Will Merab Dvalishvili make HISTORY this weekend at UFC 323? | Against the Cage - video Dailymotion

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Watch Will Merab Dvalishvili make HISTORY this weekend at UFC 323? | Against the Cage - New York Post on Dailymotion

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00:00:00Welcome back to Against the Cage, your MMA home for all the fight previews, recaps, and

00:00:12exclusive interviews that I know you're looking for, so make sure to give us a like and subscribe

00:00:17so you don't miss out on any of that stuff. My name is Jake Arie. I'm here with my esteemed

00:00:22co-hosts Scott Fontana and Eric Richter, and guys, let's talk UFC 323 coming up this weekend.

00:00:29It is the last pay-per-view of the ESPN era before we move on to Paramount+. And Eric,

00:00:35you wrote an article talking to Dana White, talking about the pay-per-views not being dead,

00:00:41quote unquote. But I have to ask you guys, and Eric, I'll throw this to you because you

00:00:44were the one who talked to Dana. Do you think that this will be the last pay-per-view that

00:00:48MMA fans will ever have to buy? Well, if I said, so like you mentioned it, right? I talked

00:00:54to Dana in August, and I'll just read the quote. I'll start with that. And you know what?

00:01:00Back it up. I'm actually, I'm going to say there won't be a pay-per-view definitely not

00:01:04in 2026. After that, I think that there is a possibility in 2027 or 2028 where they get

00:01:10a little creative and maybe talk to CBS and get some stuff going. So I'll just read the

00:01:14quote. This is Dana White's voice. Let's say there's a scenario. I'm involved in boxing,

00:01:19I'm involved in slapping, I'm involved in jiu-jitsu, and I'm involved in the UFC. What I love about this

00:01:23business is I can lay out what we think the fights are going to be for a year, and a fight

00:01:27will pop up that I never saw coming. A star will pop up out of nowhere, out of somewhere. Anything

00:01:32is possible, and you could do a one-off pay-per-view. I am going to be on pay-per-view this Saturday.

00:01:37Pay-per-view is not dead. That is a quote from Dana White, August of 2025. If I were to guess,

00:01:44I'd say, you know, potentially that something creative happens 2027, 2028. It won't be a lot.

00:01:49I'd say the over-under is probably a half of a pay-per-view. There might be a pay-per-view

00:01:55over the span of the CBS deal, but I would be mind-blown if it happens before 2028, really.

00:02:03Definitely not anytime soon. So your wallets will be pretty happy about that.

00:02:07Pretty safe. Scott, what do you think?

00:02:10You know, there's obviously, let's give a little context to what Dana said when he spoke to Eric.

00:02:15That was a day where a lot of, like, the left hand and the right hand didn't seem like they were

00:02:20on the same page as far as, you know, the Paramount people and the OC people. It didn't seem like they

00:02:25kind of had everything really ironed out. So who knows even how much Dana would even commit to that

00:02:31being the case now. He's been saying a lot of like, hey, now that we're not having pay-per-view

00:02:36anymore kind of thing in the new year. There have been more allusions to that in recent times

00:02:40since then. So I don't know. I mean, I wouldn't rule it out either. I think it's very realistic

00:02:46to just say never say never. But also, I'm kind of hoping we're in one of those no going back

00:02:51situations, right, where people get so used to not paying for these events that they would

00:02:56completely reject the idea of having to do so again. And then it would be way too much of a

00:03:01financial risk for pretty much everybody involved. So unless Paramount, you know, has a way that they're

00:03:06going to make a lot of money off of a pay-per-view. I can't imagine. I imagine that the UFC probably

00:03:11needs to give their best stuff to Paramount and that kind of thing. So if they're not doing that,

00:03:18they'd have to cut some sort of deal. I don't know the particulars, right? We don't even know

00:03:22if there's anything written into their contracts that allows them that type of freedom. But I'm just

00:03:28going to go with what we have right now, which is for the life of the Paramount deal, which I believe

00:03:31was seven years. It should not be a pay-per-view situation there until proven otherwise. But I

00:03:39wouldn't, again, I wouldn't say never either. Yeah, I think, Eric, what you said, the over-under

00:03:44being 0.5 sounds about right. I feel like there's maybe one thing that if all the stars aligned,

00:03:50that maybe it would make sense. But besides that, I just would see there being too much blowback and

00:03:56people being like, all right, well, you said it wasn't happening.

00:03:59I don't even think that people care about the blowback. I don't think that Dana White or

00:04:04in particular the UFC would even care about the blowback. I think that if they put together

00:04:08a card that was so massive, and like, let's just, I mean, the White House card, right? We've talked

00:04:13about that ad nauseum. If they were to throw Jon Jones and Conor McGregor onto the same card,

00:04:17maybe for a future one on the White House card. But if they were to throw something like that crazy

00:04:21together where the salaries for the two fighters of Jon Jones and Conor McGregor were so exorbitant that

00:04:26they felt that they could justify a payment of a pay-per-view for it, then I think, yeah,

00:04:32maybe. But again, like Jon Jones is unreliable. Conor McGregor is unreliable. Ronda Rousey is not

00:04:36coming back. Brock Lesnar is old. Like there's really not a star right now that's really worth

00:04:41paying for, at least now that we're going on to Paramount.

00:04:45Yeah, I'm going to take the under on that, the over under a half. So I think I feel pretty good

00:04:51about that because realistically, this scenario that you presented is just such a prohibitive

00:04:56and frankly, unrealistic environment for them to do that, right? Because if they're establishing

00:05:01that they want to do something massive for the White House and they want to put that

00:05:05on Paramount Plus so you don't have to pay for it, that's a high bar that they're starting to

00:05:09establish that you don't even have to pay for. So, you know, when are we paying for it again?

00:05:14Yeah, and that'll also probably be, it could be one of the things that would be going on cable

00:05:19television, right? Because they did say that in the press release, you know, some of these are,

00:05:22that that could be one of them. So if they're putting that on cable, like what's the bar for

00:05:26pay-per-view, right? I think it's time to talk about the main event of 323 though. We've got

00:05:31Murab Diwalashwili rematching Piotr Jan. The pair had fought initially, I believe, in 2023. If I'm

00:05:38not mistaken, Murab wins in a very dominant fashion. But we got to talk about the other facet to this

00:05:43fight and that's that Murab is going for a fourth title defense in a calendar year. And guys,

00:05:49there are stats and achievements that, you know, kind of elude MMA fighters as like mythical three

00:05:55belts across three divisions, right? There's Anderson Silva's record four fights, four title

00:06:00defenses in one year. Scott, how special of a feat is this for Murab to attempt?

00:06:06I think this is the ultimate accomplishment for an active UFC champion, winning four title fights in a

00:06:11single year. Like that particular thing has not been done before. We've had five men who've pulled

00:06:18off the, you know, four title victories within, you know, 365 days. Most recently, Alex Pereira did

00:06:25that from 2023 into 2024. Very impressive in and of itself, right? But there's something that kind of

00:06:30makes this particular element unique, doing it four times in a single year. And they're all title

00:06:37defenses too. Um, it's not just there. Oh, someone won the title and that kind of thing that's been

00:06:42even done before in that little, you know, 365 day window, but it's just so clean, man. Like to be

00:06:48able to just say, okay, this, this is beautiful. It's simple. Uh, it's the year of Murab. If he's able

00:06:53to do this for title defenses in a single year that, that spits out easy. We understand it. Uh, it's very,

00:07:01very, very, very, very, very rare. I don't know that we can see it again, unless he's able to do

00:07:07it next year. Like he's talking about, but of course he's got to take care of this weekend and

00:07:11then he'd have to take care of it several more times, but God, the guy wants to do it two years

00:07:14in a row. This is, he's a maniac and the best kind. Eric, what do you think? I mean, it's

00:07:19unbelievable. When you look at like the, the fighters that have done the three, you know, you're

00:07:23talking Alex Pereira, Kamaru Usman, uh, Chuck Liddell, Matt Hughes, like it's unbelievable that,

00:07:29you know, Murab's going for four and, you know, I mean, even Dana White has said in the past,

00:07:33he's a promoter's dream. Like he wants to fight consistently. He's probably making really good

00:07:37money right now. So, you know, Murab's loving life. Um, I mean, yeah, I mean, I don't disagree.

00:07:43It's a, it's an impressive feat, man. Like it's really unbelievable. The fact that he's able to

00:07:47go with this high pressure, high volume style and not take crazy amounts of damage so that he is able

00:07:53to fight this frequently at a championship level. You just don't see it.

00:07:56It's, it's amazing. And Scott, I think, I think you phrased it perfectly in terms of like,

00:08:00this is the ultimate achievement for an active champion, which like you hear champions say

00:08:05like that, that's what they want and go for. And like, it's pretty rare that that actually ends

00:08:10up coming into fruition. Murab is, is that guy? He, he is, you know, I feel like a lot of times the UFC

00:08:19isn't necessarily interested in doing that, right? Like the stars have to align on both sides. I think

00:08:25there have probably been fighters who have had that belt before and realistically they'd even be

00:08:30willing to do it, but does it align with the UFC's plans and all that kind of thing? So it's not just

00:08:35like all the other factors affecting that one fighter. It's the UFC literally needs to be like,

00:08:40yeah, we kind of want that. Yeah. And they don't always. So the fact that everything aligned here

00:08:44seems incredibly unique. I, I, frankly, I have my doubts that it can happen again next year. Like

00:08:49Murab is, is, uh, hoping for and aspiring to because I just, I have a feeling the UFC would

00:08:54move in a different direction, but who knows? You never know. Yeah. And I think like, uh,

00:08:59Volkanovski, I think is a pretty good example of one of those fighters who like would like to have

00:09:02fought more frequently, but like the calendar slots are kind of already taken up. And I think

00:09:06that one thing that can maybe attribute to why Murab has been able to is like, I think they're more

00:09:11willing to throw on the lower weight classes as a co-main event, like 125 and 135, like you saw

00:09:17in January, uh, with, uh, the Islam Makhachev, right. You know, uh, Murab also being on that

00:09:24one too. Whereas maybe in the higher weight classes, they're like, we want to save those

00:09:28guys for, you know, their own main event slot. Right. I think you're honest on that, but also

00:09:34don't forget he headline, he's headlining this weekend and he also headlined in Newark. So

00:09:39half the time he was the, the, the top billed fighter on the cards. And there's that, you know,

00:09:44not small cards either. No, of course not. But I think that, you know, take that, that

00:09:48helps it take it from like, where maybe he only would have been able to have two or three

00:09:52to that whopping four number. Um, so yeah, but it's God, that's, it's, it's, it's amazing.

