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00:00:00Welcome back to Against the Cage, your MMA home for all the fight previews, recaps, and
00:00:13exclusive 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 joined by my esteemed
00:00:22co-hosts Scott Fontana and Eric Richter. And guys, let's talk about UFC 323 because there's
00:00:28a lot to go over. Of course, in the main event, Pyotr Jan defeating former longtime champion
00:00:34Merabh Dwalishwili over the course of five rounds in a dominant fashion. So let's talk
00:00:39about that one first. Pyotr Jan, we talked about this last week. He seemed like a bit
00:00:44of an afterthought. Not a lot of people were talking about his chances of beating Merabh,
00:00:48more so the things that Merabh was going after coming into this title defense. But like I
00:00:53said, dominant fashion over the course of those five rounds. And Eric, I'll throw it
00:00:57to you. With that in mind, now in hindsight, were there any signs that we missed in these
00:01:03past few fights that Pyotr Jan has had since their initial match, Merabh and Pyotr Jan?
00:01:09And if so, what were these missed signs? What do you think?
00:01:12Yes, I definitely think there are some missed signs and hand up to me as well. You know,
00:01:17Pyotr Jan, when he lost the first fight, was dominated in the grappling. He also had some
00:01:23signs in the past with Aljamain Sterling, where he was dominating the grappling a little bit.
00:01:27He has put on significant amounts of weight, which I think really helped him, both in the power shots
00:01:32of the striking, as well as, you know, takedown defense and being able to wrestle off of the cage
00:01:38with his back against the cage. I think those are the bigger signs that we missed. Pyotr Jan,
00:01:43to me at least, looked massive in the octagon. I was super impressed with his striking techniques
00:01:49as well. His ability to fight off of the cage and, you know, use his striking in a way that
00:01:54he was able to really, you know, fight back against Merabh, who was, you know, comfortable
00:01:59with the striking. And then what you saw, once he got clipped in that first round, he was like,
00:02:03okay, let's go, let's go back to the takedown. He landed, I believe, one in the first round,
00:02:07but that was really not a whole lot of successful wrestling from Merabh, really. And, you know,
00:02:13I mean, that betting line looks crazy now. You know, Merabh was a minus 500 favorite,
00:02:18minus 600 favorite, higher maybe even. So that betting line looks crazy. We weren't the only
00:02:23ones, right? Nobody really expected that kind of performance out of Pyotr Jan, but that's what
00:02:27it was. It was super impressive and definitely deserves his flowers. A second title reign for
00:02:31Pyotr Jan. I've got to be mad about that. What do you think, Scott? Any writing on the wall,
00:02:36so to speak? I want to give a shout out to my guy, Dan Tom, who does a lot of work in the
00:02:41betting space and he did foresee a Pyotr Jan victory. So shout out to my guy, Dan, on that
00:02:47one. He is, he is probably one of the lone voices that I really saw voicing that. So, but I'll give
00:02:53you one thing to kind of consider on top of what Eric was already talking about here. And just the
00:02:59fact that obviously the, the one in four stretch that he endured from 2021 to 23, I think that gets
00:03:05a lot of attention, right? And I think there's a lot of ways where we can very much recontact
00:03:11sexualize that. There's obviously a disqualification loss to Aljamain Sterling in a fight that he was
00:03:18on track to win on the cards. Basically, he just doesn't throw that really ridiculously dumb,
00:03:23illegal knee. There's also the split decision loss to Sean O'Malley. A lot of people really thought
00:03:29that that was a Pyotr Jan victory to begin with, right? There is also the fact that the Aljamain
00:03:36Sterling rematch, that was a split decision as well. I thought that Aljamain won that fight,
00:03:41but realistically there is one judge that thought that way. Another judge agrees, it goes the other
00:03:46way. So if you can kind of do that, you're actually talking about a very plausible multiverse branch here
00:03:52where Pyotr Jan in seven years in the UFC is 15 and one coming into this fight. That is a very
00:04:01impressive record and I think it's something that if it was any other way, even with the way the first
00:04:08fight went, we're not necessarily getting to the point of a 400 or 500 minus 500 or plus 500, whichever
00:04:15way it was, Eric, the betting line there. I think it's going to be a lot closer and maybe we just slept
00:04:20on him because frankly, his record and his recent years just hadn't been as impressive.
00:04:25Yeah, and also something that I want to mention too is even those wins that he did have,
00:04:31this is something that we spoke about last week that you mentioned, Scott. He wasn't necessarily
00:04:36getting those finishes as of late and I think that that might have been something that played
00:04:42into people's heads as well. It's like you're looking at the record and on paper he's not getting
00:04:47these finishes and it can be easy to get lost into some of those things and obviously Merabh was
00:04:52a very dominant champion.
00:04:54And another thing too, I mean you talk about those recent, even the wins, right? Let's talk about this
00:04:59little mini win streak that he put together prior to winning the championship back.
00:05:04Even just the most recent fight against Marcus McGee, it was a fight that on paper, 29-28 I believe
00:05:12is what it was, right? I think it was 29-28s all around. You watch that fight, it's not very
00:05:19close, it's competitive but not close in a sense. Like Piotr Jan won the fight, but he's not putting
00:05:28like this major stamp on it that you kind of, when you're looking for someone to say, hey,
00:05:33they're in a second act now. They're actually doing something like drastically different or
00:05:37impressive and that's not exactly what we were getting from Piotr Jan yet. This performance was by
00:05:43far his best performance. I think we could probably say since he beat Corey Sanhagen for the interim
00:05:52title, what, four plus years ago? Four or five years ago? It's been a long time.
00:05:57Yeah, that's the crazy part. Kind of exactly how you said it. It's like these past few wins,
00:06:02I would put this performance on its own as the best one and it's against inarguably like the toughest
00:06:09challenger in, or challenge in Marab Duolishwili, so it's very interesting. Uh, but I, I do have to
00:06:16ask, I do have to ask you, uh, Scott, now that Piotr Jan is the champion at 135, do we foresee an
00:06:23extended life to his second title run? I know you said last week that this is someone that you thought
00:06:27was going to be a champion for a very long time. Is, is he picking up where you thought he left off
00:06:31or what, what do you think? I mean, absolutely possible. It's going to be tricky. He's got some
00:06:38interesting fights coming up, even whether it's Marab next or not, but I can see it again. He's
00:06:42only 32, like I said last week. Um, you know, I think maybe it's possible. He's just more ready
00:06:48for this now than he ever was. Um, we're talking about somebody who he's known for kind of maybe
00:06:55giving away that first round a little bit downloading data as we like to say, right? Um, maybe he needed to
00:07:02download data on his first title run, you know, and now he's got a little bit more familiarity with it,
00:07:07a little more comfort with it. Maybe now is when he's set up for it. Cause he's obviously he's
00:07:12a terrific MMA boxer, right? He can mix in kicks. He's got some nice little trips. He likes to throw
00:07:17in there as well. Sturdy takedown defense, that ability to get a takedown when he really wants it.
00:07:22He, he will go there, um, and deliver punishment on the ground. He's got a good gas tank.
00:07:27This combination, uh, it ranks very high for me in terms of like the ideal archetypes for this sport.
00:07:34So I think he's set up to go pretty far and I think now the maturity might be there too. So he,
00:07:40he might have a really extended run. We'll see. How about you, Eric? What do you think?
00:07:45God, shocked to hear you say that. Um, I'm not so sure. I'm still not so sure that, uh,
00:07:49Joe Dejan will, we'll have an extended run at Bantam way. I just, I look at a lot of contenders.
00:07:53I think that, you know, regardless of what happens next, you have Rob Devalis really,
00:07:57and you have him as potential, um, you know, rematch. I don't know what the betting line would be for that,
00:08:01but based on the last one, I'd say that good chance that Piotr Jan is an underdog defending his belt.
00:08:06It's pretty rare, but who knows? I mean, that, that performance is dominant.
00:08:09I'm not getting anything away from him, but who knows how a rematch goes?
00:08:12I do feel like, uh, Jan kind of ran into a day where he was the better man that night.
00:08:16I'm not so sure he's a better fighter. And I also would think he's definitely gonna be a betting underdog
00:08:21to Umar Nurmagomedov. I don't think that there's a way that he's favored in that fight.
00:08:24Right. So, I mean, just those two off the rip, he's already lost to Sean O'Malley.
00:08:28We know that. And of course, in a five round fight, Piotr Jan will be favored against Sean O'Malley.
00:08:33But I think the point remains, there's a lot of contenders at Bantam way.
00:08:36Bantam way is one of the deepest divisions in MMA. Um, I would like to see how he went up against,
00:08:41you know, like a Mario Bautista. He probably won one or two wins away from a potential title battle.
