The Dan Le Batard Show with Stugotz - Hour 1: Wem-B-A

Episode Date: April 12, 2024

The crew is up in arms about a video of the Panthers' mascot Viktor E. Rat having himself a time at a recent Cats game. Then, they discuss the ascension of Victor Wembanyama to a superstar in the NBA. Plus, another weekly segment of Pablo Torre Finds Out. Finally, Tony is here for another MMA Hangout to preview this week's epic UFC 300 card. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

You're listening to Giraffe King's Network. This is the Don LeVittor Show with the Stugats Podcast. I don't know, bro. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I just saw another one. There's two videos. The commotion in the studio right now is we just saw the video of Victor E.

Rat at the Panther game. Yeah, yes, sir. I was not familiar with your game, Victor E. Rat. Victor E. Rat, for those that don't know, is a secondary mascot for the Florida Panthers, who was actually assaulted by a Lightning fan a year ago or something like that. It was a fan.

You know, the Panthers crowds, they're fun. It might be happening in Kodak Black's suite. Kodak had the craziest moment I've ever seen in a Panthers game. Victory Rat like sit back and saluting what was going on for him. I really hope Victory Rat doesn't catch any heat for this. Victory Rat was an entertainer.

He's doing a lot of work out there. Victory Rat salute to you. If you haven't. Yeah, he's, Victory Rat salute you. I hate him. If you haven't seen the video in question, just search Victor E, all right? He is having a big day. V-I-K-T-O-R. My God. E period.

Why do we spell it like that? Rat. Victory. Victory. Yeah, but we couldn't do like, what does it stand for? Because there's Stanley C. Panther. Victor's a name.

No, I know, but YK, why not V-I-C- K why not vic to your hockey? That's what I'm asking So we did it. There's Russians. Yeah Yeah, that's why I get Stanley C panther Stanley's a name Stanley Cup. I get that I get that he would be I get that How do they spell Stanley? That's my question trophy. So they spelled Stanley regular. Yeah, okay So they can spell Victor regular had to be like a rush. Oh regular Yeah, okay So that's well Victor regular had to be like a rush all regular Like it's a like a win victory but Victor and then e period like Stanley either way. He was winning I was running he was most certainly winning and I didn't really expect that

Have you guys seen the the prototypes for Nike that they put out Asia Wilson? The way the women do we have a still image of the Wemba? The Wemba one looks like I'm going to tear my ankle in it. Expeditiously. Cut me off at the pass. You cut me off at the pass. Is it like a heel almost? It looks like your foot is not flat.

The Asia Wilson prototype. And these are all prototypes. And I think they're really designed to get the conversation going out there. And it's a cool little stunt for Nike. But the prototype for Wemba Nyama is pretty gnarly. We have it up there on the screen right there. And you know my own thing.

Like where's my foot go? That's what I'm saying. Are you like your foot? It looks like you're like a wide heel. It looks like a slip in with no laces. And AI made this? AI made all these prototypes. So like the robots could be trying to injure

all of our best players. Like it's starting, specifically Victor Wembenyama. That's my takeaway from this is, as you know, the only thing stopping Victor Wembenyama from ruining the great game of basketball is an injury. I look at those feet, like any big man, you start there. The great game of basketball is saved if he actually runs on the court in these shoes

because those shoes will do the job. There is no way his feet can survive playing the game of basketball in that. And that looked like a size 10. Right, no shoestrings. How you gonna stop and start? How do you, how do you? He wears like a size 25.

There is simply no way he's gonna go out there with that lack of support on his feet. For that, play barefoot. No way. And why? Pop ain't going to let that go down. No. Pop going to be like, no.

Did you see the three on one? It was amazing. Did you see the three on one? I've never seen anything like that in basketball. Where his physical presence just scares everybody from putting a shot up because they know. They break away. They're in like a flying V formation.

