like that. On the other level, though, you have to just kind of recognize what it is,

which is that this is a reward for the UFC in helping return Trump to power to the 2024 election. It is my belief that there is basically no mainstream, certainly not sport and entertainment entity, that has a greater role in returning Trump to power than the UFC. And in particular, and this is important, Dan, they are the most important, again, mainstream kind of actor in rehabilitating Donald Trump post-January 6th, and there's more to be talked about if you want to. So I'm trying to cover both of those events as one simultaneously,

a fight event, as well as this kind of political reward for this effort that they did for the Trump regime. It's called UFC Freedom 250. As you mentioned, it's going to be Trump's birthday. What are you expecting in terms of the galling fusion of things that are going to bother you as someone who is a journalist who tries to be fair and objective about the way you cover sports, but you also see America melting down in the hands of somebody who ought to be in a nursing home?

Yeah. I got to be honest, to me, the right wing turn that the company has made is complete. I mean, I don't know that they're, I mean, they could keep going further down. down the line. But what I mean to say is it used to bother me when they were in this kind of period where they were trotting him out. And it was, I mean, it literally changed the sport, right? I mean, this is not an exaggeration. On the one hand, it drove out people who have, who aren't like automatically sympathetic to Magga or to bear minimum, just, you know, politically agnostic. It drove all of them out and it pulled back in a group of folks who I

would describe as like terminally online chud losers. There's just a bunch of them more than there used to be. That's one. And then it also gave license down the line within other actors in the space to lean into their right-wing advocacy. So for example, in Coconut Creek, Florida, not too far from where you are, Dan, there's American Top Team, which is a fantastic gem, but they helped hold a political rally to get Ron DeSantis reelected, you know, during this kind of time, this fever that was happening that the UFC kind of opened the door to, at least within the MMA space. So it doesn't actually really bother me anymore.

I mean, it's kind of done. What I'm just looking to see is what it actually does to the sport long term. And to be clear, the jury is very much still out on that. They just signed a huge Paramount deal. They're going to make a ton of money. But as you indicated, Dan, the country is on fire. He's trying to set the world on fire. And I want to say this one more time.

They wanted a lot of credit in returning Trump to power when there was a lot of fever in favor of Trump. But now a lot of that fever is beginning to break. But I still think we need to make sure that we always assess. sign the return of Trump to power with the ultimate fighting championship. You cannot disentangle those two. And so I'm just looking to see what impact all of this ultimately has. But my my revulsion, those days are pretty much over. Luke, what do you make of Dana's soft launch into trying to be someone that brings all the sides together and trying to distance himself from how political an organization the UFC is in your mind? Yeah, I find this to be, I mean, manifestly absurd.

People have tried to make the argument to me, for example, that, you know, Dana himself is not super political, that this is more, you know, just sort of playing the levels of what it means to be a big company trying to navigate, you know, the world of, whatever your needs might be in terms of interfacing with government or powerful actors. And there's something to be said for that, surely, right? I don't think that he's some kind of Matt Walsh character or something. But it doesn't really matter. It doesn't matter. because what they did was, again, after January 6, one of the very first places that Trump went was UFC, I think, two, whatever, it was the trilogy between Connor McGregor and Dustin Poirier. I believe UFC 24, could be 240, something else. I forget exactly what the number is, 264, something like that, but it's a trilogy in July of 2021.

It was the same within the span of days of the time where he went to CPAC. And if you actually, I did a whole video on this, you actually look at when Trump goes. goes to UFC events, not always, but pretty often, it's in close conjunction with when he was getting indicted and, by the way, held for liable for crimes in New York State. It was when the Jack Smith case was sort of ongoing in all its various dimensions. So he's getting mugshots. He's in Atlanta. He's getting hauled around.

And in close proximity, he would go to these UFC events to kind of sort of rally support for him. Dana White, in fact, was very explicit about this. And my point is very clear, like, whatever Dana White's personal view, about the world and maybe he doesn't hold all the same views as, for example, Stephen Miller. It doesn't matter because he was a chief architect in returning a political project to power. You own what comes with that. You cannot distance yourself now.

