Fitz Nation: Stories and Life Lessons from the UFC
Fitz Nation: Stories and Life Lessons from the UFC
Fitz Nation LIVE on Combat Sports, Media Evolution, and What Lies Ahead
Text me a question for the show
From the impact of social media platforms like Instagram and TikTok on entertainment, to UFC 295 speculation and retirement contemplation, we've got it all covered. We are breaking down the John Jones vs. Stipe Miocic fight and discussing if it could be the biggest heavyweight fight in combat sports history. We're also exploring the implications of potential retirements and the transformation of the heavyweight division in the UFC.
Lastly, we're zooming out to look at the global growth of UFC, the Performance Institute, and the potential of new markets like India. And for a bit of nostalgia, we take a walk down memory lane, reminiscing about the early days of MMA and how it's evolved to become a global phenomenon.
So join us in this intriguing conversation and let's talk combat sports, media, and what lies ahead for UFC.
This is a special presentation from UFC Fight Pass.
Speaker 2:Step into our world at UFCFightPasscom. Please welcome, from the FITS Nation podcast, brendan Fitzgerald.
Speaker 1:Hey, how's it going everybody? Fits Nation Live is coming to you on a Friday afternoon and I am thrilled to be with you. Let me shut off the speakers in my home office, my studio, and we'll see how it all goes. Okay, I think I'm good here now, wanted to have some fun with everybody, and I guess we could call it a bit of an old-fashioned format. Wherever you may be from, I don't know if they have sports talk radio shows still, they exist in the bigger cities and TJ DeSantis is running the board from behind the scenes and we thought why don't we fire up the phone lines and see if there's any fans out there that want to call in and chat about this weekend, about the big fights coming up, about 2023, about life lessons learned this year?
Speaker 1:If you're a fan of FITS Nation, you know that I like to talk a lot more than just about the fights going down in the octagon. It's a lot about the stories of these great athletes and coaches and people that make the UFC world go, and something that jumped out at me recently that really spoke to me when I started to think about it was when Dana White was asked about Laura Sanko. Laura obviously made her color commentary debut at the pay-per-view down at Sydney Australia and it was a big moment for the first woman to be on the call for a modern-era UFC broadcast earlier this year. She's done great things with the contender series and she punched herself all the way up to being on a pay-per-view broadcast crew. And when Dana White was asked about it and just saying yeah, she does a great job, but she did a great job. And he then comes through and drops the gem of if you know what you want to do in life, that really gets you a lot of the way there. Once you really are clear on what you want to do, then you can rest easy and wake up with the purpose driving you towards doing what you want to do.
Speaker 1:And I have dealt with, to be quite honest, being a bit of a professional rut at times, especially over the last year or two, with the nature of the job that I have changing quite a bit. I used to go on the road pre-pandemic. I was in big arenas, there were big crowds, I'd called some title fights, our fight nights were elevated to ESPN and obviously that's changed with the way of the world. During the pandemic, the Apex is a unique environment to call sports in. So I really sat there and asked myself take that to heart? Dana White saying if you really know what you want to do, then you can go after it. And really I never got into this business to call fights specifically or to be a play-by-play announcer.
Speaker 1:What I have always loved is the idea of having an interview show, a podcast, a talk radio show, and so I've kind of put more energy into the podcast recently and it seems to have been working out. Went live with Dracus Du Plessis recently. That was a great situation. I've got a lot of interesting guests lined up for the podcast and, as I mentioned, tj DeSantis, who's run the board, said why don't we go live? Why don't we do a live stream? I got this phone number, 917ufctalk, that has been underutilized for years and years and years and maybe we'll interact with the fans. Take some calls, texts, whatever you got. Call in and we can chat and we can talk about the hot topics in the world of MMA and beyond. Tj, you want to pop up on screen as my producer on air type of situation and the guy that's made this whole thing possible. If you guys knew the force at which TJ was ramming his head against the wall today to make this live stream possible. Tj, how are you doing?
Speaker 2:I'm afraid to speak right now because it just might all fall apart, Because the audio wheels were dangerously close to falling off.
Speaker 1:Pretty much. Yeah, tj, let's talk about this format though real quick. How did the phone number? And if anybody calls in, we can take calls, like, really right away. I don't want to hold it back, but you're from a bygone era and I know that these shows still exist, these calling shows, but certainly not really in the MMA or the UFC landscape. But I think it's exciting what we're pushing, our little engine that could up the hill right now.
Speaker 2:You know what the problem is, is everyone nowadays, for whatever reason, they just don't like to talk on the phone. So you can also text us. By the way, 917, ufc Talk takes text messages. I started an FM radio, brendan, and I have always enjoyed answering the request line when I was working on the FM, because you never knew exactly what you were going to get First off. I feel like I was about to say I'm going to shatter people's dreams here, but people listening now or watching now, they don't even know anything about request lines. But we had a request line. It was never like a valid request line. There was no request. You didn't ever call a radio station and go, hey, can I hear Metallica? And I'm like sure I'll put it on in four songs If that happened. It was just a coincidence, but I've always loved interacting, because radio is this. I mean, this is the thing. I still look at it as radio.
Speaker 2:I'm looking at a camera right now, which I absolutely despise, but radio has turned into television, but the medium of interaction, I think, has gone up and down at the same time, because you can do it like an Instagram live and people can drop comments in the chat and all that stuff, but people don't call anymore. And I still think like I remember listening to radio shows when I was a kid and falling in love with some of the listeners' personalities, and I feel like you don't really get that through text on a Twitch stream or anything of that nature.
Speaker 1:No, you definitely don't. And I know that I have some fans of Fitz Nation that will tend to comment and if somebody calls in I'll be like yes, they've kind of been around and listening. But, TJ, you're absolutely right. Tj, I wondered too, like ask you a question, Like, do you ever call anybody to order food anymore?
Speaker 2:No, that's another thing.
Speaker 1:It's like all Uber Eats, it's all app, it's all online. And sometimes I do call and people are a little off put. I'm just like, yeah, can I order some food? And they're like what? Yeah, they're probably.
Speaker 2:I guess you can Answering the phone to make sure that it's not their friend calling them at work.
Speaker 1:I'm like when do you get off dude?
