Peak Points
"Peak Points" is the best place to get your fix of UFC news and the internet's most outrageous stories. Join us each episode as we break down the octagons latest match ups and dive into its most epic moments and fighters. Beyond the punches and kicks, we react to some of the internet's craziest tales, wild confessions, and jaw dropping moments guaranteed to keep you entertained every episode. A podcast made for the fans, by the fans of MMA and life stories.
Peak Points
Wait, they found WHAT in his backpack?!
A night of fights can flip a division—and a few lives—on their heads. We kick off with the Reyes card and a rare ref reversal in Magny–Matthews before zeroing in on Carlos Ulberg’s ruthless KO of Dominick Reyes and what it signals for light heavyweight. From there, UFC 320 takes over: Yana Santos banks a clean win, Shahbazyan closes the show right before the horn, and Joe Pyfer makes a ranked statement by hunting submissions, not just control time. We also parse the Josh Emmett vs Youssef Zalal verbal tap confusion and what a bad camera angle can hide.
Then the chaos crown moves to Jiri Prochazka vs Khalil Rountree Jr. Two rounds for Khalil, then a third where Jiri decided to live in the fire and drain the gas tank. We talk grit, durability, and why “create chaos” isn’t a meme for Jiri—it’s a method. The bantamweight board gets messy as Merab Dvalishvili extends his streak, chases records, and runs into the odd problem of having already beaten most viable names. Yan, Pantoja, Umar—each path says something different about legacy and leverage.
Our centerstage belongs to Alex Pereira vs Magomed Ankalaev II. Fueled, focused, and furious, Pereira cut the cage early and detonated a right hand that changed the night. The stat line—28 to 4 in total strikes—answers the trilogy question for now while opening the door to bigger talk: a move to heavyweight, a triple-champ chase, or a mega-fight with Jon Jones. We also highlight why Pereira’s stardom hits different—ritual, respect, and a moment of silence that quieted an arena.
To close, we pivot to three Reddit confessions that carry their own kind of shock: a lie that exposed meth and a gun at school, a raw admission of cheating and the long work of co-parenting and recovery, and a neglected cat that chose a new home. The throughline across cages and confessions is the same: finish when you should, own what you break, and don’t leave your fate to judges. If you felt the swings—technical, emotional, ethical—share this with a friend, hit follow, and drop us your take: who should Alex fight next, and does Merab have anyone left to beat?
Welcome back to Peak Points. Today we are going to be discussing a few past fights that were particularly exciting, including UFC 320, Enkalaya vs. Pereira, Part 2. Awesome fight by the way. Amazing. Secondly, we will be going over a few upcoming fights that we find exciting, including how some of these recent fights will influence those. And then for the Reddit portion of this episode, we will be discussing confessions.
SPEAKER_05:Yes, uh I have something to confess, Arlie. Please no.
SPEAKER_00:It's it's too late.
SPEAKER_05:I'm a big big big boy.
SPEAKER_00:Sorry.
SPEAKER_05:Bobby Flay fan. That's quite the confession. Bobby, I hope you're listening. Anyway, let's get into the octagon. And uh first I'll start with that Dominic Reyes card. I watched it entirely, amazing and uh and disappointing at the same time, but for other reasons. Right. And um I'll start off with some of these interesting ones. I know that Navajo Sterling, a lot of people are a fan of him. He got that win, so he's still on that winning streak. And maybe soon we'll see him on an actual card, so instead of the prelims.
SPEAKER_00:It's definitely something to strive for for him.
SPEAKER_05:That Tom Nolan versus Charlie Campbell, Tom Nolan wins it by submission in the first round. That was impressive.
SPEAKER_00:That was a pretty fun fight to watch. Performance of the night, all in all.
SPEAKER_05:Another fun fight was the one afterward, Neil Magney versus Jake Matthews. And they're calling the recent fights The Era of the Unk. Because Unk still got it. And this was a perfect example of Unk Still Got It.
SPEAKER_00:That fight, I have to admit, was a little surprising. Very surprising on my end. I really didn't expect Magney to pull it out. I didn't really looked from the first uh round and a half, pretty much, that he was he was not going to win. No. But he was biding his time. Mm-hmm. Which it seemed like it clearly was a a good enough choice in this scenario.
SPEAKER_05:It also seemed like a Neil Magney fight, uh where he does pull it out closer to the end. In fact, very controversial what is going on with this fight, even up to now, where if you recall, he was in a nasty guillotine choke, and it looked like it was sunk in, and his arm drops, and basically there was a confusion of a stoppage or not.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, that one that was a pretty confusing moment.
SPEAKER_05:Very confusing moment. Uh the referee, which we should probably look up um who the referee was for this one, uh, nevertheless, stops the fight or whatever, saying that Neil Mangley was choked out and then reconsiders the decision and actually continues the fight. Well, and and ultimately, if you if you see in that fight he almost gets choked out and then ultimately at the end chokes out Jake Matthews. So Jake and his camp have decided to seek some uh a judgment on it and try to get that decision overturn. Wow. And uh so let's see how that goes. I don't I'm not following that one closely, but I know that they are fighting that that win, basically, for Neil Magney.
SPEAKER_00:Right.
SPEAKER_05:After that, that Jack Jenkins versus Ramon Taveras, that was a very fun fight. A lot of nutshots, but very fun fight nonetheless. Jimmy Cruit versus Urslan, Jimmy Cruit, always, always a fun fight.
SPEAKER_00:And that was uh not a boring fight.
SPEAKER_05:Oh no, I don't I don't think Jimmy has been in a boring fight so far. Winning that by round one submission, getting a performance of the night for that. And then the creme a la creme. And then um This is AI. No. Fine. And then we had that nasty disgusting knockout of Dominic Reyes, Carlos Oberg, man. That guy is a freaking animal.
