foreign half of the program that’s been
nominated yet again for best MMA programming Award of the year of the world MMA Awards one of our friends and
someone I’m very excited to discuss this upcoming Big UFC 293 card with one half
of the morning combat Luke Thomas welcome back to submission radio pretty fresh from a holiday may I add sir yeah
reasonably fresh I’m you know um three days now and it’s time to go
back well when you travel as a parent what they don’t tell you is vacation is just not really vacation it’s a trip
it’s a trip you know but uh I wasn’t exactly living it up uh you know getting
up at 6 30 every morning right 6 30 in the morning are you in like slave Camp not bloody holiday Jesus Christ dude the
pool the we we started this Airbnb which is really nice one with a great big deck it was super cheap it was like oh that’s
so great right because the dollar is really strong in South America and that there was also this a huge pool of this
community where this Airbnb was it didn’t open until 9 A.M my daughter just didn’t believe me so she would wake me
up at 6 30 every morning let’s go to the mother effing pool dog I’m like well yeah we got some time to kill you know
best is I went on a holiday the other the other time but we had to like hide in the living room at five o’clock so
the kid would sleep so we could get a little bit of takeaway and some time to ourselves that’s like the highlight of the holiday maybe we could watch a TV
show in our crappy Hotel TV that’s you were basically held hostage by your baby
son Dennis yes you just experienced the same difficulties in a new place you know
yeah you think you were in a prison cell sharing a seller than a big guy named Reggie or something like yo dog keep it
down in there man but it’s your son Jesus Christ all right how crazy is this
Luke that we literally just spoke about this last time right how unlikely Sean Strickland would be as like sort of a
future title Contender unless literally this exact situation and scenario fell
into place and now here we are man um I’m I’m curious what you think about this fight in terms of like the timing
and Sean stepping up on short notice and how that affects things we had Eric nextick on the show phenomenal guy and
he made a point and he’s like look it’s going to be hard whether you have five weeks to prepare 10 weeks 20 weeks it’s
Israel or destiny it’s going to be hard no matter what which I think being that candid you know I really appreciated
that but then also we had huge on the show and he mentioned how like Fighters
having momentum after their last training camp are going sort of straight into another training camp is that it
can be a massive massive advantage and something that doesn’t get talked about enough I’m curious what you think about
that man um and if Sean being sort of already fit and lean going into this fight you know
gives him any kind of momentum uh yeah I mean unless a few questions
packed in there so let’s go through some of them like what do I think of the fight even that you’re right we did discuss this and we ended up in the one
that we didn’t think was the likeliest but here we are so I guess part of the good news uh such as you can say it
would be that the UFC is Nimble enough that on a card that you know it I I could be mistaken I don’t know the inner
workings of zuffa but it did not look to me like this card received the same kind of priority and planning that other big
cards do and um or at least even frankly other Australian cards of a pay-per-view do uh so it just so after thought would
be a strong word but it it kind of they they were able to luck out in the end
with a guy and Sean Strickland who I don’t think has convinced most people that he has a genuine shot but for a
backup given everything else that happened uh it’s a pretty serviceable and pretty decent actually I would say
backup again with the context everything being what it was right a lot of other promotions would have had even a more
substantially downgraded choice in a situation like that the UFC has a bit of a roster they can lean on even in
circumstances you know and and I get uh criticized to maybe some degree fairly that I bring up fighter pay or if there
were monopolization of the industry all the time but I just don’t know how you can look at this and say this is anything other than the Monopoly having
So Many Masters to serve they cannot provide the kind of typically curated experience and the curated like when the
UFC is on they’re on I mean there’s no denying that so it stands out frankly when they’re kind of off especially for
a big market like Australia especially for one of the more preeminated champions in Izzy and especially for
um you know a moment in time you talk about momentum how about the momentum of Izzy right so this is a great time to capitalize on everything he’s built as
well and it just did not feel like at least in the North American perspective it did not feel like they put a ton of
priority on making sure that this event went off without a hitch now that being said in terms of what Eugene bearman had to
offer I tend to you know I tend to defer to Eugene on a lot he’s got a lot of Combat Sports wisdom and I really take
that seriously I mean here’s something to think about right so I’ve been spending much more of my time covering boxing and we had two different big