It is absolutely too late. So this idea that now we can come to a place after you've changed the fan base, after you've turned MMA into a vector for white wing politics, now it's time for kumbaya? No, it is not. There is no coming back from this. And the destruction that Trump has has wrought upon us is only, frankly, just beginning. And the UFC was very, very clear that they were big supporters of the president. And I intend to make sure everyone understands that connection as things deteriorate. You know vastly more than I do. So please inform this, which is much reported detail as you can. The criticism that I keep hearing that Dana White has checked out, that he doesn't care about UFC the way. that he used to, that he's involved in a bunch of other stuff and his lack of touch on things can be seen. Fair or unfair? Largely pretty fair. Largely. Not entirely, but largely. And for some reason, that's actually not really controversial or has any kind of partisan valence.

Part of it is that they want him to remain in place because he is obviously the UFC's most promoted star, if you think about it. And the fan base knows him. And again, you can, make a lot of criticisms about Dana, but one thing you absolutely cannot deny is that to his bones, he's a fight fan. Like, that's real. And I accept that that's real, and I think everybody has to. Whereas somebody like Mark Shapiro, who's the chief operating officer of TKO, I mean, he could go to fights the rest of his life. And I would never consider him a fight fan. By the way, a small little note there, Dan, you may recall, Mark Shapiro was the guy Dan Snyder hired back here, I live in Washington, D.C. to turn the Six Flags franchise around in the late 2000s. Couldn't really do it,

but in any event, a little bit of a small sort of... Yeah, then he became Stephen A. Smith's agent. Yeah, right. So you get the idea. But in any case, you're asking about whether he's checked out. There is simply no doubt. They have removed a lot of power from him, right? And by his own admission, he doesn't really do matchmaking anymore. He claims he doesn't really do fighter contracts anymore. Now, he is in charge, as I understand it, of the television broadcast, for example, the production elements and how it all looks and how it all sounds. Obviously, he has a role kind of as like a figurehead. But I think the amount of success that the UFC has had and the monopolistic control, this is my opinion, take it for what it is worth. It has made them lazy. It has made them lazy

and a little bit sitting on their ass in terms of, you know, kind of the, they used to crack the whip on their competitors and there aren't any competitors anymore. And so between the market control that they have, as well as changing Dana's role within the company. He'll do these announcements for these fights, and he's like reading off of sheet of like stats. And it used to be the case he would like announce fights, and then he'd be aggressively pitching you on why they matter. He literally cannot do that for the most part. So I would say that there is absolute validity to those concerns. If he shows up, because he's missing a lot of these press conferences too, this White House event is a logistical nightmare. So what do you believe that?

the biggest issues are? In terms of its logistical challenges? Or otherwise, right? It doesn't have to just be logistical. You might be worried about safety. Or Alex Paya, how he's going to fare on the ground with Cyril Ghan? Dan, it's a very important question. Can Justin Gagey hold the right hand of Ilyot-Opporri? It's a lot of questions to be asked. I mean, just on the logistical side, you know, I honestly don't know how they're going to do it. So I've looked this up. I mean, they're going to do it. I'm not saying that they won't pull it off. They've been pretty good about, you know, achieving logistical challenges. But on the security, side of things, man. I just don't know how this is going to work. So Obama in the last year of his

office held a kind of quasi-south-by-southwest knockoff event on the South Lawn and had about a thousand people there and they did that pretty successfully without much issue, different time, different presidency. But they pulled that off. They're talking about three to five thousand people just on the White House lawn. Many of them will be troops that they're going to bring in, which I don't think is a bad call necessarily. But there's going to be a lot of the, you know, D.C. McClellan claim, KPMG, Booz Allen kind of class of people there. They're all going to have to have background checks to get in. Getting into the White House, getting out of the White House,

getting 5,000 people into the White House to say nothing of the fact that what they're claiming, and we'll see if this ends up being true, is that the fighters are going to walk out of the Oval Office onto the South Lawn. And that certainly creates a grand physical thing to show on television. But, dude, how are you going to do that with all of these managers and all of these, like agents and all of these like just training partners and coaches and like it just seems like it's a lot. I don't know how that's going to work. And then beyond that, I'm kind of interested to see just how the rest of the world receives it. I think the thing that you have to understand is with inside

MMA, they're looking at this like, hey, look at the amount of triumph that we have. We have ascended to the top halls of power. That's what we've done. And so they're looking at this as like, look, we've arrived. And there is something to be said for that, certainly. But to me, the argument is, you did that. You actually made that final assent by making a partisan turn. And in making that partisan turn, there comes a series of benefits, certainly, but a series of costs as well. And I'm very curious to see, in the end, depending on how much Trump magnification, the broadcast actually delves into what this does to the brand or the sport, which, by the way, has some issues beyond just, in fact, I would argue even bigger issues, beyond just the partisan turn it's taken.