SPEAKER_00:He earned it, in my opinion. That wasn't that wasn't a fluke. He knew what he was doing, and he executed it very well.
SPEAKER_05:And yeah, I mean, me as a Dominic Reyes fan, it's very unfortunate for me, but he definitely looked entirely hesitant in this one. And I think that was basically his downfall, Dominic Reyes.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_05:I mean, respecting your opponent is one thing, but you also have to earn respect you know when you're in there.
SPEAKER_00:He he came off as skittish to me. He was he was skittish about throwing a real punch or even like trying to do any kind of takedowns. It just seemed like a skittish performance, if you will.
SPEAKER_05:Right, and uh definitely not the Dominic Reyes that b uh basically got that controversial loss to John Jones. Definitely didn't look like that Dominic Reyes. Mm-hmm. And uh but uh uh then again, Carlos Oberg looked amazing in that one. He looked fast, he looked uh long, and he looked very decisive in his striking, which was a very impressive.
SPEAKER_00:Just out of curiosity, how do you look long?
SPEAKER_05:Well, I mean range. Oh, he was using range. That's a term for for using range. Gotcha. Uh and uh that's needing to be up and close. No, and he definitely did not. It was a nice throw a couple and then jump back. Throw a couple, jump back. Very great game plan. However, I really don't think that Dominic Reyes had uh if he did have a game plan that kind of went out the window in the first round. Eating a nasty combo. What a nasty combo Olberg threw, and sleeping Dominic Reyes, which is very unfortunate, and a massive setback for Dominic Reyes and the Dominic Reyes fan saying, Here's the title run. I didn't say that, they did.
SPEAKER_00:Oh yeah, definitely not. You definitely didn't say that. I didn't comment that.
SPEAKER_05:Uh I actually like Olberg. Uh I've every performance I've seen him in has been very impressive. And uh now his name is getting thrown around for that belt. Which we'll talk about a little later in the episode. And uh we'll talk about specifically what this win means for that light heavyweight division. And then we'll move on to that UFC 320 card.
SPEAKER_00:Oh boy, oh boy, oh boy, oh boy. There were some great fights on the 320 card.
SPEAKER_05:Amazing fights.
SPEAKER_00:And uh I didn't see all of the early prelims, I just saw the last early prelim, but ever from there on I was watching.
SPEAKER_05:And we'll talk about some of those uh early prelims, mainly that Mah Macy Chaison and uh Yana Santos. Yana Santos getting that win by unanimous decision. I think it was well deserved. And uh Soriano versus Veratenikov.
SPEAKER_00:Now that one I did watch. That one was an interesting fight. It wasn't terribly exciting, but I think they are going to be good wa good fighters to watch in the future. Yeah, absolutely. After they get a little more experience. More seasoning.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah. And uh speaking of seasoning, we had that uh Shab Zayan versus Andre Muniz and uh getting that first round knockout.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah.
SPEAKER_05:Very impressive at 458.
SPEAKER_00:That was so close to the bell. It was crazy. Not expecting it.
SPEAKER_05:And uh getting that TKO and the ref stopping it two seconds before that bell, so it was um I don't know. But I think it was well deserved either way.
SPEAKER_00:Oh, he definitely earned it. There was no question about that in my mind. It was just surprising how close to the bar or how close to the bell I got.
SPEAKER_05:And then we had that patchy concrete mix versus V Klux. Okay.
SPEAKER_00:This is the first time I've heard the concrete added to it, and that that honestly it works.
SPEAKER_05:And I like Patchy Mix. If you go back to the our previous podcast when he had his debut, I was hyping him up. I'm very excited for the Bellator champion Patchy Mix to arrive to the UFC, but this is a dreadful start to his UFC run. That it is very unfortunate. I will add myself and a lot of people are are saying that he should have won this one. And uh it's a split decision. It could go to either one. Yeah. Maybe he did deserve this win. However, sometimes you shouldn't leave it to the judges, and this is one of those cases, you know.
SPEAKER_00:Absolutely. Honestly, I I mean I saw it, but I also wasn't fully engaged in it because it was very lackluster. It it just wasn't an exciting fight. No. They were doing very basic stuff.
SPEAKER_05:Yes. Mm-hmm.
SPEAKER_00:And I I'm not gonna say you have to do that, but for someone who's a previous champion. I mean, granted a different promotion, but still a previous champion, you you just expect better from Absolutely.
SPEAKER_04:Absolutely.
SPEAKER_00:Especially when they're not even fighting a ranked fighter. It's kinda sad.
SPEAKER_05:It kind of is I mean, I'm not no no shade on Patchy Mix.
SPEAKER_00:No, no shade on him.
SPEAKER_05:Absolutely not.
SPEAKER_00:It's just kind of surprising to see that level of performance from him.
SPEAKER_05:And this puts him in a very unfortunate position at the moment, specifically with what the UFC's gonna do with him. I mean, do they keep him? He's on a losing streak and has not been exciting or uh impressive in his performance.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. I don't see it first performance.
SPEAKER_05:Yes.
SPEAKER_00:Not wildly, but it was definitely better.
SPEAKER_05:That's the silver lining, and uh I think I mean that's a good thing they saw him at least somewhat improved, but damn not to expectation. And I I don't know if they maybe give him another chance, and I'm hoping they give him another chance, and we see a different patchy mix.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, they usually give him at least three chances, unless they're terrible.
SPEAKER_05:I don't know. I wouldn't say that. I mean the UFC is just uh they could just do whatever they want. Well, yes, they can. I don't know. Could be anything. Uh but I am hoping they give him another chance, and then we had this uh prelim fight that I was very excited for uh excited for besides the the next one. Uh Daniel Santos versus Jusang Yu. And uh I I had uh you on that one. I expected him to win. Um interesting they fought at catch weight, 153 uh pounds.
SPEAKER_00:So um I was never clear which one was the catch weight.