00:09:57Um, and Eric, like you mentioned before in terms of, uh, Murab's, you know, uh, ability

00:10:03to fight so frequently, Scott had spoken to, uh, Murab recently and, and Murab revealed that

00:10:10he wanted to fight for another 15 more years. So let's take a look at, at that

00:10:15clip. My goal is to fight 15 more years here in UFC. I won't be always champion in this

00:10:23next couple of years, like next 50 years, but my goal is to stay busy and keep fighting.

00:10:3115 years. You want to fight to your 49, 50, 50, 50 years.

00:10:36So Eric, having seen that, what do you think? Do you believe him? What do you think about

00:10:40that? That comment from Murab?

00:10:42Oh, I believe him. Murab is loving life right now. He's the champ. He's definitely making

00:10:47a lot of money right now. Like, obviously I have no idea how much I would venture to guess

00:10:51he's making seven figures of fight. Like he is getting paid very well right now. So yeah,

00:10:56I mean, he hasn't taken that much damage. He's, you know, he's got that high volume, high

00:11:01grappling pressure. Um, he's getting better by the day, which, um, something that I've,

00:11:07you know, had issues with in the past is, um, when grapplers, you know, start falling in love

00:11:11with the striking, we saw Murab like willing to strike with O'Malley. Like, you know, he he's

00:11:16willing to, uh, kind of go there, um, on striking now, which I just find fascinating. He's, he's

00:11:21improving rapidly is my point. Um, and we're going to talk about that fight with, uh, Peter

00:11:25Yang a little bit later, but, um, he's improving rapidly. And so, yes, do I believe him that

00:11:29he will want to ride this out and fight as long as he can? Yes. However, and we've seen

00:11:34this in the past and we'll talk about it when we get to, uh, final round, uh, the chin doesn't

00:11:39really recover. And, um, you know, as long as he can continue avoiding damage like this,

00:11:44then yes. But eventually, yes, uh, we, we worry about damage accumulation in the sport.

00:11:51Scott, what did you think when he said that, when you were talking to him?

00:11:53Uh, look, when he, when he said it to me, it was kind of like, wait, 50, 50. And it sounds

00:11:59crazy, but then you think about it and you're like, you know what? There's a lot of people

00:12:02who actually fight to 50. Anderson Silva has taken a boxing match against Tyron Woodley,

00:12:06who I should point out is one of the guys who won four title fights within 365 days.

00:12:13He's actually one of those very few who's done that.

00:12:16Tyron or Anderson?

00:12:16Yeah, I know. And you kind of, Tyron.

00:12:19Wow. Oh my God.

00:12:21Iron Woodley did that. You, this was before your time, Jake. It was a little before you

00:12:24jumped in, but yeah, no, he did that. He did absolutely. He was a very, there was a time

00:12:27where he was very active. Um, and it was a very slight window, but he did that at any

00:12:32rate. Yeah. We've got people fighting at 50 years old. Is the UFC going to employ him

00:12:37to fight for, or contractually independently contract him to do that till he's 50? Probably

00:12:43not. I don't, I don't think we can sit there and say he's going to do that. That's actually

00:12:47going to happen. But I mean, for goodness sake, he's the type of fighter that you could actually

00:12:51see it happening for because he's just, he's so crazy again in that good way. Like I mentioned

00:12:57the LA there's that, the Dungeons and Dragons chart of like good versus evil and lawful versus

00:13:02chaotic. He is chaotic. Good to a T for this sport. So we, we got to respect that.

00:13:07So one thing, uh, one story that I'll share about Murab Davalashvili, uh, back well before

00:13:12we had pot this podcast and well before I was doing a fighter interviews, um, I went

00:13:17to Ariel Hawani show, uh, which was the ringer. And you know, I met Ariel and I talked to him

00:13:22and I was downstairs and Murab Davalashvili was there and he was talking to Ariel. I think

00:13:27he did an interview with Ariel at the show. And, um, you know, we were downstairs by ourselves

00:13:32and Murab's like, screw this. I'm going to the bar, go upstairs. He's like, anyone

00:13:35want to come with me? And we, we go upstairs with him and Murab just goes upstairs, drinks

00:13:41with all the fans, hangs out with the fans, goes going wild for hours and then comes back

00:13:47down and does an interview for the actual show. Once it began, um, later on, he's just, he's

00:13:53awesome. He's a normal dude. He's a very normal dude. In some ways, in other ways, I feel like

00:13:59he is. All right. You know what? Fair enough. Yes. Man of the people is a better way. I like

00:14:05that. Yeah. Man of the people. And that's man of the people. That's exactly right.

00:14:08Honestly, I felt like really like not, you feel like a sense of like worry when, when

00:14:13someone says like, I want to fight till I'm 50. Cause obviously you worry for like their

00:14:16health, but like a little part of me was like, yes. Like if you were ever concerned about

00:14:21him, like, you know, not being in our lives or in, in the sport, you know, competing, uh,

00:14:27in the near future, cause he's already accomplished so much. And he's, he's not like super young,

00:14:31especially for, uh, a bantamweight right now. Now you've got a little bit of, uh, something

00:14:36to look forward to in terms of his career. And I mean, he's, he's got another thing coming

00:14:41up, uh, on Saturday night as he goes to, uh, defend against Piotr Jan. So how would you

00:14:46guys, do you guys want to talk about Piotr Jan, uh, after getting through Murab? Um, Scott,

00:14:51let's do it. Let's do it. Uh, Scott, I have to ask you. So obviously we started with Murab out

00:14:56of respect for him, the champion foremost, but it feels like way more people are talking

00:15:00about Murab and obviously this, uh, incredible accomplishment that he's going after by just,

00:15:05you know, defending his title in four years. It doesn't feel like a lot of people are talking

00:15:08about Piotr Jan. And obviously that could have to do with the first, uh, fight that they

00:15:13had, but I have to ask you, does he sort of feel like an afterthought? And if so, should

00:15:19he be?

00:15:21So, yeah, he absolutely is an afterthought here. And that doesn't mean that I, you know,

00:15:26no one cares about him, but I mean, I think it really does have a lot to do with that first

00:15:31fight. We, we kind of, we saw a destruction of a younger person who had actually already

00:15:39been champion. Somebody that frankly, I actually foresaw Piotr Jan having like a pretty lengthy

00:15:44title reign. He, it didn't go that way, obviously. Um, but he's only 32 years old. Even now he's

00:15:51still, he's still two years younger than Murab, um, as he will always be forever. Right.

00:15:55Right, right, right. But, but really the problem with Jan here is the fact that he's just not

00:16:03finishing anybody. It's been five and a half years since he won a fight inside the distance. That's,

00:16:09that's not really a formula that sets up very well against Murab, who's kind of like, look,

00:16:15he can finish fights. Now we've started to see the finishing aspects of Murab start to come

00:16:19into a finer view, but also he's generally winning on the cards and his style is such that he would

00:16:25win for more frequently on the cards. So what is Piotr Jan's path here, man? It's, it's kind of

00:16:31tricky. So it's going to be a tall order to get him up, especially over five rounds, three rounds,

00:16:35maybe, but five rounds is tricky. A hundred percent. Eric, I want to get your thoughts before I go.

00:16:40Um, so this fight, it's tough matchup for him because Piotr Jan is, is Piotr Jan is the fighter

00:16:48who wants to kind of download some data, start slow, maybe pick it up at the end of the second

00:16:53round, win three, four, and five. You can't do that against Murab because his cardio is better than

00:16:56yours. It's better than everybody's. Um, so while Piotr Jan might have the, you know, advantage of doing

00:17:02that against, you know, maybe a Sean O'Malley over five rounds or, um, a song, a song you dong,

00:17:07or, uh, you know, I mean, Marcus McGee last time, you know, he started slow, builds his way back up.

00:17:13We just haven't seen any urgency from the guy in a long time. And, you know, he fights on thin

00:17:19margins on the feet and he doesn't have a grappling advantage. So when he has a grappling advantage,

00:17:22it's fine, but he fights on thin margins on the feet and is going to be clearly deficient in the

00:17:27grappling against Murab. It's a bad, bad, the math doesn't math on that one for Piotr. It's tough.

00:17:31Yeah. I, I just, I can't, I haven't seen anything that would suggest that the fight is going to go

00:17:39very differently. Otherwise, I mean, like obviously Piotr has now, you know, had that first fight under

00:17:45his belt to know what Murab is, is going to go for, but other people have known what Murab is going to

00:17:50go for in terms of just like tiring you out and making it his kind of fight. And it hasn't worked

00:17:56out for them in the past. So, um, it's tough. It's a, it is a very tall task for Piotr Jan,

00:18:02I would say. Can I just add, you know, Piotr Jan has an 85% takedown defense rate. He was taken

00:18:09down 11 times by Murab on 49 recorded attempts, 49 takedown attempts. Murab is just a motor until that

00:18:18cardio goes, which it may never. This is the advantage is just too massive. And he's also bigger,

00:18:25thicker than, than Jan. Jan's also kind of a size. Yeah. Like he's also not as big as he is.

00:18:31Low center of gravity. Yeah. A hundred percent. In that fight, he set, I can't, I don't know how

00:18:37many records in terms of like takedown attempts. Like imagine if he breaks it on this one. No,

00:18:42that'd be absolutely insane. Well, he, he, he broke the takedown single fight takedown record against,

00:18:47uh, Corey Sanhagen last time. Oh, he broke his own record. I thought he did. Okay. That you,

00:18:52he might've, I, I, I'll do some research. I didn't look that up, but I can swear. I remember

00:18:57that on the broadcast. I'll do some research on the screen so that the fans. He definitely broke

00:19:01the, he definitely broke the takedown amounts. I don't know if he broke down the attempts, but

00:19:04it could be wrong. Oh, maybe not that, but yeah, absolutely. Successful takedowns is a bigger thing

00:19:10than the attempts too, but I understand your point with the, with the repeated takedowns. Yeah.