00:08:46So, I, I would be, I'm, I'm cautious that I, I don't know if he'll even defend this belt once.
00:08:52I think Umar will have a really, really, a favorable matchup. I think it's a favorable matchup for Umar.
00:08:58I like this matchup better than Marab, frankly.
00:09:00Anything from me.
00:09:01I, you know, look, I get it, Eric. I do. I can see it. But also, at the same time,
00:09:06I can see it going the other way very easily. What, what he did to Marab Duwalsh-Willi,
00:09:09he can do again. Why not? He already did it. Um, and it wasn't fluky, you know,
00:09:14every, every minute of that round, more of that fight, practically. I mean, I get,
00:09:19I think I gave round two to Marab, but frankly, most of the time it was,
00:09:24it was very easily a Pyotr Jan fight. I don't see why he can't do the same thing to,
00:09:29uh, Umar as well. It's not going to be the same apples to apples kind of thing,
00:09:34but I could see it being there. Umar Namagomedov is not Khabib Namagomedov, right?
00:09:39He, they fight differently. I don't know that the, the, the stuff that brings,
00:09:44that, that Umar brings to the table is going to necessarily be better. We've already seen him
00:09:48be at that top level and fall short. Sometimes we see that pattern in the, in the UFC where these
00:09:54guys, maybe they don't get over the hump. I have questions there with Umar. Not that he can't,
00:09:58but can he, we haven't seen it. We've seen Jan do it two times though. And again, that O'Malley fight,
00:10:04Hey, first one was very close. And a lot of people thought that a lot of people thought vehemently
00:10:09that Piotr Jan won that first. There are some strong opinions that Sean O'Malley just didn't
00:10:15deserve that win. So frankly, I wouldn't be surprised if it goes even more strongly, uh,
00:10:20in the Piotr Jan corner next time, if they are to fight. So if look, that's, that's a murderer's
00:10:26row right there, but he can definitely get past it. And if he does now, we're starting to talk about a
00:10:31really, really impressive champion. Yeah. I think that after a performance like Jan had on a Saturday
00:10:39night, I think he's gotta be a favorite. Umar, I could see him not being a favorite against,
00:10:46but I think against Marab he would be. And I think against O'Malley, he would be again,
00:10:50that being said though, uh, to, to your point, Eric, Bantamweight is obviously a very,
00:10:55very deep division. And while he is two years younger than Marab, uh, who I believe he's 35
00:11:00currently. So he will be 35 soon. Okay. Gotcha. So, you know, Piotr's got a couple of years left
00:11:07before we get to the whole, you know, 35 curse and, and all that jazz, but it is a deep division.
00:11:13Like you said, Eric, anything can kind of happen. Um, but I know we're talking one thing really
00:11:18quick, Scott, I'm shocked that you didn't have 50, 45. I had it 50, 45, uh, in favor of Jan and
00:11:23Daniel Corbier, just one thing, Daniel Corbier having the fight, uh, you know, 2-0 Marab after two
00:11:30was, uh, baffling. I don't know if you had any thoughts on that. Um, well, I could tell you that
00:11:35the, there was at least one judge who had it 2-0 for Marab after, after two rounds. So normally I
00:11:41don't know disrespect to Daniel Corbier. I don't think much of him as an MMA judge or an understanding
00:11:47of the, the application of the criteria, but there, there is an actual official scorecard that matches
00:11:53that. I was a little surprised actually that round one went unanimously to Marab. That's, that's the
00:11:59round that I thought, okay, Jan got off to a really good start here. It's not that you can't make that
00:12:03case. Um, but I, I didn't really quite see it that way. Mm-hmm. Well, let's, we've been talking a little
00:12:10bit about what could be next for Jan and, uh, obviously having Marab been a dominant champion, a few
00:12:17title defenses under his belt, arguably the greatest bantamweight of all time coming into this fight,
00:12:21right? Do you guys think that he deserves a rematch? I'll start with, uh, you, Eric. I know that Jan
00:12:27has said that he, he doesn't necessarily want it, but what do you think about the immediate rematch?
00:12:31I don't understand why Jan doesn't necessarily want it. He just, he just, I mean, minute to minute
00:12:36as a plus 500 underdog, he rolled in that fight. I don't understand why he wouldn't want it per se.
00:12:42I don't know if he gave a reason, but that confused me. I was like, dude, that's, uh, what was the
00:12:47reason? Do you know? Basically he was saying, Hey, I didn't get an immediate rematch when I lost my
00:12:52title. He should have to earn it too. That was, it was kind of one of those, like,
00:12:56why should you get it if I didn't? Lame. Um, yeah. He kind of did get an immediate rematch
00:13:03technically. I know the need of the head. It's a little bit, it's a little bit different
00:13:08with circumstances. That wasn't exactly it. That was a little different. A little different.
00:13:13I get what he's saying. Yeah. I thought, I don't know. I think, I think that's a little
00:13:17bogus in my opinion. Um, Marab Devalish really had such, and I talked about this on Twitter.
00:13:22Marab had a more substantial title reign than maybe any champion since, uh, COVID. I'd like
00:13:29to go down a list one day and just be like title reigns since COVID. I, he's probably top five.
00:13:35He accomplished so much in a year. I think that he's owed a second title, a title shot here. Um,
00:13:41you know, I mean, it's shocking that he didn't outtake down Jan. Jan gets credited with five
00:13:45takedowns. Marab gets credited with two. I mean, that's a crazy thing to look at. Um, I would like to
00:13:50see a trilogy. I think that, that this is the fight to make and you know, it's tough,
00:13:53you know, all five, uh, all three fights have gone five rounds, uh, for in the trilogy. But,
00:13:58uh, regardless, I think that this is the fight to make you make, you do the trilogy fight and you
00:14:03move on. Um, and then the winner moves, moves forward and probably fights Umar. If you want
00:14:08to do Sean O'Malley at the white house, if you know, O'Malley gets by you dong, obviously we're
00:14:13projecting stuff out here. Um, I think that's an interesting fight too. If you wanted to do like,
00:14:17say Jan, uh, fights O'Malley at the white house, I think that could be interesting. Um,
00:14:22if Marab is like not healthy or something or injured, I know he joked and slash said that he
00:14:27had a broken hand. I don't know if he'd be ready to turn around in July, but, or June, but I think
00:14:32that those are your two fights, uh, Peter Jan versus Sean O'Malley at the white house or the trilogy
00:14:37fight with Marab pending health. Well, you know, just on the idea of Jan and Sean O'Malley potentially
00:14:43happening if, if, and if, and if at the white house, I don't know that we're looking to try and
00:14:48put the Russian champion in a position where he could leave the white house with the championship,
00:14:54uh, in our nation's 250th anniversary. That might not be the optics that they're searching for.
00:15:00Uh, I don't know who knows what they're doing, but as far as the actual, should this be an
00:15:04immediate rematch? I say, absolutely. Definitely. 100%. You kind of hit the nail ahead for most of
00:15:08those reasons I would have said to Eric is one, one, do the rubber match. Let's settle this
00:15:13and move on. I think we can absolutely close the book on this one in an interesting way,
00:15:18because we don't usually have a rubber match, a trilogy fight after one guy dominates one fight
00:15:26and the other guy dominates the other fight. Usually there's something in there that's a little
00:15:30closer or a little, uh, you know, maybe like one person got to finish early and another person
00:15:35won a decision this fight. Uh, there are, there's a lot of questions I have, which version of each
00:15:41of these guys is going to show up. I want to see it. I don't want to see anything else. Nobody else
00:15:46demands has put a mandate on being in that title shot next. I just don't see it. It's not Umar.
00:15:53It's certainly not Sean O'Malley. Even if he beats song and dong do this fight.
00:15:58Um, one thing I will say is I would be okay with it if the next person that Piotr faces is not Marab,
00:16:06but I think that Marab's next fight should be for the title. And I believe Marab has said that that's
00:16:12what Dana has quote unquote promised him. Obviously things change and the UFC or Dana White saying that
00:16:20they're going to be doing something is not, uh, something you can take as gospel until you see,
00:16:24you know, pen to paper, the announcements and, and whatnot. Um, but I would be okay with Umar or
00:16:30if Sean wins that being the next fight for Piotr, just because there has been some talk and we'll
00:16:36get into this in a second about Marab's activity, perhaps hindering his performance, uh, in there.
00:16:43And that kind of takes that equation out of it. If you give him a little bit of rest, that being said,
00:16:47you know, Marab, uh, he is, he's not getting any younger. So I guess that that would be the
00:16:53argument for getting it done sooner rather than the other thing there, Jake is, I mean, what's,
00:16:58what's Marab going to do in the interim? If he's not fighting, this is a guy who, who legitimately said
00:17:03he wanted to fight four times a year for the title two years in a row. This was his goal.