SPEAKER_05:Uh I'm assuming Daniel Santos missed weight and wasn't able to make the weight, but uh uh we had to do some reading up on that one. However, Daniel Santos um surpassed the emotes of you.
SPEAKER_00:Oh man. The first round I thought for sure you was gonna win.
SPEAKER_05:Me too. Me too. I was swayed by the emotes, and he used a lot of e-bucks on those. And uh I was swayed by all the emotes, but hey.
SPEAKER_00:I wasn't being swayed by the emotes, but he just looked crisp, clean, and tactical with all this stuff. And he was he was doing good movement for uh what's the word? Basically avoiding attacks.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, absolutely.
SPEAKER_00:So I I really thought he was gonna pull that one out.
SPEAKER_05:Me too. He was evading every strike in the first round and then just gets absolutely caught in the beginning of the second round and gets face planted.
SPEAKER_00:So serious props to Santos for sure.
SPEAKER_05:Serious props for sticking it out and um But that was a nasty knockout because he was on the floor eating nasty headshots and just face planted. It was pretty rough.
SPEAKER_00:And then the fight that honestly is surprising, it was even in the prelims.
SPEAKER_05:Ateba Gautier uh versus Vines and this in the remember what I was telling you when we watched this one was the odds that he was like a minus what eighteen hundred or something like that? Yeah, it was crazy. And uh guy was like a plus nine something, and we were talking about what if we put money on vines and he wins. Yeah. And I was like, I don't know, they're calling this guy the mini inganyu. Yep. And as soon as I said mini and you started their walkout. And uh the whole fight, I was like, damn, Gautier's just very powerful, dude.
SPEAKER_00:He is very powerful. And he's not sloppy.
SPEAKER_05:No, he's just very skilled.
SPEAKER_00:You've seen you can see you can find very powerful fighters all day long, but the level of skill Gautier brings to it, it it brings him to a new level. It's impressive. I'm really looking forward to seeing where he goes within the division.
SPEAKER_05:Absolutely. Uh, you, me, and a lot of the MMA community are very excited about this Gautier prospect guy.
SPEAKER_00:And I have to say that uh not not being talking down on Vines at all, but in the moment it was kind of funny to see just how surprised Vines was like right after the fight ended, like when he was on the ground. Yes. He he really seemed very like utterly gobsmacked that he got hit that hard.
SPEAKER_05:And speaking of gobsmacked, those freaking ground strikes were disgusting. They were vicious. Man, the like a a very impressive performance by Glottier. I uh I I can't say anymore. Uh and then another very impressive performance in the main card, Joe Piffer beating Abus Magamedoff, and uh beating him with wrestling and getting the submission was very impressive to me.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, I mean that he was He was showing some serious skill. And it was nice to see some wrestling that wasn't just all about control time.
SPEAKER_05:Yes, I agree.
SPEAKER_00:It was nice to see someone who's wrestling actually trying for submissions.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, actively attempting submissions and uh looking very great at uh the whole fight to be honest was very great for me for Joe Piper, beating number fourteen Abus Magamedoff via submission in round two, and let's see him against another rank fighter, and I I'm you know, I think he's gonna put another great performance. And then we had another controversial fight on this card, or at least a controversial uh win, was that Josh Emmond versus Yusuf Zalal.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, that was that was a wild moment in the world. It was crazy, yeah. Especially the camera angle and stuff. The camera angle was like the worst possible to figure out what what had just happened.
SPEAKER_05:What just transpired. But either way, either way, the camera angle for the most part wouldn't have mattered because it was a verbal tap. Right. According to Yusuf Dalal, who I recently listened to an interview of saying that he heard and the ref heard tap tap tap.
SPEAKER_01:Mm-hmm.
SPEAKER_05:No knock on Josh Emmett. He is an amazing fighter at featherweight.
SPEAKER_00:He he just got caught. Just got caught, and um It was an awkward situation all the way around. Yes, very and honestly, I was surprised that that I mean it may from sp I mean, admittedly, it was a terrible camera angle. Yes. But the angle we were watching it from, it didn't seem like either one of them were like actually winning in any way. It was just like a a scramble pretty much. Yeah. And it was like Zalal was just trying to hang on and then next thing you know, fights being called.
SPEAKER_05:It was And and it was a strange armbar.
SPEAKER_00:It yeah, it was w I mean I get it. When I saw it from a different angle, I get it. That that position looked painful. And it it looked like he wasn't going to be able to get out of it and or not get hurt, like actually hurt. So I d I t I don't I don't think Emmett was wrong to tap tap tap.
SPEAKER_05:No, I don't think so either. Um we're not aware of what someone feels in that position, especially what Josh Emmett felt in that position. But I was telling you guys about this Zalal guy, a nasty contender in the Featherweight division, and he's actually undef uh not undefeated, but he's on a nasty win streak, and honestly, he's been putting up impressive performances. So let's see what happens with Yusuf Zalal. I know that he might want a fight later on in the year, maybe December, he was saying, versus Lerone Murphy. And I think him versus Lerone Murphy would be very impressive. I think that would be a great fight.
SPEAKER_00:That that has potential for sure.
SPEAKER_05:Uh I don't know what's next for Josh Emmett. He is forty years old now. Right. He was the if you recall, he was the oldest fighter on that card at 40 years old, so Yeah, it was funny to see that it was funny to see that, yeah. Show up. But it's true, I mean, what w what's next for Josh Emmett? Um, you know. A lot of respect for Josh Emmett though.
SPEAKER_01:Mm-hmm.
SPEAKER_05:And then we had that very, very exciting fight. God yes. In the light heavy weight.
SPEAKER_00:That was a seriously entertaining fight, but also a serious what the hell is he doing fight?
SPEAKER_05:Versus Jiri Prohaska and Khalil Roundtree Jr. Everything as advertised and more.