fights this year both of them are on Showtime boxing one of which was tank Davis versus Ryan Garcia and then the
other case
Spence Crawford what was the one key thing that a lot of boxing heads picked
up on that maybe I didn’t really realize in real time that was a big deal they both cited that bud Crawford the winner
and tank Davis the winner had basically tune-up fights in between there was the avenisian fight for Bud on the BLK Prime
pay-per-view which was a bit of a whatever but it it kept him in rotation and in the same tank Davis fought here
in my hometown against Hector Garcia and stayed fresh like a guy like a guy like
um uh Sean Strickland isn’t just always kind of in the gym and has a kind of style he doesn’t have to ramp up too much for but to the point that Eugene is
making to the point that you’re raising here’s the guy who’s entering with uh as again as Eugene put it with a
significant momentum with the a boost fight everyone kind of clowned it but dude that was a tune-up fight that was a
tune-up fight he doesn’t fight like a guy like Izzy but he was just in there he got good reps he got to work out he
got to go through the experience again got to make the walk you got to do the press conference you got to do all of that on basically much easier terms dude
that benefits a guy now in the end I don’t think it’ll benefit him enough that it will matter that he will win but
you’re asking like factors that could be in play that is significantly one brother I should say that is surely one
of them yeah I mean people don’t talk about momentum and belief and confidence enough in sports and we’ve seen a we’ve
seen that it really impact a lot of big games whether it be uh mma’s basketball football whatever it’d be a guy comes in
with confidence thinking he can get it done and a lot of the times he does because he believes it um and Sean is you know obviously
writing that way I’ve gotta ask you man like obviously Eric Dick said he spoke to us you guys look I’ve tried to figure
out this Israel puzzle before you know we had Brad fighting Israel in the past this is obviously a guy that Eric would
have thought about a number of times in his head what do you think is the game plan or could be the game plan that Eric
is thinking of here to uh you know give Sean a good shot at this yeah
um you know uh I’m glad that Eric is Sean’s
coach because I think that kind of answer is above my pay grade I don’t know
frankly what he could do um so like here’s the problem right so there’s basically two Sean stricklands
okay so the two of them would be the guy who pushes this is to me the the more consistent dominant one the guy who
doesn’t do a lot of cage cutting although he does do a lot of steering guys right you saw this in the abuse
megamera fight not so much in the first round but certainly in the second round it was what he was trying against peretta a lot of folks were like oh that
was such a stupid strategy well yes it was a very stupid strategy against that guy but that style of Sean more often
than not works out pretty well for him and in fact the other excuse me the other Sean Strickland is the guy that
will sort of absorb pressure you saw this one a little bit more in the Canon ear one and his guard will change a
little bit right so he’s obviously right-handed so he’ll have this one here and then this one’s kind of low it’s like a Philly shell and right what he’ll
do is he’ll he likes to have a rhythm where he’ll put his hands up to block he’ll lean out of the way he’ll throw and lean out of the way but he kind of
stays he kind of stays with you and kind of stays on you just Out Of Reach um
in when he does that he’s much safer and you saw that fight with Canon here go the distance for a reason but in that
circumstance he’s significantly less potent he just doesn’t have the ability to have the same kind of offense going
um when he he needs to and I think they’re really the biggest hurdle when I think about it is like he pushed into
Pereira right and he got left hooked for it but when you go back and you watch that fight you really begin to realize
it’s like one thing again as I mentioned Sean moves a lot right so he’s here and he’ll move a lot right it’s a big thing
that he does his hands are constantly in motion whether it’s a circle Perry whether it’s a it’s a rear hand Perry whether it’s a Crossing block whatever
he’s doing he’s kind of got his hands in motion and then he’ll fool you with the distance of his cross and he’ll fool you with the distance of his jab right he
it’s a lot of that the point I’m trying to make is he bites on a lot of faints almost as a style
right this constant movement where he’s kind of in there leaning out of the way hands are kind of all he’s transferring
his defense constantly man I mean do I need to tell you guys that
if you bite on a lot of faints against Izzy like that’s probably gonna go real bad for you right like he’s I don’t know
that he’ll get the same kind of result that Alex got but it doesn’t take a genius to say sure is he might play it
safe might be a little bit smarter there could be ways but this fight goes a little bit longer than maybe even expected into Championship rounds
potentially but it’s just very hard for me to see how he’s going to be able to land something of significance and land
more than the champ when the champ has basically all the tools to use against
