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Conceive, believe, achieve. Shut the f up.

You're listening to believe you me with Michael the Count Bisbing. You know my name yet? And Anthony Lionhardt-Smith.

Ladies and gentlemen, we are back with the Believe You Me podcast. And not only is the podcast back, Anthony Smith, Lionhardt is back. Anthony, you're UFC 303. Didn't go your way. Let's just start the show with this. How are you doing?

I'm good. I'm good, man. I'm uninjured. Just the regular bumps and bruises that happen in a fight, but no injuries. So I got back relatively quickly. I went and moved around a little bit on Sunday, and we're back at it. But physically, I'm fine.

Yeah. I mean, that's the main thing. You You're not in hospital. There's no need for surgery. You're still an ugly bastard. That's for sure.

I can't fix that.

Nothing's changed there. Yeah, but that is the right attitude. Of course, you bombed out. You know what I mean? You rolled the dice. You dare it to be great. It didn't work out, and you lost a fight. You lost a mixed martial arts competition. When you look at it like that, it's not the end of the world. Definitely things to address and work on and stuff like that. And in terms of career trajectory, I'm not saying anything you don't know. It's probably not the best in that regard. But as I was saying on the show last week, when you look at it through the lens of being a provider and a family man, first and foremost, that's why we do this. From that regard, you smashed it out of the park, and I understand why you did it. But in terms of the fight, yeah, I mean, listen, it wasn't your best night. Let's just say it like that.

Yeah, I mean, financially and doing what I do for my family, that's a home run. It doesn't make me feel any better about it inside. There was just so much happening. I felt really good about the Oberg matchup. I really like that one. And then I wake up in Denver at four in the morning or something. My phone's going off, that there's a different opponent or that Oberg is out. I thought that just meant, okay, I guess I'm going home. Like, whatever. We were here, we were ready, and I'm going home. And then a couple of hours later, then it's, we'd like you to fight DeLizé. And if I'm just being very candid with you, I didn't like the matchup. But that's just not who I am. That's the fight they came with. It's not what I said. There was almost a moment where I was like, what the fuck am I doing here? Not so much like me, but why am I even in this position right now? I came here to fill in for Jamal in a matchup that I really liked and that I was very familiar with because of me training with Jamal and helping him out.

So it didn't feel I'm all new. But then all of a sudden, it's DeLisa, who I got a lot of respect for. You can go back and see all the analyst jobs that I did that he fought on. I have been very high on DeLize for a long time. It's a stylistic nightmare for me. It's a shorter, stocky grappler with good striking. Like, those guys have always been my kryptonite, where those double threat guys. So, yeah, it I just felt good in there, too. Like, of course, there was a little bit of a late kick problem, but I thought I dealt with that better than I've dealt with it in the past. I definitely checked. I checked way more than I took, which is new for me. I don't know. It was short notice, and I just didn't feel super comfortable the whole time in there. But in terms of the fight, I felt like my vision was there. I didn't take any real big shots, a little bit in second when he swore me, when our feet got tangled up and I went down and fell. But I felt like, especially with a high-level grappler like him, I thought I did a good job staying safe and working my way back to my feet.

It took longer than I would have liked, but With a guy at his level of grappling, it's going to take longer than he wanted to. Yeah, I don't know. I was just a little bit off, not even off. I mean, he did a great job. I haven't rewatched it. It felt It felt like it was close, but I haven't watched it back, so maybe that's not what it looked like.

Yeah, well, I'm never in a rush to brush back and watch the ones that I lost. The ones I win, the ones that I got a quick-I'm watching the locker room. I'm watching that shit straight away. Right, so listen, in the comment section, people are going to say this. So I'm going to say it to give you a chance to respond. Not that I'm trying to ambush you or anything, but people would say, Well, hold on a minute. Delindsay also took it on even shorter notice. You know that's what people are going to say, so I've got to say it. From my perspective, Anthony, the issue was the cardio.

Yeah, I was tired in the third for sure.

You got really tired, man. You got really tired. I know you were saying, Alvarez, just a second ago, you were worried about the implications and stuff like that. You're still 35. You've still got some time left in this sport. You've just got to really pick up the cardio side of things, because once you get tired, you're done. It It doesn't matter if you've got 10 times better skills than that guy. If you're tired, a novice is going to make you look like shit. Not that I'm calling DeLizé a novice, but I'm just saying once you're tired, you're done. You're done for it. From my perspective, you've got to really, really open that side of things because-There's just no more short on this fight.

I know I said that before. I just can't fight. I'm not in my early 20s anymore, where I can just jump in and be in shape and be good to go. It just takes longer to get in that shape that I need to be at, to fight at the level I'm fighting at. And I'm not making any excuses. You're right. I was tired in the third for sure. And it took longer. And it was harder to get up than I expected it was going to be, which is silly because he's such a good grappler. Of course, he's going to make it tough. And he did a good job of just wearing on me when we were on the fence. He wasn't super focused on attacking a submission or really getting any good ground and pound. He was just being heavy and just making me work really hard to get back to my feet. So And maybe I could have just sat there and conserved that energy, but that's not me, and that's not what people want to see. I got to try to get back to my feet. But yeah, it sucks, man. Career, trajectory-wise, I don't know that I might have put the nail in the coffin on getting a title.

I don't know. There's a lot of crossroads I'm at right now. I still want to fight, but I also told myself a long time ago, I'm not just fighting just to fight. So So if I'm not going to be in a position to win a title, then I need to start the exit plan, which doesn't mean I'm done right now.

It sounds like it. I wasn't going to say this, but just the fact that you just said right there, I'm not saying I'm done and all the rest of it. That sounds like it because if your heart's not in it 100%, the fact that you're even going to question whether or not your heart's fully in it is like a red flag.

Yeah, and I I agree with you 100 %. The problem is I do want to fight. I love fighting. The problem I'm running into mentally is if I'm not doing it to win a title, am I costing myself more than it's worth? That's the crossroads that I'm at. It's time away from my family, and that's getting harder and harder. And that's when I knew, maybe a couple a few years ago, all right, this tunnel is closing in the near future. This isn't that far away because before it was always worth it. I knew it sucked, and this was terrible, and I hate leaving, but the reward is worth the sacrifice, right? And I don't know that I feel like that so much anymore. I don't know that it's worth it. The money is great, but I got plenty of it. And I got a lot of other I can do to make money. And the time away from my family is getting hard.

And don't be offended when I say this. This is just something... When I hear people say that about the time away from the family, I see fighters are like, Oh, and I missed a birthday, and this and that. I feel like saying, Shut the fuck up. Okay, so what? You missed a fucking birthday. Do you know why you missed a birthday? It's because you're feeling off trying to provide A great lifestyle. You're trying to build something, you're trying to build potentially generational wealth. You're trying to provide for your family first and foremost. And so what if you miss a family's birthday? They're not even going to remember. They're not going to give a fuck. What they're going to know is that the father was out there trying to do everything they could to provide for them. There's people that go off in the army for nine months at a time and don't see their children or people that work on oil rigs and stuff like that. So that's only a question that only you can answer. But when I do hear the birthday ones, I always see fighters going, I've missed so many birthdays. Yeah, you fucking should.

It's supposed to be a sacrifice. Nothing in life is supposed to be fucking easy. You want to be the champion of the world, but you want your cake at the same time. There's going to be sacrifices. Again, that's not necessarily direct to you. It's when I see a lot of people say that these days.

And I see the same thing, which I've done and never complained about for the last almost 18 years. This is what I've done my entire adult life. And that's where I come to like, okay, if I'm not going to be able to get to a position to fight for a title, or it's going to take so long that I'm going to physically regress further than it's possible to get there, then is it worth it? And I don't know the answer to that right now. But I do know that I still want to fight. I just don't know how many are left. And if that means I have some fun ones and just do it because I love doing it with no pressure on myself and just fight my feeling ass off and go, I don't know. I have no idea. But I'm still trying to digest it.

I'm not trying to embauch you here, Anthony, and please don't make it seem... Hope it doesn't feel like that, but you said that it takes some fun ones. And when we text, you said, I've got to get back to having fun. I hate that. There's not fun ones. It shouldn't be fun. They're all fun. It's not about having fun. It's not a fun experience when you're feeling on the floor and Roman DeLizze is pounding your face. Not a fun experience when you're going home and you're depressed and all the rest of it. It's not fun when you go home and you're black and blue and you got from it, could have surgeries in your neck or you're losing an eye. It's not a fun game. It's a very, very serious game. It's the most serious game on the planet. You know what I'm saying? It's not about having fun. Yes, the fun is great. You go out there, you win, you're Victoria, she jump on top of the cage, all that. Yeah, that's really fun. It's fun when you're training with your brothers and you're in the gym and you go off with the team.

Yeah, that's really fun. But there's fun elements, but it's not about having fun. Do you know what I'm saying? And when you said that, I was like, Dude, it's not about fun. But my advice to you would be just take it one fight at a time because. But have a full, proper camp and really dedicate yourself to be in the best shape you can be. Come in with I've got a fucking popping six-pack, so people can look and visibly go, Fuck me. He's in the best shape of his life. Look at this guy. And you know, mentor, that you've done everything. And when you do that, and if you still can't get the result you're looking for, well, at least you know you've already tried. Because in years to come, if you don't do that, then you'll fucking chew yourself up at night. You'll lie there in the middle of the night and go, Fuck, I'm not even going to say it, hate in yourself. But if you give it your best fucking shot, that's all you can do.

You know what I'm saying? And it's hard to be mad at if you just give everything you got, and that's what it is, then that's what it is. But I don't know. Maybe I'm using a bad... Maybe I'm not using the right term to make it make sense, because I get what you're saying with the fun thing. I'm not like... I'm not enjoying myself in the process anymore. That last Saturday, I was exactly where I wanted to be. That's the best part for me, the actual fight itself. It's not saying I'm not nervous or I don't get anxiety or whatever, but that part of it, I can't get enough of. I love the actual physical elements of the fight. I love how it smells. I love all of that. I'm enjoying the other bullshit around it a whole lot less. And I used to enjoy that part of it. I used to get up at 4:00 in the morning and get my shit ready and rush off to the airport, fly to Denver, get to the gym for an hour early, and just hang out on the mats and just chit chat with my bros and then get into practice.

And now I'm fine, I'm watching the clock, constantly. I'm in practice, just staring at the phone clock. And I don't know why. I don't know what happened, but the process Like, fight week, I beg and barter and plea to get there as late as from the time possible. I didn't get there until Wednesday night because I just I don't want to be there. It's not that I don't want to be there for the fight. I hate the bullshit around it. I hate the media and the cameras. It all just feels so fake to me. And it used to be so real and this is what it is. And now it's like, I just don't want to do it. I want to show up Friday morning, weigh in, go to sleep, wake up Saturday and fight. I just want to do that part of it. But that's not how this game works.