00:19:14It is, but for Murab, it's almost not like that's kind of his game. No, you're wrong. You're right.

00:19:19Yeah. Um, okay. Well let's get into our sports entertainment rating and tie a bow on this main

00:19:24event. Um, Eric, what do you got for your sports entertainment rating out of five for each of

00:19:30those? Um, so for sporting, I'll go for here. I think it's a really fun fight. Um, and also like,

00:19:35if you look at like the, what the betting lines previously were, uh, Piotr Jan was a minus 250

00:19:38favorite while Murab was a plus 200. It's crazy to even think about that now. And now you have,

00:19:43you know, I mean, Rob's a minus 500 favorite, but there is something here. Um, and also like,

00:19:47he's kind of cleared out the division. So what else do you want at Bantamweight terms of

00:19:50entertainment? I think that this could be another pretty boring fight could be a masterclass.

00:19:54Um, but it could be pretty boring. So I was in between a two and a three on this one. I'll go

00:19:59three, but I wouldn't hate it too. I'm going to go ahead and in, I I'm going to go with a four

00:20:05for the sporting just because so a five for me would be Umar. I will, I will say that I think that is

00:20:12his toughest fight. Uh, but I'm not going lower than a four just because like, I cannot feasibly think of

00:20:17anyone else besides Umar that I would put in this position right now. Um, I just don't see any other

00:20:24contenders giving a, you know, tough fight for him. Um, as far as entertainment, I'm going to give

00:20:30this one a three because just because of the narrative around it in terms of this four,

00:20:35actually, I'm not even bump it to a, no, I'll give it a three. I'll give it a three. I think it's

00:20:38three just because of the achievement of him trying to get four in one year. But Scott, what do you think?

00:20:42I'm getting it actually a three from a sporting, uh, perspective because I don't, this is not the

00:20:49number one contender. Um, and also it's against a fighter who we've seen be him be very dominant

00:20:54against. And we've already kind of even talked out on the show why we see it to be such a high hurdle

00:20:59for Piorian to climb in this second matchup as well. So I think that's going to ding it a bit.

00:21:05Piorian is still a very much an elite bantamweight, but I'll give it a three. I'm actually going all the

00:21:10way up to a four on entertainment though. And the reason is because I think it's entirely possible

00:21:15that Murab puts on such a fascinating and entertaining performance in and of himself.

00:21:20Um, and frankly, if, if Peter Jan can put together any sort of, uh, resistance to what we're talking

00:21:28about, that's going to make it hella intriguing. So I actually see much upside from an entertainment

00:21:34perspective in the cave. So I ended up with a seven. I believe you both ended up with a seven,

00:21:38but it was the opposite. You had three, four and three, and I had three and four. So that's a seven.

00:21:43Okay. Fair enough. I think that, that sounds about right. Yeah. That feels right. Well,

00:21:48let's talk about our co-main event and see if it can get any higher. Alexandre Pantoja taking on

00:21:53Joshua Van. Um, this one's it's, I mean, it's a flyaway fight, so we'll see how that goes. They,

00:21:59you know, can be up and down in terms of entertainment, but, uh, I will say Pantoja,

00:22:04he has been quite a dominant champion at one 25. Obviously there's a pretty high hurdle for him to

00:22:09reach what Demetrius Johnson did, but he's as dominant as a flyweight champion besides Demetrius

00:22:15could be right. But I'll start with you, Scott with that in mind, do you have any questions about,

00:22:22uh, him at this point in his title run? And if so, what are they?

00:22:25You know, like, obviously, yes, the, the, the whole mighty mouse thing is, is I think out of

00:22:31reach. It's, it's nice that there's compliments being thrown out there by Joshua Van, that this

00:22:35is the greatest flyweight of all time, uh, respectfully. And I think very, um, very clinically

00:22:42disagree. I think there's a lot of reasons for that, but as far as Pantoja himself at this point,

00:22:47I think the main question I have as he's starting to get a little older here is just how much longer

00:22:52can his general strategy remain effective, right? He's, he likes to get the back. He likes to get

00:22:58the fight to the mat. He uses a lot of energy in doing both. Um, and, and, you know, essentially he

00:23:04takes rounds off more or less. We see it. He paces himself. He doesn't gas, but he paces himself.

00:23:11And as he gets older, that's only going to get more pronounced. I think it's going to get harder.

00:23:16I don't know that this is necessarily the fight where he's going to meet that brick wall, but, uh,

00:23:21there's going to be fights that come along at flyweight in the coming years where it's entirely

00:23:25possible. He's going to have to find another way to win fights. Then we typically see him do.

00:23:31Eric, what do you think? Well, any questions on your end?

00:23:34Tons of questions about, you know, what, at what point is his chin going to go? He's 35. He's fought

00:23:3935 times, you know, he's, he's had the belt. This is, you know, I believe it was fourth or fifth defense.

00:23:44Um, and you know, for me, I, I wonder how long is this going to go? Like you, you mentioned it that,

00:23:52you know, he, he takes rounds off. He also doesn't have the best striking defense. And without the

00:23:56grappling, if he's, if he ever runs into an opponent, that's really good with takedown defense,

00:24:00maybe Joshua Vann's that guy, maybe he's not, but if he ever runs into a fighter with really good

00:24:03takedown defense, you know, Joshua Vann's going to come in here and if he gets clipped,

00:24:08there's no telling what will happen here. I think that, you know, the question really is just going to

00:24:13remain at what point is it going to go for Pantoja? Um, cause 35 as a flyweight is, and it's not like

00:24:19he's was new to fighting. He's, he's fought a lot 35 for a flyweight. I mean, reality is this is when

00:24:27fighters usually start to go, especially at the, at the lower weight classes. Once the, you know,

00:24:32the athleticism starts to deteriorate a little bit and, you know, he's been at the top for a while.

00:24:37He even said it when I talked to him, he's been at the top for a while. It was hard to, you know,

00:24:40keep himself motivated at different points. Yeah. A hundred percent. And, uh, I like, I mean,

00:24:46I don't like it, but in terms of, I see where, what you're saying in terms of like the, the age

00:24:52gap is also such a big disparity. It's 35 versus 24. So I think that's a pretty valid point. And

00:24:59Scott, essentially like, I just did a quick, I just did a quick fact check, by the way, it's his,

00:25:02this is his fifth title defense. I hadn't got the chance to double check that Pantoja's up.

00:25:06There's the famous number five that he can get through it. Yeah. That's right. Yes. Yeah. Um,

00:25:12but yeah, let's talk about that, that age disparity and Erica, I'll go to you. Um, at 24 years old for

00:25:18Joshua van, do you think that he's ready for this type of opportunity against someone like

00:25:23Alessandre Pantoja? Well, so that's, that's the question of the whole fight, right? You know,

00:25:28Vaughn comes in, Van comes in here as a plus 205 underdog. And, you know, Scott, you did a really

00:25:34good interview with Joshua van last week. And I thought that there was a couple of questions

00:25:39that you asked him and that I didn't love his answers. Quite frankly, he was like, well, like,

00:25:44uh, what's it been like since you fought Brandon? Well, I got into a lot of stuff. It was like,

00:25:48well, what stuff? He's like, I don't want to talk about it, but like my coaches had to reel me in

00:25:52and get me back to training. And I don't want to hear that ahead of a title fight, especially if

00:25:56I'm betting on him. Um, so from my perspective at 24, I don't know if he's ready for this. It didn't

00:26:02sound, he didn't have me convinced in the interview to be quite, quite frankly. Um,

00:26:07do I think he's super talented? Hell yeah. And he's got the volume. He's got the striking. If he

00:26:11can defend takedowns, he could easily win this fight, but he didn't exactly sell it to me, um,

00:26:16that he was ready for this opportunity. I'll say that. What'd you think, Scott?

00:26:23Yeah, I was, I was a little, uh, surprised that he was talking so openly about that, but also

00:26:30very clearly, like, I was trying to pull that out of him. What kind of stuff? Yeah. And he

00:26:35certainly wanted, it was enough that he wanted to keep to himself. So I thought that was very

00:26:41interesting. And look, I don't want to sit there and like, we're not, we're not, I don't think any

00:26:45of us is sitting there saying Joshua van didn't earn this opportunity or he's not the number one

00:26:50contender. I think we all kind of agree that he is the, the best suited guy to fight for this

00:26:56opportunity right now, based on the results that he was able to just get. You skipped past the line.

00:27:01I think that's fine. But also, yeah, I mean, if he's out there talking about this and he's saying,

00:27:07you know, in other media that he, he doesn't have a game plan, if that's true, you know, who knows,

00:27:12but if that's the case and he's talking about, Oh, I'm going to finish him by the third round.

00:27:16That just sounds like braggadocio. It doesn't actually sound like any sort of calculated confidence

00:27:21to it. You're just, you're just taking him at his word that, Hey, I've got what it takes to do it

00:27:26in the third round. Well, why, you know, like, is there a plan? You just said there's not. So I

00:27:31don't know. It's kind of a weird thing with him. And I don't know if that's what you want to hear

00:27:36maturity wise. He just might not be ready. Maybe, maybe it doesn't matter though. We've seen fighters

00:27:41who are maybe immature and very willing to just fly off the handle in their personal lives. There

00:27:46was a, there was an Irish guy once that did that pretty well, but I don't know. Is, is that what

00:27:52Joshua Van is? We have to see. Yeah. And I'll just add to that. Like he, when you asked him

00:27:59the follow-up question, he was like, well, what do you mean by that? And then he kind

00:28:02of punted on it. My mind starts to wander. I'll be honest, especially in fighting. My

00:28:06mindset to wander is like, okay. Like you could have just said like, I don't know. I got some

00:28:10family stuff going on or something like that. But like my mind really started to wander.