either Sean Strickland and to take advantage of the very particular kind of
motion hand motion style and transfer of Defense Style with this kind of kind of crossing guard that he uses of Sean
Strickland like it’s like a uniquely bad matchup maybe not as bad as Pereira but like not far from that so you’re asking
me how do you overcome that um I don’t know it’s a good question I
honestly don’t know I’d be curious to see what Nixon Cooks up because he’s he’s one of the best for sure yeah I
mean I mean he’s uh he’s definitely the man for the job to get this done I gotta ask you this as well
Israel isn’t the type of he’s a professional when the fight goes down he’s not going to be deviating from his
game plan he’s not going to let anything affect him in there we’ve seen it time and time again and I know like some
people are really looking forward to this press conference as am I but that’s not going to have any effect on anything
that’s going to happen in the Octagon from Israel’s perspective my question to you is do you think Sean
um do you think it’s likely he’ll follow a game plan here or do you think he might get carried away like a lot of Israel’s opponents have in the past and
uh once it’s fight time things kind of go out the window a little bit well because he’s already said he’s like I
should I think he was saying to hell in here he’s like I should probably wrestle but I probably will not he’s already admitting like he’s not gonna go down
that path he probably should wrestle I mean of all the game plans that one seems to be the most likely now actually
Sean has better defensive wrestling than offensive wrestling his defensive wrestling is actually quite good it’s
actually very good um his offensive wrestling I I’m not exactly sure how good it is I have to have to re-watch the Jack Romancing
fight to to really tell us again I’m going to be more defensive wrestling but um sorry I got carried away on that but
in terms of the moment itself and following a game plan here’s what I actually think is the perhaps the most
likely is that I you know Eric nixik um who I also have a good relationship with but
he said this publicly was like you know that definitely was not the game plan that we had for Sean when he fought Alex Bonita like that was not the the walk
into him kind of approach that they wanted again and again I want to be clear not cage cutting just kind of following as a Pereira Circle to his own
left which made the left hook even worse but uh he said he just didn’t follow one and then I think he kind of had a bit of
a Goldilocks scenario with Cannon here where he was a little bit too uh adhere to it and didn’t quite have enough oomph
going in he’ll probably have something in the middle but I I really think this either is he’s going to land something of consequence and then basically just
close the show or uh he’s gonna frustrate Sean a lot and put him in a
position where he gets out of the game plan so I fully expect him to have one and stick to it early and Izzy’s not
gonna go you know marauding into him so it might take some time to get to that point but eventually dude you got a guy
who dude Izzy is one of the best at setting traps and making you think something is gonna happen and then none
of that happens guys have gotten wiser to it over time that is also true but again we’ve got a guy who’s got not this
kind of come forward here or come forward hairstyle where he absorbed and rolls or whatever and he’s got real good
movement about angles and he’s quick we got a guy who’s like decently fast but literally cross steps into position or
even goes front foot first where he’s like lurching into it between the leg kicking and the ability to set traps I
mean those are the two biggest things that Izzy does they both work very well against the kind of style that Sean has
so Sean he’s got a tough challenge I mean there’s just no two ways about it this is a very difficult fight for him
to win if he was to win where do you think this would rank in terms of all-time MMA offsets
big it’d be big and the problem is I lived through 199 when Bisping upset rockhold and obviously we all in
Australia dude how about Holly Holm beating Ronda you know yeah yeah yeah um that’s one of the biggest ones ever yeah yeah yeah yeah so like you know it’s
hard to put it up there but it would be huge I mean because consider this dude I think we all kind of thought after peretta beat Izzy the first time in MMA
we’re like I don’t know what’s gonna happen with this Championship Reign because or even getting back to it because we saw him at 205 it didn’t look
like a good fit against blahovich you know you couldn’t close the door on it but it wasn’t it wasn’t a home run right
out of the door right you can say that and now you’re like what’s gonna happen with perdeda but then he went back in there and figured it out for the for the
final time it’s I mean that’s just miraculous to take him off of one of the most insane
pedestals that a guy has put himself I don’t know how you guys feel in Australia because it’s going to be different but I will tell you here in
North America I’ve felt that Izzy is popular for a really long time and some of my colleagues have disagreed with me
you know saying yes he’s certainly growing in that way but he’s not really there yet but you don’t really hear a lot of that now you know him O’Malley
