The Herd with Colin Cowherd - Daniel Cormier TV - Ben Askren and Daniel Cormier REACT to Sean O'Malley CALLING OUT Ilia Topuria

Episode Date: February 22, 2024

Ben Askren and Daniel Cormier GO IN on Ilia Topuria's KO win over Alexander Volkanovski at UFC 298 in the latest edition of Funky and the Champ. Both DC and Askren explain why THEY ARE OUT on Sean O'Malley vs. Topuria as Ilia's next fight. And Cormier gives his fresh take on Jamahal Hill vs. Alex Pereira and why the UFC had to go with that fight as the main event. Plus, don't miss Ben Askren's thoughts on the Khamzat Chimaev vs. Israel Adesanya leak that Dana White denied on social media. 1:45 - Intro4:05 - Ilia Topuria KNOCKED OUT Volk10:30 - O'Malley vs. Topuria CAN'T HAPPEN15:18 - Sean vs. Merab predictions18:49 - Alex Pereira vs. Jamahal Hill at UFC 30024:35  - Pereira is a STAR27:26 - Dana White on Khamzat vs. Izzy leak #Volume #HerdSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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Void in Ontario. One no-sweat per new customer. Issued as one bonus bet based on amount of initial losing bet. Bonus bets expire 168 hours after issuance. See dkng.com slash pro-reau. For Domos for Deposit Wagering in Eligibility Restrictions, Terms, and Responsible Gaming Resources. You saw me standing alone. Oh, my goodness. Without a love of my own. This is the song, This is the song Ben of Manchester City. They call them the champions in the Premier League.

They are second in the table right now to Liverpool. So, yeah, the song Blue Moon, the old classic is the song of My Club. everybody's club, Manchester City, led by the great Erling Holland. Guys, I'm just giving Ben a soccer lesson

or football, as we football fans call it. I'm giving them a lesson. Ben, you, you're a football guy? No, those people are wimps.

I don't do anything with that. What do you mean? They all just fall down and start crying. Dude, it hurt. I've played, I've played it.

It hurts so bad. But what I'm saying? Which part? Dude, when they try to check, when they check you with the foot to try to kick the ball from you. I live in Gilroy. So there are soccer games going on all around town here.

You know, you're going to wear shingards, though, right? Shin guards? Yeah, bro, but it hurts. It hurts really bad, Asker. All right. It hurts really bad. So I would say it's one of the tougher sports. Okay.

But, yeah, Manchester City, the club of Daniel Cormier, Bayern Munich in the Bundesliga League. Ben Ascran will go and find his team. He seems like a Liverpool guy. Ben. I only want to watch fighting and wrestling. That's it. Really?

Okay. Ben, guys, welcome to another episode of Funking the champ. Daniel Cormier, that's my man, Funky Ben Ascran. Ascran,

220 kids going to the state tournament from your academy? It's a crazy number. You lost your screen in the back, bro. No, I know. I didn't put it on. I'm being on professional. I'm doing it while we're doing it.

Boom, I can do it. That's so great. They don't sponsor me anymore. F them. I got the wrong one. There we go. I got the right one now.

Yeah. 210 kids. That's a crazy number. I'm so excited. We got, we got Thursday. That's tomorrow. We got a lot of people wrestling. It's going to be so exciting.

I'm actually just doing the top three ranked kids right now. Deanna's doing it before we got in. In Division 1, we have four weight classes where we have number one, number two, and number three. And we have one of those in Division 2. So that should be a lot of fun. You have the premier wrestling club. in the country. I promise you. I tell everybody it. They hate hearing it. But you absolutely do.

All right. They hate hearing it. What? People hate hearing it. Oh, man. But you absolutely do. I am your biggest supporter. Guys, Ben and I are here to talk about fighting though, because for as long as he wants, he does something called FRL. And if you want to hear wrestling, I don't think many people listen to it. I don't know if you watched. Did you watch episode 1,000? I announced my retirement from the show. I love it. Oh, you quit? Well, I I didn't quit. So I announced my retirement. I'm going to be done after the Olympic team trials this year, which are roughly two months

away. I didn't want to quit in the middle of the season. It seemed weird. So I said, hey, let's get the Red CAs. Let's get the Olympic trials. And then you got, you got better, right? You're doing stuff better. Hey, as with life, people elevate and they move on.