Speaker 2:Let's hang out, yeah.
Speaker 1:And I read an article recently. This is kind of one of my crusades that I'm on this year, but it's kind of a weird thing. It's like anti-social. I went full anti-social media for a chunk of this year and I still am kind of like on the fence with that and what I've realized TJ is. I read some articles and they said social media is dead. Right, and on the surface you'd be like, well, what do you mean? Social media is dead. Instagram has never been bigger. Tiktok is joining the fray, all these things Right, but it's not social media anymore, it's media. It's media on a mobile phone. That's what the world has come into.
Speaker 1:I do not get on Instagram to keep up with friends and family and to see what they're up to. I don't do that, do you? No, that's not what it's for. It's for media. It's for news. It's for shows in bite-sized form. Yeah, it's for clips from a podcast. I can be a fan of the Howard Stern show without even subscribing to Sirius XM radio. Absolutely, and that's kind of what you know. That's what those platforms are to me. Now.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean, there are certain fights that happen that you don't have to buy the pay-per-view because the fight is 30 seconds and then it ends up on, you know, instagram or TikTok. Whether or not the UFC put it there is irrelevant, it's just, you know these bite-sized things, if it fits onto that 90-second mark. That's the way everyone consumes media and, like what we're doing right now, you know, there's this sort of long form show format, if you will. I hate to even call it long form, because what have we been on the air? Like 11 minutes, if that?
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:But like, this sort of whole entire episode is not really the end goal anymore.
Speaker 1:No, it's not.
Speaker 2:Like they're just going to be like okay, where's the 30-second clips that we can throw up on the Fight Pass Instagram, you know, and get a reality.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And that's what it is and like that's great. I love that people can just get blasted with all of this stuff, but at the same time it's like you lose so much in the you know wash if you will when you cut it down like that.
Speaker 1:Yes, I thought of having a segment on FITS Nation on the podcast, when I do interviews with fighters, called like you know, like the click bait segment. Right, be like, hey, say something outlandish and I'll clip it and put it on social media and let's like, let's see what kind of reaction. I haven't done that because I'm not really the hot take guy. I don't want to be hollow, I'd rather have kind of more substance to it, even if it takes building something over a longer period of time. But yeah, I mean, it's the world we live in.
Speaker 2:It's funny that you mentioned that, because when we started the first rounds on Facebook, pretty much at the beginning of the pandemic, we would notice that when we would just show highlights, that our engagement would go up right. So I started the segment at the beginning of every show where I called it clip bait, where I would just bait people with like fry and takiyama you know, people stop and see that. So, like I'll just hit John Jones.
Speaker 1:Let's go, let's go. You know, john Jones highlights Now people are like what's happening?
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 1:So here's the deal I want to know and maybe we could fire up that graphic that you made on John Jones Okay, way back in 2008,. We're 15 years later. But also, like, are we buying that? You know, we're about to see John Jones in his last UFC fight, 15 some odd years later, at Madison Square Garden, to defend his heavyweight championship. He's 27 and one. The one has a giant asterisk next to it.
Speaker 1:Right, like, in terms of the retirement talk, I believe win or lose for Steve Bay, this is it. I don't think he can get better than this. If he wins, if he beats John Jones I can't remember how old he is off the top of my head, but he's about that age and I don't think that he, like you know, I don't think the money would change his life really to defend that belt and I just think that Steve Bay, with the win, he'd be done with John. I think, with the win, I think Jones is going to hang around. I think he's going to defend the belt one time. I think there's too much money at stake.
Speaker 1:He signed what like a seven or eight fight contract before he fought Cyril Gondon at heavyweight. So the dollars and cents are all laid out there, and I just think that if he turns back, steve Bay is probably going to be a giant favorite against the winner of whoever they might rush into next Tom Aspinol, sergei Pavlovich, right up there, gialta now made a Jones is no undersized guy, as we saw against Cyril Gondon. So I don't know what do you think? You think they're both done, I think they're both done.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean, that's what we were talking about before we went on the air, is you know? I wanted to pose it to you by our cell. Jones and or Miochich will retire after UFC 295 because I think that we're definitely going to get one. I think winner lose.
Speaker 2:Steve Bay is probably going to walk out for the last time and leave his gloves behind, but I think Jones might as well, because you know, I understand there are some challengers that are intriguing in the heavyweight class for John.
Speaker 2:But I still look at John the way he he didn't look super motivated towards the end of his run at light heavyweight. I still don't really know what he looks like at heavyweight because it's real gone fight, you know, went so quick. If Jones goes out there and beats Steve Bay, who is statistically the best heavyweight the UFC has ever seen I mean you want to look at his numbers, they're pretty damn impressive, which goes to your argument and you know what is there for Steve Bay, you know, left to prove. If he beats John Jones, I think the rematch would be insane for him, you know, financially. But Steve Bay is a guy that like, do you see him really being motivated by money period, because I'm sure everybody wants more money, but I just don't think Steve Bay is a guy that's going to do anything he doesn't want to do.
Speaker 1:I think he has made his life changing money right and he lives in Cleveland, ohio and I don't think he's, I don't really think his lifestyles change that much with the money that he does have. There's something to be admired about that, you know and it's like a firefighter, like who still wants to go to work when you don't have to?
Speaker 2:Well, and why would you?
Speaker 1:why would you beat John Jones? You know the goat when you're the heavyweight greatest and so that would kind of put you in. You know that conversation in a certain respect. Yeah, and then why would you say well, if I make a lot of money, I can do this like you can't go out better than a win over John Jones as a heavyweight champion, be called the heavyweight greatest of all time, make a bunch of money. You don't really need money.
Speaker 1:Like he's not out there like McGregor trying to buy a yacht and start four different liquor companies. He's not that guy. So I don't think he puts it on the line like that. I think he puts it on the line against John Jones and I think this will be the last time. Are we sad if it's a John Jones retirement, thinking that Steve Bay is probably done? And I think we've, you know, kind of been prepared. Steve Bay has only fought once a year, if that for the last, like handful of years anyways, but John Jones like the greatest of all time. I mean, I was sad when Tom Brady retired because I was a huge Tom Brady fan. What do you think the MMA world reaction is going to be if we don't see John anymore?