obviously and some other ones he really turned a corner here big time you knock a guy off of that pedestal when you
weren’t supposed to get it you got it off basically a tune-up fight at the Apex your style doesn’t really work for
this guy you travel to basically his neck of the woods and you beat him dude that’d be big that’d be real real
big you know give him his credit If he if he achieves that hey Jessica like we’re talking about the Press uh just
before and like a lot of people feel like that’s the part that they’re looking forward to the most right they they a lot of people see this is like
another Sonia win I almost feel like there’s pressure on Israel here like to get
um you know a spectacular win or a spectacular finish it almost kind of has like polar cost of vibes on it not in
terms of like rivalry or anything but like you know this could be another one of those ones but then Israel mentioned
I don’t remember in which interview it was but he mentioned how like the UFC and even like Ariel’s reporting that
like UFC weren’t super keen on this fight Israel mentioned how like I think the UFC were a little bit worried about
Sean embarrassing them or something like that and I’m curious like what your take was on that like why would there be this
concern all of a sudden just because like Sean Strickland has uh main evented cards before right albeit you know more
so in the Apex maybe they thought like okay maybe not as many eyes there but like he was part of that press
conference with like Pereira and Israel and stuff like from the UFC suspective why do you think they would have been so worried about
this one do you think it’s just like oh this is the grand stage it’s the Australia card like the world will be watching it’s a title fight or what do
you think it would be well um you know this is uh let’s let’s let’s be very
close okay let me talk you know wild and fun but he’s been that’s not new you know
right so on the one hand you’re like I don’t quite understand the UFC’s position yes many many companies might
be concerned about an independent contractor that they are working with who believes what can only be described
as some of the most outrageous A person can utter in the English language um but at the same time to your point he
has a podcast they feature him on yes smaller cards but that potato card that was the Izzy card oh that’s that was a Izzy and Alex card I guess Izzy was the
headline that was the canineer Izzy right that was the one that so they featured him on big cards had he won that he would have certainly kept moving
up the ranks you know and here’s the thing about the modern UFC I remember when you guys remember when um yoel
Romero right after I was at the Supreme Court ruling here in the country I don’t remember but he said no forget Jesus
some people thought he said no four Gay Jesus Remember a week or two later was when
the UFC made their debut with the Reebok uniforms and Dana White was asked by Earl hawani hey what did you make of
what happened with ul and he was like well you know it was a bit of a mistranslation or whatever but no one wants to hear your politics he said that
he actually said that and now you know the UFC is out there basically like literally can’t like like
I’m not trying to get overly political but Trump is under 70 plus criminal indictments and they’ve wheeled the guy out at a UFC uh show and like walked him
out into the arena like it was a whole thing like they they believe it seems like at least Dana White believes it’s hard to say exactly how far down the
executive leadership this goes but that they’re basically uncancelable they want to just lean into this not like promote
Sean as like their you know the brand ambassador per se but that having a guy
in the roster who says the things that he says this still can’t affect us because we’re just not going to give in to the kinds of pressures that people
give into but you know the Australian Market to answer your question is a little bit different like I mean even I mean Alex volcanovski is one of the best
fighters I’ve ever covered look at I mean I’m old dude I’m I’m 44 I’m old and one of the best guys I’ve ever
seen ever do this is volcanovsky and you’ve even got people in his local Hometown some you know low-level politician but they’re talking
about the guy Australia’s just in a very very different place when they can’t even accept one of the greatest Sportsmen that MMA has ever seen
um and so you can only imagine what folks in that market might pick up on given what Sean is saying but I just I
think the UFC you know on the one hand hey we don’t bow to the pressure on the other hand it’s like okay but it’s a
little different the game’s a little different in Australia um in the end they’re gonna just roll the dice I don’t think it’ll be fatal or anything but it
might result in a little bit of bad press along the way I guess we’ll see and by the way shout out to Volk who had
a baby daughter I believe it and you may be doing it just the other day and what a crazy ride that guy’s had I know he
would have loved to be on this card as well gotta ask man like speaking of this card do you think the UFC screw up here
with having Rob vs Drucker so close to UFC 293 like this is always literally
the biggest fear that one of these guys would win and then not be able to fight due to injury and now we’re in this kind