And right now it's not for you to do something better. So sorry, FRL, but I took Askerra. I took the pretty girl at the prom. Ben, pretty girl at the prom. The popular person. We have all been it. We have all stood atop the world. There is now a new pretty boy in town.

A new champion, Ilya Tupoyah. What did you make of this performance last week? I spoke to him last week, Ben. And he was so certain that he would knock out Alexander Volcanowski. And anyone that would ask me, I would be like, man, he's so confident. You tend to want to believe him. But this is Alexander Volcanowski. What did you make of that?

Yeah, it was impressive. He said he was going to do it. You know, I was like, I thought there was a chance of it for sure. You know, I said that. But, you know, Volk is so good and it's, it happened against Machchiv, but it hasn't happened ever besides that. And so, you know, I thought there was a potential that the whole fight went kind of like the first round did, right?

Where Bolkanowski moves well, he's evading, he's landing strikes. He won the first round, in my opinion. I thought there's a chance the whole fight looked like that but when Tuporia connects, he connects hard. Mm-hmm. Yes.

He told me that against Josh Emmett, the fight looked different because he had to respect the power of Josh Emmett. He said that Vogue doesn't possess one knockout power, one punch knockout power,

so he was going to go at him in a way that would allow for him to get a knockout. Bro, his coaches, his corner, everybody that was in that room when I was sitting out interviewing him, they were so certain. So then I walked outside at the hotel and I saw his coaches. There are two brothers. And I said, this kid thinks he's going to knock

out Alexander Volcanovokinovokovsky. I go and I know he's your guy. I said, so I'm sure you're confident in him. Where does it come from? They said, we've had him since he was a little boy. They said, we have seen this kid grow and evolve at every step. In D.C., you asked him something about a fairy tale. Now, we don't believe in fairy tale. but we do believe that this is his moment. Because I asked to pour you about, do you believe in fairy tales, like Cinderella and Beauty in the Beast?

And he goes, no, I don't. But this is his moment. And, you know, he kind of has it. He has, like, that stark quality about him. Hey, and dude will put on a suit with a turtleneck. Anytime you see a dude with a suit with a turtleneck, you know, like, dude on a suit with a turtleneck and, like, perfect hair, bro. Like, this dude has a star quality about him.

that he can elevate, he's gained 600,000 Instagram followers in two days, two days. That's flipping insane. That's crazy. I think we were early to the party because I remember it was after the Bryce Mitchell fight, and I think we were both pretty high on Bryce Mitchell, and Tupuri just beat him everywhere. And it was like, oh, my God, this dude hits hard. He wrestles well. He grappled well.

I think he finished him with an arm triangle, if I remember correctly. And we were just kind of blown away. And then he had the Emmett fight. and it set him up and it's like, yeah, there's a distinct chance this guy can beat Alexander Volcanowski. I think he's going to be a big star. You know, I know where I thought was next fight, and I was looking at his division. His division's kind of set up weird right now because the guy who would be the obvious next fight, Max Holloway already has a fight committed against Justin Gachie.

So that's kind of outright. And then when you look at all the other guys, they've all lost. Their last fight is a loss all the way until you get down to, may I hope I don't say it's good. I have a layab. Oh, you tell him to get lost. It's Coach Pendleton. Coach Pendleton.

I'm in the middle of the show. I'm in the middle of the show. We've been asking right now. What's going on, Coach Pendleton? I call you back in a few minutes. Can I call you back in a few minutes, Coach Pendleton? You're a goon. He said, asking he said, if I'm going to be on there with you, God bless.

Let me call you back, coach. Oh, my God, you're a go goon. Coach Pendleton, the Oregon State head coach. Go ahead, go ahead, Ben. You stop. Evloyev. Evloyev. Yeah, Evloyv is the next guy.

So Volcanopsky, obviously, just lost. Holloway is fighting. Rodriguez lost. Ortega lost. Who do you think the guy is then? So if it really should be Max Holloway, if Max Holloway was not fighting Justin Gagy, or Ilya's not going to fight soon.