00:28:15There was like, well, what are you talking about? You have a title shot. You have a title

00:28:21fight coming up like in two weeks. Like are, are you trading? That was months ago. That was months

00:28:28ago. You know, he, he made it clear that this is, this is what he did in July by August, his team

00:28:33pulled him back. So he's been dialed in for months. It's not like he just, you know, maybe he did. I

00:28:38don't know. But like, as far as what he was saying, he's talking about, all right, they pulled

00:28:41me back. And since August, I've been preparing. So we'll take him at his word in that. I, you know,

00:28:46he certainly, it seems like he's not necessarily looking to lie or fudge it. He's just, maybe

00:28:51there's things he knows he shouldn't say out loud. So I think we're taking him at his

00:28:55word. Yes. And if we do take him, sorry, no, no. What were you going to say? He certainly

00:29:01wouldn't be the only fighter that needed to give you real din, you know, during a training

00:29:05camp. Like it wouldn't be out of the ordinary. Just the lack of answer, the lack of follow-up

00:29:10answer just concerns me. Yeah. And if we do take him at his word. And the fact that the gravity

00:29:14of this opportunity, the gravity of this opportunity is such that it's like, you're fighting

00:29:19for title. You know, this isn't just like, oh, I've got another fight coming up. You're

00:29:23going against somebody who is a dominant champion too. I mean, he's, again, he's not Mighty Mouse

00:29:28Johnson, but there are several weight classes where we just don't see these people going for

00:29:32fifth title defenses at all. And he's already up to that point. This is somebody that's formidable

00:29:37and probably deserves a whole mess of your focus and time. And, you know, again, he is

00:29:4324 years old. Maybe he's just not quite mature enough for that, but his talent may be such

00:29:50and his heart as a street fighter might be as such that just doesn't matter. That's,

00:29:54that is what's interesting here. I, for me anyway, 100% what it is.

00:29:58Yeah. And pretty much echoing all the things that you just said, Scott, like let's take

00:30:02him at his word for it and, you know, take what we've seen from Joshua Van in his previous

00:30:07fights and what we've seen from Alessandre Pantoja. I'm curious to get your thoughts on,

00:30:12on this, Scott and Eric, of course. In terms of Joshua Van, it seems like he is at heart,

00:30:18like a striker. Like he started out street fighting and like all of his wins have either

00:30:22come by decision or knockout. And Pantoja, like you mentioned, is, is a grappler. I feel like

00:30:28that's his, his strong suit, right? He will backpack you.

00:30:30In his heart for sure.

00:30:32Yeah. I, I just, I feel like that part doesn't really go, you know, in terms of the age being

00:30:38a, at flyweight, like that's, it's the speed that you're worrying about, that you're typically

00:30:41worried about for someone who's, who's older in that weight class. I feel like Pantoja can,

00:30:46can probably stick with that, that game plan against Joshua Van. And I guess it's, it's kind

00:30:50of up to the takedown defense, but I just see that as the path to victory for him. I'm curious

00:30:55your thoughts, Scott.

00:30:57You know, like I think the, the thing with Pantoja and his takedowns is he's almost a little bit more

00:31:03like I'm a Rob, not in that he's a good takedown artist. That's not really his game, but he, the

00:31:07fact that he's very willing to just be dogged, if he doesn't get it, he's going to go for it.

00:31:11And again, that is draining as I already spoke about, but you know, he's not going to just give

00:31:16up because he didn't get the shot. Like he's probably going to try and stick to you like glue

00:31:19and he might try to jump your back and that kind of thing. So there's a lot of things you just cannot

00:31:23do with him. You got to mind your P's and Q's, especially in those early rounds, the time when

00:31:28Joshua Van is talking, Hey, I'm going to be ready for that kind of fight. I have no doubts that Joshua

00:31:32Van's going to have five round cardio. I, you know, we haven't seen anything to doubt that.

00:31:37So if it goes to those deeper rounds, frankly, that's when I see more opportunities for Joshua

00:31:41Van. Um, but I don't know that that's the thing with age, right? That's, that's where you start

00:31:47to say, okay, that's gotta be the advantage. We'll see. We'll see if it even gets there.

00:31:50We've seen a lot more finishes from Pantoja lately guys.

00:31:53Yes. Yes, we have. But I think, I think that might have to do with a little bit of it. No,

00:31:58I mean, he's obviously very, very good. And he's, he's, it seems like he's kind of coming into his

00:32:02own, but I feel like the Tuts, what was it? Kaya Sakura, uh, was the defense he had back in

00:32:08Kaya Sakura. Yeah. He was a little overmatched, but there's nothing wrong with Kaya Karafranc,

00:32:12the other Kai, the other, that that's obviously, that was a fight that we didn't necessarily see

00:32:16that happening. Right. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. So yeah. Like, like you said, these two guys are,

00:32:21these two champions are kind of coming into their own in terms of their finishing.

00:32:25Certainly strange to look back on the, the Steve Ersing fight where Steve Ersing arguably was going

00:32:30to have that win, uh, in the fifth round before a tactical error. Um, and then since then, you know,

00:32:36he's down three of his last four fights and, you know, he had to fight, Osborne was coming up in

00:32:41weight and even that fight was close. So murderers row after that, like very tough. Um, yeah. It's a game

00:32:50of inches guys. Yes, it is. It is a game of inches. Let's go ahead. I'll just say one thing. I'll just say

00:32:55one thing before we move on flyweight, uh, generally for me has always been a very thin margin weight

00:33:00class where a lot of these matchups kind of go as toss ups, Brandon Roy Vow, Brandon Moreno go back

00:33:06and forth. And, um, you know, and obviously Brandon Moreno, uh, Davidson Figueredo was back and forth

00:33:10matchup Pantoja, Brandon morale, very, Brandon Moreno, very, very close, um, matchups anytime that

00:33:15they fought. So, um, it's very thin margins weight class. So usually I have a pretty good read on this

00:33:20division and underdogs would usually tend to have value for me, but, uh, I just, I, the only

00:33:25question for van is, is, is his age being so low and Pantoja's age being so high. It's a, it's like

00:33:30a athleticism versus mind matchup. It's, it's interesting. A hundred percent. Well, let's tie a

00:33:37bow on this co-main event and get into our sports entertainment rating. And, uh, Eric, I'll throw it

00:33:42back to you. I'm curious what you got. Yeah, I think that's fantastic fight in terms of, I mean,

00:33:46he's clear number one contender match for this, uh, weight class. Um, I'm debating between four

00:33:50and a five. Um, I mean, there's no one else that I'd rather him fight at flyweight. So I'm going

00:33:56to go five for, uh, for sports, uh, for sports ranking. And then for entertainment, I mean,

00:34:01I think that this fight's going to end inside the distance and I think that it's going to be

00:34:05really entertaining. So it's hard to go five and five on a fight. That's a co-main event. Um,

00:34:11that's a title fight, but I mean, I'm kind of there. I I'll go, I'll go five and four sports

00:34:17entertainment with sports, five entertainment for, but I think this is a fantastic fight.

00:34:21It's as good as it can get at flyweight right now. I think I'm going to echo exactly that for

00:34:26all the reasons I could see myself potentially, if we did like half points, like I do like a 4.5,

00:34:33just cause like, uh, if, if, if we're getting a dream fight, I would say maybe Muhammad

00:34:37Mikhaev, but like, there's there, you don't know for a fact that he's like better than Joshua

00:34:42Van or like more of a number one contender. He beat Joshua Van deserves the title shot.

00:34:47So I'm going to give five and four, like you said, uh, Eric, but what do you think, Scott?

00:34:51I got a five and four too. I think, you know, again, number one contender, no question.

00:34:56Entertainment wise, flyweights tend to deliver. I'm not worried about that. I do wonder if there's

00:35:00possibilities where this fight doesn't really resemble the most exciting flyweight fight,

00:35:05you know, maybe a little more takedown heavy, but Joshua Van has good survivability and it,

00:35:09it just kind of, we see a rinse and repeat type of thing. That's the only concern that I have is

00:35:14that's, that's a very real potential in my mind. Um, otherwise it'd be a five. So I've got a nine.

00:35:21You guys have nines. We all have the same score. This is a nine. We like this fight guys.

00:35:24Yeah, absolutely. Not too shabby for a co-main event.

00:35:27We have the same scores. I mean a little bit different, but same total scores, which is a first time.

00:35:32Yeah. I think that is the first time for all of us. Wow. Um, but let's get into some of the other

00:35:38fights on UFC 323 and, uh, Scott, I'm going to throw it to you. What is your fight to watch?

00:35:44Brandon Moreno against that Tsurotaira here. I think the winner of that has a very real shot at

00:35:50getting the next title opportunity, especially if it's Tyra, but also, you know, they're still

00:35:57watching that Kyoji Horiguchi. I got to watch out for the Gooch situation in there. So I don't know.

00:36:02I don't know what we're going to do, but either way, even independent of the stakes,

00:36:06this is fun. This is going to be a lot of fun. Brandon Moreno and Tyra bring it. And,

00:36:10and I love that this is a big test for Tyra. He is ready for it. Um, at least at this point,

00:36:15is he going to, is he going to deliver on what he's ready for? I don't know, but this is the

00:36:19fight he should be having. So I love it. I'm happy. Thank you. That's the best. Uh, Eric,

00:36:24what do you got? Yeah. So, uh, Jalen Turner versus Edson Barbosa. I think Jalen Turner

00:36:29thinks that he's the unluckiest fighter, uh, in the UFC, on the UFC roster. And I agree.

00:36:33He retired. Um, you know, he's very young and he's 14 and nine. Um, you know, I don't think

00:36:39he's 30 yet. Um, he might've just turned 30. Um, but regardless, the tarantula, um, you know,

00:36:44split decision loss to Matus Gramerat that I think many thought was a bad decision. Dan

00:36:49Hooker split decision loss. I think people thought was really, really close. Arguably could have gone

00:36:53to Jalen Turner. Obviously Jalen Turner also knocked down Hinata Moikano, um, Moikano. And,

00:36:59uh, he, you know, um, he kind of just walked off there. Oh, that was tough. Yeah. And then

00:37:07Moikano, you know, gets the takedown, gets the TKO on ground and pound. He's obviously frustrated

00:37:13with how his career has gone. He's probably the best 14 and nine fighter in UFC history. But,

00:37:17uh, regardless, he's back fighting Edson Barbosa, um, without going too long winded here. Barbosa,

00:37:22obviously a veteran of the game lost two straight. So, um, you know, opportunity here for sure,

00:37:27for sure. For Jalen Turner. Jalen Turner of Fontana, California, by the way. Oh, there you go.