of weed position here listen there’s just no argument that they did a good enough
job with this relative to the kind of job we’ve seen them do with other cards of priority you just can’t make it you can’t make it
so to answer the question about whether or not Rob versus DDP should have been here that would have been one thing that
would have made this a lot better I think In fairness but it didn’t have to be that there could have been other moves that they had made along the way
about when they planned this and when they were going to go to this date and I know there can be tricky circumstances about how dates get selected and then
Things fall through when you have we’re looking at the roster again the UFC in general is pretty careful about these
kinds of things when they can be but there’s just simply no denying they did not give this the white glove treatment
that we know that they can and it ended up in a position where you’ve got a fight of questionable need as your main
event you’ve got a decent co-main event I don’t know how you guys feel about it and then the rest of that card is
interesting I think for hardcourse and certainly the Australian public I don’t know that it will sell very well um in
North American pay-per-view I guess we’re gonna have to find out just quickly on that I just wanted I know I
think I mean we’re going over to Sydney and hopefully we get a chance to catch up with Rob himself and see how he’s
doing but yeah what do you make of this position that this weird position that he’s in in the division right now because it’s like this is a guy that’s
fought Izzy twice now he’s lost to dracus it seems like there’s going to be a bit of work for him to kind of make his way back up to a title shot he’s
kind of beaten a lot of the top contenders in the division already there’s no doubt though that he’s one of the best to ever do it a middleweight
and arguably you know right up there in the top five of the best middleweights that have done it so it’s like but he’s
in a sweet position he’s almost in this liquid Vortex where it’s like what do you even do with the guy and where does he go next
um he’s the you know the heir I mean there’s been many heirs to this man but he is in the long lineage of the rich
Franklins you know I mean the disparity between Rich Franklin and Anderson Silva
was vast the one between Izzy and Rob is not as significant but in terms of what
they represent in the in the division and where they are in their career it is pretty similar like what do you do when
now again losing to dracus also makes you wonder okay well now you’re down a peg even from that right so
um it’s not even that comparison is a little bit too lofty in certain ways um I don’t know is the answer I think he
might have to get creative with matchmaking um I don’t know if he’s ever at all
ready to explore another fight at 170. um I obviously you know he moved on and had much better success at 185 but as we
know weight class change and reinvention can often it’s what Rich Franklin did he
had some epic fights at 205 and we’re knocking out Chuck Liddell having a fight against Force Griffin had a knock down drag out with was the Henderson
final 185 I can’t remember anymore but you get the idea he certainly played with the levels there and it kind of kept him relevant and he had some losses
but he had some good wins too even as he aged but Franklin was like a real big
middleweight you know who could easily transition to 205 at least relatively easily and be kind of somewhat on the
smaller end again compared to Forrest Griffin Rob is like a small middleweight so I don’t I don’t know to what extent
205 is really even doable although would anyone say that division is like
you know um being stable is that division even like what’s going on I
mean these good opportunities right there’s some good opportunities yeah so I you know you’re asking what’s the path
of 185 difficulty difficulty is the path I think he has to Shake It Up easier for
me to say than him for him to do I I certainly understand but trying to just fight it out at 185. the trick is you
have to get another big win and then once you get a big win you can convert that back to where you want to go but
you got to get you got to get something to get the people like okay let’s get this going right let’s get this going
however he can do that I think is really the the clear goal yeah gotcha man
gotcha uh speaking of clear goals and I’ll keep this super quick uh your kegel
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even if the man in your life is yourself treat yourself nobody better also UFC 293 talking about it right now where are
you watching it right if you’re not lucky enough to go there experience it live be there in Sydney uh if you are in
any other part of what I was going to say if you’re in Melbourne or anywhere in Australia you might be in other parts of the world our good friends are fans
will have you covered you’ve got to find a venue to watch it right you want to go to the pub the bar some venue but you
want to know all right how many screens are there is there commentary is there wi-fi can we get food what’s the ratings
like fans will have you covered they’ll help you find the best venue I’ll show you right now right here you got the