SPEAKER_00:I mean, for how for who he's fought, Roundtree is an absolute dog.
SPEAKER_05:He's a dog.
SPEAKER_00:I mean, it's unfortunate that he keeps going up against people who are Amazing. Just utterly astounding, honestly. Yes. Like Jiri is he he's a he's an amazing fighter, all things considered. I'm not gonna say he's the most technical, I'm not gonna say he's the most vicious or the most powerful.
SPEAKER_05:He wouldn't want to say that either.
SPEAKER_00:No. But as uh like he provides the entertainment and he has fun and he's in there with the warrior spirit, like he's all about that. He fully embodies the warrior spirit. And of course Poeton.
SPEAKER_05:The only person to have beaten him in the UFC.
SPEAKER_00:Oh th those two, you mean?
SPEAKER_05:Yes, the two losses. I will say uh a great point he embodies the breaks off hill. Yeah, he did. That was a great performance too. And I will say get getting the performance of the night and uh that nasty knockout of Kaley Roundtree Jr. Uh very unfortunate because I I like Roundtree, and this was one of those fights where I really didn't want to see either one lose.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, no, I wasn't I wasn't cheering for either one specifically.
SPEAKER_05:I will add in uh Je, yeah, he's a very exciting fighter. And I'm with the judges on the scorecards where he was losing both rounds entirely. And Khalil had this fight in the bag. It sure it sure seemed that way. Until the third round, where Jerry just decided I'm gonna get as close as possible, whether I take it to the face or not. And it was just a an absolute war. Knees, elbows, elbows, elbows, elbows. Yeah. And another embodiment that that is jeary is how when he was walking out, the card said create chaos.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, the Joe Rogan's uh tips to victory with create chaos and uh Absolutely. What was the other one I can't remember? Be you or something, be yourself or whatever. Nah, I was something else. Leg kicks. Beware of leg kicks.
SPEAKER_05:Beware of leg kicks, yes, and he created chaos, which is where Jiri lives. Lives in that chaos, lives in that which Khalil does too, but honestly, Jiri is just another animal.
SPEAKER_00:Well this this is something I've seen in both the fights that round tree is lost. He doesn't have as big of a gas tank as he needs to be fighting the way he fights against people who are able to either dodge or endure.
SPEAKER_04:Just eat it.
SPEAKER_00:I mean, if they can if they can take his punches and or dodge his punches, he gets worn out a little too fast. Like, could you imagine if this had been a five-round fight? Yeah, and Jerry hadn't decided to take the gloves off on the third round and let it go to the fourth or even fifth, Roundtree would have barely been able to stand. Like, at especially towards the end, he was barely able to do much of anything.
SPEAKER_05:Right, very much.
SPEAKER_00:I'm not saying anything bad about Roundtree. He was still covering up, he was still trying to throw, but yeah, you could tell the weight behind his punches was just gone.
SPEAKER_05:And that kind of speaks more volumes to Jiri and the absolute bombs that he was eating, where Roundtree probably looked at him and was like, dang. The one where he full strength swung and hit him right in the chin, and Jiri just looks at him and goes, Damn. And like if he was upset with himself, they ate that. But damn, dude, like it's like in that fight, I I I sympathized with Khalil. We were like, what do I have to do to put this man away?
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. Yeah. It's it's a very valid question.
SPEAKER_05:It's demoralizing, I believe.
SPEAKER_00:And demoralizing and to this day, the only thing that puts Jiri down is Poeton.
SPEAKER_05:Yes.
SPEAKER_00:And uh And I do have to mention, I saw something earlier, it was something you had shared in the UFC chat that we have. Is that it is pretty amazing. Jerry has been in the UFC for fifteen years. Is it the UFC or f mixed martial arts entirely? Mixed martial arts, he's been around for a long time. So he's been in mixed martial arts for 15 years. And none of it goes to decision. That's that's crazy. That none of it goes to decision. Very few fighters can say something like that. I I actually don't I can't off top my head, I can't point to any single fighter that can say that.
SPEAKER_05:Other than in this era, Jeri is definitely that man.
SPEAKER_00:I mean, yes, a couple of those were losses, but even then he had to be knocked out in order for him to lose.
SPEAKER_05:And uh definitely kudos to Jeary putting on an amazing performance in the third round against uh Khalil Rountree, and Khalil Rountree definitely not losing stock on this one, and I feel like his stock has risen, especially from what I've been seeing online and all the support that he's been getting.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, like he he didn't wimp out. He was not wimping out. Yes, he needs to work on his cardio. Or at least his gas tank as a whole. But aside from that, honestly, he was pretty close to immaculate. Yeah, he should have knocked Jiri out. Yeah, it was. Almost any other fighter would have been knocked out at least three to four times.
SPEAKER_05:The two rounds were amazing for Khalil. Two rounds were amazing for Khalil.
SPEAKER_00:Before the end. Like it was he he was landing the appropriate shot. It was disgusting what he was landing. It was just Jiri has eating him that uh that kind of endurance. Yeah.
SPEAKER_05:I mean he he got that master's degree or whatever iron channel. He got that degree, and and now like his brain grew and he's like blocking. Um anyway. Speaking of a fighter that you have to knock out to put them away, the amazing Marab Divalishwili versus uh Corey Sanhagen. Shout out to Corey Sanhagen putting up uh a battle and not giving up in that second round with the flurry, and a lot, an absolute lot of kudos for Marab and what he's done in the Bantamweight division. I think just being considered one of the greatest bantamweights of all time at this point, beating everyone, beating ex-champions, all prior to getting an attempt at the belt.
SPEAKER_00:And then maintaining the belt against these crazy fighters.
SPEAKER_05:Absolutely. And uh 14 fight win streak now. Yeah, for the the longest win streaks of all time, two away from the great Anderson Silva.