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My mom did everything for me growing up, and now I watch my wife do the same thing. That's right for me and my boys. The patience, the sacrifice, the stuff that doesn't get nearly enough credit. Flowers are fine, but they can't feel like. like an afterthought. That's why I go with 1,800 flowers.

They've been doing this for over 50 years. They know what they're doing. When that box shows up, my wife, my mother, they know, oh my God, the fresh,

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Better. I think I haven't been practicing? Stugats. Oh. I didn't realize we had a substitute complicated legacy. Brought you by headquarters Toyota, huh? 441 and Powerline Road. Second down to nine.

This is the Dan Lebatar show. with these two gods. Luke, TKO oversees WWE and UFC, and very recently there seems to be a turn amongst the wrestling fans against TKO, the decisions they're making, being priced out, taking a

WrestleMania to Saudi Arabia, and they've got this whole creative arm that the internet wrestling community seems to disagree with. In the UFC sector of things, are there fans that are directing their ire towards TKO? Is there a clear line of demarcation the way that there is with

wrestling fans? Yes, but maybe not quite as explicit. I mean, what I'm noticing more, at least right now, and I think this will change, but certainly right now, what you're looking, what you're seeing from MMA fans is they're looking for a scapegoat of some kind. So for example, like the guy that does what Dana maybe once used to do is his name is Hunter Campbell. And he's the one that does most of not the matchmaking per se, but you know, fighter negotiations. And you'll see him at events. He has glasses. And, you know, anyway, he, he, He's kind of there all the time. Yes, he has a mustacheio, yes, or mustache, whatever the proper term exactly would be.

Forgive me, I forgot the nature of the question. Can you repeat it one more time? Well, you were holding him up as an example of like where TKO was influenced some things. Get it together. Get it together, Luke. You got distracted by your, you got distracted by the pistachio. Me. I apologize. I don't.

So that's one. The other one is because the fights, not so much the last two weeks, but in general, they've been very lackluster. Recently, you're seeing people be like, oh, it's the paramount era, which doesn't make any sense, because most of these issues are longstanding before. You are seeing some people connect the dots to what is basically the extraction economy that TCO is trying to do where they take from the talent and they extract value from the fan base. They have a monopolistic control over the industry, and so everyone just kind of suffers except for them.

You are seeing some dots connected, but I don't think it's to the, the same degree that you do from wrestling fans who clearly pinpoint the corporate overlords in a way that MMA fans are still kind of pointing at the people that are more excessively in their orbit rather than the sort of like, not fictional per se, but you know, who is Mark Shapiro to the average MMA fan? I mean, they don't even know who he is in large part, nor should they necessarily. But it seems like with WWE, the fans are much more in tune with how the product changes as a result of like basically private equity. I urge you to listen. and watch Morning Combat on the Draft Kings Network,

wherever you get your podcast and on YouTube at Morning Kombat, and also watch, listen and subscribe to Luke Thomas, gets political, getting political on the way out here. On Easter Sunday, I really do believe that we need to take the keys from Grandpa and put him in a home. What he is doing is dangerous to our country. And on Easter, he writes this on Truth Social. Tuesday will be Power Plant Day and Bridge Day,

all wrapped in one in Iran. There will be nothing like it. Open the effing straight, you crazy bastards, or you'll be living in hell. Just watch. Praise be to Allah. There are a number of things about this that are troublesome, up to an including that our president is out here

just threatening war crimes. Like, what the hell, Luke? We are in trouble. We are in trouble. We are in deep, deep trouble. We are entering a phase of the rest of the world, decoupling from the financial and security apparatus that has secured parts of American prosperity for generations.