00:37:34All right. All right. Uh, for me, I'm going with Henry Cejudo versus Peyton Talbot. And the reason

00:37:39why I'm interested in this one, and I'm not going to go too deep into it because Eric, I imagine you've

00:37:43got something about these guys in three bets in three minutes, right? Yeah. Okay. So I'm going to try

00:37:49and save some of that for you. Um, the line is, is pretty interesting. I feel like Henry Cejudo is a,

00:37:56you know, gold medalist Olympic wrestler, Peyton Talbot. He obviously had some holes that he showed

00:38:02in his game against, uh, Hayoni Barcelos. Hayoni is obviously very good. And Peyton did make some

00:38:08corrections in his last fight, it seems, but like, there's a difference between, you know, those two

00:38:13guys and their level of, of takedowns and wrestling than someone like Henry Cejudo. I was just very

00:38:17surprised to see Peyton Talbot, uh, at such a heavy favorite, uh, against someone who's literally

00:38:23a former two-time champion and gold medalist. So I, I'm just interested to see what Vegas knows.

00:38:29Who's about to retire. Yeah. Yeah. That is true. This is his retirement fight. He has made it very

00:38:35clear. This is the last one. I mean, memory retirements are as such, he's already retired

00:38:39before, so who knows, but this doesn't, he looks like a guy who right now has almost one foot out the

00:38:46door. That is true. That's the thing. Typically you don't want to bet on fighters who are on their

00:38:52way out. I think the only time where I recommended betting a fighter that was on his way out was

00:38:56Robbie Lawler when he knocked out the price. Yeah. I mean, that was a good one to take,

00:39:01but yeah, I am interested in this one and seeing how it would go, but maybe that is what Vegas knew

00:39:06that I did not. So I didn't know that this was his a hundred percent, uh, out. So maybe that plays a

00:39:13big size disadvantage five, four versus five, 10. Yeah, that is true. Wow. Oh my gosh. Okay.

00:39:19Well, I'm very curious to hear what you're going to say in three bets in three minutes, but, uh,

00:39:22Scott, let's get to the event rating before we get to that. What do we got?

00:39:27Guys, I, you know, when we talked about this at the meeting, I was looking at this card and I was

00:39:30like, Oh, maybe it's not as strong as like some of these other ones. And obviously I just didn't

00:39:34look that closely at it yet. This is a 97 guys. Um, I was really surprised at the number when it got

00:39:41spit out. So I looked at it again, more closely. Um, and it really is just stacked top to bottom 13

00:39:46of the 28 fighters on the card are ranked in the top 20. Wow. In their weight class bonkers.

00:39:5519 of them are in the top 50. Only four of them are outside the top 106 are beyond the top 60. So

00:40:02we're really just talking about this is, this is like truly elite martial mixed martial arts top to

00:40:08bottom. I can't remember even a card like this. It's, it's not like the top one of the year.

00:40:14It's actually top 26 all time, 20 years or so, I guess we call it, um, all time. But this also just,

00:40:21just for context, man, like this is closing out just an insane year for pay-per-view strength and,

00:40:26in, and rank talent, eight events have 90 or better scores. 2021 was the last time we had so many 90 or

00:40:33better. They had actually a nine that year. So we'll, we'll call this the best in four years in terms of

00:40:38that kind of thing. Stacking these cards, six of these events this year, 95 or better, three of

00:40:43them counting this are in that top 26. Like I mentioned, um, really it's, it's kind of remarkable

00:40:49how impressive their, their, um, entries have been closing out this year. And you could say,

00:40:57maybe they were doing it to start the year because they were trying to put their best foot forward,

00:41:00trying to get, you know, Hey, maybe more people want to invest in their product and get a better,

00:41:04um, broadcast deal. And then they put together these cards at the end of the year where they've

00:41:07already made their bank. They, they know what's coming and they're still doing it anyway,

00:41:11but maybe it's just to close out, um, pay-per-view in a bold way. I don't know, but it's,

00:41:15it's fantastic. And we, we just, we should be happy. I think we hope that it continues, uh,

00:41:20in 2026 under the new guys. So we'll see how it goes there. But if it's anything like it has been

00:41:25this year in terms of the quality of the fights, uh, and, uh, the rankings and all that,

00:41:30then I think we'll be pretty happy, but yes, Thanksgiving's passed, but that is something

00:41:34that I am thankful for. Um, Eric, are you ready for your three bets in three minutes?

00:41:40Get it. Thank you, Jake, UFC 323. We're going to do our best bets here. Uh, we're going to put

00:41:46three minutes on the clock and here we go. Uh, we're going to start in the prelims. Bruno Ferreira,

00:41:52Bruno, the Hulk Ferreira facing Marvin Vittori, Marvin Vittori falling on hard times for sure.

00:41:57Lost his last three fights. I mean, look at the significant strike numbers, uh, that he's given

00:42:01up here. I mean, he's absorbed over a hundred significant strikes in each of his last three

00:42:05fights, all losses. He made Roman Delizze look good. Um, even as a low volume fighter, uh,

00:42:10Bruno Ferreira has went over Gregory Rodriguez has done a solid job. I think he's a little

00:42:15undervalued here. Uh, I think you should be favored by a significant amount of minus one

00:42:18Oh five on the money line right now. Uh, one of his last two, he has a win over Gregory Rodriguez.

00:42:22Like I said earlier in his career, I think the fire has got, you know, a grappling edge.

00:42:26If he's able to take it to the mat, Vittori's takedown defense is usually pretty strong.

00:42:29Um, but I think Ferreira is the better striker. I think he's the A side here and I think Bruno

00:42:32Ferreira gets it done. So that's best bet. Number one, probably my favorite one on the card.

00:42:35Uh, we move on to, uh, and we talked about this earlier, Jake, um, Henry Cejudo versus,

00:42:41uh, Peyton Talbot. Um, look, Henry Cejudo is, we've talked about one foot out the door a little

00:42:46bit here. Uh, he, he faces Peyton Talbot here. Who's way bigger. Five foot 10 has really good,

00:42:52um, power in his punches. Um, I'm not so sure how much Henry Cejudo has even been training,

00:42:57honestly. Like, uh, like how seriously is he taking this fight? I mean, he's not,

00:43:01I mean, he said that this is a, you know, a retirement fight and he's not, um, you know,

00:43:06this doesn't have any title implications or anything like that. So, uh, for me, I think,

00:43:11you know, Peyton Talbot doesn't, uh, defend takedowns too well. Um, you know, 76% takedown defense

00:43:17and Henry Cejudo, um, you know, he's so undersized, um, that I, I, I have concerns

00:43:24about his ability to withstand the shots coming back at him from Peyton Talbot. So, um, I'm going

00:43:28to take under two and a half rounds here, plus two 10. I just think that that's too high of a

00:43:33number. I understand that, you know, Cejudo's lost, um, by decision in his last three fights

00:43:37and, and, uh, and all that. And that's why it's plus two 10, right? It's a little bit more of a,

00:43:41of an underdog shot, but I like the shot here. I think that there's a, there's a world where

00:43:44Henry Cejudo lands a submission win or TKO from ground and pound or Peyton Talbot, uh,

00:43:49finished on the feet was probably the most likely scenario. Um, but yeah, Peyton Talbot,

00:43:53uh, Henry Cejudo under two and a half rounds. We move on co-main event and it is a big one.

00:43:57Alexander Pantojo versus Joshua Vann. Uh, you'll notice that I'm not picking the main event here.

00:44:02Uh, but for Joshua Vann, he's 24 years old. He's got a lot to learn. I think that, and we talked about

00:44:08this, maybe he's, this is a little bit too much too soon here, but I don't even have a bet on the fight.

00:44:13I have the fight doesn't go to decision minus one 45. And I'll tell you why. Alexander Pantojo is

00:44:18really good at grappling. And I think that there's a way for him to finish this easily on the ground

00:44:21within two rounds. Um, we've seen, you know, Joshua Vann be taken down before he got taken down,

00:44:26uh, against Rai, uh, Rai Tassura, um, four takedowns there. He, I'm not sure what his scrambles look

00:44:34like. We haven't really seen a whole lot of them. He's never really defended submissions, uh, too much,

00:44:37but Pantojo is going to be going for him constantly. I think that a submission is on the table. I also

00:44:41think that the knockouts on the table, as I said before, if Vann's able to, to connect on a big

00:44:45shot or something like that. So, um, I'm going to take a fight doesn't go to decision minus one 45

00:44:49on draft Kings. Those are three bites in three minutes. Let's make some cash. Alrighty. Thank

00:44:53you so much for that, Eric. So that closes out UFC three 23, but we just got some fight

00:44:59announcements. I was just referencing Thanksgiving on Thanksgiving day. We got some fight announcements

00:45:03for UFC 324 and 325 on CBS sports during, uh, NFL football. Right. And, uh, there's been a lot

00:45:12of blowback, but let's go piece by piece. Let's start out with the main events. Cause there's a

00:45:15lot to dissect here. Right. I'll start off with UFC 324 and Eric, I'm going to start with you. Uh,

00:45:22Patty, the baddie Pimblett, uh, announced is fighting Justin Gaethje for the interim lightweight title

00:45:29after Ilya Teporia put out a statement saying that, you know, he's dealing with some, uh,

00:45:33personal stuff. He won't be fighting in the first quarter of the year. Uh, there's been some

00:45:38blowback for this. Has the blowback been justified in your opinion for this title flight?

00:45:44Undoubtedly. Yes. Um, the UFC is throwing, you know, Patty Pimblett and Justin Gaethje here.