SPEAKER_00:Mm-hmm. And I mean That was a great performance. I'm not gonna say it wasn't, but I will say it definitely I th I think Mirab had the power, ability, and skill that he he definitely I think could have and probably should have hit a submission well before well before letting it go to decision. I I I mean to me it feels like he was just showboating and trying to just uh keep his name on the board for records.
SPEAKER_05:That record.
SPEAKER_00:That was wild. Like there was no reason he was letting him get up from the takedowns. I mean, as a as a method of wearing somebody out, fantastic. But he was taking it beyond that, I think. Right, in my opinion. He was taking it well beyond that.
SPEAKER_05:And I've heard that one, yes, recently.
SPEAKER_00:And to be fair, Sandhagen was letting it happen. He didn't try to stay on the ground and actually wrestle them. He just kept getting back up and letting Marab stay on his back. Over and over and over.
SPEAKER_05:And over and over and over tw times twenty. Yeah. Uh I will say a lot of those takedowns were pretty impressive. I mean, some nasty sweeps and some nasty.
SPEAKER_00:Especially in the first couple of rounds. He was doing he was really working to get those takedowns. Yeah, absolutely. It was mostly like the last round. Right. It was just spamming, it was pretty sad.
SPEAKER_05:And um, I mean, like you said, getting his name in the history book, cementing himself in the UFC history book specifically with getting twenty more takedowns added to his already broken record of most takedowns in UFC. And yes, I think his name will be in the history books for a very, very long time. I will also add, you are not the only one that thinks uh he was putting like a performance on.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_05:Um specifically. Specifically because he looked like he could have finished this in the second round, beating Corey Sanhagen on the feet with his strikes, doing what he said he was gonna do, which is beating him with the strikes. Yep. Because he was hitting him with some nasty shots.
SPEAKER_00:He was. He had some pretty he had a pretty serious black eye and other contusions.
SPEAKER_05:And uh Ariel Homwani mentioning that it felt to him a lot like playing with his food. Yes. Which is what you were bringing up. A great point, which is a good thing.
SPEAKER_00:I didn't say those words, but that was the same meaning behind them.
SPEAKER_05:Uh and it did kind of seem like that. Marab wanting to fight in December as well at the end of the year. To be fair, I can't blame him. I can't blame him either. To become, I think, the first to defend the belt four times in a calendar year. This guy just wants to break records.
SPEAKER_00:He he wants to be in the record books.
SPEAKER_05:He wants to be in the record books, and I can't blame him for that.
SPEAKER_00:He's a fantastic fighter.
SPEAKER_05:Absolutely.
SPEAKER_00:He he absolutely controls the octagon when he's in it.
SPEAKER_05:Yep.
SPEAKER_00:Has he been put to the test a couple times? Sure. Yeah. But he's still almost always in complete control, realistically speaking.
SPEAKER_05:And you have to put him away. You have to knock him out or or sleep him uh somehow.
SPEAKER_00:Which is obviously incredibly difficult to do.
SPEAKER_05:Ah man, it's just and the reason why I'm bringing up this question and and this information about Morab is the position that he's in, which is also like what does he do in this division because he's already beaten everyone and he wants his next fight to be versus Peter Jan. I'm a big Peter Jan fan. And he got bodied in the first fight versus Marab. Like he got swept. And Umar got swept.
SPEAKER_00:I mean, if Peter Jan is willing to fight him, for sure.
SPEAKER_05:Supposedly, yeah, in December. But he's just he's already beat him, and I'm like I understand on Mirab's side.
SPEAKER_00:He's he wanted this not just to become champion, not just to win, but he wanted to put it he wanted to put his name into history.
SPEAKER_05:Legacy.
SPEAKER_00:And to have a legacy. And I can respect that.
SPEAKER_05:Oh yeah, absolutely.
SPEAKER_00:But unfortunately, he has been so incredibly dominant So incredibly dominant in a weight class that only has so much talent. I mean, it's not the smallest weight class, but it's still when you're that dominant, it's really difficult to find all the fights that are necessary to get him where he wants to go. So he's kind of painted himself into a corner as far as that's concerned.
SPEAKER_05:Yes, great point. And uh that that's the point I'm also making is uh now they're mentioning Pyrian, they're mentioning a super fight between him and Pantoja. And it's just uh I can't remember what uh 125 is his weight class.
SPEAKER_00:Marab's in 135. That would be that would be a Pantoja, it doesn't have to cut ridiculously far to be in that weight class. I think does he?
SPEAKER_05:I think uh if they do put that fight together, I think Marab takes that one too. Um I don't know. It's just either way, like you said, Mirab's painted himself in a corner, it's like who else is left, bro? Like who are you gonna fight now? Yeah. Who are you gonna fight now that's a draw? I mean I don't know. Especially like with Corey Sanhagen, because all the chance that he's been for years, Corey Sanhagen, give him a belt, give him a chance for a belt, give him a chance for the belt. And then we give him a chance for the belt, and it's just an unfortunate opponent in Marab. Yeah, yeah. That's like I don't think I need to.
SPEAKER_00:Not that there could have been any other opponent, but yeah.
SPEAKER_05:I don't think there's any other chance for the division to move forward. I mean, people are yelling out Mario Bautista, but even then I don't really think he stands a chance. Um anything could happen. I mean, even Marab is saying that. But I'm pretty sure because they're telling him like who are you gonna fight? It's MMA, bro. Anybody can anybody can beat me. But who's gonna beat you, sir? Well, someone it's MMA, you know. Right. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:In his position, I totally understand him wanting more fights, but yeah, he's like, yeah, like we already talked about, he's painted himself into a corner a bit. Like there's only so much talent there to do any kind of fighting. Right. And until we get some new blood or pull from another promotion or something.