00:17:08You're going to keep him on the shelf. Piotr Jan doesn't strike me as the guy who's going to be
00:17:12fighting three times a year to defend his title. So if, if they're waiting for Marab to get his shot
00:17:18after Jan defends another time, when is, when is Jan going to defend? May? Does that put his next
00:17:25title fight in like December? I don't know that you can just keep Marab on the shelf for 12 months
00:17:31and what the point would be. So I don't know about that. That's, that's, that's valid. The
00:17:35only thing that I would say is, um, at least on Marab's part, if, if the timing works out,
00:17:41let's say where he's waiting a little bit longer than he has, where this past one, it was what,
00:17:46two and a half, three months before his, his last fight, not even, it was like two,
00:17:50two and a half months. It was two months, two months in like a day. Absolutely insane. Uh,
00:17:55I think if he took six months, uh, six, seven months between this fight and the next one,
00:18:01if it's for the title, I think that that could benefit his body, the weight cuts that he was
00:18:05going through this year, four times. I think that that could definitely take a toll on you. So I would
00:18:10say just maybe letting his body recover could be a good thing, but I totally understand that kind of
00:18:14opens up a can of worms on if Piotr Jan is ready to fight and keeping him out for a year isn't
00:18:18exactly ideal either. So yeah, we'll see, but let's see. I'm did a good job. Yeah. Sorry. Just
00:18:26one, one thing to wrap on before we wrap on, um, Marab versus Jan, Jan obviously made a bunch of
00:18:31really clear adjustments, uh, especially with the body work. And I just think that that's super
00:18:36impressive. I think that the weight cuts might've had something to do with it, but I think about how
00:18:39smart that that is when you have someone that's cut weight four times, uh, to get to 135 and then
00:18:44you start ripping them to the body, really make them feel those weight cuts. You know, it's,
00:18:49it's interesting. Right. And so right. That liver shot was a, was a thing of beauty.
00:18:53Absolutely. And we're not done totally talking about the fight, uh, just yet. Cause we got to
00:18:57talk about Marab a little bit more, but Scott, I'll throw it to you. I was just referencing, you know,
00:19:01the, uh, activity being something that people have pointed to for the reason of his performance. Do you
00:19:06think that this was the root cause of it? What do you make of that? I actually don't, I'm going to
00:19:12push against that. I'm not saying it had nothing to do with it or that the weight cuts in particular
00:19:16more of the weight cuts than just the fact that he was fighting. Um, but I would actually put a
00:19:20little more, if I had to put it in anything and I'm not necessarily putting all my eggs in this
00:19:25either. I put it more in some of those health issues that Marab has identified since the fight.
00:19:30He was battling norovirus the week of, uh, he had a broken hand. Uh, those sound like things that are
00:19:35going to be a lot more inhibiting to a performance over a five round fight against a former champion
00:19:41than just the fact that he just fought a couple months ago. I don't, I don't put as much into
00:19:46that one. I think sometimes that gets a little overblown. It can, it can definitely get overblown,
00:19:50but he's not the most massive, uh, of bantamweights ever. He's, he's large. He cuts weight, but it's,
00:19:58we we've seen some really bad ones before. Uh, and I don't know that he puts into that category
00:20:03there. So honestly, at the end of the day though, he just didn't execute, uh, against an extremely
00:20:09well-prepared opponent who he'd already, again, had won the UFC title. He knew what it takes to
00:20:15win that title. And at the end of the day, you just got to execute. I don't think he did.
00:20:19What do you think, Eric? What do you make of that, uh, theory?
00:20:23I mean, it could be for sure. I mean, when, anytime that you lose, you, you look for, for different
00:20:28things, obviously we talked about, you know, him talking about being sick and his wrist and
00:20:32or his hand, and there's a lot of different things. I think more is just everyone. There's
00:20:38a different person that's in front of you every time, even if you fought them before,
00:20:41it's a whole different day. You know, it's like a blackjack and every, every outcome is,
00:20:46is different. Every, every, there is no percentage of you here. Like you're, you're facing a different
00:20:51animal every time. Jan was extremely well-prepared and Robin was the better man, uh, on that night.
00:20:56I don't think that this means that he will lose the next time that they fight. I think the odds
00:21:00will be smaller, but I think there's very well within the range of outcomes that it's a totally
00:21:05different fight next time. I just think that he wasn't the better man that night. And it is what
00:21:09it is. It happens all the time. I kind of like Alex Pereira against Magomed Ankalaya, but I could
00:21:14totally see it going that way where Ankalaya kind of like put Pereira on his back foot and, you know,
00:21:19not even taking him down, just doing a really good job beating him in the striking, like just some
00:21:23like kind of like bizarre stuff that you saw there. I wouldn't be surprised if, if
00:21:26Marab went out there this next time and, you know, put his game plan on, on Piotr Jan and dominated the
00:21:32next fight. I think MMA is a, is there is no such thing as MMA math, right? We talk about it all the
00:21:37time. I feel like this could be one of those things where you have no idea what will happen
00:21:40the next time these two fight. That's why I launched the trilogy. Absolutely. A hundred percent.
00:21:45Give me that trilogy. And honestly, what I'm really hoping for is that we finally get a fight
00:21:49between these two guys where, Hey, maybe they both come to fight and, and there's like a little bit of a
00:21:55back and forth kind of war. That would, that would be fun. That would be a perfect close. And then I
00:21:59think we're starting to talk about this. The breadth of this trilogy is maybe one of the most
00:22:03entertaining and most fascinating that we've ever had in this sport. That would be really cool.
00:22:07That that's the only thing that this trilogy is missing is two guys going at each other at their
00:22:12best. Cause honestly, like the first fight wasn't that competitive. It was 11 take downs from
00:22:16Rob Davalashvili. He doubled him up in striking. And then this fight, it was kind of the opposite of like
00:22:21Yon was dishing out all the damage, even though the striking numbers are close, but
00:22:25Yon's dishing out all the damage. Yeah, no, this is definitely a perplexing one. So that,
00:22:30that, that is all I could really hope for in the trilogy fight is, is a competitive fight.
00:22:34That would be good. Cause the, the past two ones have not been very competitive. Uh, but we were
00:22:38just talking about the trilogy. Eric, I'll throw this to you. If that trilogy fight isn't next,
00:22:42this is the other sort of scenario that we haven't really talked about yet. Former Rob, if they do want
00:22:46to keep him active, if he does want to stay active before he gets, uh, the title shot. And if he gets
00:22:51that title shot, what do you do with him? What's the next fight for Murab? I got two, um, but they're
00:22:58further down the rankings, like not too much. I could go Song Yudong if you beat Sean O'Malley,
00:23:02right? That's an option. My top option, honestly, is Mario Bautista. Um, I know like, you know,
00:23:08we've, we've seen him fight, fighting more that wasn't particularly close. Um, but I was pretty,
00:23:13I've been pretty high on Mario Bautista for a little while now. Um, I like his, I like
00:23:16his grappling style. I like that. He's able to, I don't think he'll be totally dominated
00:23:20by, um, Rob in the grappling department. I think that he can be a little bit offensive.
00:23:25And we saw Jan do that in this fight. And I think that it's important for any fighter
00:23:29that Marab fights to also be able to have the option to be offensive in the grappling
00:23:33rather than just only fending off takedowns for 15 minutes or 25 minutes, uh, depending
00:23:38on if it's a main event. Uh, another, another option, if you really want to go further
00:23:43down, um, and just get him in quick, I don't know what Peyton Talbot's, uh, injury, uh,
00:23:48situation is ranked number 12. So he's a little further down there. Um, but I think
00:23:52that that's another one. If you want to try to build him up really quickly and get
00:23:54him up to a title shot quickly and how many times Peyton Talbot will be able to, uh, make
00:23:58that wait, uh, for much longer. So I think that's an option too. So those are my three
00:24:03really. It's Song Yedong, if he beats Sean O'Malley, uh, Mary Bautista or Peyton Talbot
00:24:08if you really wanted to go further down and go for a deep hit. I find it a little bit
00:24:13tougher for Song just cause they fought back in, uh, 2024 in, uh, what was it? March in
00:24:19Miami. Yeah. But it's not unheard of that as we're finding out in February of next year,
00:24:26it's not unheard of that, uh, someone who's recently lost to a champion can't get a title
00:24:30shot. But what do you think, Scott? Honestly, because Marab has beaten so many of these guys
00:24:35up at the top, I mean, we're going to start getting into rematch territories. That's why
00:24:38we had a Peter Jan fight, frankly, because we, we needed to go into the rematch realm from
00:24:43Marab Wallace. If, if it goes that way, I'm much more okay with it than, um, than I would
00:24:49honestly think I would be, but yeah, I don't know about the Peyton Talbot thing. I, you know,
00:24:54I have some more thoughts a little later on Peyton Talbot, but, um, I think maybe the Bautista
00:25:00one does sound a little interesting. If he can get through, uh, uh, I believe the,
00:25:05the matchup is, I was going to reference this later, but we'll bring it in now. He is supposed
00:25:08to be, uh, it's in the works. It's reported. He's going to be fighting in the main event
00:25:14against Vinicius Odevera, uh, on February 7th. And so that, that's a, that's a, an apex
00:25:19card. So look at the winner of that one. Hey, maybe that makes a lot of sense. Sure. You could,
00:25:24you could do that and then just kind of keep him busy and keep him in that area where, uh,
00:25:28where maybe he's, uh, staying in the title picture. I don't know. It, it's tricky because
00:25:33you just don't have guys who've beaten so many of the top contenders otherwise. So
00:25:38fresh matchup. That's, that's where I would go, I guess.