fixture out of Sonya Strickland you click on that and it shows you a list of venues and pubs and bars in your area
that you can choose from here we’ve got the Amsterdam langwar and the sporting Globe the Grand hotel hotel Brighton
Jose has the acai predictor I always forget which one it is but one of these ones has 50 screens so I’m gonna try and
find it right now no so the hotel Brighton has one screen the Royal Oak let’s see what the Royal Oak is packing
10 screens commentary service food Wi-Fi guard and projector outdoor screen I like it man what about the Grand Hotel
I’m really keen on finding this 50 screen bad boy right here uh all right
let’s just compromise 20 screens that’s enough screens for me 20 screens commentary service food Wi-Fi Garden
projector outdoor screen you’ve got reviews there and with one touch of a button I can check in I can book a table
I can rate them call them and add them to the map fans have you covered you’ll
be watching 293 or any other sporting events maybe the fifth World Cup maybe the Rugby World Cup all of that in style
isn’t that right Dennis that’s right man the Faber’s really heating up what about the AFL Grand Final as well and all the
big finals coming up around the corner I know I got the big Saint Kilda gws game when we’re over in Sydney for the UFC
I’ll be checking that out at a pub it’s really just a lifesaver in the ultimate venue finder click click the link in the
description and get started now you want to secure the perfect venue for the boys to have the Ultimate Experience when
history is made Cass that’s right all right Luke just getting back to you man appreciate your time and now just one of the last things we want to cover with
you just before we let you go um we I want to get your take on this because we had the great Eugene Berryman
on a couple of weeks ago and like a lot of a lot was made of his comments regarding triggers duplicity and
Hendrick is being injured and how basically like he missed his opportunity and now he goes back into the pool and
you know he may have to fight again and how what you just saying is like he shouldn’t be confident that he’s got the
next shot basically because we were sort of looking at it from the perspective of like so do you think drinkers would be next like is that the next logical fight
without looking to forward past Sean and he said look you can’t ever be confident
that you’re next you know in this UFC game the way the UFC works and I wonder what your take was on that how much do
you think it was just completely literal how much of that was sort of gamesmanship like the camp trying to
send drakeas a message and how much of it was simply you just sort of pointing out the fact that look man we’ve seen
crazy happen in the UFC and it happens all the time you know Welter away it was like Colby Covington
numerous times um so many other title shots that you think this guy’s gonna get it they don’t get it you got Paula
Costa and Hamza sort of looming like who who would have thought Sean Strickland would be fighting Israel at
UFC 293 you know for Hamza to potentially beat Paul Acosta and then maybe go in there and fight Israel next
that’s entirely possible and I know Israel mentioned the other day speaking of Mike Bonnie’s like time waits for no man and I don’t know whether he was
referring to drikas or whether he was speaking about himself in terms of like hey I’m 34. there’s things I want to do
in this sport what if I go to 205 and then for that reason you know Rodriguez doesn’t get that next title shot I’m
just curious like how you took that from huge I took it like the ladder that
you know it was incredibly triumphant for Izzy to win in beating potato in
this last fight I mean just again don’t need to go over all of us saw it it was it was monster monster moment but it
really creates some weirdness for UFC because it’s like well dude Izzy’s beating all these guys I mean another one is out there but in general
like you look up and down that list it’s like dude there’s not a lot of fresh matchups had another had potato one
there would be much more fresh matchups like if Colby had beaten kumaru when he had the chance it would have created
first matchups because Colby had done a lot of winning excuse me um Camaro had done a lot of winning in that division so he’s kind of back to a weird place
where it’s like okay this is you know this was amazing amazing moment but you know Sean Strickland again this is a
fight of questionable need I would put it that way questionable need and then you know to your point about his age I
mean you know Izzy is eccentric but the last thing he is is stupid I mean the
last thing the very last thing he is is stupid he says things that I’m sure people like or don’t like or believe or
don’t believe but in terms of his Clarity of purpose and his understanding of himself you know there’s not many
ever like him in the fight game so I took it like his time is limited in the sport but more importantly his time
in middleweight is limited I think he wants to definitely get another crack at 205 he’s been getting progressively bigger and more filled out over the
years the last time I saw him in person was the time he lost to Parana the one when he had the the fight in New York I
believe it was if nor New Jersey whatever place it was um you know so he I think is much more