And the way in which this is going to come undone and the way in which it is going to be both messy, ugly, and probably very, very bad even for the average American, I don't think they've even wrapped their head around. I mean, for example, just in terms of closing the street of Hormuz, the oil reserves that have already in motion to get to the country, are basically the last versions of those arrive, April 15th. If you think your prices at the pump are high now, just wait. And to say nothing, by the way, of the role that MMA played,

specifically in the podcast circuits or the MMA Jason World, that Rogan sphere and returning Trump to power is kind of also an important point that should not be lost on other people. But like, I just want to be clear, I'm 46 years old. I've never seen the world through American power as destabilized as I do now. We are, it is very obvious that our trading partners and our friends to the north can no longer trust us. It is obvious that our friends and trading partners in Europe can no longer trust us. We made a bet with the GCC countries that they could do tax, you know, lose tax laws and they could have this kind of, you know, no street crime society, but we had to provide security for them.

We cannot. And I want to say something else. I watched, this is very important. I watched 9-11 happen in my dorm room, my senior year in college. And if there is one thing that I learned as a result of all of that is that when you have incompetent people in positions of power, it's not just that they make bad decisions that don't yield fruitful results. It is that they are dangers to the world.

They are dangers to society. They are dangers and threats to everybody else. We are surrounded. We are surrounded with leadership that is grossly incompetent, way in over their heads, simply unable to understand the enemy that they have in Iran, unable to plan ahead because they don't understand their actions. They don't understand, by the way, with this whole immigration, satanic panic, which is what I call it, I'm the husband and the child of an immigrant.

Like, none of that is based in the reality and the truth about immigration. They are Don Quixote attacking windmills, the phony problems that don't even exist, meanwhile exacerbating the kinds of existing problems or creating new ones, because they simply do not know what they are doing. I don't have any great or encouraging words for your audience other than buckle up because the ride is only just beginning.

Speaking of danger, talk about danger in the heavyweight division. Alex Paneda moving up for a, just completely crazy three-time belt champion in three different weight classes. What did you just say? What did you just say? Tap out. What did you just say? I mean, I would love for Luke to answer the question.

I think it's interesting. What he's talking about is the co-main event of this White House card. As I mentioned, there's some griping about the card, but the main and the co-main have some real value. In particular to me, the fight he's talking about is the best one on that card. So what they've got is this guy named Alex Pereira. He was a very, very, very accomplished kickboxer who kind of came to MMA late. And if you know the history of MMA, kickboxers have sometimes done really well, but in general, the wrestlers tend to do better. And he started out at middleweight, had this insane rivalry with Israel Adasanya, who was, you know, on again, off again champ at that time.

Then he moves up to 205 pounds, becomes a multi-time champ there. And now he dropped that belt to go up to heavyweight to do something that literally no one in the history of the UFC has ever done, which is claim a title in a third weight class. It's literally never been done in large part because you can't even get the opportunity to do it. Now, the only catch here is it's for an interim title. It doesn't actually confer full status. That is currently owned by Tom Aspinall, who has been out with an eye injury for some time. Nevertheless, it would represent a historical achievement within the sport. And I would say this, Alex Pereiro is the guy who headlined UFC 300.

He's been like the MVP of this company, him and Elliot, I'ma, Ilya, but more so Poiton. In just terms of like delivering big action on big stages, high stakes, he's the guy of basically the last few years, even maybe longer than that. And so real history on the line at UFC White House. This is what I mean. It's both one of these kinds of events as well as something else. I don't know your history, how you ended up in the Marines. When you were in your dorm room, had you already decided to become a Marine? Yeah.

So the way that worked was I actually, I joined when I was 17, still in high school. And the way it worked was I graduated high school on a Friday. And then I went to boot camp on a Monday. And I missed the first week of college because I went to William and Mary at that. that time and because the Marine Corps boot camp is 13 weeks. And I went to an artillery unit. Truly, I say this, Dan, with total, I don't know how else to say this. There's been a few things in my life that were really unlucky. But there's been a couple of things in my life that were insanely lucky. And what I mean is the unit that I went to was Hotel Battery 314, 4th Marine

Division. This was just south of Richmond, Virginia. And the reason why this is relevant is because it was an artillery unit. Well, artillery at that time, we're talking late 90s, early 2000. was being the Marine Corps somewhat phased out. Now they changed a little bit of this when ISIS came back to power because they had to shell them. But the point I'm trying to make is when 9-11 happened and then we invaded Afghanistan and then ultimately Iraq, they didn't have use for us. They had very little artillery that they needed because they were going, you know, house to house quite literally. And whatever artillery needs that they had could be met by the army.