00:25:43Well, I think that kind of wraps us up for the main event. Let's talk about the co-main event
00:25:48where, I mean, talk about another disappointing end to a title fight in 2025, Joshua Van versus
00:25:55Alessandre Pantoja. First 26 seconds were looking like we were in for a pretty good fight until
00:26:00Josh Van goes for a takedown essentially. And Alessandre Pantoja posts his elbow very visibly
00:26:08did not look like it was going the right way in that moment. Looks like it dislocated. The UFC
00:26:13said that it was a shoulder injury. It's been a lot of theories suggesting that it was the elbow
00:26:18or the shoulder, what have you. I'll leave that up to the doctors, but I believe it was later
00:26:23confirmed to be an elbow. Okay. Pretty sure there, it did not look right. I'm pretty sure
00:26:27we learned later that it was his ankle guys. I mean, that's honestly, that wouldn't have
00:26:31been out of the world of speculation for what we were hearing. It's his heart. His heart
00:26:36has problems. It was bad. Um, but obviously not a satisfactory ending, not what Joshua Van
00:26:43wanted in the way to become champion. How do we think of him as champion? How should we
00:26:47think of him as champion? Eric, what, uh, what's your perception?
00:26:52A little lucky. I mean, it's tough. Like he was an underdog here. He's 24. He's one of the
00:26:58youngest champions in UFC history now. So I don't look at this and be like a little fortunate.
00:27:03It's okay. There's nothing wrong with being fortunate. And we didn't, and we're not saying
00:27:07that you don't deserve to be the champion. You're the champ. You got the title shot. This
00:27:11is fantastic for you. It's just, you know, to win in 15 seconds, you're a little lucky.
00:27:16He's one of the luckier champions. 26 seconds, sir. 26 seconds, 26 seconds. Uh, regardless,
00:27:25it's tough because it's like, you know, it's like when Aljamain won the title against Piotr
00:27:28Jan, I mean, obviously that one was worse, right? But when Aljamain won the title against
00:27:32Piotr Jan, that was due to DQ. This is due to injury. Um, I cannot remember the last time that
00:27:38a title switched hands due to an injury. Um, I, Anderson Silva, Chris Weidman, like comes
00:27:44to mind. I'm trying to think of other ones, but there was more fight there for sure. That
00:27:47one, that one in particular, not only that, but not only was there more fight there, that
00:27:51was the result of an action, a defensive action. So I don't even put that in the fluke territory.
00:27:57That's like, that is something that is built in to that move that if you can counter it,
00:28:02that can happen. Yeah. That's a good point. That is a really good point. And I don't know.
00:28:07I just, I just, I'll categorize him as lucky right now. That doesn't mean that he won't
00:28:11have a long title reign and that he is the deserving champion. He's just super lucky to
00:28:16be the champion win inside of a minute against a fighter that frankly was a, was a favorite
00:28:23here. He was a dominant champion going on his fifth title defense. He's had the grappling
00:28:27advantage in theory. Um, we have no, we learned nothing about Joshua Van in this big spot.
00:28:34We didn't learn a whole lot. So he's the champ congrats, but you're lucky to be here.
00:28:39Yeah. That's the thing. He, Eric hit the nail on the head here. This is a fighter who,
00:28:43a champion now who just didn't prove he was better than the former champion who he defeated.
00:28:49And, you know, that's not through any fault of his own. Really. He caught a kick, uh, Pantoja ended
00:28:55up trying to post cause it was an attempt to take down and everything went haywire from there.
00:29:00In some ways it was his own actions, but obviously that wasn't, uh, an expected result of those
00:29:05actions. What I look at when I see Joshua Van is I see a belt holder with a lot to prove. I don't
00:29:11see necessarily a champion. I see a belt holder. He holds the belt. It's true. I'm not trying to be
00:29:17insulting, but I think even he would probably have to admit like that he just didn't show that he was
00:29:22the better fighter yet. Um, but he also didn't show that he's not. So that's why it's so imperative
00:29:28that we get these guys to at some point resolve things whenever, um, Pantoja is healthy enough
00:29:34to be able to do that. He's definitely one of the top two flyweights in the world. I feel
00:29:38comfortable with that, but right now I'd say he's kind of only two. I would rank him behind
00:29:43Pantoja still, honestly. Yeah. I don't blame you. We didn't learn anything in that fight.
00:29:48Yeah. There was nothing to prove us other, like to prove otherwise, should we say? Uh, but
00:29:53Scott, I got it. It's almost like a no contest. It's, it's, it's technically there was a result,
00:29:58but it feels much more like a no contest. Agreed. Yeah. Yeah. But Scott, I got to ask you
00:30:04because we've had a few disappointing, I guess one other Tom Aspinall versus, uh, Cyril gone
00:30:10earlier this year is, is an example here. This is a pretty disappointing result. That was a
00:30:14disappointing result. Is this the most disappointing result of a title fight that you can remember
00:30:19or do you have something else for us? Better snake bit fourth quarter of, uh, 2025, huh? We,
00:30:25with the two here, um, I'll, let me, I'll throw out those kind of, maybe the, the terribly boring
00:30:30title fights and the fights that went the distance and had extremely questionable, you know, scorecards
00:30:35coming off of it. I'll leave those out and I'll give you three more in addition to Aspinall,
00:30:40right? Three more that kind of stick out to me. We've already mentioned, uh, the Piotr Jan illegal knee
00:30:46costing him that fight against Aljamain Sterling. That, that was kind of the one that obviously
00:30:50people think of as well, but I'll give you two that I think are also pretty disappointing results.
00:30:55One is involving Anderson Silva. That was Patrick Cote challenging him for the title many years back,
00:31:01uh, blew out his knee in the third round. It was not a particularly super great fight to begin with,
00:31:07but Cote's fight, his knee just kind of gave out. So that was an unfortunate result there that was,
00:31:12that left a sour taste, but my money for my money, the most disappointing title fight result ever
00:31:19is Vitor Belfort winning the light heavyweight title from Randy Coteur because his glove sliced
00:31:26Randy Coteur's eyelid through happenstance in 49 seconds. It's it's, it was so anticlimactic.
00:31:33It just, it just, the punch just landed in such a way that it was on the eyelid and the doctors would
00:31:40not let it continue. And that was it. I, it was very like this, this was more devastating for the
00:31:45champion himself, but like, man, you're just waiting to figure this out. There's a whole lot
00:31:49of like boring and waiting and the fight never got going. And it's just, it was even worse. You
00:31:54guys should go find that just so you can see. Oh yeah. That's, that's, that's a self homework
00:31:57assignment. Part of me is like, I want to go watch that. And then part of me is like, I really don't
00:32:02like, I don't know. I don't know. It's not gruesome. It's not gruesome. Okay. That's good.