SPEAKER_05:Let's see how Mario Bautista does. Uh he's fighting later, I believe, in November, against uh Umar and Margamedoff. And um 'cause to me, uh I'll just mention this real quick sidebar. I don't know if you recall this, but when they had set up that Umar fight, I was certain that Umar was gonna put up a significant challenge to Marab.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, I remember you mentioning that you honestly weren't sure if Marab was gonna win on this one.
SPEAKER_05:And boy was I freaking wrong. Utter dominance by Marab again.
SPEAKER_00:So uh I mean to be fair, Umar did a decent job. And it did come out that he had a broken head.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, but he broke it in the fight.
SPEAKER_00:I thought it was uh I think he broke it in the fight. Not fully healed. I think not fully healed re broke it in the fight.
SPEAKER_05:But regardless, like it just wasn't the performance I expected from Umar and uh the expected performance by Marab, so uh and that that's all I have to say about Marab and um who'd see who we'll see in the future what happens with the Bantamweight division. And moving on from the Bantamweight division to the light heavyweight, we got that very exciting rematch uh between Magomed Angolaev Begang, as they used to call him, uh versus Alex Botan Pereira trying to get his belt back, seeing a determined Alex in this one. Oh boy, did we ever and all the lead up towards it, I'll just give a little synopsis of the little lead up was the first one, there wasn't really that much smack talk. I mean, I don't really think Alex is too much smack talk anyway.
SPEAKER_00:I mean it's mostly just in response to smack talk too much.
SPEAKER_05:It's mostly just trauma, yeah, in response. Uh and a lot of smack talk coming from quote unquote Ankalaev. A lot of people are speculating, and maybe the manager, Ali, talking for him. I won't I won't speculate on that. But I will say whatever happened there fired up Alex to a point where he was very angry. We had an angry Alex.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. And that was a dangerous Alex.
SPEAKER_05:And that was evident. And it translated to this fight where he came out blazing.
SPEAKER_00:I've never seen him come out like that. Like he's usually measured at first. But oh my goodness, he was on the war path.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah. And um some of the smike talk that Ankelen was talking also I don't whether it was him or not, also was met prior to the fight. In the UFC PI, where is PI? Sorry. Uh the Performance Institute, which is their little um gym that the UFC has in certain locations. And Alex trains at them sometimes and also goes to them pretty frequently and was training and accused I use the word accused because I don't have the evidence for it, that Ankalaev came in and hid from him and his team. Yeah. And uh that prompted Ankalaev to come out and say, like, who's hiding or whatever, and they ended up having which you guys could look up online, a Google Translate war of words, where they were just talking smack to each other through Google Translate, ultimately ending with Ankalaev walking away and saying, No Chama and the look of a brokenhearted man by Alex He said, No Chama.
unknown:How could you?
SPEAKER_05:That's when I knew Alex had a way better chance. As I was saying. The fire had been lit, uh, leading to the beginning of the fight where he was absolutely fired up, cutting off the entirety of the cage like super fast. Like you said, never seen that before. And n what we have never also seen before is these this dominance against Enkalaev. Nobody has ever even, I don't think, even hurt Enkalaev in any of the previous fights I've seen of him, where he's been under dominance. It's taken him a long time to get a title uh chance as well. Yeah. His only loss being to Paul Craig a long time ago. So this massive win streak, massive champion, who put who had Alex in the back foot in the first fight, gets absolutely blasted by a nasty right hand. Yep. Not even the death hook.
SPEAKER_00:Not the death hook, but he had full extension and torso, like the uh leverage of his whole torso turned into it. And it was yes, that wasn't like um a true knockout area, but the back of the head behind the ear through the guard is that's that'll stun you.
SPEAKER_05:And he was absolutely stunned shooting for a desperation takedown and was uh just had no chance.
SPEAKER_00:And actually honestly, good on Alex for training on that. He immediately stuffed it.
SPEAKER_05:Immediately and turned it into offense and uh uh controls them on the ground.
SPEAKER_00:But the total number of strikes is also crazy. I've never seen this much disparity in a championship uh defending championship fight.
SPEAKER_04:Well, we have four. Hamza Jemai vs. Dricas, but he had more than four strikes.
SPEAKER_05:Who, Dricas? Yeah. I don't know. I guess yeah, you're right.
SPEAKER_00:I'm not saying that he did uh he had any kind of dominance. I'm saying he had more than four strikes though.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, that's a good point. You know, who knows?
SPEAKER_00:Nikolayev had four total strikes. Not just significant, four total strikes against twenty-eight. That's all Alex took needed was twenty-eight. Twenty eight strikes to finish him.
SPEAKER_05:That's wild. Uh and getting him the perfor getting Alex the performance of the night. And uh I was insanely just shocked by the sheer dominance of Alex becoming a two-time lightweight champ with with determinant fire in his eyes from the belt.
SPEAKER_00:I do have to say, we we talked about it after their first fight that Alex clearly looked not in top form.
SPEAKER_02:Mm-hmm.
SPEAKER_00:And in this one and Clayev didn't look in top form, and now we're seeing reports that he had broken ribs. Right, or something like that at least recently. Maybe they they might not have been fully broken. Who knows? But either way. No excuses. He didn't no, I'm not saying excuses for either one of them. Um this isn't an excuse for Alex losing the first time, this isn't an excuse for Engelaev losing this time. But honestly, I know a lot of people are are against a trilogy. Yeah. But personally, I would not be upset to see a trilogy fight between actually fully there. I would like to see a fight between them where there is absolutely zero zero things wrong with either one of them, you know? Hypothetically speaking. No, oh we lost. Yeah. No excuses, but Right.