But you don't get that part unless you do the grind. Nobody wants to do the grind.

Nobody I used to, though.

I used to look at it. I know, and therein lies the problem, though, Anthony. And I'm not trying to turn this into a whole Joe Rock and Brenda Sharpe side. You're saying this stuff and we're having a conversation. I've got to be quite honest. You don't get the adoration, you don't get the end result. You don't get the money, the payday, the victory, the personal victory, and the fun. Because when you get that, it was all fun. It makes it great. I know what it's like when you go through a training camp. At the end of the camp, you're like, I am I'm sick of this shit. I'm so fine over it. But then it's worth it when you go out there and you get the victory. And one doesn't come without the other. And if you're saying that you're so burned out with it because that's what it sounds like, the media, don't worry about that shit. Nobody wants to do the fucking media fight. It's just a necessary evil. You have to do it. But if you're saying that you're burned out with preparing properly and all the other discipline, sticking to a diet, not drinking alcohol, and just getting early nights, if you're burned out with that shit, then that's an you.

I mean, in parts, what you said is right. It's so minute part of it. It's so specific. I don't mind. There's always going to be days you don't feel like going. That's just part of it. It's not the training that I mind. I think this is going to sound crazy. For whatever reason, I've become so introverted that I don't really want to talk I don't talk to anybody. And it's making me a bad teammate. Not that I'm mean or that I beat the shit out of people or whatever. I don't want to talk to anybody. I don't know what happened in the last couple of years, but I've just... This is going to sound like the most bougey shit in the world, but I have a gym here in the house, in the basement. I've never been the type of person that wants to work out at home. And then I got the sauna, and now I got the cold plunge, and then the pool. I'm just doing everything so I don't have to have to leave. My wife was like, What is happening here? Why are you keep doing it?

I have the same thing, to be fair. I got the cold plunge, the sauna, the home gym, and I use that shit every day. That's just called being sick of the shit, the bullshit, and the kids in the gym, and the annoying little bloody overly enthusiastic. Like, I just don't want to put you in the lead.

And I'm like, I don't know. I don't know why I'm isolating myself so much. But then I go to the gym and we're training. When we're in I'm in the actual training. I'm having the first time in my life. But then we got to stop, and it's like, you got to bring everyone to the middle. And then it's like this brohaha session where teaching the technique. I don't want to talk. Let's just get to the middle, show the technique, and let's break, and then get me back where I'm having fun again. It's like the logistical bullshit, like in between the fun parts that I'm having a hard time, like navigating my way through mentally. And I still do it. It's not that I'm sick of it, and then I don't do I'm still feeling good doing it. I don't know. It's the little shit that I'm just nervous, bothering me. And maybe it's deeper than fighting. It might just be I need to go talk to somebody.

Maybe, and by the way, I got to be careful when I say this, I think Montoya is amazing. But maybe a fresh car of paint, maybe a new team, not a new coach, a new team, because if you're saying that that's getting on your nerves, and not necessarily from a personal standpoint, but you just... Sometimes you need a fresh A lot of pain. Sometimes you need, and again, there's nothing directed at Mark Montoya, and I'm not saying that at all, but I'm just going off what you just said there. Maybe working with a new team to make it feel new and fresh and exciting. You can still work with Mark. You can still work with Mark. I'm not saying abandon Mark or anything like that. I've got nothing but massive respect. I know he's a fantastic coach. But what you're saying there, because the team environment, the gym environment, never mind the team, your team, team Anthony, the people that you walk in and you drill with and you spar with, typically, there'll be a small circle. It's always the same old guys. You're bringing a few people here and there. But if that's for getting on your nerves, then you need to maybe do something about that or something more drastic because you're not going to get it.

You're just going to keep repeating these cycles. Yeah, you might win a couple here and there. But as you say, if you want to be a champion, we're not going to get that.

I don't want to do that. I don't want to flounder. Yeah, I don't want to flounder. I don't I don't want to flounder, and I don't want to do this. I don't want to do the next two years of win one, lose one, win two, lose one. I don't want to do that.

Sometimes you got to do that. I did that for a period of about three years.

Yeah, but I don't want it to have an end. I don't want to feel like this is where I'm just going to live, because if that's what it is till the end, I don't want to do it.

I used to train Michel Strickland. He was in the gym every Friday, working away, grinding. I did the same thing. Most people that were champions, they're doing the same thing. And a lot of other distractions, traveling and stuff like that, it eats away. They become distractions. That's what they called them. And it's taking away from that because you got to be single-minded. You have to be. I mean, only you could answer those questions. But I would say take a fight, give yourself a full training camp, and work your fucking ass off.

For sure. That's really the only option.

I mean proper discipline. I know you like a cheeky drink here and there. That's got to go. You got to up the road work. You got to fucking run. You got to leave it all in the gym So then you can leave it all in the octagon. Because if you don't leave it in the gym, you ain't leaving shit in the octagon other than some of your own blood.

You know what I'm saying? I'm not even trying to do that. That's not the plan. No, you're 100 % right. I guess got to Well, again, I know I said this before. Absolutely no more short notice fights for sure. When I get a full training camp, I feel great. I felt great in the Patrino fight. And that's what's frustrating, too. Then you're mad at yourself. It happened in the Khalil Roundtree fight, too, where I'm halfway through the fight thinking, Jesus Christ, you're an idiot. If you had a full training camp, you walk through this, dude.

Yeah, but the reason you take a short notice five is because it's easy, Anthony. It's easy. It's easy to take a short notice five because you don't have to go through two months of bullshit. And it is bullshit. It is easy. So you go, You know what? I think I can do this. I'll take this short notice five because I get to step in. And online, you might be called a badass or whatever, but you get a win, you get a payday, you go up the ladder without that shit. And most of the time, that doesn't work out. Sometimes it can. Sometimes. But generally, it doesn't deserve. Otherwise, throughout the history of combat sports, people would just go, Let's just do short notice fights. They don't. They do from training camps.

If it was historically successful, more people would do it.

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Brother. That is clarity.

That is some WiFi right there, brother.

How are you doing, man? I'm doing great. I'm glad the I'm on the internet working now. And thank you for having me, Mike. It's my pleasure.

No, it's good to have you, Marab. It really is. We were just discussing your car. What car are you driving?

It's a Hyundai. A Hyundai? It's a new 2023 or 2024.

Right. So yesterday, I'm sitting there scrolling social media, and I just keep coming across these videos of you with a fake Sean O'Malley. And you're in the back of a car, You're having a bloody party. You're doing all kinds of crazy shit. O'malley chooses to go in the easier elevator, maybe final, I'll hit some of these in after. But I really enjoy them, and I thought, I've got to speak to this guy. What is What's going on with you and Sean O'Malley? When is the date? When is the fight? When's it happening?

I'm trying to get his intention. I know I'm fighting him. I just don't know when, and I don't have a date. I don't have a contract. I'm just keep pushing, promote this fight. Now he finally mentioned my name. He finally, he make like... He tried to make fun of me two times last. He also make some video. I was so happy to see that because I've been chasing him since 2018. I want to fight him because I see him as a big challenge. And I think now is the best time to fight him.

Marab, when he was over the weekend, he worked the nick Dias, Masvidal fight on the work in commentary. And they asked him a couple of times about when he what he was going to fight and what he was looking at. He said that he was pushing for the Sphere in September, but if not, he wanted to fight. I don't remember, maybe he said December at the end of the year. But are you pushing for the Sphere, too, or would you be good with that date?

Yes, that would be the best to fight at the Sphere. We all know we all want to fight there, and I want to fight there, too. You guys know I was ready three weeks after my fight. I can't wait And I was ready to fight Shon O'Malley. Chito O'Malley, actually, I know he's training with you guys, but if you guys see that he touched the scale with the elbow, you don't have to say anything.

Hold on, listen, listen.

There's an elbow gate.

What is going on with the elbow? What are you talking about? Okay, yeah.

So we all know that when Shon O'Malley and Chito O'Malley fight for the belt, Chito O'Malley take all his clothes off. That means that he was overweight. And he take all the clothes and they put a whatever it is, things like you see, he touch with the elbow. One hand was up, one hand he was touching. I have a video. Really? That's how he made the wait. Yes.

The sly old dog. Hey, listen, Marabno. That's tricky, yeah. If he gets away with it, you get away with it.

Yes, he did. I don't say anything. That's why I'm like, okay, you know what? I was ready, but when I said, should I mention this? Should I I'm like, No, it's okay. Let them fight.

I say congratulations, Anthony. I have no issue with that whatsoever.

Yes, I'm in here. No, I absolutely love that. I hope Brian can find a video of that, maybe sneak it in a little bit for Gino.

Yeah, I can send it. I have a link.

So, Maran, you're living in Las Vegas these days. You're from Georgia, correct?

Yes, Mike.

That is a very, very different world that you're living in these days. How do you like Las I love it because we all know you can have so much fun, but same time, you can focus, training, and at the same time, I have my peace here because I have Lots of good friends, but fighters and all guys who stay healthy.

We fight sometimes, but same time we're training hard, we're working hard. And I have lots of different training partners. And We have UFCI here. Everything is closed. Even you guys live other states, you have to how many times you have to come in here. Everybody coming here. Even for vacation, I see people coming from Georgia here, from New York, and fighters coming all the time here. And it's so much easy to live here in training. And I like to... And also it's warm. And I'd rather be warm than cold.

Rob, I've never been to Georgia, and I don't know that I know anything about it. What's there to do there? What's the lifestyle like? What's a day in the life? Hold on.

Okay. No, no, no, no, no. Let me guess. I've never been to Georgia. I know nothing about Georgia. I'm going to say that you We could guess as well, Anthony.

Okay.

A lot of horseback riding. There's a lot of horses.

It used to be now. It's today changed because today, it's now because of social media, it's a nice car. It's more fancy, but When I was kid, riding horse all day, every day, all the time.

Yes. Is there lots of mountains there?

Yes, there is lots of mountains. But now, even last 20 years, lots of things changed. When I was kid, I was born in a village, and I was born in a farmer's family. And when I was nine, we moved to capital city. And I was always a wild kid, even I was a living city or something. It was a bad time also because 1991, when I was born, Russia had war with us. And then the country... And we were the first country who left Serne and Union, and we started growing up as a new country again. It was a bad time. Everybody wants to be gangster. I was one of this guy. Thank God, the life change. And we have a new government, the police. And of course, now it's my country. We have lots of tourists because it's very It's safe for tourists and very cool country. We are very old country, second Christian country. We have big history, own culture, own language, own alphabets. And the big history, we have a big culture, but we are same time. We love guests, we love visitors, but we are tough people, warrior people, because we need to defend ourselves all the time because we are living next to Russia, and Russia is crazy.