And so what ended up happening was I get out a few months later, 2004, I get out a few months later, my unit gets converted to a rifle company, and then they get sent to Fallujah to go do prisoner transport, which of course means they got shot every single time they left the base. I got to skip all of it by virtue of just how the Marine Corps was constructed in my MOS, the whole nine yards. I consider not having to die for Dick Cheney and George Bush or be mentally affected by whatever you want to say, one of the truly great blessings of my life. Luke, you do a great job. Thank you for the time.

Hope you're on with us again, sir. Anytime, Dan. Now, Tony, you had such a good joke there to end a really... I talked to Luke on a semi-regular basis about MMA. Tony, Tony, I need you to back off a little bit. So let's get the coaching. I need you to just back off. I understand that you want to be defensive about this.

Mike has been trying to hold you. And while Luke was giving me his history in the Marines, I heard you say in my ear just the single F-word expletive, and I assume it's because Chris had replayed for you in there the sound of you trying to say whatever you were trying to say about Pereira to Luke Thomas. So before we play the sound, can you tell me now what you were trying to say? He got what I was trying to say. I'm asking you.

I'm asking you. What I was trying to say was Alex is going for a historic thing, which is winning a championship in three different weight classes. right so that's what i was trying to ask him what does that historically mean for let's hear what you actually ended up saying for a a on the just completely crazy three-time champ belt champion in three different weight classes what did you just say that's look that's good tape and bad tape because the joke the timing you slide the joke was even in there the joke was written the beginning. I know. You slide in. You want to talk about danger

and then like that's a great setup. Just get right to it. But then you said too many words. The issue is that the three time champion. Tony, shut up for a second. Play it again, Chris. For a on, just completely crazy three time, belt champion in three different weight classes.

What did you just say? It's an unfair at it. What do you mean? That I agree. You cut out the good part. It's a great joke. I wanted to say, speaking of immigrants, Alex Pereda. I went with danger instead. Yeah, you should have said that. Which is why I got tripped up when I was asking the question.

I was like, which one I'm going to go with? And then I saw Dan staring at me. And I was like, all right, I have six seconds to say a 13 second question. Three-time belt champion. This is an opportunity to get better. That's what I like about it. You know about that completely crazy three-time belt champ? I don't even want to hear from you.

You say that six times a week. What do you want about? They should give him. They should give him if he wins. They should give him that completely. Crazy three-time belt champion belt. Crazy three-time belt champion. Miss me yet?

This is bad. Jeremy's dunking on us. Well, he does is right on his little whiteboard over there. He's been funny today on the board. He's funny when it doesn't talk. Wow, but I don't think he's ever made a mistake as large as this one. He has a 27-minute question. Did you understand?

three-time belt champion. Zazzo, what are your thoughts there in general as you delight more than most in Tony's failings? I'm embarrassed for you, man. Luke Thomas. I talk to him, I talk to him a couple times a year. It's a regular way. A sucker now.

Hey, it's Mike Ryan, and I want to talk to you about the random midweek hang that you have with your friends. Maybe it's an NBA game. You get a text. Hey, come over. You want to watch the game. Maybe you're like, I don't know. I kind of just wanted to stay home. And then you think about it. After your buddy hits you up,

and you know just the thing that'll make that regular hang, that regular midweek hang around the basketball game, into a special time, into a Miller time. That's right. This happened to me just last week. I grabbed a six-pack of Miller Light, said I was on my way. And next thing you know, we're arguing about rotations like we're on the coaching staff, yelling about a miss call.

And the game's coming down on the final possession. It was one of those nights that you look around, you take a sip and you think, yeah, this was the right call. And my friendship's stronger for it. Cheers to legendary moments with Miller Lite. Great taste, 96 calories. Go to Miller Lite.com slash Dan to find delivery options near you. Or you can pick up some Miller Lite pretty much anywhere they sell beer.

It's Miller time. Celebrate responsibly. Miller Brewing Company, Milwaukee, Wisconsin, 96 calories and 3.2 carbs per 12 ounces.