They break out to the perimeters, they have a lane to go to the cup, they refuse to, and they kick it outside, they refuse to shoot because Victor Wimminyama can close out. Guys, I know I get aggregated freezing cold take, but when I said at the moment in time that he is not a good player, thank God, because Pop didn't know how to use him,

but even within that clip, if you watch the actual original clip, I was warning you, the day is nigh. And by the way, the day is here. He is absolutely turning into everything that I feared. The only mystery here is not whether or not he becomes that, it's why the Spurs are so bad right now while he's doing what he's doing right now,

because he's only gonna get better. My friends, the only way to stop Victor Wemba Nyama is with this shoe. We need this shoe to drop. He's already one of the three best defenders in the NBA. Maybe you say top five, but his impact on the defensive end already is ridiculous to the point where-

I'm gonna start calling it the Wemba. Yeah, I mean, it makes me wonder how truly pitiful the rest of their roster is that they're not at least a little bit better because He is one of the most dominant forces I've seen as a rookie ever. Yes ever in the history of the league We've never seen anyone look like that do these things and right now he's still spry The playability if Tom Brady didn't convince you on playability the playability. If Tom Brady didn't convince you on playability, Victor Wimunyama going a full NBA season

without any real injury questions at that frame is wild. Brother, a epiphany just came across my mind that scared me half to death. The Spurs are gonna be a lottery team. Can you imagine Wimby and Zach Eady on the same damn team? Oh, whoa. Just for fun. Pick Frankfurt. Holy damn moly, bro.

Nobody get no shots off in the play. I think you actually put out the scenario in which Zach Eady could work in the NBA. Alongside Wemby. Oh, my goodness. You could, wow. Or at least as the backup big man. Because even if he ends up being,

everybody keeps comparing him to Bobon, even if he ends up being Bobon, right? As the backup five, where you always have someone who's seven foot four. Right now, like they're just re-doing what they had with Tim Duncan, with David Robinson now just 25 years in the future. The crazy part. And the thing that I wonder is, is there going to be a player who decides, yes, I want to, like, I want to sign in San Antonio.

A star player in the league who wants to go play in San Antonio to go play with Wemby. Because that's not normally a free agent destination. I've heard people float the idea of De'Jonte Murray going back to San Antonio and those two would be outrageous together. They did sign Lamarcus Aldridge. Yeah, different time though.

Because that was still, if I'm correct, that was still around the time that the rest of that crew was still in the league. Kawhi might have even still been there. So it was like a time where they were still in their stage of relevance of this is the end of a dynasty, let me help try to keep it going. Where this is a completely new era.

So this is a, all right, do I want to go play for Pop alongside Wemby and make that my destination? If you're, especially a guard, if you're a good guard in this league and you can play along him, he'll untap so many different things in your game. It makes so much sense. He's still doing so much stuff on the perimeter.

I think it's actually, like you mentioned the ED thing, I think it's a great location for a big that wants to just work inside because they want to develop Wembe to the point that he's this outside force. My old concern with that, at least earlier in his career, is number one, he wasn't that good at it. He's getting way better at it. And also, the more you float out there, the more you play outside of your frame, the more susceptible you are to injury. So he's already proven me wrong in terms of the injury. I would have thought that it would have came 15 games in and dude is out there and he's

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Who wants to go next? This is your show. Okay. Well, I want to make everybody happy and avoid conflict. And you yelled at me and now I'm a little afraid. Well, I tried to wrap the last segment to keep us on time. I put a bow on it for you. I feel like Mina's topic is a good segue out of this.

Speaking of the concept of how we organize ourselves and how we keep order in our lives. Okay. Yeah. It is a good... I think actually it probably flows pretty naturally from how I just described myself, which is... So the article that I brought up is by Ezra Klein, ran the New York Times, and I don't have the title of it. Yep. Happy 20th anniversary Gmail. I'm sorry I'm leaving you by Ezra Klein

in the New York Times. It's basically about how Gmail is done and Gmail sucks. And he kind of lays out the promise of Gmail or the biggest sell of it was the idea that you, there was no limitations on the number of emails you could have because so much memory and as opposed to, and that got me thinking about like, I guess it's been in my life so long.

I can't remember a time when we were forced to delete and organize emails. Yeah. If like with Outlook before it or whatever services we used, I guess AOL, Hotmail, whatever. Well, I think we got Gmail in college, right? Yeah. Thereabouts? Yeah. cuz I remember like my school address and then the the open world of bottomless gmail. Yes and Gmail as service

Basically offers you all these ways to organize your email with tags and this and that but you there's no limit to the amount you get and tags and this and that, but there's no limit to the amount you get. And like a lot of people, as her writes about how he had millions of emails, and at a certain point he was like, this is non-functional for me anymore, I cannot use this. So he was like, I have to go in a different direction. He described a service, I believe it was called Hey something, that is more restrictive. Like it keeps people from emailing you, which is basically the internet becoming unwieldy generally, and there being too much choice, too much content,

too many people who have access to you at all times, and he gets at that. But I thought it might be good to just kind of start with the framework of Gmail and to ask you guys, how big are your inboxes? And we all have our phones. Uncomfortable, I mean, I have 3,798 unread emails. I have 3,708 emails. That's eerily close, LibreGang.