What you said there, because we always talk fighters, we had it hard and all the rest of it.

Growing up in essentially a warzone, would that be fair to say? Essentially a warzone or right after a war in a country like Russia, I saw that video where you went back to your village and where you're from, and I saw everybody celebrating. So you come from a real small little village, and he's got a nice cheesy grin. He's frozen up.

Yeah, I think he frozen.

New You there, brother?

But that's a perfect time. I was like, damn, he loves what you're saying.

Yeah, that's a perfect time to freeze. I mean, Brian, what do you reckon? Do you reckon we just crack on? Or is he taking a phone call? He's just still loving the vibe of everything we were saying. He's still frozen. He needs to go around another corner.

All good. Hit a different gas station.

Listen, we'll leave that conversation there, Anthony. Listen, it is what it is. It was a fire at the end of the day. You've just got to be honest with yourself. You know, do you still want to do this. If you do want to do it, then you got to go for it and leave no stone unturned. And you got to make sacrifices. And you got to fucking get running, bro. You got to get running.

You weren't running.

Don't give me that shit. You weren't running.

I don't ever run. I haven't ran in years.

You got to run, bro.

You know as well as anybody. My knees can't take it. You got brand new ones.

I don't give You got to run.

If I run, I can't train.

It's supposed to hurt. It's supposed to be uncomfortable.

But I do shit that's super hard. I do a lot of VersaClimber. I do a lot of bikes. I do a lot of rovers. No, I don't do a lot of elliptical. Thank God.

If you said elliptical, I was like, This The last is for me to get over. Sitting there, giving it one of these.

No, that's- I can't even get tired on an elliptical.

But on like- Exercise bike, no.

Versaclimber, okay. The VersaClimber, it sucks.

Running, bro.

I agree. I agree.

Got to get running. Anyway, whatever. It is what it is. It is what it is. It almost turned into a Joe Rock and Ben the Job. I'm like, Bro, you got a lot of things you can do, Anthony.

There's a lot of things you can do to make money.

You're an intelligent guy. Anyway, you mentioned it there to Marab. I don't know if we're going to get him back. The talk of the village, that was too much.

He said he was a gangsta. Yeah, he was like, I'm out of here. I know. I was like, Wait a minute. Marab's out here gangbanging?

That's where I was going with that, I'm like, Can you imagine my rap as a gangster with Sean O'Malley's jacket walking around the mountains of Georgia? Shades on.

Horseback.

Yeah, on horseback selling drugs. Oh, my God. Right. Saturday night, we had, of course, Nate Dias, Jorge Masvidal. I was there. They offered me some tickets, so that was very, very polite of the promotion. So thank you very much. Eighteen thousand people in attendance. The Honda Center is a big cold place. The crowd was phenomenal. To say that they were pro Dias is an understatement. Any time Masvidal came on the big screen or anything like that, the boos were insane. And then when Dias walked out, the atmosphere was electric. It was insane. It really was. So much energy from the crowd. Dias is... I'm telling you, man, the fan base that he has is incredible. It's insane. And I'll tell you what, I got to backtrack a little bit on Nate Dias, because that fight Saturday night, It was fantastic. That was a brilliant fight. It electrified the audience. I don't know how it looked on TV, but in person standing 20 feet away for 10 rounds, they went to absolute war because I saw him I guess Jake Paul. I was like, he's done. He's done. He looks like shit. Maybe, no disrespect, Anthony, you could take a little inspiration.

That's how quickly you can turn the corner because against Jake Paul, he looked shit. He looked awful. Against Manfred outside, didn't I? He looked tremendous.

I thought he looked great versus Masvidal. I don't know that he won, but I thought that they both... Honestly, I was so impressed with both of those guys. The conditioning, just the heart and their willingness to step. They were in a phone booth for 30 minutes. Yeah, fighting. That is so hard. That's such a hard way to fight. Dias took some big shots and came right back. I think, versus Jake Paul. I don't know if he underestimated him or if he was injured or if he was dealing with some things. He was 22 or something, like 22 pounds heavier in the Jake Paul fight than he was in the Masvidal fight.

No, he looked like shit. He looked like shit. He underestimated him. He didn't train.

You think that's what it was?

Well, it had to be. Or he didn't train.

Yeah, he did. No matter what it is, he definitely did train the way he did for Masvidal. But for those two guys at 39 years old to go in there and fight in a phone booth at that pace for 30 minutes. I thought it was great. I thought it was action-packed. It was exactly what the fans wanted to see. There was a couple of boxing fights, a couple of fights with legitimate boxers. And I was like, God damn, let's get this going. It wasn't exciting. And maybe the boxing technique was better in some of those other fights, but the excitement factor and just the action was must see TV in the main event.

Yeah. So Dias had the higher output. He walked into Masvidal straight away, and it was just nonstop punches. Wasn't the Christmas techniques. It wasn't the best punches technically delivered or anything like that, but it was output. It was aggression. He walked him down. He caused Masvidal to be on the back foot a lot. But when I was watching it, I was there with my brother-in-law, and we had a great time. And Masvidal was landing the better shots. He was landing the cleaner shots. He was rip into the body hard and athletic. He showed some beautiful pivoting, some excellent footwork, whereas Dias just walked him down and just like a little tiny uppercut and one after the other. It was just bloody nonstop, but he wasn't loading up. And when I was watching it, I was like, I don't know how they're going to judge this, because for one, right in front of me, there was a bloody cameraman, so he was blocking the view most of the time. The big screen was right above my head, so I was having to look like that, which as a man with a bad neck was for an agony, no one's fault.

But when I look at the compi stats, when you look at the punches, right? Punches thrown. Hold on.

It was a shit. It was like 1,400 combined punches thrown.

This is a different bloody list to the one I looked at the other day. Total landed. No, total thrown for Dias, 740, whereas Masvidal threw 654. So there you go. It looks like he's throwing more. But I will say this, Masvidal blocked a lot of shots. A lot of those shots didn't connect. Masvidal landed 182, Dias landed 151. So Masvidal landed more shots. I think they had better impact. But on the night when they announced Diaz, I wasn't surprised one little bit because from a distance, it's hard to tell what's landing and what's not. Well, the people that write the compi stats number, Masvidal landed more shots. So I understand That's why Masvidal was a bit pissed.

Yeah, it was one of those things like, what do you value more? Do you value the guy that's seemingly doubling up the volume? Because that's what it looked like from the outside. You got the numbers, but it seemed like the output was way higher there. And he got the pressure on. He's overwhelming. He seemed to have the momentum in his favor most of the time, because even when Masvidal would land something real big, he'd come back with two shots of the head, rip the body, and come to the head. Dias would take it and then just continue to walk him down. So although the shots seemed more impact or they seemed heavier and crisper, they didn't seem as impactful as Dias coming back with this pressure and walking. I knew it was going to be hard. I knew it was going to be hard for them to judge.

The only time somebody was rocked, I think Dias might have been rocked once or twice. As I said, I've got tremendous respect for Dias, so I'm not trying to shit on him because I thought he was an absolute gangster at the weekend. Speaking of gangsters, Marabda Valeshvili. How are you, brother? Listen, Marab, the WiFi situation, I don't know what happened before, but you froze in a big smile. You said to me, you used to be gangster. Talk to me about Marabdha, the gangster. If you don't mind.

I'm impressive. Good. I like that. So what happened was I was mentioning I like to be hot, but I guess my phone is overheated.

You live in the desert. What do you expect?

I like it. I like it.

Yeah. So listen, Sean O'Malley, I What's going to happen when you guys fight? Talk to me about that fight.

So first, this is my dream fight, and this is perfect time to fight him. And what's going to happen is now I'm going to show everybody my striking. I have a recipe, but now I want to prove my striking, and I want to go punch in the face because you think I'm going to wrestling. No, I'm not going to punch.

I don't believe you.

Thank you. I was going to say, Marab, you are full of shit.

You're full of shit. No way. Not a chance. Honestly, though, your regular game, just your normal fight style, you go out there, you put the pressure on, you're attacking the takedowns, you're just smothering people and exhausting them. That almost seems It was like, you got the best style to beat a guy like Sean O'Malley, to really shut down that distance, his range, and that sniper mentality that he has. You might be the best guy in the division to shut down. I feel like going out there and striking with him, probably not a great game plan.

Technically, you're right. Stylistically, I had to beat him in wrestling, good cardio, close the distance and the clinch. But I still respect his striking. Even Aljo was supposed to beat him for the striking. Even, he was supposed to beat him, too. But we all see sometimes not always best fighter wins. I think I'm a better guy, but I have to respect his striking. If he got me, if he land me. I have to respect in striking, but I believe myself. But still, I respect every my opponent, especially him. He's a champion. He has a competence. He has a reach. He has experience. He has knockout power, he has a good technique, good coach. I have to beat his coach, too.

Oh, you got to beat the coach. Let me take you back. Anaheim, California, UFC 298. You're in the ring with Henry Saoudo, the King of Cringe, the former Olympic wrestling gold champion. You pick him up in the air, walk across the ring, and then slam him down. How good did that feel, beating Henry Saoudo at his own game?

I was happy to beat him in the ring, but I have so much respect for Henry. I don't know. Sometimes when you look your opponent lose, then you love him, you respect him as a fighter. Sometimes I'm not... I wasn't too much... I don't know. It was like with Josiah Aldo. I love Josiah Aldo when I beat him. I wasn't too much happy But yeah, I'm in the MMA. Olympic wrestling, maybe kick-boxing champion. But we are doing MMA. The MMA fighter is the best. So I'm a MMA fighter. This is MMA. And I have a good MMA. Maybe if I'm wrestling against Hane Saoudo, of course, he will beat me. But I'm happy that what I'm doing. I was happy. But at the same time, I feel bad for Hane Saoudo.

You seem like such a thoughtful guy to even consider something like that where you feel bad for him just because of what that loss meant for him and Jose Aldo, to be fair. What win are you most proud of? Which one where do you sit back and you're like, you're just really happy with yourself?

Good question. When I beat Russian, Peter, yeah, because that guy is bullying.

Is it because he's Russian or because he's a bully?

No, I mean, because of He's Russian, no. Because, yeah, I don't like Russian politics, but I know everywhere is good people, bad people. I'm not saying because of Russian. Of course, he's from Russia, and Russia occupied Georgia's 20% territory, and that his country is enemy to my country. My country are very welcome to every country. But not only that, because he's an Italian, he's just a crazy guy. He's a bully. Even I met him five years ago in Texas somewhere in the hotel. He was bullied. He was looked at me like he wants to kill me. I'm like, Bro, he won't for me.