suited for a move now than he was when he fought against blahovich there is something to be said for like well who
knows because someone could get injured in training and then drikas doesn’t get his shot and it could have been you know then you have to go right to hamzat or
whatever yes that’s all in play two but as a general rule you know this is in boxing like in boxing if you interview
like Derek James or you interview bomac or interview you know you name it um Bob Santos guys will tell you like yeah our
guy’s not going to take that fight they have sway over the process I have nothing but respectful things to say by
Eugene bearman it doesn’t it’s not personal to him or specific to him but any any coach even one is tightly
intertwined in the life of his fighter in the way that he is with Izzy doesn’t really have a significant degree of say
over the process just because that’s the way MMA works today now if MMA changes and it gets more like boxing then it
will have significance I’m just saying him being like oh well we might not do it I just don’t believe between the
management and the matchmakers in the UFC that that kind of stand if it came to it would last it has to be other
factors that might steer the process in a different direction before we wrap uh just want to quickly
highlight this so we’ve got uh cam uh roasting he’s gonna compete in
the Dana White contain Contender series and then UFC 293 ckb and Eugene bearman
they have they’ll be cornering six fights on the night you got Shane Young Blood Diamond Carlos albeck Kevin you
said Juicy Juice said who we saw in Hicks Tyson Pedro and of course Israel bad I mean
I think the night before I’m pretty sure they’ve got Eternal ever made the night before and we’ve seen gyms but what
people don’t understand is we’ve seen gyms get their opportunity to sign Fighters with the UFC and we’ve seen it
fail time and time and time again and it almost feels like every year on year ckb
just keeps growing and growing I mean what do you make of this remarkable week that’s coming up for the actual gym and
Eugene bam and Luke in one night he’ll be there 50 of the time that’s insane
yeah and then they’re not they’re not nothing fights you know you’ve got guys fighting for their job you got Israel
for the belt it’s insane yeah Alice alberg who’s on the cusp of being right in there as well in the
mixing 205. yep no doubt about that um certainly uh listened I I would say
you’re probably right to have concerns I’ve seen coaches do upwards of four I’ve seen or I should say yeah I’ve seen
up to four six is a lot six is a lot and then of course the night before but you know what’s funny too is like I’ll sometimes
watch fights out of Australia like boxing fights and I’ll be like like is that Eugene bearman in
the corner with this dude like you know he’s big in boxing he’s got his red boxes too yeah yeah so you’ll just
randomly see I’m like dude this is what this guy does this is what this guy does every week every day he lives it he
bleeds it I don’t think it’s like the best idea to like have six on the night
before but the two things I would say is one I I’m if Izzy loses I have a hard
time seeing this being the reason you know your reasons are usually Multiverse factored but uh you know because my
point really is if anybody can do it anybody it’s him I mean you know I just
don’t think you guys know this and I think a lot of you are Australian and and kiwi fight fans know this but like
you know again for whatever it’s worth I’ve been interviewing coaches for a long time dude they’re not they don’t come as smart as him very often I mean
he is a master of his craft he understands his students they understand him everything is locked in he I’m not
gonna say rules with an iron fist but he certainly gets the respect from his students quite visibly everywhere he goes they listen to him as much as they
need to uh I I think in general and his understanding of the fight game is like
I I really believe he’s ahead of his time I think the fight game will catch up a little bit obviously he’s as he
gets older and best practices get better you can’t hold on to whatever Advantage you have in the fight game forever but
you know make no mistake about it dude Eugene Berman is ahead of his time now in fairness Eric nixic I think is also just one of the very finest coaches that
we have so this is a battle of the uh Clash of the Titans but but you’re asking like could someone do six I don’t
recommend it I don’t recommend it but I feel like if I had to pick a guy out of a crowd of elite coaches who could be up
for the challenge Eugene Berman would probably be at the top of that list history in the making man this this guy
being able to do it nothing should have extraordinary uh extraordinary like you my friend Luke follow the man at Luke
Thomas news sorry Al Thomas news on Twitter and Luke Thomas news on IG checkout morning combat and all of their
phenomenal coverage leading into UFC what time is your flight Luke what time are you getting off the plane so we can crack open the bees in Sydney
uh oh yeah right I’ll be there in Brighton bushy-tailed at 9am yeah like this Cod I’m flying down oh yeah this
was a big priority for me yeah I wish you were man I wish you were we’ll post for another card stay safe in the
meantime man definitely get to vote for the man as well the awards yes congratulations
thanks Luke lots of love man bye