Speaker 2:I mean unfortunately, I don't think it'll be as devastated as it should be. And that's just because John has been this guy, you know, with a lot of ups and downs in his career. He's, you know, left millions of dollars on the table because, you know, personal things have gotten in a new way and, you know, john Jones not being an active UFC fighter isn't all that strange to people.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I guess we've gotten used to life without him for a while.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that said, I think he's the greatest to ever do it. And if you argue that he's not, you're arguing because of like role model type of things, you know, mainstream athlete types of things, like all the intangibles that Conor McGregor has, that sort of elevates him to the the greatest of all time. For some people, john Jones has detractions. In the same manner, if you're arguing that John isn't the best to ever step in the octagon, it's because of things that have happened outside of competition. And yeah, I mean I don't know, no matter what I think, whenever John does call it a career, I'm going to be sad. And it's not because we won't see him anymore, it's because of how much we've already lost.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, it's a. It's a what could have been type of situation with John Jones that always will be in a certain respect, and like he just elevates an event like to a different level, like you don't really have to even do much in terms of promotion. I'm interested to see how much bigger it's going to get when the UFC put certain fights and certain events together. I continue to be surprised, knowing that you know the UFC were the best to put on big fights on a consistent basis. There's no question about it.
Speaker 1:And I remember thinking this past summer International Fight Week and Las Vegas, and then you know Volkanowski fighting Yaya Rodriguez, and then that's the headliner, and I was just like man, that's what we're trotting out for International Fight Week. I would have thought it would have been a bigger fight than that, you know. And then we had the flyweight title as the, as the co-main event. And then, sure enough, fight Week comes. Stuff starts ramping up. Las Vegas gets a little crowded, ufc X is kind of wall to wall with fans at the convention center.
Speaker 1:Trump's going to show up and all of a sudden, on fight night, I'm like, well, goddamn, this couldn't have been much bigger. Yeah, this couldn't have been much bigger. We own the sports world. Tonight it became this huge event and I loved Alexander Volkanowski, love what he stands for. Yaya Rodriguez is an exciting guy and in Mexico is, you know, obviously this blossoming country in terms of churning out highest level fighters. And you know it became a huge event and I just go. Well, there I go again. You know I was wrong. Again we can make big fights, so I'm really interested to see how big it's going to get in New York City with John Jones.
Speaker 2:I mean, that's the thing, too, and this actually goes to a text message we just got from Tim in Seattle. Tim writes and he says hey guys, where does this rank as biggest heavyweight fights in combat sports history, not just in the UFC, not just in MMA, but overall combat sports? I think there's something to be said about that, because for me, the baddest man on the planet is always going to be perceived as as a heavyweight. I think you know, when it comes to combat sports, I'm always going to favor a heavyweight mixed martial artist over a heavyweight boxer. So if you're the heavyweight champion of the UFC, mainstream sports and otherwise, you're the baddest man on the planet. You have the statistical greatest heavyweight to ever do it in steep John Jones, the greatest MMA fighter in history, in the world's most famous arena, Madison Square Garden. I mean, I got hairs in the back of my neck standing up right now.
Speaker 1:I know, and I hate when we go on recency bias and we just say that was the best thing we've ever seen on Monday morning when it happened on Saturday night. We always say that. We say it was Super Bowls all the time. But, yeah, it's hard to really argue for anything different than this one being the biggest. Tyson Fury, deontay Wilder was like a massive event. But here's the thing, and this day and age for boxing, boxing is now the niche sport, in my opinion, in regards to boxing versus MMA. Maybe it's because I'm so far down this rabbit hole and I don't watch a lot of boxing events, but I don't know. I just feel like the UFC just gets the nod in terms of making headlines across the sports landscape more readily than boxing does. And Tyson Fury's in the news. He's going to fight Francis and Gano and then he's going to fight again for the real fight that he's in in December. So I just think, yeah, like this one has got to be the biggest before this.
Speaker 1:You know, steve Bay fights in Gano and it happens in front of a huge arena and a bunch of fans. Then, you know, mate, in the rematch I'm talking about, obviously they fought in Boston, it turns into kind of a clunker of a fight because in Ghana wasn't ready for that. But if in Ghana and Steve Bay, instead of fighting in the apex with a few hundred watching in what was that? Early 2021, march of 2021, if memory serves then you know that would have been a monster event. But the world wasn't open the way it is now and also like that might have been the biggest to this point, if in Ghana was able to knock out Steve Bay the way that he did.
Speaker 1:But this one would have trumped it anyways, because John Jones is a bigger name than Francis and Gano will be and will ever be, at least in my opinion. Now, if in Ghana pulls an upset at Tyson Fury, then maybe the you know that conversation gets opened a little bit more. But you know, right now John Jones is one of, if not the biggest stars in combat sports history in the UFC's heavyweight division, the way that he moved up, the way that he dominated, like he did. If he defends his belt in New York City, madison Square Garden against Steve Bay Meech, yeah, you got to say this is the biggest matchup in heavyweight history and combat sports.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no, I think it's the plants Murko Krokop and Fedor Miliyanko as the greatest heavyweight mixed martial arts fight we've ever seen. It's a pride fight. I know maybe that's a popular opinion If I'm, you know, toeing the company line here, but you know, as a hardcore MMA fan, I remember thinking this was the greatest heavyweight fight that we had ever seen. It happened in, I think, summer of 2005. And don't get me wrong. There have been great heavyweight fights and intriguing matchups. Steve Bay has done amazing things statistically Again the greatest in the UFC but I don't know if I would consider Steve Bay the greatest heavyweight to ever do it. We'll never really find out. I don't know what a prime failure would have looked like against a prime Steve Bay Meech.
Speaker 2:You know, I think that some people will say that the heavyweight wasn't as evolved back in 2005 as it is today. I don't really think there's all that much of a difference between the talent in the heavyweight division from 10, 15 years ago to today. I think it's, unfortunately one of the slower divisions to evolve, but that largely comes down to the fact that these guys are 230 pounds. You know throwing. You know with lightning fast speed and you know things happen. You know, on any given night in any you know weight class. Someone can win in mixed martial arts that they land in the button that is magnified tenfold when it comes to heavyweight. So I think we have seen a lot more turnover there. But again, I do think that this steep Meech hitch in John Jones fight is bigger than Fedor and Croko.