Mirab, I'm just texting my producer, Brian, if you're listening to this, and I hope you are there. On Mirab's Instagram, there's a video of you guys having a party in the car, right? There's a lot of fun going on. You're in a car filled with water. Can we just play that video? Because not only is Sean O'Malley in that car, I'm pretty sure Peter Jan is in that car as well. He's in the car. You're talking all this shit. Is he in the car? Was he in the car?

No. No. Yeah. That's Jan. That was Jan.

Was that a lookalike or was that him?

I think that's a mask.

Yeah, that's mask.

You little shit. I'm not pulling the bull off of my eyes. That's Aljo.

Whose idea was it to put the water in the car?

That was me.

Yeah, that was me. Whose car is that?

My Rob.

Okay. Four years ago, when I first I came to Vegas, and at that time, I had only maybe four or five fights in UFC. And I was making money, but not big money. And I buy this car. And first, I rent a couple of times car. I was staying here two weeks, three weeks, and I realized the rent was expensive. And after I buy this car because it's a mini van, all my All my partners, all my gears, everything is in the car. And after, when I decided to move here, of course, I changed car, but I don't sell this car. I give my other friend. And so now this car is It's still my friend.

It's the party boss. Let me give you some advice. Here's what you got to say. And I'm not saying this, but you've got to say for the fight with Sean O'Malley, and I'm a big fan of Sean's, By the way, I'm a massive fan. I like him, and I think he's tremendous. You got to say, American mixed martial arts suck. Iliya Toporia, champion. Giga Jikadze is going to be a champion. Marab, you're going I'm going to go out there and smash one of the only American champs left. You got to say, Listen, the sport has moved on past America, guys. Okay, you all fucking suck. I'm going to smash Sean O'Malley, and you're running out of American champions. I'm telling you, that will hype that fight. All right. And that will get Sean O'Malley's attention. By the way, disclaimer, not my words.

He said, No, no, no, no, no, Mike.

Yeah, you just got to stir the pot a little bit. All right, Murab, go on.

We are immigrants, but we have big heart, of course, but we move United States and we learn good technique and we learn good things.

Of course.

Yeah, America is great.

Oh, no, it's amazing. I love living here. It's incredible. I'm just having some fun. Murab, thank you for your time, brother. When the fight gets booked, let's do this again. But thank Thank you for coming on the show. Thank you for finding the better Wi-Fi. And thank you for the entertainment online. I'm telling you, keep those videos coming. They are funny.

Okay, we'll do. Thank you so much for having me, guys. It's been my pleasure. When I will get booked fight, please bring me here again and I'll be more than happy.

Yes, sir. My man.

Thanks, Marab. Take care. See you, buddy.

See you, man.

The machine.

I love that guy.

You go out there, you beat him with a hudo. Yeah, of course, you have respect, but you're allowed to enjoy the moment. You just beat him with a hudo. You beat him at his own game.

Yeah. I can't imagine what it would feel like knowing you lift him up and you got this Olympic gold medalist, and you're about to hit that score, too.

Yeah, exactly.

I got training partners that are division one All-Americans. And anytime I get a takedown on one of them, as soon as we hit the mat, I get the takedown, I'll always go, two, just to give him a bunch of shit.

When I fought Chael, he out grappled me in round one. He got me down in round two. But then in round three, we had a scramble. I pushed him up against the fence. I pick him up, I get the take down. I was like, let's go, baby. I got one back. All right, today's episode is sponsored by Betterhelp. That is professional counseling done securely online. It's designed to be convenient, flexible, suited to your schedule. You just fill out a brief questionnaire, and then straight away, you are matched with a licensed therapist. So therefore, you can start dealing with your issues. Let's be honest, we've all got issues, and speaking to a therapist is the best way to try and help yourself, help your loved ones, and get onto the right path. You become a better version of yourself, for want of a better word. The problem is, therapy in itself, I always say this, that can be quite an anxiety-inducing process to go through. With better help, as I say, you just fill in a brief questionnaire You get matched with a licensed therapist, and you can do it at your convenience. You just sit on your phone.

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As I say, you just fill out a brief questionnaire and off you pop. Designed to be convenient, flexible, suited to your schedule, betterhelp. Com/believe to get 10 % off your first month. That is betterhelp. Com/believe. Shout out, Murab. Thank you for joining us. What we were talking about, Dias and Masvidal. So listen, well done to Nate Dias. I thought, because the narrative, certainly in my mind, and certainly to a lot of people that I've spoken to, was like, he's done, he's washed up. But after that performance, and yes, I understand why Masvidal was annoyed, But Díaz went for it and he fought for that victory. Yes, you can carve out an argument to why Masvidal should have won, which we highlighted. But well done to Nate Díaz, and well done to Masvidal. Masvidal looked phenomenal. And I think now Nate Díaz has just given himself a ton of options. He said it on the microphone. He wants Leon Edwards. Highly unlikely, but still, Leon might want that. Jake Paul came out, called him a hole, called him a bitch. I don't understand. What do you think Nate Dias, ducked, that's the wrong word, didn't take up the offer of $50 million to fight Jake Paul in MMA?

Because I think that Nate Dias is such a real, like he says, he refuses to fight for the PFL. I don't think he'll fight MMA for anybody but the UFC. I think that's what I think that's what it is. I don't think he... Because he still talks about wanting to come back to the UFC. That's where his heart is.

Isn't that weird? Isn't that weird? As many options as he has, he wants to come back to the UFC because that's where you get paid really good, guys.

You're a UFC shill.

That's true.

That's what they're going to say. But look at Nate. He's out here making millions of dollars boxing and still wants to come back to the UFC. Every time he talks after a fight. That's what he talks about. He wants to beat up Jake Paul, and he wants to come back and fight for the UFC.

I'll tell you this. I got to say as well. Sorry, go on.

Don't say if that doesn't... A guy like Nate Dias, who has proven it time and time again that he's as real as they come, that he's as much a fighter's fighter. I know a lot of people hate that saying, but when it comes to Nate Dias, it's true. He's through and through an O. G, has all the options in the world, can do whatever he wants or nothing at all, and he still wants to come back and fight for the UFC.

Yeah. And I'd love to see him back, but I will say this as well. I just want to say, again, well done to both men, because you see guys step away and they want to do their own and all the rest of it. But that was like a co-promotion, right? It was game-bred. And what's his thing called? Real One or something. Real Fights Incorporated, I think, regardless. For them to get the Honda Center as a venue in the first place, And then to pretty much sell it out for 18,000 people to show up. That is an incredible achievement. The production was fantastic. It really was. It flowed along. There was a little bit of a delay in between fires. The pacing could have been a little bit quicker for my opinion. But again, I'm splitting house.

That's boxing.

Yeah, that is. They should speed it up a bit. But all in all, the production was fantastic, and they had some very nice wing girls and some nice people putting on a great performance.

I wish they would have marketed it earlier a little bit better because I didn't realize it was coming up until just a couple of days before. Some of that is me staying off social media a little bit, so I probably missed it, but I didn't realize it was coming up until right before, or at least hadn't thought about it. I I knew it was coming up.

No, it's because the day got changed several times.

Yeah, and I remember the day got moved. So I think they could have done a better... They would have made a lot more money had they marketed it a little bit better and been able to get a little bit more visibility I had no disability on it before. But as soon as I bought it and tuned in, you pay 50 bucks for a product that you're not really sure about. I went through hell to try to find Chael and Anderson's fight. I think I watched it on a stream from someone's cell phone in the 47th row.

Did you regret it?

No, because I feel like those are two guys that deserve your attention. If they're going to fight, you should probably watch it just because they deserve it.

Oh, yeah. No, I don't mean from my perspective. I mean for all the bloody.

It was such a pain in the ass.

All the undercard fights, everything. You're like, Just give me Jail and Anderson for fuck's sake..

You know what I'm saying? Yeah, it was a pain in the ass. I was going to buy it no matter what, just because it's... Some of it's just my loyalty to MMA legends and the O'G's. If they're going to take the time to put on an event, then because of who they are and what they've done, I'm going to buy it. But you're like, throw 50 bucks or something. You don't know what it's going to be like. Then when it started, I was like, oh, shit, this is legitimate. There's some really good boxers on here. The Vargas kid, I've been hearing about him for a while. That was cool to watch him fight. He was fighting Ryan Garcia's brother. There's some legitimate boxing matches on there. And then some legends with Pettus and Massmeral. It was cool. I just think if you marketed that a little bit better and just had more time and not had to switch the dates and all that stuff, I think they could have probably drawn a whole lot more money on the pay-per-view side because it was worth it.

There's some pretty cool people around It was a VIP area as well. It was Quincy Rampage Jackson, Brian Garcia was there.

Did you see? I guess you didn't see it. So Rampage does a little interview. During the... The pay-per-view portion starts. They have one fight, and then that lady who's going around interviewing the famous people in the crowd, stops and talks to Rampage. And she says, All right, you got anything else left to say? He's like, All right, don't miss it. Make sure you buy the paper. But he's saying it on the paper view portion. Anyone who's watching it has already bought the paper view. He goes, Well, yeah, they're watching. He goes, That's how the interview ends because he's stuck because he realized he got up. But it was like a typical Rampage. It was so fun to watch.

Yeah, but knowing Rampage's personality, he probably did that on purpose. Probably. He does that stuff.

It was fun.

From one boxing event to another boxing event, all the way over on the other side of the world. Brian, can we play this video? So Darren Till went up against Muti or something. I don't even know what his name is. I'm not doing the research. I saw a little bit of the buildup, Darren Till versus this guy. They were getting a little bit nasty leading up to it, talking shit. They had to be separated. And then the fight stops. And we're not going to spend too much on this, but let's have a look here.

That goddamn bomb.

Oh, that was nothing. You're a bomb. That was a tiny, tiny, little, tiny rabbit shot to the back of the head.

Look at Till, though. Look at Till physically here. That's what I took from it. This guy's a pussy. This guy's a coward. But Till looked incredible physically.

Yeah, but this guy is a pussy and a coward. So this is the fight ending sequence. They're in round two. Brian, can you show the brawl that ensued afterwards, please? So the fight ends because he can't continue because he's hurt. So I think he thought they would probably give it a no contest, but they gave it to Darren Till, right? Because he won the first round. And then the guy attacks him after the bell. Well, a second ago, you couldn't continue, Moody. So which one is it? Can you fight? Can you not fight? Check this out, Darren front kick.

Oh, wow. He tagged him with that left hand, too. Yeah.

No, no, no. Keep showing it, Brian. Keep showing it. Keep showing it, please.

Man, Daryn looks like a savage. Look at him.

Yeah, he needs to work on the take down defense, though. Darren, come on.