00:45:48It seems like kind of the throwing Justin Gaethje a bone a little bit. Cause Justin Gaethje was like,

00:45:52I'm going to retire if you don't give me a title shot. Um, and that's what it seems like. Look,

00:45:56I understand the blowback. I get it. You know, the people are upset because they think that,

00:46:00you know, Armand is, you know, he should be getting the title shot. He's the clear number

00:46:06one contender. And the fact that he's not even getting an interim bout really sheds, um, you know,

00:46:11kind of a damper on, you know, his outlook for the future. He's, he might not be seen for the next

00:46:16year because of this, of what's going on here. And that's a bummer because, you know, he looked

00:46:22amazing against Dan Hooker. It's a, it's a tough reality. And, you know, I, a lot of people were

00:46:28frustrated, especially, you know, some fighters, I believe Aljamain Sterling was one of them that,

00:46:32you know, it was like, this is, you know, some WWE stuff. And it was like the top, you know,

00:46:37the top contenders don't get exactly rewarded for their, um, you know, don't exactly, you know,

00:46:44it's not a meritocracy to a point where it's, it's gotten a little crazy, right? Like

00:46:48Patty Pimblitt's last three wins. I think that they were all on, uh, major losing streaks going

00:46:54into those. Like he never beat anybody in the top. Yeah. Yeah. Or since then. Yeah. And even

00:47:00coming into it, um, like, you know, Michael Chandler, Tony Ferguson, like none of those guys are,

00:47:05you know, winning fights consistently. And even, even Armand jokes, like everybody beats Michael

00:47:09Chandler is like, give me something, give me a real win. Um, it's the totally warranted. This is,

00:47:15it'll be fun to watch, but matchup wise, what are we doing? It doesn't make sense.

00:47:20One thing that I will say is, uh, you mentioned like appeasement of Gaethje for me. I think it's

00:47:26less of an appeasement of Gaethje and more of like, uh, sticking it to Armand or like skipping over

00:47:32Armand, punishing him, whatever you want to call it. I'm not sure. What do you think, Scott?

00:47:38I don't see why the UFC would appease Justin Gaethje or his, or his management even frankly,

00:47:43cause I'm pretty sure they're pretty take it or leave it with most people. And as much as

00:47:47Justin Gaethje is a fun fighter, I enjoy watching him personally. I think a lot of people do. I

00:47:52don't think that's, that's controversial, but they would move on without Justin Gaethje and they

00:47:57wouldn't look back. So I don't know how much they really care about that. I think it has much more

00:48:01to do with, they needed somebody. They wanted to make a little splash. Patty Pimblit has some name

00:48:06value here. Justin Gaethje's name value is probably much more than, than that of Armand

00:48:12Sarukian, even though just days ago, he put together a fantastic performance in a main event

00:48:17that the UFC wanted you to pay attention to. Um, that timing of that's very goofy. I don't,

00:48:22I don't love that kind of thing. No, I think, I think absolutely everything's justified, but also

00:48:26I just don't understand why we need to have an interim belt on the line. You don't, I don't think

00:48:33you need it. This fight is going to be fun in and of itself anyway. Do people generally get much

00:48:38more excited because there's interim gold on the line when then, when there's not, I don't know

00:48:44how much people care. Maybe it's a bit UFC obviously thinks so. I don't, I have an answer to that,

00:48:50but we're going to talk about it in a bit. Well, so I think that the reason that, um, that they're

00:48:55putting a interim belt on it is because this is a fight night fight. There's a fight night main event

00:49:00without it. And that's just a fact. Um, these guys, it's a fun one, but neither of these guys are

00:49:06ranked in the top three of the division. This is, this is very important. Like they are fighting.

00:49:11They're fighting for a bell. I mean, get rid of Patty Pimblett is going to have zero wins inside

00:49:16the top 10 and he is going to fight for a bell. It's crazy. Yeah. An interim belt, I suppose,

00:49:22but yeah, it's just, he's still in the top 10 at lightweight, right? Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Okay.

00:49:28I gotcha. Gotcha. Gotcha. He's fighting for a bell. Yes. Yes. Yes. He will have a win.

00:49:32If he defeats Justin Gaethje, if Patty Pimblett beats Justin Gaethje, there's one. Yes. There's

00:49:38one. That's, there's one. There we go. Um, but yes, I will get into, uh, the, the other stuff in

00:49:44there, but as far as, uh, it being, I feel like it could be, let's say Pantoja wasn't, uh, fighting,

00:49:49um, Joshua Van on, on the card this weekend. I feel like this would be easily slottable for a

00:49:55co-main event without the, uh, interim title on there too. It's big enough for that. So it's also,

00:49:59yeah. Yeah. Okay. Sorry. No, that finished up. Um, the, also worth noting, um, Charles Oliveira,

00:50:06Max Holloway, not heard from, I would venture to guess that they're fighting for the BMF title

00:50:10probably in March. Yeah. But that one makes sense. I would say like either of those guys,

00:50:14if they were put into the interim title shot, I'd be like, why? Oliveira versus Patty Pimblett is,

00:50:19would have been a great fight. I understand that Oliveira just got knocked out by Teporio. So if he

00:50:24wins, that would have been annoying, but I don't think that Oliveira be, uh, winning the interim

00:50:29belt for whatever reason would preclude them from making, uh, Armand versus Ilya. I, I just don't

00:50:35understand the thought process here at all. Yeah. Well, we're going to get back to UFC 324 in a bit,

00:50:42but let's keep with the main events of, uh, these announcements. Alexander Volkanovski, uh, is not

00:50:49going to be fighting Lerone Murphy or Movsari Ivloyev, but is going to be rematching Diego Lopez,

00:50:55uh, with literally his last title defense being against Diego Lopez. Scott,

00:51:00I have to ask you about this one. Is the blowback justified for this main event? What do you think?

00:51:07Uh, I'm actually much more like kind of heated about the 325 main event that I am that 324 when

00:51:12we just spoke about, because frankly, um, we, we just saw this guys, like we don't need this. And

00:51:19there are two very clear contenders that you just mentioned. Um, and frankly, Volkanovski seemed

00:51:25like he was up for fighting Murphy. And I don't think anyone would have argued he's coming off of

00:51:29a, an insane KO knockout of Aaron Pico just, you know, six months ago. Um, was it that long ago?

00:51:37Oh, I'm like almost losing track of my year, but, um, frankly, was it Newark? No, no, it wasn't Newark.

00:51:44Lerone knocked out, um, Pico on the Hamzat-Drickus card. That was August.

00:51:50That was August. Yeah. So very recently, I mean, why, why aren't we capitalizing on this?

00:51:55Frankly, I can't imagine a scenario where Lerone Murphy puts out a better highlight between now

00:52:00and then if he has to fight again, if he goes out there and they do him versus Ivloyev and say,

00:52:04okay, one of you is going to emerge and you'll be the definitive contender. I don't know how good

00:52:09you're going to look beating Mo Sarivloyev potentially. It's probably not going to be a

00:52:12potential KO of the year. Yeah. What are we doing here? Just, just do that fight. I, I, this is not

00:52:19against Diego Lopez and he put out a nice performance against John Silva back in, um, in September that

00:52:25at least got him back on the right track. But if we look back at that fight against Volkanovski back in

00:52:30April, it's not like anyone thought he won. It's just that he beat expectations. And, and

00:52:34I think there's a problem with, with, we get into this scenario where, okay, you did better than

00:52:40you, than we thought you would. So now you're a better fighter than we thought. But what if it's,

00:52:44what if that was the very best version that we are ever going to get? And then we go back and we

00:52:49get, okay, this is like a waste of time. And also it could go the other way. I will give you that,

00:52:53but he hasn't necessarily earned it over Lerone Murphy. And I don't even know that it's necessarily a

00:52:58more entertaining fight. Like it was probably a slightly better fight, but that highlight from

00:53:03Lerone Murphy. I mean, you could play that, that that's going to sell a fight, I think a little

00:53:08bit. So the fact that they didn't go that way, it just doesn't make any sense. And why don't you

00:53:12listen to the champion or the champion wants a fresh fight? He wants this fight. No one would

00:53:16have been mad at it. Just do it. I don't know. Yeah. I, I completely agree. The three 24 one,

00:53:22I, you know, I've had people ask me, um, cause obviously, you know, I can't go get through a

00:53:26conversation in without the first 10 seconds saying that like, you know, I like UFC and people who do know

00:53:31about it. They're like, what did you think about the fight announcements? Like, did you, do you have

00:53:35any problems with them? I was like, I can excuse the Patty and Gaethje one. Uh, number one, because

00:53:41it's an entertaining fight and I'm actually excited to watch that one. Like as a fan, it has intrigue

00:53:46to it. I want to see who would win and it's going to be entertaining. Right. And then also on top of

00:53:51that, I feel like if you're going to start off the year, that's the type of fight that you'd want to put

00:53:56on. I get it from a business perspective. This one, I cannot excuse like at all. I can't, I can't

00:54:01rationalize it in my head as to why it would even like sell better. We just saw that fight in

00:54:09Volkanovski's last title defense and it was in April. I don't understand it. I think it can sell

00:54:16better in the Latin market. You know, he, he obviously has appeal, especially in, in Mexico.

00:54:21Um, but he's, I mean, he's also Brazilian too. So that, that brings in a couple of the markets

00:54:26there, but I don't know. I, there's also the English market here. I mean, we could talk about

00:54:31the UK as, as something for Leroy Murphy. I don't know what, right. Am I mistaken? He's British.

00:54:36He is British. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. For a second, I blanked for a sec, but yeah, like I don't,

00:54:42I don't know why we can't just do that. It shouldn't be, that shouldn't be such that it's,

00:54:46it takes over everything. I don't know that we have that type of thing here where it's like, man,

00:54:51like he's not bringing in China or Russia or something with like a giant, giant following

00:54:57that's going to change things or draw gigantic numbers. I don't see that being such a big thing.

00:55:02Maybe I'm wrong. I don't know. I can't remember a case where it's just like such

00:55:06favoritism might be the wrong word, but that's what I'm going to use. Like such blatant favoritism

00:55:13for a title shot. Like thinking back to like Colby Covington facing, uh, Leon Edwards. Like that

00:55:18was one where I thought that that was just like strange. This one that beats that by a mile,

00:55:22in my opinion, what do you think, Eric? I mean, I'll just point out Lopez is six and three in the UFC.

