Episode 672: Arman Tsarukyan forces the issue with Ilia Topuria
Prior to Arman Tsarukyan’s win over Dan Hooker on Saturday at UFC Fight Night in Qatar, we figured Tsarukyan was still on the outside looking in at the lightweight title picture. He’s long come off as a fairly nondescript, vaguely dickish yet undeniably tough guy who wasn’t offering much in the puts-butts-in-seats department. He’d already blown one title shot by pulling out of UFC 311 on a day’s notice — and the UFC still has Paddy Pimblett waiting as a more marketable and presumably far easier next opponent for Ilia Topuria.
But this performance against Hooker? A full-on beatdown. And maybe Tsarukyan’s spoiled-brat persona is starting to take on the air of something a promoter can actually use. The question now: Can Tsarukyan force Topuria’s hand? Will Topuria lose face if he takes a gimme fight against Pimblett first? And will the UFC’s preference for Paddy the Baddie win out?
Plus, Ian Garry keeps winning while somehow underperforming. And, of course, Conor McGregor has decided he is the great-grandson of God himself.
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1:17:43
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1:17:43
Episode 671: Islam Makhachev left JDM with no plan B
Yeah, so, Islam Makhachev is your new UFC welterweight champion. Not a huge surprise, considering the former lightweight titlist was a solid favorite to dethrone Jack Della Maddalena at UFC 322 over the weekend. What we maybe didn’t expect was just how dominant Makhachev would be. Della Maddalena had no answers — and, from the looks of it, no plan B. By the end he appeared absolutely miserable out there, getting taken down at will, while his corner seemed fresh out of ideas beyond, “Try to punch him in the face!”
You know who else is still really good? Valentina Shevchenko. She convincingly turned back the challenge of former strawweight champ Zhang Weili to retain her women’s flyweight gold.
Plus, just like Conor McGregor before him, Dillon Danis found out that some people don’t play. And Jake Paul is on a suicide mission. But does he know that?
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1:08:17
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1:08:17
Episode 670: UFC 322 is the big banana
It’s November in the UFC, and you know what that means! We’re headed out to Madison Square Garden with a fairly stacked card. UFC 322 features a pair of championship fights in its main and co-main events, where two reigning titlists will try to fend off challengers moving up in weight and looking to become champ-champs. We still say that? Champ-champ? Is that still a thing?
Your welterweight main event features surprise champ Jack Della Maddalena trying to make his bones and earn his respect against former lightweight king and unstoppable juggernaut Islam Makhachev. The co-main, meanwhile, features women’s strawweight great Zhang Weili moving up to try to take women’s flyweight gold from the legendary Valentina Shevchenko.
It’s gonna be a good one, kids — and it’s the second-to-last pay-per-view before the UFC moves to Paramount+ and (allegedly!) into the PLE era.
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1:07:41
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1:07:41
Episode 669: The UFC & combat sports enter ‘Plato’s Cave’
What’s even real anymore? That’s the question we ended up asking ourselves after last weekend’s slate of combat sports chaos. For starters, Isaac Dulgarian’s first-round submission loss to Yadier del Valle at Saturday’s UFC Fight Night sparked yet another fight-fixing scandal. At this point, you couldn’t blame a casual viewer for wondering: Is this whole shit rigged?
Also, there was referee Mark Smith’s bizarre stoppage in the heavyweight bout between Ante Delija and Waldo Cortes-Acosta — a mix-up that led Delija to believe he’d won, only for the fight to be restarted and Cortes-Acosta to immediately score a knockout victory. Whoops!
And that’s not even touching the boxing world’s latest drama: Gervonta “Tank” Davis getting booted from his fight with Jake Paul after new domestic violence charges, followed by Paul acting like he was just now discovering that Davis might be a terrible guy.
Oh, and Andrew Tate is apparently the new CEO of Misfits Boxing, a move that might be real, might be trolling, or might just be setting up a future fight with KSI.
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1:02:26
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1:02:26
Episode 668: UFC 321: It doesn’t get any more heavyweight than that!
How does Tom Aspinall still have an eyeball right now? Dude, Ciryl Gane went two-knuckles deep in Aspinall’s left eye (while pulling off the rare double-eye poke!) during their heavyweight championship fight at UFC 321 on Saturday. Gane might have Dundasso’d a little TOO hard, as his exploration of Aspinall’s cranium with his left index finger did get their bout declared a no contest, and yet, somehow, it still felt like Gane won the battle of public opinion.
The crowd booed Aspinall (naturally). A bunch of shitty MMA meme accounts made fun of him (naturally). Some former fighters came out and said THEY would’ve kept fighting (naturally). Dana White is talking about booking the immediate rematch (because of course). So, sorry, Tom, you got Three-Stooged and now a lot of idiots think you quit.
So, yeah, we thought the worst thing that could happen at UFC 321 was a Ciryl Gane victory, and then heavyweight basically laughed in our faces and said, “Hold my beer.” Plus, in the other two heavyweight fights, Jailton Almeida lost by forgetting to fight and Chris Barnett (literally) showed his ass.
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An irreverent and unscripted look at the week's mixed martial arts news from longtime MMA journalists Ben Fowlkes and Chad Dundas. Topics include the latest happenings in the UFC, Bellator and other promotions.
New Zealand