Speaker 1:Well, yeah, and also the sport is so young that the conversation is constantly changing in terms of what it means and how big it is. I mean, think about 2005 compared to now and the platform that the UFC has. Last thing I'll say on heavyweight is, if both do retire, like TJ is inclined to believe the very interesting thing is like how they handle the heavyweight division going forward and like who jumps out and who becomes the name, because there's not really this giant marketable star at heavyweight outside of Jones. You could argue that Steve Payt isn't that marketable. I mean, he's kind of like resisted the social media and the you know being out there, right, and he's always done what's needed of him. He shows up at the press conferences but he's not a bulletin board material guy.
Speaker 1:And neither are the other guys coming up next in line Tom Aspinall, sergey Pavlovich, gail Tenelmeyda, curtis Bledes has been there for a long time. I guess Derek Lewis right, derek Lewis makes headlines and can mount a championship run, depending on who they might match him up against. But you know that's the development in the heavyweight division. Should both retire, I think we should soak in the buildup that's going to be over the next month or so, and it'll be kind of a sprint because you know Abu Dhabi is going to get a lot of headlines obviously in the next few weeks and after that, you know, we're only two weeks or three weeks away, I guess, from Madison Square Garden being the center of the sports world for a night.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I get another text, this from by the way, you called it to go more meta to have our show talking about media. People want to text, call in people. What is it?
Speaker 2:917? Yeah, 917 UFC Talks, so it's 917. Ufc Talk 917-832-8255.
Speaker 1:If you want to talk, then come on and talk, let's talk.
Speaker 2:But if you want to text go ahead.
Speaker 1:We encourage all forms of feedback. Go ahead.
Speaker 2:This one from the 310. He says you guys are talking about the evolution of mixed martial arts. We've seen some countries break out as of late. What about India? 1.5 billion people and we have yet to see an Indian star inside the UFC. When will it happen? That's interesting.
Speaker 1:So Anshul Jubli came off of the road to UFC last year, I believe. He's Indian and he fights in Abu Dhabi, I think, and so there's one of the early ones. And then, who was the heavyweight TJ that just fought? He was a wrestler and a heavyweight and he was a Canadian, he was Indo-Canadian, so not from India. Oh, arjun Buller, arjun Singh Buller. So he just fought recently, in the last five years, but he wasn't going to be a big star.
Speaker 1:What's interesting is I don't know if I'm supposed to, you know if this is inside baseball, but we're just going to have to ride with it here. You know, I know somebody that works at the UFC Performance Institute, I know plenty of people that do, and so obviously we're opening up a new UFC PI in Mexico and that's coming up this fall. And we have the UFC PI in Shanghai, china, and a few years ago they held like a combine, remember this? They held a combine in Shanghai and they're like let's see who gets to go to the program. We're trying to build China as a market. We're going to start chasing India, we're going to get into India and you know there's going to be some of that kind of treatment. Now there's no plans for a PI, but you know Shanghai will be kind of their home base for whatever comes out of India. But they're going to start actively building that market with people in our umbrella of like a combined situation to try to like develop that market.
Speaker 1:Get the best fighters they have. You know wrestling, they have fighting, they got athletes and they got a lot of people. And a lot of people means a lot of eyeballs. That means a lot of wallets and you know it's like why not? We're a global sport, let's keep building the business. And so if you say, what's next, how much more can we grow? India is a good point by whoever texted in. From what did you say the 310?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think that's LA. There we go. So you know, I look at the evolution and you know, obviously Khabib has been a great star for Dagestan and you know, I remember when I first got into MMA, podcasting back in like 2005, a guy that I did a show with named Jordan Breen was talking about the caucus nations of Russia. You know, and they weren't really on the map yet, there were a handful of guys that were, you know, fighting, but not to the level that they are now. And obviously we've seen an explosion. You know there are so many fighters that are, you know, cut from the same cloth as Khabib and you know Khabib is the greatest to do it at 155. Who knows what, you know, those countries are still going to look like here in five, 10 years.
Speaker 2:And you know, I just think that, you know, with the PIs going up, you just need that exposure and you get more exposure. You get. You know. I mean, look how much women have evolved since Ronda Rouse came in the UFC. And I think that that you know 15 year old kid is sitting at home looking at the television going. That person looks like me. That person I can live vicariously through this person. Wait, I can go to the gym. Wait, I'm actually kind of good at this, and all of a sudden.
Speaker 2:You know there's an explosion and you know where. There's one or two today, there's many more tomorrow.
Speaker 1:There's no more accessible sport. I was blown away by this. Once I started working you know, really starting to call fights move back to Las Vegas in 2017, went into syndicate, did some Muay Thai classes and stuff like that. And I was like oh God, yeah. So I did Muay Thai for a few and then, like you know, it came to sparring. It was super light sparring, so I'm going to sound like a major wimp when I say this, but, like you know, somebody just popped me right here, right?
Speaker 1:And I was still kind of new with the.
Speaker 1:UFC and it just gave me enough where I had to just make sure my tooth wasn't loose. I didn't have a mouth guard in or whatever and I'm like nobody knows who I am not that they would care, anyways. I'm not a do you know who I am type of guy, but just in terms of like hey, maybe don't give me a black guy. I got to be on TV this weekend and I was just like gosh, maybe Muay Thai isn't the one like right where it's like I thought I would like striking way better than grappling. Most people say that Most I would say you know people without a grappling background. You know, didn't high school wrestle and all that. They're like I don't want to roll around with a guy on the ground and do all this stuff.
Speaker 2:Right, I'm allergic to getting hit. Brendan, it caused me to, so it sounds much more manly, though.
Speaker 1:Yeah, but you don't think about getting hit, you think about hitting.
Speaker 2:It's much more manly to be like boom, boom on the bag.
Speaker 1:One. Two, right, stephen A Smith is hitting the pads and I could do it better than that. So, anyways, did a little Muay Thai just for a few classes, and then I just got hit in the mouth. I was like maybe I shouldn't really do a sport that could give me a black guy when I'm new, you know, when I'm the new guy. And then I started jujitsu 2019, liked it a lot more than I thought and I took the pandemic off. I took a longer time than than you know I normally would have. You know, obviously there was a bunch going on and we have a baby and all. There was a lot of different factors, but I've gotten the in the gear. I've gotten the key back on in the key in the key for the most part.