SPEAKER_05:I agree. I agree, however, I think even the first loss to Enkalaev, uh, it wasn't a cakewalk for Enkalayev. It was not. It was still a great back and forth with Alex winning a couple rounds. Mm-hmm. And honestly, it wasn't as dominant a performance as this was. No. But this kind of shut down the trilogy thing, especially for Enkalaev, who didn't win many favors with the fans. Yeah. Especially with this whole Smack Talk, no Chama. Even we saw in the press conference where he said, We killed Chama. Chama's dead, and then Alex just said, Chama, and then the whole crowd just blew up. Ankalaev didn't win many favors, and I am very kind of unfortunate about his where he's kind of getting thrown back to the back of the line. Mm-hmm. Even l losing the number one contender rank to Jiri, Jiri becoming number one and Ankalaev number two, which is crazy to me. And like you said, not getting that trilogy fight.
SPEAKER_00:I mean, to be fair, looking purely at record and numbers, Jiri should be number one contender. Should he not?
SPEAKER_05:Mm. I don't know. I would still put Enkalayev number one just because I mean The way he lost, he's the way he lost to Paul Craig was insane for Paul Craig, and he got a last second submission where Ankalaya was beating him the whole fight. Whereas uh I don't know if this had anything to do with it, where Jeri lost both fights to Alex in dominant fashion. But yeah, I mean Je has put up amazing performances.
SPEAKER_00:Well I'm not saying like in comparison to Alex. I'm just saying like their overall record.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:Honestly.
SPEAKER_05:That's what I mean, you know.
SPEAKER_00:Jeri has 32-5-1 versus Ankalaya's what is it? Twenty twenty-one, two, and one. So m more than ten more uh wins, yes, three more losses. But it it just seems like and but no draw, right? It it it just pure numbers. I think Jerry has totally earned number one contender.
SPEAKER_05:And that's an argument for sure that someone can make. I just don't feel that uh if you're the champion, you should go down to number two. It's just you should get your a chance for an immediate rematch, you should get your number one contender, and um it's just very unfortunate. Nobody's even talking about Ankalayev for the belt if Alex moves up in weight class. They're they're throwing out Jerry versus Olberg. Yeah. Completely undermining Enkalayev, which I don't agree with.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah.
SPEAKER_05:That's the part I don't agree with.
SPEAKER_00:Based on treatment of previous champions, once they've lost their belt, I can't say that that's a great choice. Or entirely fair. But to put things in a perspective of money making, which is what UFC is all about, is making money. Or at least his foot has been shot. I don't know who pulled the trigger, but his sh his foot has been shot. Exactly. And he's a lame duck right now as far as fans go.
SPEAKER_05:What a point, yeah. Great point.
SPEAKER_00:And I mean, and so unfortunately, it might not be the best or entirely fair, but from the point of making money, which is what UFC is all about. I mean, it's not truly all about that, but uh that that's a driving force behind it, is keeping the fans happy.
SPEAKER_05:Absolutely, and I feel like that's what Alex has done and uh cement his legacy in the UFC as uh I mean it's crazy to say that his short time, and he's already like one of the goats.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah.
SPEAKER_05:Such a short time, and uh majority of his fights have been for belts.
SPEAKER_00:And as mildly unorthodox as that is, he has earned it, and he has shown time after time after time against opponents that you really had the pucker factor, if you will, going into it, you're like, man, this is gonna be a real challenge for him because he has this, this, this, and this as far as uh skills against him that Alex is weak in. Absolutely. And he still comes out on top.
SPEAKER_05:Absolutely.
SPEAKER_00:I mean he's he's earned it. He's earned it a little faster than some, but not the fastest I've ever seen.
SPEAKER_05:And uh we were talking about this off-air is how his coming up in the UFC, how he was uh Alex was entirely dismissed as a kickboxer. And as we know, wrestling is just has become the dominant thing in the UFC. And that's where all the doubt came from for Alex. Yeah. Constantly doubting that this is MMA and you know you can't just go there and be an exceptional striker and that's it. All the doubts were on his side a majority of the time. True. And uh like you were saying, he just surpasses all those doubts and coming into this fight, he wasn't the underdog. So it's just sim like I said, cementing himself as one of the greatest in in the sport.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah.
SPEAKER_05:In a in a short amount of time, and it's just incredible. I think it's like a once-in-a-lifetime kind of thing that we're seeing.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:And I have to say I appreciate the uh star power that he has to put it in that in a common part of that is he doesn't speak English, but he's still a star in America and also Transcending Language He's not he's not becoming a star because of how much of an ass he makes of himself. I agree. Or how much of an ass he is to other players, I agree, or being like John Jones. He's he's being a genuinely good human and he's still being a superstar, which is nice to see. I'm not saying no one else has done it, I'm just saying that he's done it and I appreciate it.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, and I agree with that to the point where, yeah, like I agree, he's his superstar and his stardom. Uh transcends everything we know about the sport so far, transcends language, like you were saying, transcends character because he's stoic, but like But when he's out of the octagon's he can be a goofball. He's a goofball, he's doing side quests, he's uh kicking people kicking fans. Well, kicking people and fans that asked to be fair to be fair, doing all these little side quests and um even rising up controversy from all those side quests.
SPEAKER_01:Mm-hmm.
SPEAKER_05:However, he's himself, he is Chama, quote unquote Chama. He is that, he embodies that, and a lot of people see that and love that about him, and I'm very surprised by how many people like this guy.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_05:I mean, how many people when we were watching it were excited to see this fight, we're excited to see Alex win. Some random dude come in and give me a high five if Alex won. And I tr like I was saying, I chose the right day to wear my chama hat.
SPEAKER_00:We sure did.
SPEAKER_05:Uh, and just transcends the sport in general because of everything he's done to this point. Yeah. Before we get off the subject of Alex, I do want to add some of the stuff that we've been hearing afterward, him moving up in weight class, possibly becoming even more of a possibility. In the press conference afterward, after the fight, Dana White saying that Alex actually he was asked about it, actually came up to him in the UFC PI and he was like, What are you doing here? Like, you're the last person I expect to see you before the fight.
SPEAKER_01:Mm-hmm.