00:32:05No, I wouldn't call it gruesome. It's just, it was a cut on the eyelid. That's a part that
00:32:09often that's what you're going to do to stop it. That's a bad spot. Um, for the fight to continue
00:32:14like the literal eyelid, not above the eye, the eyelid. Gotcha. Very strange. Yeah, that is my
00:32:21goodness. Um, well let's talk about, uh, what could be next for Joshua van cause he is the champion
00:32:28and obviously he is injured at the moment. We don't know necessarily the full extent of those
00:32:34injuries, but Dana White did say at the post-fight presser that it is likely that Josh will be
00:32:38facing, facing someone before they can make that, uh, rematch. So who do you guys think should be
00:32:43next? Eric, what do you think is next for Joshua van? Well, I mean, there's a fight this weekend,
00:32:50which we'll talk about. It's obviously Brandon Roy Vow versus Minel Cobb. There could be some
00:32:53implications there. We'll talk more about that fight. Minel Cobb, where to get, we'll get through that
00:32:57one. I think that's a fun matchup cop versus, uh, uh, Joshua van to be, you know, definitely get
00:33:02some attention to Tyra looked excellent against Brandon Marino finished Brandon Marino, which is
00:33:06pretty rare. Uh, Brandon Marino is very hard to get out. Um, I actually thought that was a good
00:33:10stoppage too. Um, for what that's worth. Um, I think that the winner of this fight or
00:33:16Tetsuro Tyra makes the most sense. I'm really interested to see what Scott has to say about
00:33:19this. Uh, Tetsuro Tyra is pretty controversial just in general, like, uh, throughout his career
00:33:25grappler first, um, you know, not getting a ton of, uh, respect, I guess. Uh, but he
00:33:31was, you know, a betting favorite here against Brandon Marino. So, um, I would, I would do
00:33:35Minel Cobb, especially since it would be a striker versus striker matchup. I think that
00:33:39would be, uh, pleasing aesthetically. And, uh, it would make sense if he's able to get past
00:33:44Roy Vow, who, um, had a razor tight decision. I can invest in earlier this year. Um, really
00:33:51fun fight. I think from, for my money, I would really like to see, especially if it is Roy
00:33:57Vow who comes out of this weekend, uh, the Victor, and especially if it's an impressive
00:34:01or exciting performance, I think he really ought to get it ahead of Tetsuro Tyra in my
00:34:05book. I think you do a rematch of the fight of the year, uh, this time with more time to
00:34:10prepare and over five rounds. How is that not like going to be an amazingly fun fight? I
00:34:14think that absolutely delivers, but I do have a feeling that regardless of this weekend,
00:34:20the UFC will go to Tatsuro Tyra, even though Tyra did lose a split decision to Roy Vow last
00:34:25fall. You know, I think sometimes that gets slipped on the radar a little bit here. Close
00:34:30fight, right? We're talking about split decision here. Um, but if they can put that in Japan,
00:34:34like maybe Dana White was musing about post fight, I could see them wanting to do that
00:34:38from a promotional standpoint. It just makes some sense to do that. You've got two Asian
00:34:42fighters fighting for the title, uh, in Asia. I think that's, that's something that
00:34:47can draw a lot of eyeballs and draw a lot of potential growth in that market. If that's
00:34:52what they're looking to do. Right. So I don't know that cop does that. I think even with a
00:34:55cop win here, unless he goes out and does something amazing, I think it's probably going to be Tyra
00:35:01or Roy Vow again, if he wins. Yeah. Interesting. For what it's worth,
00:35:07my cop is a minus three 50 favorite. Really? Against Brandon Roy Vow. That is shocking.
00:35:14Scott, what do you think of that? I mean, I'm a little surprised by that number. I, it's not that
00:35:19I couldn't foresee, uh, a cop victory, but my goodness, minus three 50, uh, against Brandon
00:35:25Roy Vow. Okay. Wow. Okay. Oh, by the way. And the line has, yeah, the line has gone in
00:35:31cop's favor too. I bet Roy Vow last week when I saw you with plus 200, the cop, the cop steam has
00:35:37continued to come in. That's unreal. Very strange. I'm curious now. I really want to see what actually
00:35:43happens here. Yeah. I don't see it that way though. Uh, and by the way, shout out, uh, Scott putting on
00:35:49an interview with, uh, Brandon Roy Vow that went up earlier this week. So make sure to check that one
00:35:53out. And also Eric, who spoke to Nikisa Bedarian, uh, ahead of Jake Paul's fight next weekend. So check
00:35:59those ones out, but let's, uh, wrap up this fight and talk about Pantoja who of course was injured.
00:36:05Do you think that he can bounce back from this, Eric? What do you think? Um, depends on how long
00:36:09he's out for. I mean, anytime you lose the bell over something like this, it's always going to be,
00:36:14that's just, that stinks. Right. And like, and you ever know when the next time you're going to get an
00:36:18opportunity is there was an age concern here. Um, he's fought a lot like his record, um, off the top of
00:36:24head. I don't even remember it. I believe it was like 30 and five, 30 and seven. He's fought a lot
00:36:31and he, he was on a roll here. It's, it's unfortunate to see his reign end with an injury.
00:36:37It's like, come on. Um, you know, he was on, it was on his way to being the second best flyweight
00:36:42ever. I don't think everyone will be able to eclipse what Demetrius Johnson did, uh, when he was
00:36:46here, but regardless, um, will he be able to come back from this? It's unfortunate that, you know,
00:36:52we were talking about the Kyori Horiguchi fight. Now we're not even talking about Kyori
00:36:55Horiguchi, uh, fighting for the title. Right now there's tons of contenders that can jump
00:37:00up here, um, and fight. So it's a bummer for Pantoja's bummer for Horiguchi as well. Um,
00:37:05I think that, you know, at the end of the day, I think that Pantoja is going to have to probably
00:37:10feed out for the year. He might have to fight again and then fight for the title. So that's
00:37:15unfortunate. Hopefully he's able for his, you know, potential hopes of getting to a title.
00:37:19He's going to need to rattle off a win, maybe fight Tyra, maybe fight Roy Val and then get
00:37:24up to the title shot. It's, it's a precarious position. I would say when you lose the belt
00:37:29on something like this, and then have to be away for an extended period of time puts you
00:37:33in the lurch a little bit. I feel what do you got Scott? Even with the way UFC can kind
00:37:40of be, you know, of the moment and, and, you know, shiny new thing in their booking of,
00:37:44of title fights, I really would have a hard time believing they're not going to give Pantoja
00:37:48an immediate title shot whenever he's ready. Um, you have question marks here. We're already
00:37:54talking about, you know, between you and me, we both think that Pantoja kind of hasn't been
00:38:01dethroned in a sense. So I, I don't think they're ever going to put that off, but as far as if you
00:38:07can bounce back, look, he is going to be 36 by the time he fights again. We don't know how long
00:38:11he will be out. Um, I don't necessarily foresee him falling off a cliff, but you know, it depends
00:38:17how long he's on the shelf and, and how much does that, you know, type of weird injury actually get
00:38:23into his head or not. It probably doesn't. I think he's an older, more seasoned guy could
00:38:27probably move past it, but I guess I'm mildly pessimistic right now that he does regain that
00:38:32belt. Um, it's, it's just, there's, there's a lot of guys out there and the division is going
00:38:36to start moving on. And even if they're not going to move on in terms of giving a title
00:38:41shot, there's going to be growth of this division. He's going to have to rehab more than he's
00:38:45going to have to grow his game and sharpen his tools. And that that's going to, that's
00:38:50going to hurt him a little bit. I'm no doctor, but I will say from what I have seen from doctors,
00:38:59the elbow, if that's the most significant injury, I'm not really sure on what the deal is with
00:39:04the shoulder, that type of injury. We agreed that it was his lungs.
00:39:09We should have ankle too. Elbows are generally easier to heal than something like, obviously
00:39:14like a shin injury that like Anderson Silva suffered, but yeah, he'll have to sit out of
00:39:19the gym and not, or, you know, he won't be doing the things that he would like to be doing
00:39:24with his, with his training that he would otherwise be capable of doing. So that could definitely
00:39:28have an effect on you. He'll be coaching up Kiori Veraguchi rather than the other way around.
00:39:32Fair enough. But let's wrap up that fight and wrap up UFC 323. Do we have any haymakers
00:39:40to talk about before we wrap this one up?
00:39:43I got a haymaker for you. And it pertains to, we mentioned him earlier, well, Eric mentioned
00:39:49him earlier, Peyton Talbot. And like, he, he just had his coming out, the giant coming out
00:39:54party, shutting out Henry C. Hudo in his retirement fight. And for better or worse, that, that means
00:39:59he's done with the prospect label, right? I think he's now in the big fish territory here.
00:40:04He impressed the heck out of me. I will, I must say here, I was very impressed with what
00:40:09I saw from him, but I don't know if I'm convinced that he is going to just keep on swimming at
00:40:16this level. The, the fight against Howney Barcelos back in January that I haven't forgotten
00:40:21it. Like it didn't really go his way. He didn't look particularly fantastic that night.
00:40:25How good is Howney Barcelos? That's obviously the question Henry C. Hudo has asked since
00:40:30then. That was, that was a fun little way to, to frame that as well. But I don't know.
00:40:35I, I think he could experience maybe some ups and downs even at this level still. Um, that
00:40:41isn't to say I don't believe in his championship ceiling because I don't think I've ever been
00:40:44more convinced of his championship ceiling. So, so we'll, we'll see. Time will tell.