Speaker 1:And for the most part in the key on the road when.
Speaker 2:Yeah, On the road you know I don't pack a key. I put a key on one time, brendan. I put a key one time because I took a nap real quick with my own, they got to choke me out of my own. Damn no, thank you.
Speaker 1:No, that's like one of the early things that you just like trying to grab or whatever, and somebody just takes your callers and it's like, yeah, I haven't been put to sleep yet but, people like you.
Speaker 2:See you're more like I'm getting me.
Speaker 1:No, here's another thing. Speaking of you know who I am Nobody. Well, I shouldn't say nobody. I've never. I would have thought that at Extreme Couture, where UFC fighters are training 30 feet that way, and I'm saying hello to all of them and good to see you, and then I get on the Jiu Jitsu mat and theoretically, these are people that are into Jiu Jitsu, so maybe they watch the UFC. They would probably know who I am right, they don't know who I am. It's crazy. I'm just like you know and I'm like you know. It's a lot in my voice and not my face. That's on TV Often. I get that. But even the coach, even the coach like Nick Sick. Nick Sick was like hey, man, green light, this guy, anybody wants to, you know, tap him out, whatever. And he's just like oh, you know him from high school or something. And I'm just like no, I work for the UFC, I'm on TV, like every Saturday.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so you know, I mean it's you get humbled real quick. You get humbled, so I've. I've done a lot of Jiu Jitsu commentary over the last probably six or seven years with Eddie. Oh yeah, I want to get in on that TJ.
Speaker 1:Like that's a new life. Goal is to have you calling one of my Jiu Jitsu matches. Like maybe I get on that FBI, you know.
Speaker 2:FBI. Sure, I mean, you got to get out of that Get out of that.
Speaker 1:Come on, isn't there a GEE situation we could do?
Speaker 2:No, no, no, no, no, ok, ok, all right, I'll get it down the thing that I think is interesting, though, is when I first started doing Jiu Jitsu is, a lot of the community was like oh, this is an MMA guy. I'm like, yeah, but like, without Jiu Jitsu there would be no UFC. Like to me, Jiu Jitsu and mixed martial arts are one in the same. Like all combat sports are a cousin to one another. But for whatever reason, I think that over the last 10 years or so, the hardcore Jiu Jitsu community has kind of pulled away from mixed martial arts.
Speaker 2:It's kind of coming back. I think you know what the UFC and fight pass is doing with the FBI is really significant in bridging those two worlds. It sounds weird to me to say bridging those two worlds because again to me they're the same, jiu Jitsu. I mean the UFC was the paid program for Gracie. Jiu Jitsu. You know what I mean. It literally was the.
Speaker 1:I know the, so everyone started it, they're like I was a 150 pound guy. I saw this guy beat all the baddest dudes. Now what's now? What's interesting, though, is there is definitely a rivalry between the boxing world and the MMA world.
Speaker 2:It's gotten a lot better a lot better, A lot better, but for a long time I mean. The go to for me was oh, you know how many people die a year in boxing? A lot, Mm, hmm.
Speaker 1:You know how many people die a?
Speaker 2:year in the UFC. None Right, we're beyond that, I don't have to argue. The safety points of mixed martial arts yeah, but yeah, I think the issue is is you still have an older guard in boxing that, for whatever reason, they can't seem to either? A get over the fact that you know wrestling is a real part of combat and you have to embrace fighting on the floor. And they don't like it for many reasons. They always try to say it's barbaric. I mean it's too exciting, it's too exciting for them. I just that's the problem. My issue is this like you're going to tell me that wrestling and hitting a guy on the floor is barbaric when a guy gets knocked down twice and around and he gets back up and he's clearly out of it. But you go, go fight. You got to stand in front of this guy. Still, You're still here. I mean, yeah, it's combat sports, it's barbaric. We don't need to argue about the barbaricism. Is barbaricism a word? Let's go with it.
Speaker 1:I'll go with it, yeah.
Speaker 2:You know we don't need to talk about that anymore, but we're a lot, you know. One thing I think is interesting is what Dana is doing with this kid, callum Walsh. You know really blowing him up. You know he's fighting out there in Madison Square Garden and the theater a couple nights before 295. I think you have a lot of MMA fans that maybe haven't come over to the world of boxing starting to get turned on to Callum a little bit and paying attention. Maybe they're not watching live, or maybe they are. They're at least, you know, looking up the result and you know following him a bit. I think that's really important because I don't think we've really had too many people that have been an ambassador for mixed martial arts and boxing at the same time. And you talk to Callum and like the only reason the kids are boxers because they didn't have an MMA gym in Cork, ireland. You know what I mean.
Speaker 1:He would have been in the MMA round if it was there, but it wasn't. Yeah, because he came up and McGregor was blown up, right yeah.
Speaker 2:I think that we're starting to see this new generation of fans not really look at any sort of flavor of combat sport being, you know, a rival to one or the other. It's just like all right, I'll watch this. This is interesting and that's the way it should be. If you like mixed martial arts, you at least have an appreciation for every combat sport. You might just not know it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, exactly right, that's interesting, that jujitsu and MMA thing, like you say that, and so many people that get into MMA via MMA right, they don't come in from one particular combat sport and then get into it, like you know, like me, like my kind of first real experience, professionally and as a fan, and all this is into MMA as the UFC, and then I can appreciate the art of grappling and jujitsu and I can appreciate the art of boxing. But I will say, you know, when there's a knockdown of boxing, I'm just like, oh, it's just getting to the good part, why are you stopping? Right, it's just kind of one of those things.
Speaker 2:Yeah, but if you watch MMA and then you go and watch a single discipline, sport there's part of your brain that just goes like, okay, this isn't a complete fight. I'm not trying to say that it's not, you know, valuable, I'm sorry. I think the most brutal if we want to talk about brutal sports. I mean, you already talked about it Watch a Muay Thai fight like watch a pro Muay Thai fight.
Speaker 1:I mean just elbows, Just to the ring. You know, right, right the impact.