Still can't stop He got taken down. God damn it.

That's what everyone's going to be saying. They're like, Yeah, Darren looks good. But he did get taken down with a single leg defense. Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ. Well done, Darren. We'll get him on the show, maybe. We'll have a quick chat Anthony, are you going on holiday this year? Vacation?

Yeah. I'm going to the lake. I'm going to ride my Razor in the mountains and hills of Wyoming. I think that's it.

I'll be going off to Maui soon. But the reason I bring this up is not so we can discuss and compare vacations and stuff.

I was about to ask you about your trip and what you were going to do. I was getting excited there.

Oh, no, no, no. Well, I went to Costa Rica, but I've been all over the bloody place. I'm going to Manchester, come back next day, fly off to bloody Maui just for a quick week. But when I'm there, I don't expect people to give me shit and protest against me being there because I'm a tourist. The reason I bring this up is that's precisely what is going on in Barcelona. People are taking to the streets of Barcelona. Hold on, Brian. People are taking to the streets of Barcelona to protest and complain and the squirt in water, all the tourists and stuff because the sick of the streets being so crowded, the sick of the property prices going up. I'm sure they don't mind the economy that they bring with them. I'm sure they don't mind the hotels being full, the restaurants being packed out every night, all the street vendors selling loads of shit, but they're not happy about this.

I wonder how the government feels about them protesting that.

Play the video, please, Brian. Images of people protesting in Barcelona against tourists. One of the reasons why they're so upset is that they believe that there are just too many tourists, especially in the city center, and that many parts of the city, particularly the center, are now catering almost exclusively to tourists and not to local people.

Something else that local people are upset about is the impact that tourism is having on housing.

They feel that the high number of short term tourist apartments in Barcelona is pushing up rental prices so that local people simply can't afford to live in the center in many cases, and they're having to go out to other parts of the city to live. The mayor of Barcelona has said that in 2028, he plans to revoke all the licenses Wait, what license is he revoking? Airbnb licenses, basically.

I mean, if you want your town, your area, to end up being a ghost town, and then maybe you can afford to live there, but there ain't nothing else there. The tourist is fine somewhere else.

Well, tourism is great for the local economy. I understand people... The Airbnb thing is an issue because that pushes up local rent prices. I get that. That's a whole different thing. Tourism Listen, it's a thing. If you live in a beautiful place like Barcelona, I've been there. It is beautiful. If you live there, people are going to want to come and visit. I was down at Newport Beach. That's why my face is so red. I was out at Newport the other day on the beach. Absolutely feeling packed. I wish there was no tourists, but that's just the way it goes because it's a beautiful place. As we said before, can't be cake and eat it. You want the thrill of the victory? You got to do the shit in the training camp. If you're going to live somewhere awesome and historic like Barcelona, corner, you might have to put up with a few people coming to visit here and there.

Yeah, that's absolutely crazy. I understand it, I guess, because I don't want a whole bunch of people just moving into Omaha and taking it I don't know, that would suck. But I don't know. It seems messed up to be squirted with squirt guns. People are just trying to go somewhere beautiful, spend money in your local economy. What happens if there is no tourist? I wonder what I wonder what the economic effect of no tourists would put on Barcelona in five years. Well, probably- If they stopped getting tourists.

Yeah, it did take a big hit, but I think it would be fine because Spain has got a decent economy in general. It's not like one of these Greek island towns where it's just seasonal for a few months a year. There's a massive influx of European travelers. It's not a place like that, but still, there's a massive amount of tourists. I was there last year or was it the year before? It's awesome. I recommend it highly.

I tell you what-What would you have done if they squirted you with water guns when you got there?

I would have said, thank God, because it was boiling. It's not the best form of protesting. Let's cool it. It's July. It's 31 degrees celsius. It's about 94 here today. It's pretty hot where you are, I'm sure. Barcelona, probably very similar. You're walking around in a nice, Lucy-gucey shirt that's nice and free-flowing. Somebody squirts a little water on you. You're like, Muchos gracias, amigo.

They're like, Please give me more.

Yeah, you're an idiot. I mean, nobody wants to go somewhere, and it's absolutely jam-packed, but come on, get a grip. It's fine. Speaking of tourism, I went out on a boat the other day. Hired a boat with the family.

Yeah, did you fish?

I wanted to fish, but it was a yacht, not a boat. And they said, Rods aren't allowed. No, I know. Then we got some family over from Australia. So we'll do something nice, do something special. So we rent a nice boat for the day. And we had a lovely day. We go out on it and get some some. We had some paddle boards and shit out in the ocean. Had a lovely day. It wasn't cheap to rent, as you can imagine. We get there, we get told, pull up, be there at the dock at 11:45. The captain will be waiting for you. He will greet you. The boat, it was like a 60-foot yacht. It was very amazing online. I thought he's going to be standing there with his little hat on. Hello, Michael. Part of six. Right this way, sir. Step on to the yacht, maybe hand you a nice, refreshing cold water, something like that, right? I'm waiting. 20 minutes past. And I've had this up to the max to my brother-in-law. Do you know what I mean?

I'm like, Oh, this place is- Yeah, just wait.

I'm like, Just wait till you see this boat. It's shit off, right? We're there, 20 minutes past, 25 minutes I'm like, What the fuck? Where is this guy? Anyway, all of a sudden, nice big boat pulls in. Then a party of about 35 people all come off the boat, shit-based, drunk, Messy people, babies, diapers, shit just everywhere. They all walk off the boat, right? And I know for a fact already that that boat is going to be a shithole. And then the guy And I said, Is this the booking for Michael? He goes, Yeah, welcome aboard. I said, Is the boat clean? He goes, Relatively.

Relatively. That's what he said.

That was his answer, relatively. I'm like, What do you mean relatively? And he goes, I don't appreciate you using bad language at me. I said, I don't appreciate renting out a dirty boat where I've just seen bloody 5,000 people walk off with babies in diapers and all the rest of it. And then he goes, Well, Well, all right, let's start again. We're going to be together for an afternoon. I said, It's not your fault. It's not your business. You don't run it. You're just the captain. I get that. I said, It's just a little frustrating I'm late, and now you're telling us the boat's relatively clean. I said, We paid for a clean boat. We walk on this, towels everywhere, there's shit everywhere. There's drink holders all over the place. We like empty beers and cans and shit. What would you have done?

I'd have been pissed. I'd have been pissed for sure, especially because not how you expected it to be. You didn't expect a frat party with babies. I didn't get off of it.

They had babies.

Yeah, I'd have been pissed. I'd have been pissed. So what did you do? Just deal with it?

No, nothing. I just... With the family there and stuff, I didn't want to cause a big scene. And Rebecca's family, they're all very calm and very chill. Inside me, I'm like...

You're going insane.

This is bullshit.

But How often did Rebecca stare at you? Just waiting for you to freak the fuck out?

No, she didn't because I handled it pretty cool. I was like, Okay, I don't want to let myself down. So I just internalized it and we got on there. We cleaned it up. I had to clean the shit up. And now they're hustling me every day for a review. Really? I hate how these companies do this. You pay for a service, and now they want me to go out of my time, give up my time to do a survey and leave a review. Is that if I leave a review, bro, it's going to be a bad one.

You're not going to like it. No. You should tell them that, though, and say, Listen, I'll do your review if you want, but it's not going to be great.

You ain't going to like the words that come out of my mouth.

What's the name of the company? Tell us. No, I'm not. I'm just joking. Don't do that. I was like, Don't do that.

I'm not trying to mess up people's businesses. But if the milk turns out to be sour, I'm the pussy to drink it. All right, so Alex Pereira. We're not going to talk about... In fact, he did have a good win that night. I'm sure you'll agree.

I thought he looked great. Yeah, it was incredible.

Before you go too far, Alex and I have this very cool relationship.

I think it's very, very cool what we have going on. And now I lost and he wanted to be the champion, whatever. Maybe there is nothing there ever. But we're very I think just competitive in general. But when we're in person, I thought it was so cool how we have this... We have a lot of respect for each other because it's not awkward in person. It's really not. It's a head We're not acknowledgement. We don't talk or shake hands or anything like that, but we have no problem standing right next to each other in a room. We did media together, not together, but in the same areas at the same time. I think it's really cool how, although we have this competitive thing, I don't want to even say that it's a negative thing, whatever it is, where we go back and forth from time to time. His team has always been so cool to me before, like when it was just Glover and I wish I could remember the guy's name, but Alex is main guy. And then Glover and his wife, they've always been super cool to me. It's always been an embrace when we see each other, super respectful little chit chat.

Even when it's all of them, Glover's his coaches, and Alex together, everyone still acknowledges me. They're still super kind to me. I don't think it's unfair of me to speak about him as a fighter, and then we get all this riled up nonsense. I think it would be unfair of me to not say, on the flip side, how in social situations or when we're in person, how super respectful he is and how kind his team and coaches and all those people around are. Even as kids, they had video game where he's playing the UFC game with his kid. His kid's using me, and Alex is using himself, and it knocks me out that it was on the embedded episode. Really, really fun and funny little episode. His kids were like, high five and fist bump. It was like tongue in cheek. It was all fun. So I just want to say that. It's unfair of me to only talk about him as a competitor. Everything's always cool with us in person.

Yeah. Listen, Glover's a share. You guys have a good relationship. But Glover is like his coach, and not only that, he's a very close friend. He's a mentor of his as well. So just because you're in a division, there's always going to be competitive rivalry. Most of the time, even if you're at the top of the food chain or another guy is right on the bottom. If you're, oh, shit, my screen saver just went red. So my redness picked up a touch there. I got to change that on the settings. It does it all the time. Now I have fields of red. I don't know how to change it. So my complexion has just gone off of tone. Anyway, yeah, Glove is going to tell him, No, Anthony is a good dude. It is what it is. But speaking of Pereira, Anthony Joshua, did you see this? Anthony Joshua came out. I think it was last week, and he said, Anthony Joshua said, Alex Pereira should make his boxing debut one day. Pereira came back and he said, I'm honored that you think so. It's always been my dream. I'm 37. I cannot make a career in it.

So who do you recommend I fight? Anna, number one, it's great to see somebody like Anthony Joshua who's definitely top of the food chain, pretty much. He's certainly top of the food chain. Pretty much, he's right up there. He's one of the top heavyweights, recognizing his greatness and certainly his ability. That's amazing for him to see. He's very humble of Anthony Joshua to say that as well. And great recognition for Pereira. Did you also see the video of Pereira sparring that boxer?

I did. It's been a while, right?

Yeah. Was it Pavekian? Brian, just bring that up. It was a good, good sparring session. It was really good. But what do you What do you think about that, Pereira in boxing? Yeah, I think- Hypothetically.