00:55:28It's not like he's running through everybody. Leon Murphy's undefeated. Like this just makes

00:55:32no sense from that perspective alone. And then also like Diego Lopez lost him. I'm sorry,

00:55:36I know that fight was really close and it was short notice and blah, blah, blah. I get it. But again,

00:55:40he lost, he lost the fight. The like, there was a decision on that fight. He lost. So I look,

00:55:46I'll be honest. I actually more passionate about the Gaethje Patty Pimble one, uh, than I am about

00:55:51this one. Mostly because I think that Diego Lopez will have a really competitive fight with

00:55:55Alexander Volkanovski. And I think that there's just so much like it aside from the Aaron Pico

00:56:01knockout, a lot of Leon Murphy's fights have been, I guess, quote unquote, boring. I like decisions.

00:56:06I don't care if it goes to decision. Like that doesn't matter for me at all. Um, but you know,

00:56:12some other like fans, like some fans just like, they want to see knockouts. They want to see blood.

00:56:15They want to see guts. Look, whatever that I guess, you know, different strokes for different folks.

00:56:20Um, and if that's what sells, that's fine for me. I think I'm, I'm more into the art of it. And I

00:56:25think that like the, the Roe Murphy and, and, uh, most of the blood were more deserving of the title

00:56:31shot. Volkanovski just beat Diego Lopez. But I think that the high of, uh, the Noche

00:56:36UFC Noche card was so high that the fans are going so wild when Diego Lopez got the win

00:56:41that that's kind of what carried him here. It makes no sense though. I hate it.

00:56:45All righty. So let's dial it back to 324 and get into this co-main event that I was referencing.

00:56:51And part of the reason why there's blowback, uh, for the interim title, uh, for, you know,

00:56:56uh, Gaethje and Patty, Amanda Nunez and Kayla Harrison, not the main event as the undisputed

00:57:02135, uh, title, uh, actually I'll throw this one to Eric. Why was this one not a headliner

00:57:09over the interim title?

00:57:10Your guess is as good as mine. Uh, I have no idea why this is not the headliner is the

00:57:14biggest fight in women's history. And, you know, Ali Abdelaziz even said that this fight

00:57:17should sell more than Conor McGregor versus Habib Nurmagomedov. Obviously it's not going

00:57:21to, but I think that this fight should be headlined and billed as the main event. I don't understand

00:57:26why it's not. And, you know, frankly, I almost expect the UFC to go back on this and like,

00:57:31eventually they have to see this, right? Like these are two fighters that are in the interim

00:57:34light, lightweight championship fight, you know, that are four and five in the division

00:57:38versus the clear one and two, uh, for UFC bantamweight. There's no reason for it. I hate

00:57:44it. This is probably the one that I'm most passionate about. Um, this is just terrible.

00:57:47This is terrible billing and it's just bad for women's MMA. Like this is going to be a really

00:57:51fun fight. It's not going to be a boring grapple fest or whatever, but it's gonna be really

00:57:56entertaining. So I think that should be the main event. I don't know why it's not.

00:57:58Scott, what do you got? It's entirely possible. This is the greatest women's fight of all

00:58:04time. I mean, there's, there's a short conversation that it's in for sure, but Dana White is calling

00:58:10this the greatest women's fight of all time. And if he thinks that the greatest women's

00:58:14fight of all time is a co-main event, what does that tell you about how the UFC views women's

00:58:21fights? They are not going to headline numbered events. That's doesn't even matter about pay-per-views

00:58:27anymore. They're just not going to do that. And I don't think that's, look, I don't know

00:58:32that the women are always moving the needle anymore. Ronda Rousey was a unique case. We've

00:58:36had, you know, I think Holly Holm had a little bit too, or, you know, even Chris Cyborg. Um,

00:58:41but I think here, this is the fight that really ought to be doing that. And I, the fact that they

00:58:49didn't want to do it in this case, I don't really understand it. I, I, it's, it's just clear.

00:58:54They just don't think that much of women's MMA in, in this current 2020, it'll be 2026,

00:59:01um, world we live in. That's unfortunate. I think, I think we should have done it here.

00:59:06I'll never forget back in the day when Amanda Nunez versus Cyborg was the co-main event.

00:59:10I believe that John Jones was on the, was the main event, which makes sense, but that was,

00:59:15that's fine. That was a stacked, stacked card. Yeah. That was a loaded card, but this one,

00:59:19I violently disagree with. Yeah. And actually, if I, if I'm not mistaken, I want to say that the

00:59:25heavyweight title fight was on the line for that one. And that was Stipe versus Daniel Cormier.

00:59:31Um, sorry. Okay. No, no, no. You're right. You're right. UFC 232 was, uh, John Jones,

00:59:40Gustafsson for the vacant light heavyweight title. And I believe I remember that was one of the

00:59:47first UFC cards I ever watched. Um, I, I talked to John before that one too. That's funny. I forgot

00:59:53that now it's all coming back for us. Right. Uh, but to go back, I'm old guys. I'm 40 to go back to

00:59:58what I was saying before. I think that's the only reason why this one is actually four. And I don't

01:00:02know if they would have made it an interim title fight. Um, if, if it wasn't the case that, uh,

01:00:10Kayla and Amanda are also on this card because they wanted to obviously put Patty and, uh,

01:00:15Gaethje over that one. I actually don't know if they would have made it an interim title fight if

01:00:18it wasn't, uh, if that wasn't the case. So that's my hypothesis. I could be wrong, but yeah. Uh,

01:00:25another announcement that we did get, which let's, let's talk about some good news, right? Uh,

01:00:30there are new main card start times. Main cards will be starting at 9 PM Eastern Scott as a father

01:00:37and just a human being in general and an East coaster. What are your thoughts on that?

01:00:44Uh, much more of an East coaster. They did an experiment with the, with the 9 PM main card

01:00:49start times for the numbered events way back in, I believe it was 2011. Um, and that lasted like a

01:00:54good eight months or so. And I loved it. I also didn't have children at that point, guys. I was young.

01:00:58Uh, so I, I just, I really love that they're going back to that. I think it's definitely going to

01:01:05raise the profile of this sport on the East coast where most people in our country live.

01:01:10It's just the way it is. Um, I, I think that's always a great thing. And Hey, not for nothing,

01:01:15our outlet, the New York post is going to make it a lot easier to get these results into the paper

01:01:20when we've got an extra hour to get it in. We have a very late deadline compared to a lot of

01:01:24newspapers, but even at that, it was still tricky. Uh, I like having this. I think a lot of people

01:01:28in our, our area are part of the world. They're going to be thrilled. Uh, the, the, the people in

01:01:34Europe are certainly proud. I know, uh, Sean Sheen was like, Hey, I'll take an hour earlier. That was

01:01:38good. A hundred percent. Eric, what do you, I mean, you're also, we're all East coasters, but yeah,

01:01:43what do you think? I'm hyped. This is awesome. That's it. Yeah. It has been resounding,

01:01:49like yays across the board. I can't believe that they didn't do this sooner. I, I, I, I mean,

01:01:54I'm sure they could probably explain it beforehand on like what metrics they were going for. I don't

01:01:59know, but we'll take it. Right. Um, when I got the, when I got the press release from, cause I,

01:02:04I received an embargoed press release early from the UFC to know what was going on with the 324

01:02:09announcement. And, you know, we had that written up and we got that up immediately. Um, when I got to

01:02:15the part about the start time, that was the part that I was easily the most excited to see.

01:02:21It's not the fights. It was the start time. Yeah. 324, 325 will come and go the start times.

01:02:27That's forever. When I interviewed Dana white in August, I asked him that question and I was like,

01:02:31Oh, he didn't know the answer then, but it was a good question. It was too early. They obviously

01:02:35didn't know anything at that point. Did they? Yeah. Yes. Yeah. We got it. Well, now we know and

01:02:40very much looking forward to that 9 PM start time, but let's talk about some of these smaller

01:02:45news items that have occurred since the last time we spoke Scott, why don't you take it away for

01:02:49quick hits? Yeah. So actually these are almost like, sometimes we have some like negative things.

01:02:54Like there's like people in the world who unfortunately pass away or get arrested or

01:02:58whatever. This is all like stuff, right? That's good. Unfortunately, unfortunately we are starting

01:03:04with one negative thing in that realm though, because Tom Aspin out, he revealed this week,

01:03:07uh, that he has been diagnosed with bilateral traumatic Brown syndrome, which affects both eyes. Um,

01:03:14he has not been training, uh, or medically cleared. It sounds like he is very far from out of the woods,

01:03:19uh, after absorbing that eye poke from surreal gone in their title fight in October. So that,

01:03:24that bears monitoring as well. And we certainly wish, uh, the champion well, and, and the hope is that

01:03:28he can continue his career and be able to make a nice, nice living for his family over in the UK.

01:03:35Ronda Rousey. She's back in the news. I mean, we've been talking about her a little bit more this year,

01:03:40but she's as reported by boxing scene in active negotiations to box Katie Taylor. This would be

01:03:47the UFC hall of famers boxing debut, and it would come against a dominant current champion in the

01:03:52ring. Uh, there's some conjecture about some other fights that could be in the mix, but we'll let's

01:03:57stick with the one that's being a little more reported here, which is this boxing match. And we'll

01:04:01see if it even happens. Something else that's kind of been, you know, up and down as far as the

01:04:05reporting of it. You alluded to this earlier, uh, Eric Charles Olivera in an Instagram, uh, story

01:04:11post, he ruled out January for his return, uh, for the bantamweight title fight against, uh, champion

01:04:17max Holloway, but he did make it sound like all parties are interested in it. And yes, they are

01:04:21looking at that March or April window. What did I say? You said bantamweight, but it's okay.

01:04:28Bantamweight, BMF. That's fine. Yeah, no, no, we're good. You got me. Appreciate it.

01:04:32Yep. Keep it moving. We've got the former UFC middleweight champion, Sean Strickland.

01:04:38His suspension, uh, just, or is just about to expire or just expired from the Nevada state

01:04:42athletic commission. We'd reported on that earlier this year. He said in an Instagram video that he

01:04:47turned down fighting at three 25 in Australia, but he does want to fight Anthony fluffy Hernandez,

01:04:53as long as it's on us soil. Uh, so there is that to keep an eye out for maybe that's going to get

01:04:58made. We'll see some unfortunate news with UFC three 24. We didn't even make it to the show where

01:05:03we got to talk about those announcements before we lost one of the fights, uh, Alexa Grasso.