Speaker 2:The sound that they make when they are slamming into each other is.
Speaker 1:Well, and they can't, you know, they can't get into the ground and take a break, right, Because you get a takedown and then there's some top control. It's like all right, I'm not eating an elbow right now. I have seen some. You know, I don't have to stand here and take big shots.
Speaker 2:I have seen some Muay Thai smokers in the Midwest where some wrestlers try to try their hand at Muay Thai and they get rocked and the referee has to stop them from going into. That you know instinctual.
Speaker 1:Into the last double Instinctual shoot for a leg.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:It's always fun You've been at smokers in the Midwest TJ.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, I commentated some. I mean, I've commented on a show that ended in a riot, where my color commentator came back and she had a black eye. Wow yeah, fun, fun times yeah.
Speaker 1:I mean, I knew you were a real one, but jeez, what are you commentating for? I thought the whole thing was smokers. Is that they're illegal? They're underground? No, so. So was there a live stream.
Speaker 2:No, no, no DVDs dog, it's 2004. You know, we got to put these DVDs.
Speaker 1:Whoa yeah.
Speaker 2:Uh, not all. Where'd you sell the DVDs? Oh, cagefightvideoscom. Thank you very much.
Speaker 1:No way huh.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you can check it out. Wow, you go back in the way, way back machine archiveorg and go to cagefightvideoscom.
Speaker 1:Cagefightvideoscom. So you'd make and that's funny that you have a commentary crew for that Like the fights weren't just enough, so they just like wanted them to sound like you know, here's what's going on and there was commentary for it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, it was. It was a mess. Yeah, you know how much I got paid.
Speaker 1:Let me ask you, so like, of course, you didn't get paid.
Speaker 2:No, no, I got paid.
Speaker 1:Oh, you got paid.
Speaker 2:I didn't get paid. I got a discount on the DVD. They let me buy it for $15 instead of $20.
Speaker 1:Right, exactly yeah, so you didn't get paid.
Speaker 2:No, you didn't yeah.
Speaker 1:I did. I did some of those. Uh, you know, like you know, you call some popcorn or football, stand up on the stand up on the bed of a, of a truck and uh say what's going on? Right, that's you know, the humble beginnings Exactly. What do you think of? Uh, what do you think of? Like this TJ then? Because you know I'm old enough now where I don't want to say I get grumpy about stuff, but I do get nostalgic about a lot of different things and you realize that the old world isn't coming back. It's just not coming back. Your kids are going to grow up in a different era. There are certain things that you loved about the way that you grew up and it's not going to be the same in the MMA scope of things, like you've seen it, like you've seen a lot of this sport to where it is now. What are your thoughts on it?
Speaker 2:Uh, I mean, I think that everything that I will complain about not being the way that it used to be is, uh, probably for the better, because it means that we're getting you know more fights, like people say. Oh, ufc Fight cards are watered down compared to what they used to be. Yeah, the UFC was put on six cards a year. I mean, right, you know, depending on the, the month, the UFC can put on five cards and you know, five weeks in a month and still be inside the same calendar month.
Speaker 1:We just got done that. Last week we were dark Uh-huh. For the first time in 18 weeks we did 17 Saturdays in a row.
Speaker 2:I know my wife doesn't remember what it's like when I'm home on a Saturday, like that's wild, that's wild.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I'm yeah, so I mean right like 2002 is when I first got into to mixed martial arts and like really started to follow it. I could not sleep starting two days before a UFC. I remember UFC 40, november 22nd 2002 T-Dor T's Ken Shamrock, ufc 40 vendetta. I'm watching on pay-per-view and I literally Can't sleep two nights before because we haven't had a UFC since August. You know it's the the biggest blood feud the sport has ever seen and in Tito and Ken and it was like that repeatedly. And I remember in 2003 UFC 43 happened in June and then there wasn't another UFC until like September and like I went the whole summer Without a UFC and it's like right, that was my obsession, you know what I mean.
Speaker 1:Like yeah, I benefited there are no regional shows. I mean, there was none of that there were.
Speaker 2:there were regional shows, but it was a dude. They were scary. I'm not kidding you, they were scary. Well, they weren't on.
Speaker 1:You know it's not easily accessible. No, I'm gonna Omaha dude Like I'm. That's what I mean.
Speaker 2:Yeah, they're not no, I remember the UFC would end up on Direct TV and like some of these regional sports networks, every once in a while It'd be like a what think of, like what UFC unleashed is. It was like the precursor to that and I remember setting my alarm to wake up at like three o'clock in the morning to watch a UFC fight on the Sunshine Network, and it was like Tiki goes in versus Bob Cook and Like I shouldn't even have the Sunshine Network. I lived in Minnesota at the time but you know it was on and direct TV and I was like I'm there for it.
Speaker 2:Yeah but like that's, that's how much, like I needed it. And you know, the thing that I think is is most interesting about it is I have an appreciation for what a lot of people will kind of bitching and moan about with the UFC today, because it's like oh, this isn't the greatest car, there's not a title fight in this. You know, fight night or you know this pay-per-view is a little soft, like yeah, but there's an offering, man, like you have the opportunity to watch, and like I don't want to say like don't watch If you don't want to watch, because I always want people to watch. But it's like you can pick and choose and you can take things on demand. You can watch things you know on your phone. You can download an app and it's just like, even when I am home on a Saturday, if we're not doing like extra rounds or something like I got it up on my phone, dude, my wife hates it yeah, I'm an addict and like.
Speaker 2:My problem is this, brendan Like I've watched so long that, even if, like, fight past fired me tomorrow, I'm like seven seasons into a Television series and I can't stop watching until the end. There's not ever gonna be a finale, so I'm gonna be here for the rest of my life and People just have to accept it and my loved ones have to accept it.
Speaker 1:Okay, sorry, my wife is leaving to pick my son up from school.
Speaker 2:She's like you're really talking about fights again, brendan.
Speaker 1:Yeah, exactly. Yeah, I mean I hear you on all that. That's very interesting and it's like I don't think it's the water down thing, I think that it's.