00:40:49I'll give you one fight that I actually want to see for him next. I think this would be
00:40:53interesting. Marlon Chito Vera. Oh yeah. That's a good one. I like banger. Banger.
00:41:00I love that one. It's a, it's a guy who's a lot bigger. I think Henry C. Hudo, he just
00:41:04had massive size over. And honestly, that's kind of almost working in his favor in my mind
00:41:10if he was to fight Merab like you were suggesting earlier, but I, I don't know that I want to
00:41:14do that one just yet. I think, I think, uh, I want to push him a little more seasoning
00:41:18up there. My thing, I want to push him up the ladder quickly. He's five foot 10 and
00:41:24making 135. It's not going to last very long. My way I look at it. It's a fair point. I
00:41:30know Sean and Mick are listening right now. So he, they are, they are. They text me all
00:41:35the time. Alrighty. Well, let's talk about the fight that's happened this weekend. Uh,
00:41:39obviously we've been referencing it, uh, throughout the show. Brandon Roy that I'll be taking on
00:41:43a little bit of a later fight night event. 10 PM Eastern is when the main card will start
00:41:487 PM on the prelims, all on ESPN two and ESPN plus. So that'll be on cable television rounding
00:41:55out, uh, the ESPN era. Uh, but let's talk about that. Scott, is this the right capper for
00:42:03the ESPN era? The final event of this, this, uh, streaming agreement between the, the, the
00:42:11two companies, what do you think, Scott? Look, the first UFC event on the ESPN deal,
00:42:17that was Henry Cejudo defending his flyweight title against TJ Dillashaw. So I think it's
00:42:21perfect synergy to close out at 125 pounds as well. I love it. I love that the UFC has fully
00:42:27embraced the flyweight fights without championship gold on the line. Now it's not something we really
00:42:33were accustomed to seeing for many, many years. Um, but in recent years, we've started to see that a
00:42:37lot more. So I think it's, it's, it's the best sign of the health of the flyweight division that
00:42:42they're putting this on as the very end of it. And once again, same thing as they came in there,
00:42:47they're coming out with a flyweight, uh, headliner. So I, I think it's great.
00:42:51It's pretty poetic. How about you, Eric? What do you think?
00:42:54I mean, it's perfect. What better way to end the ESPN car ESPN era than at the warehouse. It's
00:43:02perfect. We end at the apex, no fans. It's, it's just chef's kiss. Thank you. UFC ESPN app sucks.
00:43:14Let's end it with no fans in the apex, in the warehouse, late start card. Last time we'll get
00:43:21a 10 o'clock for at least seven years. It seems like it is perfect. Apex show and the UFC era,
00:43:29get the ESPN app off my TV. I'm tired of seeing the commercial break technical difficulty screen.
00:43:35I'm done with it. Let's move on.
00:43:38Listen, we don't know that there's not going to be 10 PM start times for these,
00:43:43these paramount plus cards. It's really more the numbered events that they're saying the main
00:43:46card is going to come back down to nine o'clock start times. Um, we could certainly see, I don't,
00:43:52I have no reason to believe otherwise that we could see 10 PM start times. It just depends on where
00:43:57they are and what they want to do. Cause if it's just on paramount plus, they don't have to worry
00:44:01about a television, you know, broadcast situation. I don't know. We'll see what it's like. One thing
00:44:07though, while we're kind of on this, actually, they're bringing up the CBS era, the paramount era,
00:44:11paramount plus, excuse me, uh, TKO president and, uh, COO Mark Shapiro was just speaking on a
00:44:17conference call yesterday. Uh, and he's basically learned to that half of the numbered events
00:44:21are going to be on CBS as well, at least in some form. I don't know how specific it kind of was,
00:44:27but that's a lot more than we saw during the ESPN era of them going over to ABC these last
00:44:33seven years. So I think that's cool that we can at least start to set a baseline. That's a little
00:44:37more active on, you know, especially the network network television here, hopefully expanded out,
00:44:44reach more people and give more opportunities for people to watch these impressive fights without
00:44:48having to fork over $120, even a year, which is again, better than it used to be, but you know,
00:44:54I like it. I like giving it to the people, reach the masses. Absolutely. And, uh, let's talk about
00:45:01the other fights on this card. Of course, there are many Scott, what is your fight to watch?
00:45:06I'm giving you Neil Magny against Yaroslav Amosov. I can't even imagine why this is stuffed on the
00:45:12prelims other than that. They want to bury a former Bellator champion just because as if he's
00:45:18some sort of prospect, it seems goofy, but, um, this is fascinating. I think it's a great way to
00:45:23start Amosov's run here. I've been waiting to see how he would fare against the Walter weights
00:45:27of the UFC. I think he's got the potential to swim for quite a while here. I don't know what
00:45:33his ceiling is, but Magny's a good test. I like it.
00:45:36Eric, what do you got?
00:45:38Good fight. I'll see your fight. I'll raise you a fight. Uh, women's Amanda Lemos versus
00:45:43Jillian Robertson. Probably the first time I've done a woman's fight down here. Um, but I'm super
00:45:47excited for this one. I think Jillian Robertson is a low key, like potential title challenger.
00:45:51Her striking has gotten a lot better. Now I still think that she's going to need to get takedowns
00:45:55here in order to win the fight. If Lemos is able to, uh, avoid the takedown, she's certainly a live
00:46:00dog here. Robertson, obviously, uh, a savage with the submissions. This one's going to be action
00:46:06packed finish. This is gonna be super fun. All right. And then for me, I have Mr. Giga Chad
00:46:12Giga Chikadze taking on Kevin, the yay host, uh, you know, a bit of a veteran taking on a
00:46:18up and coming contender, obviously Giga Chad long rangy striker, uh, taking on a guy who not in his
00:46:25last fight, but his previous to have, uh, come away with, uh, finishes. So we'll see what happens
00:46:30there. Uh, but it's got to round out this final fight night of the year and of the ESPN era.
00:46:36What is our event rating for this? How'd they do? We think we have a 33 here, uh, very high level
00:46:43card for apex standards, right? Main event, obviously both entertainment potential and stakes. Uh,
00:46:49there are also highly ranked in their weight classes here. The co-main isn't as high rated in
00:46:53terms of the ranking, but there are several fights, um, throughout the card that are very
00:46:58important. We named two of them in particular, Eric did. Um, that's a very pivotal fight at 115
00:47:04pounds on the women's side, but also we've got 20 out of 26 fighters are in the top 100. This feels
00:47:11like UFC talent all packed in. At least 11 fighters are in the top 30. It speaks to the, the depth of
00:47:17high level talent on this one. I think it's a terrific way to sign off on ESPN. I like it.
00:47:22All righty. There we go. And Eric to round out this weekend, what is your three bets in three
00:47:26minutes? You ready? Thank you, Jake. Uh, UFC Vegas, one 22 end of the year. The last time you're
00:47:33going to hear bets from me most likely, uh, coming out for the rest of the year. Um, you know, two
00:47:38and three last week, hoping to end on a high note here. Um, we're going to go get started three bets
00:47:43in three minutes, put three minutes on clock. And we're going to start right on the main card
00:47:46here. Uh, Cesar Almeida versus sorry, only Jay shack. Uh, you guys, if you've been listening to the
00:47:51show, which you definitely have, uh, you guys know, this is our, you know, my guy, he looked
00:47:57amazing on the contender series against, uh, thou hide, uh, back in the day, their, um, first
00:48:02round finished in the Zorba strike. I think that this guy could be one of the really serious
00:48:06contenders at one 85 and, uh, you know, massive of the division six, three 75 inch reach.
00:48:11Obviously his brother, Michelle, um, Cesar Almeida is mostly the gatekeeper. And I think that
00:48:16Olajicic gets it done in the first round. I'm going to take him, you know, here by knockout
00:48:21plus one 30, but, uh, I think that you can get this done pretty easily. Cesar Almeida,
00:48:25not my favorite over at the, uh, over at one 85. He did be a dual rather like Hassan, but
00:48:31you know, loss to Roman Kapilov really is only a path here. He's going to be on the grab
00:48:36or he's going to be, you know, standing with him. I don't think you're going to be able
00:48:38to stand and trade with him. Maybe he can get a, get a submission, but Olajicic gets
00:48:41it done. Minus two 30 for your parlays plus one 30, uh, for your knockouts. We
00:48:46move on to the Comey event. And this is the last time I'm taking a shot on Giga
00:48:49Chikadze over at one 45, master for the division. We've got seven core
00:48:54inch reach versus 68 inch reach. He faces Kevin Volavos. You know, he's, he
00:49:00loves a grapple. We know that. I don't think that he's, you know, this
00:49:03excellent grappler. I mean, if he, if, if Giga Chikadze even got a little bit
00:49:07of take time defense, he could have been a world champion. I think that that ship
00:49:10has probably sailed for him at this point, but I do think that his striking is
00:49:14light years ahead of where Kevin Volavos is. So I think as the last time I'm
00:49:18taking a shot, Giga Chikadze, plus 280. I think the line's a little out of whack
00:49:22and I'm taking him here. And then we get to the main event and it's Minel
00:49:26Cobb versus Brandon Roy-Vallon. Oh boy, is this one tasty. Uh, Brandon Roy-Vallon
00:49:30always coming forward, right? And he, high volume. He's looking to grapple. He's
00:49:35looking to strike. He's going to throw elbows. He's massive, uh, for 125 as we know.