We're out here. I mean, just like looking in a mirror. My cosmic brother. Looking in a lustrous, bearded mirror. Look at mine. That's my inbox. What do we got? What are we working with?

There are seven emails in here? Oh my God. I've truly never in person. I thought you people like you were a myth. And what a couple of these really shouldn't be in here either. Oh, by the way, I should say too that like some of the videos archive that. I have 3798 in my inbox on Gmail unread, but I have a hundred and forty, a hundred fifty four thousand and thirty in the promotions tag under forums.

It's four thousand sixty six updates. It's ninety three thousand three hundred and forty. OK, so it's just like hundreds of thousands of emails that I just have never seen. Just a dog pile. This really does flow quite well from our last segment. Okay, so I just wanna ask you, how do you go about your day living this way?

Because- Blissfully, largely. Very easily. Okay, so you're not, because what Ezra describes is the inability to go, just being like, it's too much, I can't deal with it. I don't like this form of communication with people where I have to actively search for things. It doesn't bother you?

No, just because I think email is so much more of a passive form of communication that it doesn't, like, I think the thing that resonated with me most about this and the idea of that clutter you're describing was him talking about on this hay service when it takes over your whole screen. It eliminates the rest of the email box being behind it because that's the problem I have in general

with my relationship with my phone now is there's so much on it between work, between personal life, the group chats I'm in, email threads, stuff I'm posting for work on social, that it all feels tied back to the work that draws anxiety. And so when I go in there to do one thing, I end up getting inundated by something else that pops up, and it distracts me to the point where a lot of times,

I just set it down and have to put it away. Yeah, I have like almost an eclipse glasses relationship with my inbox. I'm not gonna look directly at it. I'm just gonna like, yep, that's the thing I should deal with. You peek a little though. Peek a little bit. But for me, the thing that resonated from Ezra Klein's column was this notion of a shame closet. Yes. So this concept of like, it's the place you put everything so you don't have to figure out what to do with it. And as I was contemplating, I saw the headline of his

of his article and I was like, f**k this dude. Like Gmail and me, we get along great. It's not stressful. If I, the search function is actually key to it, right? Like if I need to find something, I'll get a couple of date qualifiers and like subject lines and all that stuff, attachments. I can find it.

But what I realized as I was reading it was that it is like my, it's like, like my photo album on my phone at this point on my iCloud where it's just hundreds of thousands of things that I don't have an intuitive sense of. Like I know if I need to get something, I can find it. It'll just take me a long time. And it's detaching me from the premise of like, oh, I consult a nice tidy box of people trying to reach out to me.

Instead, it's like a ball pit where I'm like searching for treasures at the bottom of it. So I have that with photos, actually. What you mentioned photos where we used to be like, what are the best photos I took at this thing? And now you just take a zillions of them and you look and you try to find you kind of lose, you know, I mean, having a child now, it literally is just millions and millions of photos. And it really bothers me and stresses me out knowing that I can't find a photo.

Like if I want to find a photo from something that happened a specific year, most of the time, like I'm not really sure if I can find it. I know there's like search functions, but they don't really work super well. It's like, yeah, the AI, so you can put it in like sunset. Yeah.

And you'll get all of the sunsets, but also it's imperfect. That bothers me a lot, but I, and I actually have been like, I should take a day and go throw my photos and like, but I'm just not gonna do it. Whereas with emails, it's like, okay, I have kept this thing under control

and I want to keep doing it because it would bother me in the same way knowing. That's a Virgo for you, buddy. Look at that. Yeah, I guess so is it the so it's the fact that you can't immediately control all the parts of it that it is just something that overflows in a way that you can't somehow organize a lot, when we think about like, what do I have to do today?

Okay, what do I have to do today? I had a taping at 12, I had this taping at two, those are the main things, I got my hair done. But inevitably every day you have to reply to emails. I can't fathom conquering that part of my to-do list without a clear look at the emails in front of me, without a clear look at like, okay, I have seven emails in my inbox.