So maybe after Max Holloway fights Justin Gage. How do you know he's not going to fight soon? Ilya has already said he's not fighting Max. He said he's not fighting Max. He's not fighting Jaya Rodriguez. He's not fighting against Brian Ortega. He said he's not given any of these guys title fights. He said he has to continue to move the division forward

because Alexander Volcanowski was not going to be taking those fights. That's his mindset in regards to the guys that have been around the top of the division for a long time. But I think for him, if he wants to continue to build that star, he's got to fight Max Holloway. Right. You have to fight the guy that's. So recognized, because that's how Vogue became a star, right? Remember, Vogue beat Aldo. Then Vogue beat Holloway.

And then you start saying, well, this guy might be the greatest featherweight of all time. Honestly, he might still be. He is. I think he is. But I'm saying, that doesn't happen, though, if you don't beat the guys that was there before you, especially if they're still able to compete and they're still fighting. So I think that's why. But one thing that I don't know if I'm into, I can't tell you who he's going to fight next,

but I can't tell you what I don't want to see. I don't want to see him fight showing him out. I agree. I don't need to see those guys fight just yet because neither of them have defended their championship. I don't know that we should continue to, I don't know that we should continue to allow for these guys to get a belt and immediately leave the division.

That's what happened with Islam and Volkanah. Yeah. Because, but that was more. I feel both of them had cleared out the division a little more. No, no, Islam has a clear out. Dude, Islam has two title defenses, both against Volk. He's a 45-bund. He's never defended the belt against the lightweight.

But again, that white with Volk was a credit to Volk for what he had done. Because he had kind of cleared out his division. So I get it in that instance. But if we're talking to Pori and O'Malley, these are two guys that haven't fought anyone in that division. So I don't think these guys should fight each other right now. They've got work to do. Yes. So I agree with that.

So Mokachev did fight, you know, a decent amount of people because it took them a while to get a title shot. It took him a long time to get to the bill. Yeah, like 10-ish fight. So he fought Dan Hooker, Bobby Green, Charles Al-Avera. Obviously, they should just say, you know what, we made a mistake. We're going to scratch the Gachian Holloway fight. hallway fights, Sepuria, Gaichi fights, Mokachev, that would honestly make the most sense.

But you need it for UFC 300, which is something we're going to talk about a little later in the show. Yeah, unfortunately. You need that fight for UFC 300. That's also kind of ideal because that's kind of who should be the top challenger in the division. And then, you know, 35, it's highway robbery. And I, listen, I know you can't say anything bad about Dana. It's okay.

I can't. I freaking hate it when Dave does this shit and doesn't give people he doesn't like title shots because. No, he is. He is. But Marab, how about you hit him with nine in a row or something? But no, he is. He's actually, now, I get it. But now, but now on Saturday, he said Marab is the next guy.

Well, yeah. About damn time. Belal's another one, right? He has to get, Bilal's one. How many errone he has? Yeah, but Belaw's next. Okay. But some of these guys, tell me the, okay, okay, I mean, here's the guy.

I'm not even mad because I like this guy. Michael Chandler, he, he came into Bellator. He might have been off a loss or. He fought for the belt right away. He fought for the belt right away. He won one fight and fought for a belt. And then you have a guy like, because data liked him, right? And you have like, Bilal who went like, what, eight or nine in a row?

You have Marab. I don't think Belal's lost in like, it was like, man, that was hadn't lost in like 12 fights before you got a title fight. That's what I'm saying. So it's so frustrating to like watch these guys just struggle and they're so good. And you know who actually talks about this? Your new co-host said you, you know, you got. me as a side piece and you got your main event and Chil Suna. But he talks about this is that sometimes we don't know who the best in the world is.

With the wrestling every year, we have a world championship. So we know who the best is and no one will argue it. But how long has Marab actually been the best in the world? Right. It might have been a couple of years. I don't know. Well, yeah. So on Saturday, it was very apparent that it could be no one but Marab.

But then when I watch Sean O'Malley immediately go and say, I want to fight Ilya. To me, to me, when I look at it, the optics of it isn't ideal because it would seem, well, now we haven't seen Sean Grapple. I've heard stories that he's a great grappler. But it would seem like Marab is a horrible matchup. He's so good. Dude, what? He doesn't get tired. How does he go that hard and doesn't get tired?

I don't know. It's really impressive. I mean, Henry did a really good job in the first round, keeping the distance and landing some big strikes. And then Rob just kind of took over. Henry's not a guy who, you know, in wrestling, he never gassed. He had a great gas thing. You know, he wars people out, actually.