Speaker 1:It doesn't mean as, yeah, it doesn't mean as much because you don't have to wait as long. Like think about how the modern-day equivalent is football. Yeah, I think of how much people just get so jazzed up for the start of football season right and now, and, like, truth be told, like recently, I'm just like man, football is so saturated. Now I'm like you can't get much bigger, can it? And then Travis Kelsey starts dating Taylor Swift and they do a toy story broadcast from Andy's room, and I'm like, well, it's gonna get bigger, like it's already gotten way bigger. Yeah, like in the last two weeks, just as I was saying, like football really can't get much bigger, between Fantasy and betting and this and that, and like the games are on in red zone, you watch seven hours commercial free, all this stuff. And I'm like, well it's, we're kind of nearing the peak. And then Taylor's like, hey, travis want to go on a date. And then it's like, okay, here we go, we'll both skyrocketing.
Speaker 2:Could you imagine if Travis Kelsey was a UFC fighter and the camera was on Taylor Swift during the midst of a fight? So I mean it's crazy.
Speaker 1:It's crazy. I'm I wondered how we would handle that on the broadcast, because I Get it. The people who are big-time football fans, like if you're sitting there and I'm one of them like if you're watching a game, you want to watch the game, right, right. But it would be Irresponsible of that TV network doing the game to not milk it, like they don't care about pissing you off. You're watching Sunday Night Football. It's chiefs and jets and turns out it ends up being a pretty good game. You're gonna watch that game.
Speaker 1:Now you might gripe about it all they showed her too much this and that but you're gonna watch. So they're not concerned with you changing the channel. They are concerned with the millions of people that are watching so that we can cut away to see Taylor's reaction to a touchdown. Like it becomes an award show at that point and she's the most famous person in the building and it's the story that everybody's talking about. And I promise that I wouldn't really Get out there and give my Taylor Swift and Travis Kelsey take, like a week ago. I'm like I'm just gonna not tweet about this. I'm not because it pisses me off, because I'm just like, whatever the world can have their fun, right and I'm having. You know it's kind of funny, whatever, but it would be irresponsible from a speaking from a media perspective for whatever TV network to not do it.
Speaker 1:Now, fighting is different In that you can't cut like during the game and all this other stuff, but you bring up a good point. If she was dating a fighter, you know right, and then it's like that fighters fighting like you got to think in between rounds, when we're showing replays, we're gonna show her reaction. Oh yeah, whatever the biggest thing is, you have to. It all depends. You know it all depends. I mean, you know there's obviously a lot of celebrities that Go to UFC events and we show them. It's kind of a formula. You show the bigger celebrity toward the main event. You know, if it's Trump, we're gonna show him several times and you know it kind of depends on. You know that depends on if they bought the tickets or not. You know, like some, like Leo DiCaprio, we don't usually show Because he buys his own tickets, right, so that he can say no but if we?
Speaker 1:give Mark Wahlberg front row tickets. It's like, hey, I'm gonna show you a camera, right? Yeah, it's like I'm gonna show you on camera.
Speaker 2:Going back to radio. No one calls us so we can't really do anything about it, but they should. 917, ufc talk is the number. If you call us, there's a law that it's implied consent that you're willing to allow us to broadcast your phone call. It's illegal to broadcast a phone call when someone doesn't know they're on the air. But there's implied consent because you're calling a live show, right? No one's calling. I do have another Text here. This from the way, guys when from Hawaii.
Speaker 2:Yeah, when is the octagon going to come to Hawaii? We need it here, especially after the tragic fires in Maui. Mahalo man, thank you for.
Speaker 1:Thank you for texting from Hawaii. My wife is born and raised in Hawaii. I'd like to retire there someday. Got big Hawaiian ties. There's a there's just a plain old dollars and cents issue. When it comes to going to Hawaii, the biggest leaping off point is that their arena is not exactly conducive To a big-time UFC event, and that's what we'd want it to be. A loha stadium, obviously, is big enough to handle the capacity, but it's outside. Dana White has said repeatedly that he doesn't want to deal with weather concerns because, as we know, it can.
Speaker 1:Well, it can. It can rain. For I went to a UH football game when Colt Brendon was the quarterback and you know they were putting up like 80 points every game and it was that season where I think they ended up going to the sugar bowl that year and then they got blown out by Georgia but went to a game that year and like it'll rain for five minutes and then it's not, and then it kind of gets and then it gets dark and then it'll rain again, and then I'm just like no wonder they have such a good home field advantage. You got jet lagged players. They're in paradise. It rains every five minutes. You don't know if it's two pm or two, like you know. Once it's dark, it's like you don't know what time it is. The weather is different. So I mean, that's really like we had a heyday, I feel like in the last three, four years, where we could have put basically like a Hawaiian against a non Hawaiian, kind of like we do in Brazil, and we could have done it all the way up, and then Max could have been in the main event. Right, you could have done like Max and Connor at Aloha Stadium.
Speaker 1:The other thing that people kind of forget about is like the time of day. If you're not gonna have an arena, then the stadium doesn't work, because then, like the 10 Eastern for 10 Eastern, 7 Pacific start time for a main card, well, that's four o'clock in Hawaii, four or five depending on the time of year. So that just doesn't work for an outdoor show and then the indoor show. And they've tried to make it happen. They've tried to make it happen.
Speaker 1:They've talked to Hawaii and they were just at an impasse in terms of Hawaii will give us this amount of money to come do a show over there. And the UFC says that's not enough and it's not really a moving target, like you need to pass this and we'll go, if not, we won't go. And the other thing is Hawaii is not really begging for like, like, like, hawaii doesn't need to be. Like, hey, man, wouldn't it be great if we could do a UFC event here? Maybe then some people would come visit, maybe some people go on vacation to Hawaii if we held the UFC event. That's not how it goes.
Speaker 1:No, no, but I appreciate the text from the 808 and, believe me, there would be a lot of competition within all departments of the UFC as far as who gets assigned to that show.
Speaker 2:There's a rich tradition in mixed martial arts and Hawaiian history. You know they're amazing fighters. You already mentioned Max, BJ Penn, but there's some you know, very influential promotions and the grassroots of mixed martial arts that were Hawaiian based. I would love to see, maybe like a team Hawaii versus the world on the ultimate fighter or something like that.