00:49:39Minel Cobb, good counter striker. Usually doesn't lead the dance too much. I think we
00:49:43saw that in the Mojave Bakaya fight. He doesn't really like to lead the dance
00:49:46that he's more of a counter striker waiting for people to come in, uh, and,
00:49:49uh, you know, do some damage. You know, the, the betting line has gotten more
00:49:53out of whack. I'm on Brandon Roy-Vallon here. I'm on Brandon Roy-Vallon plus
00:49:56250. I, I, I said earlier, I bet him plus 200 thinking that the line would move
00:50:00when closed. It has not. Um, so maybe I'm on the wrong side here. I'm taking
00:50:04Brandon Roy-Vallon. I think that he's a better fighter. And I think, especially in a
00:50:08five round fight, I think that he, he keeps everything close. I don't need those to
00:50:11decision at plus 140. I think four straight for Brandon Roy-Vallon have
00:50:14gone to decision. And again, Minel Cobb isn't, isn't like a finisher here. I
00:50:19mean, yes, as he finished his last two, he has a little bit lesser of a
00:50:23competition. And I just think that Brandon Roy-Vallon has a shot here to get a
00:50:27title and he's going to be leading the dance. We're great on damage here. And
00:50:31unless Minel Cobb really dominates, uh, in the counter striking, I think that this
00:50:35is, uh, this is going to be a Roy-Vallon fight. So give me Brandon Roy-Vallon,
00:50:38taking plus two 50 and we'll see where we end up here. We got two other dark
00:50:41picks and we'll see where we end up, but, um, I'm all in on, uh, on Brandon
00:50:45Roy-Vallon. This time we're actually getting out of whack. Three best in three
00:50:48minutes. Appreciate you all year. And we will talk again in 2026.
00:50:53All right. Thank you so much for that, Eric. And let's move on to our other big
00:50:57event of this weekend. PFL, PFL Lyon taking place, of course, in Lyon, France.
00:51:01Correct me if I'm wrong. This is champion series for quote unquote as well,
00:51:05right? My understanding is, is both champion series four and also PFL Europe
00:51:112025 final or PFL Europe four, or maybe it's five. I don't remember. They have a
00:51:17lot of naming conventions and I think they've got to smooth that out.
00:51:20No, no, I love it. No, it's so bad. It's so bad. Yeah. But that is a little bit
00:51:26earlier. Uh, that is 11 AM Eastern time Saturday. Correct me if I'm wrong.
00:51:31Saturday, Saturday. Great. Okay. 11, 11 AM Eastern time. Uh, and that's going to be
00:51:35on ESPN unlimited. Uh, so there you go, Eric. Um, and let's talk about the main
00:51:42event that, uh, Vadim Nemkov versus Hennon Ferreira for the heavy heavyweight title.
00:51:46And I feel like we have to mention this, Eric, your box office, does this title fight feel
00:51:52legitimate without the PFL's arguably biggest star, Francis Ngannou, certainly at heavyweight.
00:51:57What do you think?
00:51:59He was certainly the most expensive star ever. Um, look, Hennon Ferreira in a spot where he
00:52:06kind of is better than everybody, not named Francis Ngannou. Seemingly everybody's, uh,
00:52:10got that problem, right? Francis Ngannou, I haven't seen him since October, 2024.
00:52:14He's, I don't know what he is doing. He fought one time for PFL. He boxed twice. Unclear
00:52:21PFL got any of that money. And now he's contracted up. He hasn't been showing up to events. I'm
00:52:28assuming he's just not really on the PFL roster anymore. So I don't know. I don't know what
00:52:34to make of this. I would just assume it doesn't matter. Like it doesn't matter about Francis
00:52:38Ngannou because he's not going to be on the roster. He said, uh, to Ariel Helwani on, uh,
00:52:43his podcast, uh, earlier this week that his contract is up before the white house part and
00:52:48he wants to fight John Jones in the white house, probably never going to happen. The UFC,
00:52:51um, you know, has said a lot of things about him over the past few days, honestly, even years,
00:52:57but even just the last couple of days, Francis Ngannou, it doesn't matter if he's legitimate
00:53:01or not. He's not, I don't think he's going to be on the roster. You know, he's not, he's
00:53:05not a PFL fighter. If he doesn't fight for the PFL, he's not a PFL fighter. So right now,
00:53:09no. What do you think, Scott? Uh, you know, as far as if this fight feels legitimate. Yeah,
00:53:16obviously the Francis Ngannou thing is the big complication here. It is an inaugural PFL
00:53:21heavyweight title here. So they're, they're just putting together. I think they're two
00:53:24heavyweights. They're two best heavyweights outside of Francis, which is to say probably
00:53:30the ones who are going to be here for a while, because yeah, it does sound like he's got one
00:53:34foot out the door. I don't think he's off the roster, but I guess there's the, it looks like
00:53:39the end of his contract is approaching in the way, in the way he framed it. So yeah, I mean,
00:53:43put together these top two, uh, heavyweights on the roster. They're both top 10, top 12
00:53:48level here, but even I'm called a foreigner champion who just gave up his 205 belt to
00:53:52move up here. Um, I'm tired of the weight cuts and all that kind of thing. So yeah, I think
00:53:58it's fine. You know, again, you just, you got to contextualize it as we're accepting that
00:54:02Francis Ngannou is not going to fight for PFL anymore. If he was, then yeah, this is silly.
00:54:08Yeah. Uh, so I, yeah, I think that does kind of justify it in a way that makes more sense
00:54:13about it. Had we not seen that interview with, uh, Ariel Helwani, I think that things would
00:54:19have been a little bit different and just been like, come on, like, what are we doing
00:54:22here? But now I think there's probably a little bit more clarity to what's the situation is
00:54:26at the moment. Uh, but let's talk about the co-main event, Chris Cyborg versus Sarah Collins
00:54:32for the women's, uh, featherweight title. And Scott, I got to ask you in this past stretch of
00:54:38fights that Chris Cyborg has had, it seems like really Larissa Pacheco is the only one that I could
00:54:42really point to as being really any one of significance. Do you think that there are any
00:54:47more interesting fights for Chris Cyborg before her career is over? In MMA, I mean, she's made it
00:54:54clear that, or pretty clear anyway, that she wants to finish this journey, this, this, this ride in
00:55:00this sport in PFL. She doesn't really have any aspirations that she's putting out there publicly
00:55:05of like, I'm going to try and go over to the UFC and maybe have some of these big fights.
00:55:09She'd have to go down to 35 anyway. So I think, yeah, in this sport, no, I don't even really need
00:55:14to see this one to be perfectly honest. I think I'd be more interested in what she might do if she
00:55:19goes over to box and what she's been over in boxing. She's been boxing a lot more than she's been
00:55:23doing MMA the last few years, but there's been all this back and forth chirping between former
00:55:28friends and teammates or training partners. I should say, uh, Claressa Shields, who is of course
00:55:33the, uh, Olympic champion and longtime champion of, of, uh, professional boxing as well. Just make
00:55:39that fight. I'd be more interested to see how that goes. And frankly, it'd be the first time in a long
00:55:43time where I've looked at a cyborg fight and said, gee, I wonder like, this is like a tough one for
00:55:48her. I'd rather see it. Yeah, I think so too. I think that that could be a fun one, but yeah, I agree
00:55:54with MMA. Not really sure if, uh, if the opponents are very compelling at the moment for her. Um,
00:56:01but Scott, how did they do in the event rating BPFL? What's, what's the, uh, what's the number we
00:56:07got? So the event rating is it's a six. It doesn't sound very good. And I think the reason for that is
00:56:13because it's, it's just extremely top heavy. You know, the two championship fights are legit. Even
00:56:18Sarah Collins, I believe is like a top three or top five, um, women's featherweight, which says a lot
00:56:24actually about the women's featherweight division, not just now, but not just now, but kind of always,
00:56:31it's kind of always been very, very shallow, right? Um, a lot of puffed up, uh, women fighting
00:56:37above their weight class, maybe even 20 pounds over their weight, uh, to get up there in some cases.