Hey, could I say something about Henry, though? I think Henry, I think Henry left it all. Like, I believe that we have a certain amount we can give. Yes. And I think the work that he put in to become Olympic champ, and then the work that he put in the windows two championships, it's all gone. I think the reserves empty.

And I just don't know that he can get himself to go to that level again. And I think that's what showed. Marab hasn't done that. And the other thing is he's 37. And you know that crazy stat because they brought it up against with Volcanovsky. People 170 and under in title fights are like two and 36. It's freaking wild. Tyrant has two wins.

He's the only one. If you take Tyron out, people over the age of 35 or over are 0 and 36 or something like that. That's crazy, bro. That's so crazy. At 170 down. Only people that can win heavier. Only that can win later are heavier guys.

Yes, because I've said this time and time again, bro, we're just not as good. Well, I think it's a speed. No, we're really just not as good. Like, I mean, it's the same. Bro, it's the same as wrestling, right? When you're small,

as you get heavier, It gets easier. That's why you probably tell your kids, too, when they're gaining and they're growing, I say grow, especially if you've been, like Cody Merrill, my guy, was wrestling against the heavyweight

and the kid beat him so bad off the high crotch. Cody went limp knee. The heavyweight's like, oh my God, what is that? Cody wrestled 140 as a freshman. So you're like, you know how to do stuff as a small guy

that if you can bring it to the heavier weight you're going to win, they're just not as good. And I tell that to fighters. I'm like, you have to be so much better than I was because of the level that the little guys have. Demetrius Johnson is the best ever

because he was small and he dominated and he was so good in everything. That's why I respect those guys. But again, back to the topic, we always tend to go on the tangent. I don't want to see those guys fight yet, man. Not yet. Okay.

We just did it. We'll just tell Dana. We got Dana. We have a plan. It's Sean first Marab one, 35. Well, Sean has to beat Cheeto first. Okay. Do you think he's going to be Cheeto?

Yeah. Wait. Why? I'm not so certain about that. He lost to him before. I'll put Marab in. Oh, my God. Marab time.

Let's go. You love Marab, don't you? Yeah, he's great. Everybody loves it. Yeah, everyone loves him. He's very lovable. But then Holloway versus Tupouria at 45 and Gagchi versus Mokachev at 55.

We've got a plan. It's a great plan. That's nice, Ben. That's nice. Yeah. But you can't take, you can't take Gachie and Max off of UFC 300. Maybe something bad will happen. Dude, don't wish that.

Bro, all the work that they've done to get UFC 300 to where it is today, you do not hope that anything bad happens to that. By card. Imagine an Olympics where doping is not only legal, but encouraged. It's the enhanced games. Some call it grotesque. Others say it's unleashing human potential. Either way, the podcast's Superhuman documented it all,

embedded in the games and with the athletes for a full year. Within probably 10 days, I'd put on 10 pounds. I was having trouble stopping the muscle growth. Listen to Superhuman on the I-Hard Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. A win is a win. A win is a win. I don't care what I'm saying.

Yep, that's me, Cliver Taylor the 4th. You might have seen the skits, the reactions, my journey from basketball to college football, or my career in sports media. Well, somewhere along the way, this platform became bigger than I ever imagined. And now I'm bringing all of that excitement to my brand new podcast, The Clifford Show. This is a place for raw, unfiltered conversations with some of your favorite athletes,

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Welcome back, my friends. Look, speaking of UFC 300, you just said move Gaichi, move Max, do something different. When you, and this is a bit of a slippery slope here for you, Ben. So when you promise something, I'm going to give you the greatest thing of all time, how much of it is on you to deliver? Because even if you deliver something that's spectacular, maybe it doesn't match the expectation. When you have heard now for the last three weeks that you have.

C300 main event is going to be so amazing. You will not believe this. You can't imagine how big this is going to be. And then you get Alex Pereira versus Jamal Hill, which is a phenomenal fight. What is the initial reaction from you? Because so many people are like glued to the TV for the post-fight presser wondering, he said after the fight he's announcing this fight, what is the reaction for you when you hear that that's the fight? Yeah.

You know what this is what I tell my athletes. Hopefully you tell your athletes. Dana, you tried your best. You worked hard to get something. You let us down a little bit, but it happens sometimes. We can't all be the best every time.