Yeah, hypothetically, I think that he could be super successful. His earning ability in boxing would be huge. I think there'd be some fun fights and matchups. I mean, it wouldn't be the same as just an MMA fighter coming over to boxing. I mean, he was a striking specialist only first. So I think that that's right in his wheelhouse. I think he would do well. He definitely has the power to change the game, even if speed and a little bit of slickness that comes with those high-level boxers, I think he can mitigate a lot of that with his power and just his aggressiveness. Honestly, his mentality really is what sets him apart from everyone else. Obviously, he's got the punching power and incredible striking, but his mentality and his fight IQ, I think that's something I've never given him enough credit for. Even watching the Prohasca fight and watching the warm up that led to where the knockout was, How he'd seen when they put both fighters up on the screens and they're moving around in the locker room, they show you on the broadcast before. He even picked up something he's seen that thought that he wanted to throw a switch kick at some point in time in the fight.

I just don't think I would give him enough credit for his fight IQ up to this point. So I think he would be just fine in one of those competitive boxing matches where he's only got two things to worry about.

Yeah, I'm just looking at something here because another one of Pereira's former opponents, who's also a big name in the world of striking, but I'm talking about kickboxing, Artam Vakitov. He's a guy that fought Pereira twice in glory and defeated in both times, I believe. And he's talking about maybe making a transition over to mixed martial arts. He said that MMA for me is always something that interested me. I'm obviously very motivated by the prospects of getting that trilogy match with Pereira. He's a superstar now, and I'm happy for him. He goes on to say, though, that Pereira's biggest weakness is that he's all attack and he has no defense. Because of his lack of defense, he's open to taking a lot of punches to the head if he faces a skilled striker. You saw that in his second fight with Adesanya. He got caught because he leaves a lot of openings for people who know what they are doing. And I mean, that's great words from him to say, because, of course, he has a victory over him. I think it might be one-one, actually. Who knows? Of course, he's going to say that because he's trying to replicate the path of Alex Pereira.

And any kickboxer on planet Earth, I'm getting redder and redder by the bloody minute. These fields are getting darker. You can't see them. It's my screen saver.

I was going to say, you look the same to me.

No, bro, it's just all red. Anyway, any kickboxer is going to want to replicate that path. I mean, Israel Adesan, you did it the old-school way. Izzy came over to keep MMA from kickboxing, got his wins, got some high profile knockouts, talked a good game, elevated his stock, became the champion. Pereira came over, as we know, was on his track because of the two wins over Izzy. And now, if you look at him, outside of McGregor, he's the biggest star in the sport. He's making a shit ton of money, millions of dollars every time he fights. So of course, somebody out there that's beating him in kickboxing box in, he's going to be like, Bro, I want a piece of that pie as well. What do you make of that situation?

I think anybody that's been competitive or got to win over him probably thinks, Well, I could go over there and do that. I just don't think So I think that he's very unique in what he was able to do. I don't know that it's going to be that easily replicated because he's competing in jiu-jitsu. He's way more well-rounded now than when he came in. And honestly, some of that is credit to some of the matchmaking and him being fast-tracked. He was able to win the fights doing what he does best already while in silence working on the rest of his game. I think it's going to be tough. I think it's going to be tough. I did like how he acknowledged that he's 37, and so he couldn't make a career in it. I think that shows a lot of self-awareness. So I don't know that anyone could come over into MMA right now from kickboxing and get to him before he's potentially done. He doesn't seem like he's the guy that's going to be around for a long time.

I was just trying to change the screen saver if it seemed like I wasn't listening. I was listening. I think people underestimate because, of course, with his alignment with Glovo Sechera, he has been working on this for a long time. Is he a high-level black belt? No. Does he have enough of an understanding to be able to compete with somebody like Jan Blahowicz? You had him in a couple of situations, of course. For this guy, Arton Vakitov, he's going to have to do a lot of work. I'm probably pronouncing his name completely wrong.

How cool would it be to see Alex Pared shoot a takedown past someone's garden, choke him? That'd be terrifying because then what do you do?

I guarantee he can do that 100 %. You come around and you be around mixed martial He's a high-level athlete. He's a major success in other sports, kid boxing. Your brain is hardwired to learn shit. So 100 %, he does that stuff in training all the time. He just doesn't need to do it in an MMA fight because that's not his strong suit. This guy here would have to go off for Kitov and do years of training, at least two years.

He's too far behind.

At least two years of training to be able to compete. Because before you got a shot against Pereira. You got to go through a few of her people. Just like Pereira had Michalidas, he had Bruno Silva, Sean Strickland before he got to Israel Adesanya. He had some legitimate wins. So it's an interesting one, but still, I'd like to see it, though. I would like to see it. Have you seen that, Vakeetov? Have you seen footage of him? Have you seen highlights? I have.

I've actually seen the highlights of him fighting Pereira.

Yeah, he's a bad motherfucker.

Yeah, it's scary. It's weird watching someone do to Pereira what he does to everybody Yeah, it was weird.

He's a scary, scary dude. All right, this episode is sponsored by Hexclad, which is going to revolutionize the cooking experience in your kitchen because Hexclad has changed the cookware industry with the all-in-one hybrid pan that gives you the convenience and cleanup of non-stick, the versatility of grandma's cast iron pan, and the durability of a lifetime. Yes, that is correct. This pan, or the pans, or the cookware has a lifetime warranty. So whatever it is that you're grill in your backyard or maybe you're cooking up a storm for a fancy dinner party, Hexclad has got you covered with unbeatable performance and style. And yes, this is endorsed by the great Gordon Ramsey. So you know this shit's going to be good. Hex Club Pans, I'm very lucky they sent me some, and we absolutely love them in our house. First of all, no chemicals, none of the non-stick stuff. It's like the old-school cast iron pan, except it's very lightweight. It looks great. It doesn't It doesn't heat up. It doesn't burn your hand. The pan itself heats up very, very quickly. Super easy to clean. And Rebecca says that the food tastes even better on that.

She says, The more you cook on it, the tastier stuff gets. I don't know about the science behind that, but she's the one that does most of the cooking, and that's what she says. So if you go to hexclad. Com/believe, you're going to support the show, but you're also going to support the cooking experience in your kitchen, and you're not going to take on all of those toxic chemicals with the non-stick pans. Trust me, you got to get rid of that, but you want to do it still with the convenience. You want to do it with a lightweight pan. You want to do it with a pan that isn't going to burn your bloody hand, and you want to do it with a pan that is endorsed by the great Gordon Ramsey. One more time for 10 % off, go to hexclad. Com/believe. Hexclad. Com/believe. Speaking of scary things, there's scary prices on a lot of designer goods these days, Anthony. And I know you like a little bit of Louis Vuitton. You like a little bit of... You like some trendy shit.

Yeah, a little bit more shoes, but yeah, I do.

I don't really go in for the labels. I used to like some nice shit, and I still do like nice shit. I only buy nice shit if there isn't a big logo. Can't stand the logo.

You know what I mean? Yeah, I totally agree. That's why I don't buy a lot of super fancy designer clothes. Maybe I got a couple, I don't know, Gucci shirts or something like that, but they're real small logos. They're not crazy flashy. I'm very similar.

The only T-shirts that I wear with a designer's name on his helmet, Lange, not because I want to display helmet Lange on, who's not like some big, big, big. It's not like Gucci or anything, but the great shirts, and they don't shrink, and they fit well. That's the only reason I wear those. But the reason I brought this up, Harrington, he will be able to tell you more. There was a lawsuit recently in Italy, and a big fashion house, it was uncovered that they don't pay a lot of stuff. Shock, horror. They don't pay a lot of money for their goods. This is going to blow your mind. Yes. The investigation was for a number of these fashion houses, but specifically, major penalties coming against Dior. When it was found out that their purse worth nearly $2,800 at retail is being made in a Chinese factory in adverse conditions for as little as $57.

Wow.

Yeah, and the adverse conditions as well.

I can only imagine what they are. What does that look like?

Sweatshops with children working in them. Yeah, with the fucking kids. Which is utterly disgusting. And listen, business is business. Capitalism, good for them. You know what I mean? But $57. I guess the problem is when you're talking about a brand like Dior, you have a reputation. You have a certain level that you hold yourself to and prices that people expect to pay. Just because they get it made for $57, that's probably because, and I'm not defending them, by the way, But that would be because they've perfected the craft of making them, of producing them, of manufacturing them. They do it for so cheap because they own the factories and all the rest of it. Of course, I'm sure the conditions are terrible, and that's absolutely disgusting, but they can't lower the prices just because they make it so cheap. If they lower their prices, it would lower people's impressions of it being a luxury brand. Do you know what I'm saying? Which is a weird thing.

The $57 thing It doesn't bother me as much as the adverse conditions. If you can get someone to pay $2,800 for a $2,800 bag, then look and do it. I'm all about business. I'm all about business. I get that. But the conditions and sweatshops and kids and whatever that means, that bothers me. If you can make it for $57 in its respectable work conditions, then congratulations.

How would you know, Brian? Just try and Google what that means. Terrible. Terrible work conditions. Chinese sweatshops. I mean, what are we talking about there? I haven't done a deep dive on any of that stuff, but I would assume it's ridiculously long hours in terrible conditions for next to no money. And then they're selling it for 2,800 a bag. I mean, in that point there, they've got absolutely no excuse to make the working conditions a little bit better. Add to that the safety concerns with a lot of the stuff being done in those factories. So there's like a governing board that's making sure that people are wearing gloves or have eyewear on or those protections that a worker has about working in conditions like that in America. It takes me back to working in factory Factories, man. You worked in factories, Anthony? Yeah. I used to hate it. What's the shittest job you've had? We've probably had this conversation before.

I worked at a meat packing plant. It was... I I don't like being cold, so it was freezing cold in there all the time because it's all raw meat. Packaging raw meat on an assembly line, it was terrible. You just smelled like it was an overnight shift. Smeled like raw meat all the time. It was freezing. The pay was decent, though, at least for the time. I was doing okay.

Yeah, no, I've worked-What about you? Yeah, no, I've worked. I've done that exact job. I've worked at a meat packing place. Then I got upgraded to be in the It's a little autumn. And for me. Do you know, I don't know what you call them, like lampshades? Do you know lampshades that are corrugated? And they're really deeply made. But if you take those off the lamp, they compress, and it's just like a piece of plastic. And the job was, you got this big, massive box of these big pieces of plastic. If you pulled them apart, they were lampshares. They just need to put it in a circle. And you had to grab one, put it in a machine. One lever would clamp it. The next lever would put a hole in it, pierce a hole so you could put it through. And then you just unclamped it and put it in an empty box. And you would do that all day long.

Oh, my God.