I have to reply to two of them today. If it was millions, I don't know even how I would begin to assess which ones matter to understand even how to go about it. My approach to scheduling my day is comically incompetent compared to Mina. What is your approach? So for a long time it used to be,

my to-do list was a draft of an email in Gmail. So it'd just be like an email that was blank that I would fill in with like my tasks and it would save because it was a draft and I would just update it day by day like I'm gonna I did this thing let me delete that so it's like a constantly updating single email that was like very very simple and like the opposite of like strategic and then it got to be I use Google calendar but in Google calendar I'll put like reply to this email. Yes.

And it'll just move every day. So there are some to do tasks about responding to like a friend from high school who's like, can you meet this kid that asked me for like a career advice, what's getting to sports media? I'm like, cool. Absolutely. And it's been following me on delay for literally a month. The sort of question hanging out all of this is like, this is actually a problem, right?

Because as your client presents, this is a problem. And I think it's, it is a problem, one, if it gives you psychological stress in the case of emails. And it sounds like none, we're all fine because we've all figured out our relationship with it is different. Yep. But I do think that there is an actual problem here. Is there a better way? It sounds like we're all fine, because we've all figured out our relationship with it is different. But I do think that there is an actual problem here. Is there a better way, I guess?

Yes. I mean, so the question about photos, it's like, what does it mean when you can have infinite everything? Music. Is that the problem that you're talking about? Like, what do you think the actual problem is? Yeah, I think the email thing is a little bit different

from photos and music and search and all of that because if there is a problem, it's if you don't have a handle on it, like either you have a handle on it, which sounds like you guys do or I do, but we do in our different ways. One of the Pablo's does. Yeah. I think there are like, we're all actually like, oh, we're fine. I think there are a lot of people who are like Ezra Klein and who are like very much stressed by the way email is conducted now where like you don't, it's just so overwhelming and you lose sight of what to reply to and it's just too much.

I think that that is the thing. But I think with regards to actual like the photos and music and content, that is something I actually view as more of a problem for myself, because I think the way my mind works is, it is easier for me to wrap my mind around, you know, something that's limited in a way, like 20 photos or a single album or whatnot that I have to listen to all the way through. And I think my experience of those things,

photos, music, news has degraded because I have so much choice. I think that's one of those things that also you can zoom out more and one of the things he talks about at the end of this is he lumps social media into this is also and the line that really hit me was I've stored everything and I've saved nothing. Like this idea that there's a lack of permanence to all these things and it's this what you just described always makes me think of when people talk about just humans in general

and their relationship with social media. Like we were built to exist in groups up to a certain size. And now we're simply interacting with too many people all the time. And does it limit or cheapen the value of each of those interactions the same way that having too much music keeps you from really enjoying one bit by having all of these

interactions and the idea in here that like oh have I given so much of myself to this space like on social media Where I have not contributed meaningfully to actual relationships in my life in a way that's beneficial and has permanence When it comes to email, it's like you have been sort of like fighting the battle for intention. And I've like so far I've, I gave up on that battle so long ago that now email is effectively not an effective way to reach me. Yeah, which is very true thing that I'm not mad about in so far as like one goal I have in general is I don't want to be expected to be super responsive on so many platforms. Like if you got to get to me, you need to,

like the terror alert scale color needs to be like red. Right? Like call me, text me is like an orange. An email it's like, I may get back to you in six months, legitimately. Which is not the worst way to gatekeep, but it does mean that email as a concept is just less, it's less useful to anybody who deals with me. I just never want to be called by anyone.

So please just send me an email. Don LeBretard. We got a free knee heart away. Free knee? Who is a free knee heart away away I was trying to read fast you do is on the team Luke Jackson Bobby Jones the matrix on Marion Stu guts so shacks which Parker Chris Quinn D Wade Jason Williams are all right I mean stacked roster This is the done libertar show with this two guards. What's up five fans?