Now, these are good fights. This is a fun fight. This is a great fight card. But it doesn't feel UFC 300-ish. And really? It doesn't. It doesn't.

We needed something a little bigger. Like Pereira versus Aspinall or John Jones coming back, McGregor versus Chandler. And I know, he tried. He tried. He tried to make it happen. This is a very good fight card. It's a very fun fight card. I will be excited to watch these. But it doesn't have the feel that

I don't know, do you remember UFC 100? I don't know if you were a fight fan back then. But that was like, oh my gosh, that was so much fun. What about, but then even when I'm getting my Google up right now, UFC 200 was, let me see UFC 200 fight card right here. It was

UFC 200 fight card ended up being on the pre the early prelims had Joe Lozance sent Gaygar Musassi was the second fight of the night on the prelims. Yes. Then on the prelims you had Gaston Hendrix. That's an awesome one. T.J. Dillishaw, a son-sal. You had bro, you got a couple of three UFC champs there

on the undercard. Yeah. And then you had Brock, you had Amanda, you had myself and Anderson, you had Jose Aldo Edgar, you had Kane Velasquez, Travis Brown. God, so good.

You, yes. You had like a card that felt, but I kept telling everyone, as we were building closer to this thing, I said, we have to manage our expectation because you're only going to be able to do what you can do with what you have.

Right. You can't make something up. This is not a world where you can just will someone back into fighting. So Brock Lesnar's older, right? So that's was very far-fetched. There was no Brock Lesnar to come back. Rhonda's not fighting. No. Rhonda would have came back. Great. Honor. He's still here. That would have been great. Kabir. Not fighting. If you could have got Kabit to come back, that would have. been great, but none of those guys were fighting. Yes. You have to do the best with what you have, and I think they did the best of what they have. Look, Brock might have fought somebody, but the boy, Brock's in a whole bunch of shit right now himself. What do you do? What? Well, you know I don't pay attention? What do you do? Brox, bro, did you see what Vince McMahon

did to the girl? Allegedly. Unfortunately. You got to say allegedly. Yes, allegedly. So I guess Brock Lesnar was like a part of this whole thing. Bro, they're like scrubbing him. from all WWE stuff. Bro, all of his clothes and shit is on like discount. They took him off the video game. They're like, I swear to God. They're almost like trying to scrub, bro,

from the history of the WWE because he was so intertwined with this whole thing with Vince McMahon and this girl. It's crazy, right? Yes, totally crazy. So it's like he's not coming back for a multitude of reasons.

So they did the best with what they had. So when you put Gatzy Max, great. You put Jamal versus Alex. Great. But you knew it would be very difficult to find that third title fight when you look at the first quarter of the year in the fights that were announced. Yeah. I mean, listen, I agree with you totally. I'm just telling you, you asked me how I felt. I'd tell you how I felt. It doesn't feel the same way as UFC 100. Doesn't feel the same way as UFC 200. It's a very good fight card. I'm going to watch. Was UFC 100 really that? good, though? It was awesome. But wasn't or were you just a guy that didn't know fighting? No, no, no, no. I watched since early days.

Bisbing versus Henderson was like, that was so hype. Oh, yeah, I forgot about that. That was freaking awesome. Brock Lesnar Frank Mirre, that was freaking awesome. George Champier fought for a title on that one. Diego, Alves, I think. Yes, and that was when he was on fire. Yes, that was a really good card. That was a lot of fun

to watch. Yeah, it was a great fight card. I just think that, I think a lot of that fight card for me was, they had the biggest stars and the biggest name and the sport was exploding so much at the time that it really didn't feel like whatever they did was going to work. It just felt like whatever they did was going to work for me during that time because those guys were such big stars. But when I think about Jamal Hill and Alex Pereira or Pareda, I think you have one of the- He's getting there. People are really starting to like him a lot.

Bro, I was good. That's exactly where I was going. Okay. They love him, dog. The reception, this guy gets everywhere we go is nuts. Because he went to Canada, dude, there had to be 10,000 people in that mall to see him sign some autographs. He, everywhere he goes, people are just drawn to him. And I believe that part of that intrigue is the fact that we still don't know him.