And to make it even worse, you were facing a wall. There was a wall about a foot in front of you. So you just got your back to everyone all day facing a wall, 12 hours of time there just doing that shit. Behind me, there's a big, massive factory. There's a lot of stuff going on. There's a few of the boys, a few of the lads. It might have been one or two sit birds working there. They could have turned the desk around, but no, they had us facing a phone wall, 12 hours a day just doing that for minimum wage. Shit.

Yeah, I worked in a meter, a factory that made gas meters that go on your house. And there's this one little piece, and it was a tiny little metal piece that was shaped like a dog leg. But at the end, it had this little spot for a screw to just lay on it. And then on the other side, I had one full box. I'd have these boxes of these metal, tiny little inch long dog legs, and then an inch screw where And then I would put the dog leg in one little template, and the screw in the other template, where it was just overlapping it just a little bit. And then I'd have to put my fingers in these sensors, and this machine would come down really fast and solder those two things together. Then I would take that piece out. Now it's just one piece and put it in the empty box. And then I'd go... Same shit, 12 hours. One dog leg, one screw, fingers in the sensors, and then take it out and put it in the... I mean, thousands of those things over and over and over. Oh, my God. I just want to jump off a fucking bridge thinking about it right now.

Yeah, but times like that. And by the way, I was just trying to change this screen, say, because you can't see it, but I look so red because it's just red. Anyway, I'm going to do it after. But this is why. Think back to those days, Anthony. Think back to being in that factory, busting your ass, 12 hour days, minimum wage, utter shit. Don't get me wrong, there's a lot of people in those situations, and you always want to bet See yourself in life. But it's situations like that, and I'm not making an excuse for you. But that's why when you look at it through that lens of where you used to be to where you are now, you just went out and fought. You earned hundreds of thousands of dollars. And the worst thing is, oh, shit, maybe I'm not going to be the champion. When you try and look at it from that perspective, you can look at it in a positive manner. You know what I'm saying? Don't forget those days.

I had a couple of those moments. So over the fourth, I had this quick little work thing I had to do on the fourth. And so I took my family to Vegas with me on Wednesday. I don't feel like being in Vegas by myself on the fourth of July. It's one of my favorite holidays. I'll just take the whole family. So we go. And on Thursday, that morning of, I go and get in this, not me bragging. I'm just explaining to you guys my mentality. We go and get this-. We get one of those poolside cabanas at the MGM. And so I get the little cabana that's just drinks, and there's all the kids drinks, and all these food. It's just food and drinks, and me, my family, one other family from Omaha. And I remember sitting on the couch and looking out, and my kids are just running around. They're having a blast. They're jumping in the Lazy River. They're having the time of their life. And I was just being a bum because I'm just all in my feelings. And I was like, what? Am I allowed to be sad? Look at the life I'm living.

Well, then I go, I walk out like, all right, I'm going to go swim and just forget about all the bullshit. I'm going to swim and hang out with my kids. And some kid that worked at MGM, like it was working at the pool, comes up and say, I'm a big fan. Can I get a picture? Blah, blah, blah, blah. I was like, yeah, yeah, yeah. So he pulls his phone up and got a video going. And I was like, Hey, it's on video. Because people do that sometimes when I'm taking a picture.

I hate that. I hate it.

I hate it. I said, Hey, no, it's a video. And he hits Start Recording. Right as I finish saying, Hey, it's a video. He goes, Oh, no, it's fine. I wanted a video. Chama. And pulls me. I'm like, you're a asshole. So the camera, he shuts the camera off. I was like, You're a fucking asshole. I was being super kind to you. Number one, Alex Praer doesn't know who the fuck you are. Number two, I'm here with my family and took time out of my day to take a picture with you. You're a fucking asshole. He said something like, But don't forget where I am right now and what I'm doing, and you're at work. So I'm getting off. I was so pissed. I was so pissed.

It's like when I go into some restaurants, you go into a nice restaurant and the girls on the desk at the front of the restaurant, and they're normally Normally, if you go to a nice place, it's normally attractive young girls, and they're on the front, and they're so snobby. They're so snobby. Not always, but a lot of the time, they can be. Or You are like when you go into a nice clothing store, like we were talking about before, and the staff, they look down their nose at you. You can just tell. Maybe I don't dress to show everyone that I've got money. This is a Lulu Lemon I'm in shirt. Could it be me a Gucci shirt? Or was it really? There you go. Lulu's. It could be a Gucci shirt very easily, but I'm not a douchebag, okay? And just because I'm walking around that store doesn't mean I can't... It doesn't I have no business being in there. But first and foremost, you're working here. You definitely can't afford it.

You can't afford to shop here.

Stop looking at me like I'm the dickhead.

Right. That shit drives me crazy, too, because then you do go I'm in there and no one will help you because they're like, Oh, he's not buying anything. I got a black eye. I'm wearing gym shorts and tennis shoes. Like, oh, he's not buying anything. Yeah, I was going to. The black eye is fair enough.

I remember after I fought Anderson Silver, we went to Rome. And after the fight, because he got me with a good knee and he opened up all kinds of cuts and stuff, I had about 20 stitches in my face and a big old China and scratches and shit. My face was a mess. And we went to this beautiful We're going to a hotel in Rome, and we're going to nice places. We're doing the touristy stuff and sitting for nice lunches and stuff like that. And I look like a thug of the highest degree. Do you know what I mean? And everywhere I went, every time I sat down and every time a waiter would come over, I would always say, I think MMA is getting more popular in Italy now, but I wasn't sure in 2016 if they gave a fuck. So I had to explain. I'm like, Just so you know, I'm a professional fighter. I had a fight at the weekend. And my My wife was like, You don't have to explain anything. I'm like, I don't know, babe. I got to do. We're going to get thrown out of this restaurant in a minute.

Anyway, it could have been worse, Anthony.

It could have been.

Because you could have been punched in the face, been unconscious, whilst being in Poland, and then get kicked in the face. Did you see this clip, Brian? No. Roll this one. Where is this? Number eight in the notes. Oh, no.

Oh, Oh, shit.

Check this out.

Right-look at that right-hand, came from nowhere. Oh, my gosh.

The kick just propels him through the air. One more time, Brian. One more time, one more time, just because he deserves it. The poor guy.

Boom.

Let me ask you this, was that an illegal knee?

I don't think so. I don't think so.

I don't think so. They probably allow head kicks, soccer stomp, like some organizations do. You know what I mean? It could be worse, Anthony.

It could be that. It could be that. And I'm not that guy.

You could be that guy. Okay, let's have a look what else we got. Not much. Steepet says, He's not holding up the division. Should we talk about this real quick? Harrington, explain yourself. You put this in the notes. I did see this. To be honest, this is the way that Harrington puts it in the notes. Harrington puts it here. Steepay says he's not holding up the division, and anyone who says he is should stop crying. I saw this. I didn't think there was anything confrontational, but the way that Harrington puts it in the notes is like Steve Bae is being a dick.

I mean, look, can we let Steve Bae speak for himself and tell me if I'm wrong?

Okay.

Then John's and Tom's has been with each other. But objectively, how would you feel if you were in his shoes? You're the interim champion. It seems like you're just stuck waiting. Yeah, I mean, I get it. I mean, I feel that same way, but I'm not taking anything away from them. They're usually going to do what they want.

It is what it is.

The only one guy I want to fight is Jon Jones at the same time, but you'll see he can pick who they want to pick. People don't notice.

There's a couple of times where I was ready to fight him, and they gave them another guy.

What am I supposed to do?

But I'm not holding up any division like everyone says.

I don't care. Do what you want and stop crying. I'm not going to say he's crying. I'm just saying fans and stuff like that. I'll be honest, just because I feel bad for Tom. I've been crying a little bit.

He did say like that. To be fair, that is not the one that I saw. Again, I'm trying to change his home screen. Brian, is there a home screen that I need to change? Because it says it's the home screen. But anyway, whatever. Homescreen, screen saver. Are you working on computers?

No. I'm computer illiterate.

Real life. Anyway, Steepay, what do you think about that?

I go back to the same thing that I said about Tom when Tom was getting upset about the John and Steepay thing. That was the deal. So everyone always gets mad when the UFC switches up things and they change it and they don't stick to a plan. This has always been the plan. I don't think he's holding up the division because Tom's fighting in Manchester, defending Fighting Curtis Blaze and defending the interim title. Steepa would fight if John was ready. So if anybody's holding it up, it's John. And that's inadvertent. I mean, he's injured. Again, me and John aren't the best of friends, but the dude doesn't pull of the fights. He's not injured a bunch. I don't know. And he didn't hold up any division. He gave up the title when he wanted to sit out. So the guy's injured. I just feel it gives the dude a break.

Yeah, no, 100 %. The division isn't being held up. It's the fight, as you just said, that's always been said. Tom, it's created excitement. Let's be honest. Now, you're going to enter him in the champ. Now there's excitement. Now there's narrative. Now there's all this discussion of who's the real champ. That just makes it excitement. That brings more eyeballs. That brings more energy. That brings more money. That brings more interest, hype, whatever word you want to use. Now there's John Jones as the champ, and even my hand is red. You see the redness on my hand? It doesn't matter. There's John Jones as the champ. There's Tom Aspinal as the interim chap. And when they meet, that's only just going to make it way, way bigger. And then also from Tom Aspinal's side, If they hadn't done an interim Championship, Tom would still just be fighting any old fight.

He probably would have fought Pavlovitch and Blades anyways.

Correct. But now he's the interim champion.

He's getting paid way more money.

He's getting paid more money. And he'll be getting paid pay-per-view points. This is a perfect situation. They could have done Tom versus Pavlovitch just as a regular heavyweight fight because he wasn't even the main event. Pereira and Yuri was the main event. So Tom isn't complaining about it. I don't think Tom is crying about it. I spoke to him a couple of weeks ago on the podcast. Tom is very matter of fact about it. He's like, It is what it is. So what? I'm just training, I'm fighting. What do you think about that fight with him and Curtis Blades? Because I'm commentating it.

I'll be there for a couple of days. I won't be there for the fight, but I'll be there for a couple of days.

What are you doing in England? We spoke about this before. What are you doing there?

I'm just doing some ESPN stuff.

Okay.

But that weekend is my birthday, so I had already taken off.

What day do you get in?

Monday. So I'm there Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and I leave Thursday. Actually, the little tattoo, the tattoo feature I'm doing. I'm doing one of those with Tom.

Oh, very good. Very good. Go on, you were saying you were saying about Curtis.