MMA hangout presented by Cuervo and we finally made it UFC 300 week Danny Segura MMA junkie your boy 10 daytony. We're gonna break down Possibly the biggest card of the year UFC 299 was huge possibly the biggest card of the year. UFC 299 was huge, but UFC 300 from top to bottom. Main card, prelims, early prelims. It is a absolutely stacked card. Danny, first off, what's up brother? Second off, how do you see 300,

the excitement of 300? Obviously you're doing work for MMA junkie. You've got all the weigh-ins, you've got the press conferences, you've got all the way ins. You've got the press conferences. You've got all these different things break us down. Like what a week like this would look like for you. Hell pretty much. I mean as a fan,

I'm excited because the fights are going to be amazing. You know, we've seen some of these apex guard bees and not so great, but this dude literally you got former champions opening up the preliminary cart. If it's in Figaro and Cody Garbrand. So from from start to bottom, this this card is going to be amazing. But yes, the fight week itself is going to be quite hectic press conference. They're going to have every single person of the card on the press conference

media day every single fighter. That's going to be 26 fighters in total. So it's a lot of video, a lot of editing, a lot going on. But over at the MMA junkie team, we're well oiled machine. So it's a lot of video, a lot of editing, a lot going on. But over at the MMA junkie team, we're well oiled machines. So we got this. The main event came together. There was a lot of speculation across a lot of different weight classes. I'll let you talk about the rumors and all that. There was rumors of Islam. There was rumors of could John Jones be healthy enough. There was rumors of everybody, right?

Uh, then they settled on the light heavyweight title fight of Alex Bada versus Jamal Hill, who last year tours Achilles in an MMA basketball game, don't ask me why they'd be doing that, but towards Achilles, Hey, yeah, right. Had to vacate his title, Beta comes in, wins it. And now we've got a match between essentially champion versus champ because Jamal Hill never lost his title, right? When you look at this fight and how the UFC kind of brought it together, what would first when they announced it, were you like, eh, this is okay.

But now that it's kind of given some room to grow, has it opened up like a nice bottle of wine? Man, I feel like I'm being unfair to this fight just because it's 300. So just for the people and I'll address the rumors. Just real quick, 301 is in Brazil. So the next paper is in Brazil. But he does Brazilian. He's maybe the biggest star right now from Brazil. So they wanted to make him and Jamal Hill, who is recovering from that injury that you mentioned that is a, it has a quite lengthy recovery time. They didn't have a main event for UFC 300.

They didn't want to put Connor in there. Timeline didn't align. They tried John Jones. They tried Islam. They tried a bunch of stuff. None of it works. So what do they do? They moved the main event from 301 to 300, which a lot of people are speculating is even

Jamaal Hill healthy enough to be competing at this day and did he just take it because they offered him more money or whatever the case it was in order for him to get a sooner date. So anyways, this light heavyweight fight is amazing, but because it's not a McGregor, it's not a Brock Lesnar, it's not, you know, these names that we're accustomed to seeing in this, in these 100 events. A lot of people are kind of talking shit about it and disappointed on it. But like, to be honest, it's two scary strikers with tons of power that have given us tons

of finishes in fight of the nights. This is a fantastic fight. It might just not have be as sexy, but look, look at the rest of the card. I mean, it's stacked the bottom. So I'm getting a little bit of hate because of it, but still a great mini event. When you look at the actual fight, last time we saw Jamal Hill, who's beating Glover Tashara in Brazil. Like that was a massive, massive win for Jamal Hill and a fight that was bloody.

It was everything you would want from a light heavyweight title fight. And now re-racking it next, you know, the next year. And you have Alex Baderda who Glover is in his camp. Glover is basically like his father. Yeah, exactly. Like his mentor, his father here in the United States. To me, that gives both on such an advantage because Glover's a share has already fought Jamal Hill. He already knows kind of what the pain points are, how to take him down, how to, you know, the combinations that he needs to be effective. And let's just be honest. Is both on has he had the best 11 fight run in UFC history?

He's nine and two. He's won titles in two weight classes. Like, is this the best 11 fight run ever? 100%, 100%. I mean, people need to wrap their minds around this. 11, crazy, he doesn't even get you in the UFC. 11 fights, 11 fights. And within 11 fights, this guy

is already a UFC vet. Like he's already got a bunch of fights in him. He's won the UFC middleweight belt and he's won the light heavyweight belt and he's headlining UFC 300. This is ridiculous. I mean, if you can put together the most successful 11 fight run in the history of the sport, this is it. I mean, what the guy has achieved in just 11 professional MMA bouts is just unreal. Yeah, just crazy stuff. And he's beaten killers too. It hasn't been like the the Bo Nichols of the world where he's

fought in every tomato can that's out there. Cody Brundage, no disrespect to you, but come on, right? And he's fighting killers. Like what he did to Strickland was insane. Yeah. Strickland ends up coming back and winning the middleweight belt against Israel Desanya and walks him down the entire fight. Right.