00:56:43Um, but like I said, the heavyweight fight makes a lot of sense too. I think these are, these are a
00:56:48group of elite fighters. There's also some kind of interesting top note, top 100 notable fights.
00:56:52My women's flyweight prospect, Paulina Vishnevska, uh, she's fighting Sabrina De Sousa and also
00:56:59Taylor Lopoulos against, uh, Liam Gittins at bantamweight. Those are two fights. At least
00:57:03they're, they're, you know, notable in, in terms of the world situation here, but I guess maybe a six
00:57:09is just a little underrating it, but I don't know how much more I would expect to see and be like,
00:57:14yeah, that makes sense. I think we're still looking at kind of a lower level car. That's just
00:57:18top heavy. And then a bunch of other guys and, and, and gals. Fair enough. I would also just
00:57:23call out that I, I would also just call out, I think Cyborg should box Holly Holm. I think that
00:57:27would be a fun boxing fight. That'd be cool too. Yeah. Sure. I could get behind that. I could get
00:57:32behind that. Do it on Jake Paul's boxing promotion. Call it a day. They'll all be happy. You know,
00:57:38everybody's interested in that one personally though. Really? Then the Claris fight, I could
00:57:43understand why. Yeah. Yeah. I'd rather see that one. Cause I, like I said, I like the danger
00:57:48factor. I think I want to see Cyborg actually, it's not that I'm rooting for Cyborg to lose. I
00:57:52just, I think it'd be really cool to see this woman who's been just a dominant force and predicted to
00:57:57smash every single woman she fought save for, you know, even ahead of the Amanda Nunes fight. We
00:58:02didn't think that was just a smash fest. Um, I want to see, I want to see some danger there. I want to
00:58:07see some doubt and I want to, I want to be intrigued. I think I know how it'd go, but I'd rather see it.
00:58:11Yeah. I want to see her come in as a betting underdog for once. Yeah. I think that's kind
00:58:15of what Scott's. Yeah. That's, that's a good way to frame it. Fair enough. Alrighty. Well,
00:58:20I'm going to throw it back to you, Scott. Let's talk about some of the news and notes that we
00:58:24missed, uh, to talk about. So what do we got for quick hits? All right, guys, we got a bunch of
00:58:29quick hits here. A lot of fight announcements, uh, to go over some of them. We already found out
00:58:33while watching the card over the weekend, but we have a headliner for UFC 326. That is max
00:58:39blessed Holloway against Charles Oliveira. Holloway putting his BMF title on the line. That is
00:58:46official for March 7th in Las Vegas. We talked about that last week as Oliveira was kind of
00:58:51saying March, April, apparently it's March. Uh, also we've got another headliner announced
00:58:57for February 21st. Yeah. 21st at UFC Houston. The headliner is Sean Strickland against Anthony
00:59:05Fluffy Hernandez. That is a pivotal middleweight fight, potential that the winner gets the next
00:59:10shot, uh, at Hamza Shemaev or the first defense of the new champion there. There's also a co-headliner
00:59:18that we have announced for UFC 325. It is the Dan Hooker against Benoit Sandini battle of top 10
00:59:26lightweights in action on this one. Going over another thing that actually came off of, uh, Mark
00:59:33Shapiro's, uh, conference call yesterday. Zufa Boxing is planning to have its first event on
00:59:39January 23rd. That would be the day before UFC 324, uh, would air on Paramount+. We don't have a
00:59:46location. We don't have a venue, uh, publicly available, but, uh, it would certainly make sense
00:59:51if it was in Las Vegas at the same time as the UFC. And then lastly, as it also pertains to Paramount
00:59:58Plus, everything rolls around this, right? Um, you, the Ultimate Fighter and Dana White's Contender
01:00:03Series, they are both being rolled over into Paramount+. It really is becoming a one-stop shop
01:00:09for UFC, uh, content. So there you go. That's it. Alrighty. Thank you so much for that, Scott. And
01:00:17guys, it is time to move on to the final round and let's talk about our homework, Justin Gaethje
01:00:22versus Michael Johnson. Uh, this one was a crazy one. Uh, honestly, just because of, uh, it looked
01:00:29like Gaethje was going to get finished in, in that first round. Like he, if there was more time to that
01:00:34first round, I think that Johnson could have gotten him out of there. Uh, but he rallies for the second
01:00:39round. I think I want to say if I'm remembering correctly, he also took a big shot in that second
01:00:44round and then he comes back and just goes after Michael Johnson. It was a crazy one. Eric, what did you
01:00:50think? Yeah. I mean, you gotta also remember where Michael Johnson is coming off of this. He's
01:00:55coming off of a knockout win of Dustin Poirier, but then he also fought Habib Nurmagomedov on the
01:00:59prelims of Eddie Alvarez versus Conor McGregor. So, um, I know it's crazy. Um, but I just gotta
01:01:09remember that going into it. Yeah, no, you gotta, you gotta, you gotta know that. I mean, that's
01:01:14big information, uh, to have going into it. It comes in there. It looks like a world beater in round
01:01:18one. And then, uh, I remember just being so excited with Justin Gaethje signed from world
01:01:22series of fighting. Um, I had watched like one or two of his other fights and, um, man,
01:01:28like if there's ever a spot for him to wrestle, like we know he's like with a pretty credential
01:01:32wrestler prior to his MMA days, um, to see him, you know, kind of just be like, I'm going
01:01:37to stand and bang here, even though, you know, I'm, I'm losing in the beginning, at least it's
01:01:41a man. Gaethje is just, his whole career has just been wild. Like he is the most violent
01:01:48guy. This is where he really gets the nickname most violent guy in MMA. This is where like
01:01:52it kind of starts a hundred percent. And, uh, Scott, what do we have for our next homework
01:01:59assignment?
01:02:00I'm giving you guys, and not to Babaluso brawl against David Heath. This was back in 2007.
01:02:06I think UFC 74 doesn't need a whole lot of setup other than just know that, uh, David
01:02:11Heath had a not nice thing to say about Babaloo before the fight. And, uh, I would also, I
01:02:16must insist you have to watch the post-fight interview as well.
01:02:20Okay. Gotcha. Should we watch the pre-fight, uh, as well beforehand?
01:02:25I don't know how much of one there really was. Uh, this was back when the prelims were not
01:02:29really aired, uh, other than as filler on the, on the main cards of pay-per-views. So you
01:02:35didn't really need a whole lot. I don't think they did those video packages as much.
01:02:40Okay. Fair enough.
01:02:40Um, so yeah, don't, don't worry about that. You'll get everything you need afterward. I
01:02:44promise.
01:02:44Got it. Got it. Okay. Very nice. And what about this week in MMA? What are we at?
01:02:49We're going, we're going back nine years to December 10th, 2016, a UFC hall of fame fight
01:02:56between Cub Swanson and Duho Choi. Uh, this doesn't need a whole lot more other than to know that
01:03:01it was just, these guys went after it. It was a nuts fight. Um, we don't get a lot of,
01:03:05you know, kind of semi-meaningless fights that end up in the UFC hall of fame. So that says a lot
01:03:09about the level of violence here. Nine years ago this week, uh, that, that fight. Oh, well,
01:03:14there we go. If you know, you know, and Scott, for those, uh, MMA junkies, so to speak, who are
01:03:19just itching for one more fight outside of the PFL and the UFC. What, uh, what do we got for those
01:03:24folks? I'll give you guys tough enough, uh, 150 that's on Friday night, 10 PM Eastern time. You can
01:03:31watch it on fight pass. The main fight that I'm singling out here is, uh, it's a battle of
01:03:36women's bantamweight prospects fighting for that promotions regional title. It's Evelyn Martins
01:03:42against Jalene, uh, Roby Robledo, I believe is how do you say it? Um, the winner of that one looks
01:03:49like they're heading places at 135 pounds, probably to the UFC, if not the next fight shortly thereafter.
01:03:54And I'd be curious to see how they do. So, so here you go. All right. Yes. Yes. On fight,
01:04:01which is free for the, for the rest of the year for anyone that doesn't know. That is true. That
01:04:05is actually, that is a good, don't know. Now, you know, right. That's a good one that we missed
01:04:09out on providing volume. Yes. That is Eric's your guy for that. Uh, already, Scott, Eric, as always,
01:04:15it is an absolute pleasure. Thank you so much for joining me and for you at home who stuck around to
01:04:19watch. Hope you enjoyed it. Enjoy the fights this weekend, do your homework, and we will see you next
01:04:24week.
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