Speaker 1:Be cool. Yeah, I think the ultimate fighter needs to continue to. You know, gimmick is looked at as a negative word. I think it needs to continue to gimmick itself to stay relevant. Yeah, it's like it's a bit of a format that we've seen too much. So this year they decided to go big. They get Connor and Michael Chandler, so that was a splash and they put it on ESPN over the summer. They need to continue to do creative things with the ultimate fighter. I like that idea. I like team high. They're like. So, like Max was, could have been in the main event. Ega Yanti Madaris, when he was on the roster, was always a fun fighter. Like we had like a good chunk of Hawaiians that were like in the mix. Like Yanti was in a main event against Cowboys Seroni in 2018. Sometime between 2018 and 2020, you know would have been ripe for something like that, but happen yeah.
Speaker 2:No, I'm not going to happen anytime soon, unfortunately, you mentioned gimmick and I think that you know there is a long unfortunate standing and there being gimmick promotions and things like that and a lot of gimmicks and MMA to sort of get on the radar. But I think you're right when you have something that is proven, you're using the gimmick angle to spice something up. There's a lot of value there and I think some people will sort of fight against that. You know there are some purists that just want to see the best fighters that are available fight their way to the UFC through the ultimate fighter.
Speaker 1:But that's why we have the contenders series now 100%, yeah, so like there's less of a need to find, like, the absolute best guys for the ultimate fighter. Yeah, now it's even more primed for like let's do something fun with this, right.
Speaker 1:Let's do a country, let's do a country, let's make good TV. I've always thought too, instead of having a coach's challenge at the end of the year, there should be some sort of challenge every episode. Like you remember the biggest loser? They did like every episode. They had like a game and it's just like if your team won the game, you got immunity, or the other team had to add a pound to their you know whatever total like do that stuff Early early, early tough.
Speaker 2:They did that and it really was gimmicky and it was silly, because the fights were being decided by a game where all the athletes would be on the mat and they would have socks on and whoever could keep their socks on the longest got to pick the fight. I'm not even kidding you. That was like literally one of them. There was another one, I think I think it was season one where you basically would stand and your partner would get on your back, like a piggyback ride or standing, where you make a choke position and they had to crawl around the body and whoever did that the most would win. And Diego Sanchez did it, I think, on like Rashad Evans or something.
Speaker 2:I don't know who it was. They weren't on the same season, so it's probably not it, but the idea was basically make the guy do it a whole bunch and then you would go next and they made him do it a whole bunch. He set the record and then the team said, oh, we forfeit, and then picked, I think, diego to fight because he was so tired from doing it. But I don't know. Yeah, now's the time to go back to stupid stuff like that. It's fun.
Speaker 1:You know, like like a combined show, like you know, like the ultimate fighter and the apprentice, like let's find a fighter that I don't know.
Speaker 2:I'm just like let's find a fighter at the same time.
Speaker 1:Well, no, do a TikTok challenge, like, do like, like, incorporate marketing into it. I feel like all right. Well, this guy's, this guy gets the game like fight. You know, combat sports are promotions, they're not leagues, they're promotions. So it's just like, all right, this guy, this guy knows how to promote, this guy could be fun whatever, but that would be winners at the top.
Speaker 2:You know what I want? I want Dana to do the ultimate promoter. I think that would be a fun television show.
Speaker 1:That would be. That would be a great show too. That would be great. And then, like you know, you get a job on the, on the staff. You're fighting for a job in the front office. It's accessible. There's a lot of people out there. They asked me. They're just like what could I do? I just want to work for the UFC. What could I do? And I'm just like I don't know. Dude, like what do you want to do? Like you want to be in medical, you can be a medical. You want to be a lawyer. Like you could be in our legal department. You like social media, you can be in our social department. Like I don't know what to tell you. You know there's a lot of different things. There's like the ultimate promoter. There's a show. There's the show TJ, let's do it. Put it on UFC Five Pass Done.
Speaker 2:We just came up with television ideas.
Speaker 1:All right. So I have to get run and zoom. We've got to wrap this up. This was a good first foray. What say you, what do you think? Is this all right? Yeah, you know, I think we need Humbl, Humble beginnings.
Speaker 2:We need to try to coach people out of their shell to actually pick up the phone. You know yeah.
Speaker 1:I have a dream of people calling in. You know I used to love this podcast where people would write like parody songs about like the podcast and things like that. And I've thought like, oh my goodness, wouldn't it be fun to make like MMA songs, like UFC songs or something you know 30 seconds long, a minute. Take a karaoke version, dub your voice in, write some fun lyrics, send stuff in like that. Listen. There's a lot of different avenues we could go down, but if you've gotten this far in the program, forever indebted to have you listening along, and I think we'll do this again, tj we gotta wrap our heads together what went right, what went wrong, what could go better. But the good news is we have a long runway because you know it costs nothing to hit. Go on our home studios and find some time and put out some content like this yeah, let's do it Whenever you're free.
Speaker 2:I like Fridays like this, you know it's fun to sort of get things up and you know, whenever you're free, let me know we'll hit the buttons and make it work better next time.
Speaker 1:All right, well, tj DeSantis is the man and you know, just thanks for kind of giving the idea, giving the support, giving the resources. Ufc Fight Pass has been great for FITZ Nation to kind of continue to thrive and, you know, get some interesting guests and give me the creative ways to create more stuff like do different types of things, like a live stream talking about UFC things, whether it is going to Hawaii or the history of the UFC or John Jones and Stipe upcoming. I do have some exciting interviews that are coming down the pike. Kyle Bohiolo will be fighting in the Comaine event in Sao Paulo in November. I'm gonna link up with him next week.
Speaker 1:Megan O'Levy just celebrated 10 years with the UFC, so I texted her the other day and I'm gonna link up with Megan O'Levy in the coming weeks as well, so the interview shows won't be going away. This the first of what I hope to be a handful of live streams for FITZ Nation to just kind of talk fights, shoot the breeze a little bit and see what other ideas we can come up with. All right, thanks everybody. Hope you have a great weekend. Enjoy the fights tomorrow Grant Dawson, bobby Green, in the main event from the Apex. I'll be back on the call a week from tomorrow at the Apex for Sadiq Youssef and Edson Barbosa. Thanks again, we'll see you next time.