Generally, we get to know guys before they become champions, right? Right? It felt like you knew Max Holloway because he was around so long before he got to the belt. Leon Edwards and all those other guys, you feel like you know him. Alex Pereira has still only been here for two and a half years, bro. It's been two and a half years and the dudes already had two UFC championships. Mm-hmm. Yeah. So crazy. Yeah, listen, I'm excited for that fight. I think it would have more fun to let him go for his third title.

but I'm in Jamal Hill is the you know was the champion gave up his belt so it's kind of like to me a little bit like a unification title fight I think it's gonna be good it still seems a little fast for an Achilles right after watching what Aaron Rogers did

oh bro what the hell Doug seriously what was that so crazy what was that well I don't know man I love the fight I love the fight for Jamal Hill Jamal Hill said that he's going to stand with him

He said he's not taking him down, Ben. He said he ain't taking him down. He said he's going to stand with Alex Pereira and he's going to knock him out. Maybe not the best idea, but he's welcome to try however he wants. What do you mean? He's not the best idea.

What do you mean? You saw he put people to sleep. Stand around with Alex Pereira. You're going to fall on the ground. He's good, man. Oh, he's so scary too. He hits so hard. A little bit like the Puria where, you know,

sometimes, you know, like an Izzy fight, he was getting beat, but when he connected, boom, it's over. he's so big too that's the problem he's so big for the weight class he's big for 205

when he was like so what was he at 185 he should have never been making that weight class he never should have that was so impressive that was actually ridiculous that was as impressive as his fighting

when he was going down 285 pounds I believe that UFC 300 is an amazing fight card that is going to be fantastic and the buzz is going to be crazy around Vegas that weekend.

And luckily, I get to sit next to the octagon and call it. It's going to be, I can't wait. It's going to be so fun. I got a brand new suit, Ben. I got a brand new custom suit for that fight. I mean, Bruce Buffett sometimes has suits that has like his whole life story inside the sleeves. It is sick.

I'm making me one of those for UFC 300 because it's going to be that freaking good. Last thing before I let you go, Ben. Mm-hmm. Yesterday, Dana was all pissed off because they broke Hamzaa Chimayev versus Israel Ed Asana. Now, I'm not- Exactly. I know Yahoo, correct? It was like, and yeah, that's viable.

Yahoo's real. Yes. Is it wrong? Is it wrong for media to break things that may not be. confirmed or is it wrong for the reaction from the company when those news stories are broken when not confirmed? Because then you run into the issue where Dana comes on, says it's not happening, and then sometimes plans change, and it almost messes with the credibility of the site.

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, well, that's, they should know that's the real. They run when they put something out there that maybe is not all the way confirmed, is that, you know, they have the chance of being wrong. And I think that's a risk a lot of them are willing to take. And honestly, like sometimes they're right and then something changes. And then all of a sudden, they're wrong.

But no, I see no issue with it. This happens everywhere in all sports. It happens in politics. It happens everywhere, right? Everyone wants to scoop. They want to put something out there before anyone else puts it out there. So no, I don't think they're wrong. It happens in politics.

Yes. Really? Bro, I don't act like you don't pay attention to politics. Give me an example. Give me an example of just a fake story, man. A fake story. Oh,

because that Dana said, you're trying to get me, you're trying to get me checked off the internet. Dana said, I'm not full for your traps. There's too many big stories. It's completely false. You know what's the worst?

When somebody does something and you get mad, you almost like confirm what they're saying. Yes. Because now, again, Dana's been in the public eye for so long now that people just gauge his reactions to see if they're on the right track. But he gets so upset,

he can't even, like, not play their game. It is kind of funny to watch a little bit because he gets pissed off. Dude, but you know it's crazy? He watches every, he, like, watches a lot of stuff. And I don't know if it's his staff giving him stuff, but he, like, sees all these things. I don't know that Roger Goodell

or Adam Silver. I hope you know who these people are. I do. Are doing this. I don't know if they're watching everything as closely as he is. I mean, there's no way he consumes that much content. I mean, I know he's like turned on all the time where he just is going and he has a lot of energy. But yeah, I got to assume that he's not, you know, people are bringing it to him and saying, oh, did you see this or oh, did you see that?

You know, that type of thing I would guess is happening. You know who watches everything? Who? bro, everything. No way. Fabib watches everything. He watches everything, bro. I don't know.

He sees everything. He must need to be, he needs to get back into coaching, something to occupy his mind a little bit more. He's got his family, right? Spends time with his family and just kind of, this dude is happy.