I like the fight. I think it's definitely going to be now that we're going to get it completely this time instead of the abbreviated version we got the last time. I think it's going to be one of Tom's toughest tests. I think you got a full mixed martial artist in Curtis Blades. He's going to be hard to take down. I think Tom always has that check down where if it isn't going to be how he wants on his feet, he could always shoot a takedown and dominate there. It's going to be harder with blades. Not impossible because we've seen Jalton Almeida take him down repeatedly. So it's definitely possible that Tom can go in there and get a takedown if he wants I like the matchup. I like the size of these two guys. They're both really big, strong, athletic heavyweights that move well and move like they're lighter than they are. I like that because whether it's John or Steepay or neither, whatever, whoever, say John beats Steepay, he's got a... Either way, whether it's Blades or Aspinal, he has a legitimate athletic, large, fast heavyweight in front of him, and that's a big test.

It's going to be interesting because I do think stylistically, it is one of the toughest matchups that Tom has ever had. I don't think... You can't take anything away from Serge Pavlovitch, but after seeing Volkow beat Serge, it seems a little less interesting.

He seems less scary.

He seems less scary. And maybe that's because Tom beats him and knocked him out and it made him a little hesitant and all the rest of it. There's some truth to Maybe there is, maybe there isn't. But still, seeing Volkow go out there and beat him at his own game over the course of three rounds, it does. It makes him seem less scary. When you look at Curtis's blades, knockout power for sure, wrestling ability. Could he stop the takedowns? Probably. Could he get back to his feet? Yes. Could he take Tom down? Probably. I think where people underestimate Tom, though, is the punching power. We were all sold on him. He knocked out Serge. When He beat Marcin Prashnil, it was a one, two, he hit him with and knocked him flying across the octagon. So I think Tom's a better striker, but it's a really interesting matchup.

I can't wait for that one. I can't wait for it either. It's a fun fight.

So what are you getting tattooed in Manchester?

I don't know that I'm going to get tattooed. I might just because it'd be cool to get tattooed there, but I don't have a plan to right now. You're going to get a B. What's a B?

A bee.

Why?

The Manchester Bs.

Oh, okay. Maybe I'll get a bee. When do you get there?

The monkey bees. The monkey bees. When do you get there? The Mikey bees. The Mikey bees. I fly Sunday, I land Monday.

Okay, maybe I fly Monday and get there Tuesday.

Yeah, no, you'll lose your day traveling. Yeah. No, the bee is like the The slogan, what do you call it? Their mascot, not mascot. Okay.

Like their animal, their thing.

Yeah, they're their thing. We should go out with the lads. Get a little bumble bee on you. I think that would look good because you've got all the The toughness and all the fine samurais and skulls. You know what I mean? You got all that. And amongst all that madness, you should juxtaposition it with a cute little bee, a little bee, some little yellow stripes and some nice eyes and some little wings. I think that'll look badass.

Well, maybe some of the believers will send in some bee drawings. We'll get some suggestions.

Get a bee tattooed on you, you dickhead. What are you waiting for, Anthony? Call yourself a real man.

You don't have any bees?

He doesn't even have a bongal bee tattooed on him. I think we've bumbled on enough. Brian, do we have any questions this week? If we do, and if you want to send one, please send it into bympod@gmail. Com. What was going to say? Oh, make sure you subscribe and ring the bell, please. Subscribe. If you're watching this, press subscribe. If you're listening to this on Spotify, whatever, press subscribe. If you're somehow overhearing this while walking down the street and you're hearing this bit precisely, go on your phone, search believe you may on YouTube, and press subscribe. I'll send you a video question into bympod@gmail. Com. I mean, you just did the whole thing for me, but if you're listening to iTunes, Spotify, where did you find podcast makes you subscribe. Leave us a five-star rating. Positive video really helps on those platforms. If you're watching on YouTube, make sure you subscribe to the channel and hit that notification to find out whenever a new video drops in. If you want to catch over 500 episodes, you can't find anywhere else completely ad-free and totally uncensored. Head to gastigital. Com.

Use the promo code get 20% off. All right, we have one question here today that is playable, and this one is from Richard from England. This is actually pretty interesting.

Hey, guys. My name is Richard Fischer. My name is Richard Fischer. My name is Michael. I don't even remember me, but I got you to sign my leg so I could tattoo it on myself. I still welcome the rest of the BYM crew. I think this is, by the way, all of you. But currently me and my girlfriend are cycling across the UK, going from the northmost city to the southernmost city. I thought I'd just stop with that and ask you a question. I think the world is getting a little bit softer, but I think there's a rise in combat sports. Do you think that would collide and make them even out?

Or do you think the now generation will always want to hit better for the next generation?

Love the podcast. Take care. Cheers, mate. So I think he's going from Land's End. No, John O'Groats to Land's End. That would be-How far is that? It's far. It's pretty far, but we're not the biggest country. So he's going from the tip of Scotland, I think, all the way down to Land's End, the most Southern part of England. Cornwall. Beautiful place. What was his question? Because the combat sports is getting bigger and bigger and more people are wanting to fight. Does that basically mean that this generation is not as soft as what we thought? Is that what he's saying, Brian? Because you thought it was a good question. You've obviously watched it once or twice.

Well, he was wondering if... He's like, Because the world is getting softer, but the popularity of combat sports is rising. So do you think that the popularity in combat sports is going to bring an equilibrium to the universe? No. I don't think so. No.

No. No. It's a nice bit of escapism away from all the pussy footing.

It is. I think it's... No, I don't think that there's any real overlap there. I think it's just people found something that they like to watch. I don't think it makes you any less weak for watching it. Now, if there's more people doing it, like little kids, instead of playing football or basketball, as little kids, they're doing mixed martial arts, then maybe. But I don't think watching it is going to make anybody tougher.

The pussy futting. It's an issue.

That's a big issue.

It's an issue. Everything, you're pussy futting around everything. Talk to me like, growing up, if something went wrong, it was just like, Suck it up, get on with it, get up, stop being a bitch or whatever. Listen, I'm all for people I'm being taken care of, and I'm all for people being gentle and nice and caring. But also sometimes you just got to suck it up a little bit. I mean, your kids play a lot of volleyball. Do they get pussy-footed about? That's a bad term, talking about your daughters. Do they get molycottled?

No, not at all. But it's like, mine don't. But a lot... My kid just played at the National Volleyball Tournament just a few weeks ago in Dallas. And so their team is good. They finish top 16 in the whole country. They're good. But my kid is not treated like that. But are there kids on these teams that are treated for sure, that can't handle losing, they can't handle adversity, they fall apart? That's the biggest problem I've seen amongst a lot of these teams. Actually, Steph Curry was there, too, because his kid was playing in the same tournament. But watching these kids have some adversity in these big moments, in these big tournaments, and fall apart the way that they do, and then not be able to recover, it proves that point. I remember watching, I don't know, when I was growing up, I just felt like we were mentally tougher. You ran into some tough stuff and you just pushed through it. But my kid doesn't really have too many problems with that because she's used to having to be tough. And a lot of these kids just aren't. They're just not used to They don't know what to do when things get hard because in that a scenario, in a sports situation where your parents can't come out and save you or fix it for you or tell you you're great or whatever it is, they're stuck out there on the court by themselves, and they have to figure it out, and they can't.

And I've always forced my kids to, You got to figure it out. Things get hard. Life is tough. You have to push through this. I can't fix everything for you.

Yeah, it's a tricky one because as we become more developed as a species, as we learn more about the mind, and we learn more about mental health, then obviously we know that positive reinforcement and stuff like that is good for people. When we learn about the mind and the psychology of children and what they go through, they need to be told good things. You know what I mean? And I think that's just maybe just gone a bit too far. Obviously, now you've got new teachers, you've got young teachers graduating university, pushing all kinds of bullshit walk agendas to children and whatnot, which is crazy, right? Sometimes Sorry, what I was going to say was I think, though, it's not as bad as what we think, because I think we just see little snippets. Yes, for children now it's hard because of social media, and then they compare themselves to other people. But you would be a fool to do that, but children are children, right? That just says it all day. It doesn't mean they're an idiot. They don't understand that they're just seeing the best snippets out of people's lives. They're children. They don't understand.

They think that's the way people are living all the time. But I think I think in general, I don't know what it's like where you're from, but I know where I'm from. Life hasn't changed for most people. It's not like people are getting wrapped up in cotton wool. People are still living their same old lives. Yeah, okay. Granted, certain standards have changed and stuff like that. But life's just as tough. The people are just the same mentality. The sense of humor is exactly the same. They're not all sensitive little What's the word I'm looking for? Nancy's. Not Nancy. What's the word? Sissy's. There you go. They're all sensitive little sissy's. You know what I mean? They're not. They're just like normal regular people still getting on with it. So this whole theory that the world's going really soft. I think that's a little bit over-exaggerated. Yeah, life's hard. I don't think it's going soft.

I think all this shit, not as bad as maybe we're making it seem. I think maybe a little bit, but I think some of it, like brought up social media, I think we just see it more. I think that before everything wasn't as visible. I think all this shit's been happening. I think down to when we get in these phases where there's a lot of highlighting of police brutality and all these different murders and all these bad things happening. This shit's been happening. It's just we all see it now because we have access to the entire world in our hands. So we see more of it.

Yeah. And it's because the algorithm shows you that. And I know we've said this before, but you're right. If you watch something online, that algorithm is going to show you more of it because you engage with it. For example, here's what I'm getting a lot of. If I go on Instagram right now, I'm going to try. I'm going to try. It's going to show it. My brother-in-law sent me a video of Tito Ortiz saying the dumbest shit.

That's all I see.

So now my algorithm is just sending me, and some of them are hilarious. Now, I'm going to...

How far do I have to go? My best friend does the same shit. He sent me Tito videos. Here's what it is. Here's what it is. It's that 15 years right here. It's two decades. As long as my body lets me, but in my mind, I want to meet that 15 years right here. It's 15 years is two decades.

See, I I told him. That's all it keep showing me. It keep showing me. Tito Ortiz and Dana always comments on the top. It's always, My boy, it's hilarious. My boy. Yeah, exactly. Anyway, going back to what we were saying, if you're watching these videos of brutality or people getting murdered or racial attacks, racially motivated attacks. They're just going to show you more and more and more. I don't think it's really that bad. Anyway, Anthony, good to have you back, buddy.

It's good to be back, Mike. It was good to be back. I always feel a lot better after we get to hang out a little bit. I don't know, we just navigate through it and talk through it.

Don't worry. I can see your wife. Well, I don't know. I can see her, but I can see you.

No, she just... My kids just came barreling in here.

They're like, Are you still going on? Are you still on that little podcast?

They're like, You're still just running your mouth.

Waffling bullshit. Anthony, don't take a short notice, fine. Let's end on that. None.

Don't. Right you, no more short notice fights.

Don't do it. You got to run.

Yeah, you got to run. That's it.

All right, boys and girls, take care. See you Thursday.