So this guy is such a special fighter. I think we're going to get a very special main event because Jamal Hill is one thing he's going to do is stand up and bang. Yeah. That's what this is. It's a perfect scenario for fight fans that love watching guys stand up trade blows with absolute just hands of steel fighting against each other. These are like two robots fighting against each other.

Yeah. For the casuals, I would say this is like almost the perfect main event because you know, if you already, uh, you know, if you host equitable shots in and, you know, you already you know a few host equitable shots in and you know you're vibing at the bar last thing you want to see some like super technical fight on the ground or whatever the case may be dude these guys are gonna go at it they're gonna go for the finish it's just a fantastic main event as far as action wise it might not be as sexy as maybe other names but like action action wise, this is as good as gets man. It's, it's a huge, huge fight. Uh, who do you have brass tacks?

Get down to it. I'm going to go pay data. Look, as you mentioned, Glover is the mentor of Alex Pereda and you know, they already prepared for a Jamal. They did a whole training camp for Jamal Hill, so they already have a lot of footage, a lot of knowledge on them. I'm sure perita had a mimic a lot of what Jamal Hill does, uh, in that training camp as well, and look, I think there's a horrible of knowledge on him. I'm sure Pallada had to mimic a lot of what Jamal Hill does in that training camp as well. And look, I think there's a horrible matchup for Hill.

He's coming from an Achilles tear, which we know that that's a pretty big injury and he's coming earlier than he was supposed to. And then on top of that, you know, you got what time with tons of activity, all the momentum in the world. And I think the matchup itself is just terrible. I mean, he's not fighting a glory to share that's got, you know, questionable striking at this point and really good wrestling. No, he's fighting probably the most decorated striker right now in mixed

martial arts and his thing striking. So it's like, it's like, the way I see it is, is a plus fighting, you know, B plus or a minus, you know, what time just has an edge everywhere. But. Both these guys have power, so it could always end in a finish in either side, but you gotta put the money on the most technical guy, which is Pareda. It's going big on big, like strength versus strength.

We're gonna line up across each other and say, hey, I got hands of steel, you got hands of steel, let's make it happen. So I'm super excited for this. I'm gonna go with you there. I think Pareda retains the light heavyweight belt. Shama. He's just on another level right now. The women's strawweight championship, Zhang Weili versus Yan Xiaonan. China stand up. I think Zhang Weili right now is at a different

level after those couple losses to Rosadamia Yunus. She's gone on a tear. I think she's a special fighter right now. I like Yan. Like I thought she's fought well, but she does not have the pedigree that I think Zhang Weili does as far as the fights that she's put together and the championship fights that she's put together. Yeah, I mean, there's clearly a huge gap in experience. I think there's a huge gap in athleticism here and just in overall skill.

Zhang Weili is one of the most well-rounded fighters out there today. I mean, she's got the wrestling, she's got the jiu-jitsu, ground and pound, striking, toughness, athleticism. She's a great fighter. She's fantastic. Zhang Junan is a good fighter, but I think far more limited than Wei Li. So I'm going with Wei Li in this one. And I'm a little bit like, I don't know if the word would be surprised, but I don't know. I feel like this fight's not

getting a lot of attention between the main event, the BMF, the lightweight action. It's like it's been kind of overlooked, but this is a pretty good fight. It really is. And anytime we see Jean-Wei Li like she's gonna put on a show like that's that's what that's what she's done in the USC is put on great fights I'm sticking with Jean-Wei Li I think she's going to retain the belt. Don LeBattard. While I was gone a third Zagaki was born and I think I heard correct me if I'm wrong here Jeremy trying to partake in a fourth Zagacki and I am

here for a future where I'm surrounded by a chorus of clucking Zagacki. Stugats! You know what it means when you have four Zagackis dead. You don't have one. This is the Don LeBattar Show with the Stugats! Let's move over to a lightweight battle elevated the BMF belt. Wow. When you talk about a fight, this could headline another card somewhere else. Like this is that good of a fight. Justin Gaethje versus Max Blessed Holloway. Wow. Amazing fight.