01:05:08We learned she's not going to be fighting Rose Nama Yunus because Grasso had to pull out of that

01:05:13fight. Natalia Silva has stepped in. Uh, and frankly, this is definitely an opportunity for her to

01:05:19put a stamp on that flyweight title shot. It's between her and Aaron Blanchfield. I guess we'll see

01:05:24what comes out of this situation. And frankly, if Rose Nama Yunus gets it there, then that changes

01:05:28the perspective a little bit too. Even with Barron's win over, we'll see a lot of permutations

01:05:33there. And the last thing we're going over to the PFL side. They announced this week that former

01:05:38Bellator middleweight champion who was potentially going to represent them as a champion lost his

01:05:43title fight earlier this year. Johnny Eblen, he has resigned the promotion. Maybe we'll see him

01:05:48try to gun for that title again. All right. Thank you for that, Scott. And guys, it is time

01:05:53for the final round where we watched the Mirko Krokop experience as Scott has dubbed it. 11 fights

01:06:00across Mirko Krokop's career spanning what I think two or three years. Unbelievable. I believe it was

01:06:07five years. I want to say it's 03 to 07. Yes, I can't do math. That's why I'm in video. Um, but my

01:06:16god, this guy murderer, like I know, I mean, he fought the axe murder. I feel like this name is

01:06:22like, almost just as proper for for Mirko that left high kick. Come on, man. I mean, like, that's

01:06:30got a base. He doesn't need a nickname. He's the Krokop. He's the Croatian cop. Unbelievable. Eric,

01:06:35what did you think was your favorite one out of all these? The Vanderlei Silva one was just crazy. I

01:06:42mean, Vanderlei Silva's yeah. I mean, I mean, his whole side of his face is just busted up. I'm

01:06:46pretty sure the eyes pretty much closed. He throws a left high kick. Definitely never saw it coming

01:06:49and, uh, just flatline. That was crazy. Mark Coleman was a good one as well. Uh, I was actually

01:06:54kind of surprised. I didn't expect. He put him out hardcore. Yes, that was a big one. That one. Yeah,

01:07:00that was crazy too. There was also scary ones, man. So I knew that I mean, um, I knew that

01:07:08Krokop beats Gabriel Gonzaga later in his career. So I had actually thought that Krokop was going to

01:07:13beat Gabriel Gonzalez in this fight. And when I was watching it and I was like, whoa, he lost my

01:07:19head kick to Gabriel Gonzalez. What? Um, I was just shocked by that. So there was a good surprise in

01:07:23there for you. Nice. Yeah. Oh yeah. Big surprise there at the end for me. So that was fun. Um,

01:07:28God, Krokop, um, big takeaway. Also the boss rootin interviews pre were awesome and something that I

01:07:37wasn't super familiar with previously. I knew boss rootin obviously for podcasts and other stuff.

01:07:40Um, but boss rootin's personality is really fun and pride. I enjoyed it. He's so good. He's a fun

01:07:45dude. Yeah, absolutely. And like, I'm glad you guys got to see all of these because obviously there

01:07:49were some range of different types of knockouts too. It was mostly, you know, left kick cemetery.

01:07:54You saw some right kick hospital with like the leg kicks that he kills and that kind of thing. But,

01:07:59um, man, I mean, there was, there was a liver kick knockout. There was leg kick finishes.

01:08:05There were soccer kicks that would end the fights. You guys don't used to see too many soccer kicks.

01:08:09So that was probably neat. That was also something that I, uh, that was like, I wonder why the UFC

01:08:15like refused to put that in. Cause it doesn't look super damaging. Um, although it probably is.

01:08:19Well, it's the commissions. It's not the UFC. I will. Okay. I, I, I am reaching back into my memory,

01:08:25but I think this might've been a John Danaher quote. So I know he's not a doctor, but from,

01:08:30in his opinion, soccer kicks are one of the most like devastating things that can be thrown to a

01:08:36person in terms of like hurting someone, like to kill someone. Like that's, that's something that

01:08:40it's basically like akin to like curb stopping or something like that. It's not good for you.

01:08:47Um, but that is John Danaher. Not a doctor. Nothing is in this game, but yeah, that's interesting.

01:08:52Yeah. Um, I get it, but also I'm kind of okay with it because these fighters would be okay with it too.

01:08:57That is true. That is true. Oh, before we move on to that. Yeah.

01:09:00Doesn't it hurt like the, doesn't it hurt like the metatarsal bones in your foot? Like I feel like

01:09:04somebody would break their foot on it. Yeah. If you're hitting like right over here, that's gotta

01:09:08be. Yeah. I feel like with the foot. Yeah. But I mean, you don't want to land with the instep

01:09:12ideally with kicks, but, but obviously that is a soccer kicks a little different. So yeah.

01:09:16Before we move on to the next assignment, Scott, cause, uh, you might have, I mean,

01:09:20you definitely do have more knowledge about this. Isn't there like some lore about Mirko

01:09:24Krokop that he was like a secret agent or something like that for, uh, the Croatian

01:09:29secret service or something like that? Or am I making that up in my head?

01:09:33I'm not familiar with that particular thing. And he, he used to be, uh, in, I believe he

01:09:37was in the military police or in the, in, he was the actual policeman or something like

01:09:40that. He was definitely in the military at one point too. And I'm, I'm aware of that.

01:09:44Um, but yeah, that, that was cause his guys, his last name is not Krokop. He is Mirko

01:09:50Filipovich. So just, just know that Krokop is the nickname that he just goes by kind of

01:09:57like Chris Cyborg was not born to Mr. And Mrs. Cyborg.

01:10:00Yes. Okay. That makes sense. And I think maybe the like secret spy agent or something like

01:10:06that came off of him being in, in the military or something like that. I feel like I've heard

01:10:10that. He's not at Liberty to say. No, exactly. Uh, but let's talk about our next assignment.

01:10:15Scott, what do you got for us? I'm giving you guys at Justin Gaethje. We're talking about

01:10:20him. I'm giving you guys the original UFC, Justin Gaethje fight. Eric's probably watched

01:10:24this. I don't think you have Jake, but it's against Michael Johnson back in 2017. This was

01:10:29Gaethje's again, UFC debut. He had already made a name for himself as kind of like one of

01:10:33the bigger names to come along through free agency. He was with world series of fighting.

01:10:38He was undefeated at this point, that promotion then eventually morphed into PFL. So that's,

01:10:43that's kind of the origins there, Jake, if you weren't aware Johnson, he came into this

01:10:47one, he'd lost three out of four, but he was in the middle of this like absolute murderer's

01:10:51row of fights. He had in, in sequence, prime Edson Barboza, Benil Dariush, Nate Diaz, Dustin

01:10:59Poirier, who he knocked out in that fight. And then Khabib Nurmagomedov. This was all in the

01:11:04two years preceding this fight against Justin Gaethje. So, uh, you know, when you look at

01:11:09his record, it's not impressive, but if you look at the opponents, man, Michael Johnson

01:11:13fought everybody.

01:11:14Yeah, that is absolutely insane. I'm looking forward to it. I actually don't know who wins

01:11:17this one. So very much looking forward to that.

01:11:20Have a good time.

01:11:20Yes. And then what do we got for this week in MMA?

01:11:24This week in MMA, I'm going back to December 2nd, 2018. This was UFC 218 in Detroit. Francis

01:11:31Ngannou just obliterates Alistair Overeem with the uppercut from hell all the way to heaven

01:11:37that sent Overeem into another dimension. I mean, single best highlight of Ngannou's combat

01:11:42sports career. One of the best heavyweight knockouts ever for my money. If you haven't ever

01:11:48seen that, Jake, I encourage you to go find that highlight. It is a very short fight.

01:11:51I have seen the highlight. I actually haven't watched it all the way through, but I don't

01:11:54imagine it takes very long.

01:11:55You don't need to. I think it only goes like a minute and a half. So, you know, frankly,

01:11:59you saw everything you needed. If you saw that, saw the punch.

01:12:02Unbelievable. And then to wrap up our show, uh, if, if people are looking for one more fight

01:12:07to watch this weekend outside of the major promotions, what do we got?

01:12:12Guys, this is, this is like a real like fight card here. It's, it's ACA 197. Uh, this

01:12:18is a Friday, you know, midday morning kind of thing. The prelims start at 7 40 in the

01:12:22morning, main card at, uh, at 12 10 or so streams free at ACA dash MMA.com. And I got

01:12:29all the information from, uh, Kaposa, his website. Fortunately, that was a big help for

01:12:34me, but this card guys, it's not just like one fight or two fights. It is stacked. It

01:12:39is possibly the most stacked non UFC or PFL event that we're going to see out there.

01:12:44It has an event rating of 10 guys. Okay. This beats some apex cards. Okay. 24 out of 32

01:12:52fighters on this card are top 100. Six of them are in the top 51 at lightweight alone.

01:12:58Wow. There's like, excuse me, light heavyweight, my mistake. Um, there's, there's a matchup at

01:13:04the top, uh, between two top 30 light heavyweights. It's Adlan Ibrahimov against Muslim Magomedov.

01:13:09He is 15 to know he's 30 years old, comes out of Dagestan. Um, you got to wonder if he's on the UFC

01:13:16sooner than later, especially if he can get through, uh, this fight against Ibrahimov,

01:13:20but there's also, and again, there's also, um, a fight on here, two of the top 35 flyweight talents

01:13:27as well. It really is like, if you want to see the best of the best that are not in the UFC or PFL,

01:13:33this is where you go. And look, it's a little problematic. ACA has its, it's very clear

01:13:39associations with, uh, Ramazan Kadyrov, the, uh, Chechnya dictator. If that's your bar that you

01:13:45won't clear, I'm not going to tell you, you should do that. But like, frankly, the fights themselves

01:13:51are fantastic. And they're really, you want to see who else is fighting in the world. That's at the top

01:13:55fight. Watch these guys.

01:13:57All right. Well, thank you for that. Scott. I mean, I was not aware. And for those

01:14:01at home who were not as well, now we know if you don't know, now, you know, as a certain person

01:14:05likes to say, uh, but thank you guys so much again for joining me on this episode of against the cage

01:14:11for you at home, watch those fights and enjoy this weekend. And we will see you on the next one.

Will Merab Dvalishvili make HISTORY this weekend at UFC 323? | Against the Cage

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