Listen, I love my family. But how could you just spend the whole day of their family sit around and do nothing? No, he's working. The dude works and does all kinds of other stuff. But he's a businessman.

And he has a very booming business. But he just loves consuming mixed martial arts, but he doesn't necessarily want to be involved in the sport right now. You know, I would love to see those two fight, especially now that is he's not fighting, or Drake's Duplice is not available to fight. It seems like Drake's Duplice right now is dealing with the injuries from the last fight. and he's going to need some time to recover.

I want to see at a Sanya fight. I want to see Chamea fight. And I want to see Chamiya against a guy, another world champion level guy, to see if he should be the next guy against Drake is Duplessi. Because look, beating Camaro Usman is very impressive.

But Camaro Usman is a 70-pounder, right? That's a fight that we should have saw at 170. And honestly, the visuals after the fight it didn't seem like if this was a five-round fight, it was going Chameh's way. Yeah, agreed. Yeah, Chimajov, someone who came on the scene so fast in 2020,

where you remember he fought like three times in two months or something to that effect. But then he really slowed down, and he fought, you know, Gilbert Burns, who is a very highly ranked guy, but that was at 170. He fought Kevin Holland. I don't know what weight that is, but, you know, Holland's been at 70-85.

Ouzman's a 70-pounder. So Chimayev, as good as he, he probably is. We haven't seen him fight any of these very, very best 185. So I am all in on him fighting, Izzy Adasagna, and then giving him the title shot. I think that would be great. Feels like he was going to get a title shot like two years ago and he's still kind of like came around. They actually got him ranked 11, which is totally. Wait, what at middleweight? Middleweight? No, you're looking at some bad rankings.

I'm not, I'm looking at UFC.com slash rankings. This is correct because say Machado, Gary just moved up four spots, right? So this is literally brand new. They have Chmai of 11, which is crazy. That's a crazy number for him. But you know what you look? He hasn't beat Strickland or Outa Sanya or Whitaker, cannoneer, Vittore, Brenton, Allen, Paul, Coast.

He hasn't beat any of these dudes. So he's got to beat some guys at this weight class. But doesn't it feel like now finally the divisions are moving? I was telling somebody this the other day. I said, MMA always resets itself, right? Like every few years there's a reset where it feels like you have these long-reigning champions

and it feels like they're going to be around forever and then there's a reset. I think right now we're in that reset phase where Dracus is the champ, Ilya is the champ, O'Malley is the champ, Makachev is the champ, Edwards is the champ.

There's not many people in those divisions. I think the long reigns are going to be harder and harder to accomplish now as we, because you got guys like Ilya who has been training since a very young kid to become UFC champion. And I think that is going to make it real difficult to defend the belt five, six, seven. I was talking to someone about this the other day. What makes you a Hall of Fame person off of your resume Hall of Fame as a champion? how many title defenses?

How many title defenses is considered a great reign to you? That's a great question. But I think you'd have to also look at what was their path to get there. And you look at someone like a Leon Edwards and he beat everyone on the way up. You know, he had what, 10 fights in a row or something. And maybe his reign is shorter, but he also didn't get the title as early. Two. What?

Two to three defenses for me is a great reign. You think even if they, you know, like someone like, and I'm sure McGregor is going to be a hallfamer, but like at 55 he got the title shot almost right away. And he never fought another fight there. He never fought another fight there. He never fought another fight there, but he never defended the belt. He won the belt and lost. He gave it away.

Yeah. He fought could be for the belt and loss. Yeah. In certain instances like that, it feels weird or like, you know, Sean Strickland, it would be interesting to see where he goes because obviously he won the belt and then failed in his first defense. but he also has some other good wins along the way there. And where does he go from here? So I don't know.

I don't think there's a set answer. This is our next conversation for the next show. We have to determine, look into it a little bit. That's what I want. What determines a great title reign? For me, I think it's three. And I'll give you my reasons the next time. Ben, good luck this weekend of the state tournament, my guy.

I'm heading out to the state tournament with my Gilroy Mustang. You guys can watch it on the flow wrestling. Guys, like, subscribe. Tell your friend and tell your friend that D.C.'s got a YouTube channel. I'm hanging out with Ben Ascran. Follow Ben on social and everything else the guy is doing. And tune into the Ascran Russell Academy. Those guys are really, really good.

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