The only thing is, look, I'm gonna shit on it and people are gonna be like, oh, you know, he's such an MMA hipster, this and that. Oh no. But I'm gonna shit on it a little bit. Look, from an action standpoint, amazing. The fact that Holloway's going up to 155, I've been clamoring for the guy to give it another shot,

especially given how the division has panned out. But the BMF title, I don't know, man. You saw the integration. That was between our boy here, the 305 King, Jorimaz Vial and Nate Diaz. That felt fitting. You've been around, I'm sure Justin Gage and Max Holloway, badass fighters, scary as shit in the Octagon, but outside of it, to the nicest people you can ever meet. Nice guys.

I feel like for the BMF title, you got to have a little bit of a criminal record. I look at the fights in the backyard, on the street, at a bar, a few skirmishes here and there, maybe a felony charge, maybe a battery charge. I feel like that's got to be a requirement for these types of fights. You don't think so? I mean, I see where you're going. And you look at Justin Gaethje, you look at Max Holloway and you're like, they are bad. You don't think so? I mean, I see where you're going. And you look at Justin Gatje, you look at Max Holloway and you're like, they are bad. But what does bad mean? Are

we talking bad in the octagon? Are we talking bad overall? Like, George and Nate Diaz, two guys that you can categorize bad guys. There's bad guys. Street fights from both on the internet, plenty of them. I feel like that's a requirement. If you put it this way, this is where I draw the line on, are you bad? If you have foughten pre-iPhone, okay, there's video of you fighting pre-iPhone with jean shorts on, you're a bad dude.

Yeah. You're a bad dude. Yeah. I need to see the jean shorts, the long jean shorts. If you have never foughten in jean shorts pre iPhone, it's going to be tough. Yeah. It's going to be tough for sure. That's my whole thing.

Like BMF. I don't know where we're going with this. I don't know where this is going to lead first title defense ever for the BMF. So this is going to be a continuous thing. I don't know. Um, when you look at the fight, technically, uh, two guys that are fighting very well, um, we haven't seen max be seen max be tested in the last couple of fights. Justin just out, just knocked out Dustin Poirier.

Poirier comes back, does what he did. Like there's a lot of steam for Justin right now, cause there's a lot of steam for Dustin and Justin knocked out Dustin with a head kick. Do you see what was it? 291? I think it was, yeah, it was in July of last year. Yeah, this one's a weird one because again, like we don't really know what the BMF title really means at this point in time,

but it obviously brings a lot of eyeballs. We're talking about it right now. I know the fight before that, Charles Oliveira versus Armin Sarukin got labeled as a title eliminator to fight Islam. But dude, I feel like if Justin Gagey wins, defenses belt gets a sexier win, a knockout, something a little bit more, you know, more, more impacting than, than Olivera or Serukin.

Bro, I think he should probably get the next title shot, given in mind that he also being a porio. So, yeah, I don't know, but this is a great fight. Um, I think the best result for the sport hear me out. It's going to be max Holloway just cause he just makes so much, so much sense, so much interesting matchups. Now at one 55, he gets a win. Plus he can always return with that BMF belt fight.

He got the podia and that's a bad ass fight at one 45, but if Gagey wins, it's also not bad either. Uh, but yeah, this is a fantastic fight at 145. But if Gagey wins, it's also not bad either. But yeah, this is a fantastic fight. I'm gonna go with Gagey on this one. Wow. But yeah, I think the power difference is gonna be big here. That's the question, right?

Max moving up, does the power move up with him? Or is the power that he has at feather like kind of what he is, right? Cause there's a lot of guys that make that transition that power doesn't follow him And then you're stuck you're giving your best shots, and he's eating them You're like that's kind of all I got so there's there's nothing else that I got going on here It felt like when Izzy went up to light heavy, and he's throwing shots

And it was like all right this kind of doesn't really matter because he's not knocking anybody out with that I'm gonna stick with you on this. I like Gagey. I think he's just fighting at an elite level right now. And I think he's gassed up for what he saw Dustin do to Sandini. Right? Like that was like, Oh, wait a second. Like I just beat a guy who's still a killer. And if things go right, I can get another title shot. Things do get a little bit more complicated if Gagey wins because then you got Gagey versus Dustin. Feels like Dustin deserves at least one more shot to get a title. But then if Gagey's in the way, does that happen? So I think for Dustin fans, I think it's important to see Max Holloway with the W.

Yeah, 100%. Yeah, the UFC lightweight title picture is going to get shaken up widely affected by the results from 300. So we'll see. The next title. The next title challenger will come out of this card, I think. But who knows? Maybe maybe it's for you. Moving on to the lightweight title eliminator as it's been dubbed Charles Olivera, Armand Sarukian. Danny, I feel like this is your favorite fight on the card. Yeah, it is.

Dude, this is just such a badass fight. Probably action-wise gauging Holloway is going to be crazier, but I do feel like if we are looking at the highest level of fighting, this is the fight on the 300. This is, I think, the highest level of mixed martial arts that's is this is the fight on the 300. This is I think the highest level of mixed martial arts that's going to be displayed on that night. Charles Olivera, I mean, dude, the Bronx with the with those super white teeth, you know, you know, pricing, you know, platinum blonde hair, blonde hair. Yeah. I mean, you can't hate

on Charles Olivera. That dude's just a badass. Striker, Jiu Jitsu, like the guy just has it all. He's super dangerous. And Sadukyan is a bad dude as well. He knocked out Darius recently. He's been racking up wins. A lot of people don't know, but he made his debut on short notice

against Islam Makashev, back when Makashev wasn't a champion. In a fight night. In a fight night and gave him, I believe, one of the toughest fights of his career. Uh, so this is a bad ass fight. This is a bad ass fight. I'm really looking forward to it.

And I do hope that the winner here gets a title shot because I do think the winner here will be the rightful number one contender at 155. It, it just worries me that Sarukian in the fight itself, like let's take the title picture out of it. Dupron has been in that deep water. He's fought in Makashev. He's fought in, you name it, he's fought him, right? Serukian hasn't had outside of Makashev early. He hasn't had that guy to test him the way that Dupron has had people test him. And it feels to me like Charles is ready for a war that Serukin has never been in. Right. And when you look at the experience, you look at the power that he has behind

his hands, you look at the excellent jujitsu that Charles has. It just feels to me like there is no reason why he should be. A, a dog of this magnitude. I think he's plus 190. It might have moved since then on DraftKings, but he's a dog. And it's like, I'm looking across and there's tons of MMA people that are way smarter than me. But for me, it just feels like easy money looking at Charles, looking at his ability, his experience and Serukian. I get it. He's incredible. He's probably the next up in this division

when things clear out from the old guard. But how can I go against Charles? How? Yeah, and I think a good bet here would be Charles Oliveira by finish. I mean, we've seen Sarukin get rocked by lesser quality opponents. But again, Sarukin is just 27. You got to be

careful with fighters that are around 27, 28, because the leaps that they make in between fights, I mean, are just huge, right? So this is a good example. Yeah, a great example. So you could, this guy could very well go out there and just start Charles Olivera and then just be the future of the division. He's certainly beaten some solid guys since losing to Makashev. He's only lost once and has defeated quality opponents, not of the love of Charles Olivera. But again, we've seen escalation, which is a signal for evolution. So I do believe that we're going to see an improved version of Sorokin this Saturday. Will it be enough to beat Olivera?

Bro, Olivera has got my heart. I cannot bet against that man. So I'm going to go with Olivera and I think he finishes Sarukin, but hey, there's something there with Sarukin for sure. He's going to be a future title challenger and maybe even champion at some point. I'm going to give you a very, very easy comp right now. There was a guy last card that was the future of this division against the guy who's a little bit older. And then the guy who's a little bit older starts the guy who's the next cup in this division. I'm just gonna put that out there.

Dustin versus somebody just just throwing it out there. Charles versus a rookie and maybe the old guard is like, wait a second. We still got some stuff. Yeah. I mean, Gage is thriving. The old guard is still in there. He's still hanging in there for sure. Absolutely. Last fight of the main car will make this quick because it's going to be quick. I feel like Bo Nicol versus Cody Brundage in a middleweight fight to kick off the main card for USC 300. Pretty simple. Bo Nicol. He's better all around. Bo Nicol's Bo Nicol.

I mean, I think that's the breakdown you got to give him. But yeah, this, I mean, we know what the UFC is doing here. Cody Brundage, he's got eight fights in the UFC. I believe he's four and four. He's a decent opponent. I mean, the fact that you've made it in the UFC and you almost got 10 fights in the promotion, that means you got to be pretty damn good because it's hard to get to the UFC and then

much harder to stay in the UFC. But look, I think the match up here is for Bo Nicol to run through Cody Abramdige and have a showcase in the first fight of the pay-per-view and really turn him into a star. That's what the game plan seems from the UFC standpoint.