SPEAKER_05:Uh Alex and his uh camp, which I'm assuming is Polinho, the coach, right, basically told him, like, we want to move up and wait. And Dana White basically telling him, Let's see what happens after this fight. Right, right. We saw what happened after this fight. Uh a massive performance by Alex.
SPEAKER_00:Well, we saw the fight. We haven't seen what happened.
SPEAKER_05:And uh Alex coming with prior to this fight, if he won, coming with that shot uh call out of John Jones was what he was planning to do, from what I understand. Um, however, John Jones' brother sadly passing away unexpectedly.
SPEAKER_04:Yep.
SPEAKER_05:Uh condolences, severe condolences to John Jones for that. And Alex mass again gaining even more massive respect, telling everyone, even though this is his victory speech, let's take a moment of silence for John Jones' brother.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, that was that was good of him.
SPEAKER_05:And the first time I've ever seen the any stadium actually get quiet for someone, you know, usually people are still talking. And when Alex said moment of silence, they gave a moment of silence.
SPEAKER_00:That was that was an awesome moment for sure.
SPEAKER_05:Amazing moment, and this board is just full of amazing moments. And uh that's that's what I appreciate about this board the most, and that's what I appreciate about Alex as a person.
SPEAKER_00:I'm excited to see the future. Whatever the future is, I'm excited to see where Alex goes.
SPEAKER_05:Many speculations. I mean, let's see, it looks more and more like he's gonna leave this belt and move up and wait. Very exciting prospect, very exciting prospect seeing the possibility of the first ever triple champion is is unheard of, and that possibility is more and more growing by the moment because we have this guy, Alex. Yeah, who's like I said, if he does that, he transcends weight class.
SPEAKER_00:Sure does.
SPEAKER_05:And it's just but who knows? I'm getting ahead of myself. We'll have to see. I'm getting ahead of myself, uh, because I still want to talk about that John Jones, that he wants to fight John Jones, it's really bad. They really want to fight each other real bad. John Jones hasn't spoken about this yet, but remember prior to the Aspinol fight, uh, the one that was gonna happen, John Jones was saying, like, I want to fight Alex.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, he was I remember while uh all that hoopla was going on about him ducking Aspinol and blah blah blah blah blah. Mm-hmm. I remember John Jones saying that if he wants any fight, he wants it to be with a superstar like Alex.
SPEAKER_01:Right.
SPEAKER_00:And I mean I understand that. He's he's been in a position and earned himself the the clout, if you will, sure to kind of make demands like that.
SPEAKER_05:Absolutely.
SPEAKER_00:And I will also say And UFC will make a lot of money on that fight.
SPEAKER_05:That would be a super fight, however, there's some obstacles, uh, but not not that not through Alex's part, because he clearly confirmed that he wants to fight John Jones, maybe in the White House, and John Jones is begging, pleading Wadana White to be on the White House card. So, however, how do we put these two champions, Alex only fighting for belts, and John Jones exclusively in his career, mainly only fighting for belts? How w how do we do this? How do we make a super fight with no belt?
SPEAKER_00:Um, but who knows with this new platform they're they're going on? I think it might be a possibility.
SPEAKER_05:Anything's possible, yeah. Yeah, I mean, a lot of things have happened recently where I'm like that wasn't possible. Yeah. And we've talked about this in a previous episode, is all if I were to tell myself things that I wouldn't believe, you know. Right. And a lot of that has happened recently. Uh so I think anything is possible. Let's see if Alex Bereda versus John Jones in heavyweight happens. I mean, uh I don't think Alex has any problem making the weight. I mean, prior to the fights, he comes at like what, 240 or something like that?
SPEAKER_00:Uh yeah, I don't know.
SPEAKER_05:A massive cut. He did like a 30-pound cut to get to 205 recently, so that's insane to me.
SPEAKER_00:He does I know he had to cut a lot to be in light heavyweight. How did this guy ever make middleweight is crazy? Yeah, middleweight, sorry.
SPEAKER_05:How did he ever make 185 is crazy to me. We do have a couple of amazing upcoming fights. We got uh what more than likely when this episode is released, we have happened that UFC fight night for Charles Oliveira, which uh I'm not happy about him fighting so soon after being knocked out.
SPEAKER_00:Not not ideal.
SPEAKER_05:He's fighting versus Mateus Gamrat, a uh just gonna be a a a short notice fight for Gamrot. Original opponent was supposed to be Rafael Faziv. Didn't happen, and then we have in that same card uh Davison Fijuardo versus Montel Jackson. First fight we've seen with Fijuardo fighting after his loss to San Hagen, which he got injured in that fight. Yeah. So that should be interesting, and then Vicente Luque versus Joel Alvarez on that card. So that's very exciting. So that already passed Saturday, October 11, 5 p.m. And that's in Rio de Janeiro. We got another fight that I'm very excited about. Hasn't happened yet. Um we're gonna see Rainier De Ritter versus Brendan Allen. Another short notice fight. Original opponent was supposed to be Fluffy Hernandez on that one. Fortunately, he got injured, and that was a fight that I was posting and posting and posting about because I was very exciting. Yeah, very excited about that, because it was supposed to be like a contender fight for that middleweight belt. Right. And Rainier De Ritter fighting five times, five or six times in a calendar year, is very impressive. This guy is trying to make a name for himself and he is succeeding at that.
SPEAKER_00:He is. I mean, he's not exactly the most likable fellow or have particularly great star power. But his skill is undeniable.
SPEAKER_05:It definitely is. Uh versus Brendan Allen taking this fight short notice, but let's see what he's able to do against Rainier De Ritter. Same card we got Kevin Holland versus Mike Millot. I like Mike Millot. He's a very Exciting striker, and uh Kevin Holland is also a very exciting striker, so we should see fireworks in that one.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, definitely looking forward to that.
SPEAKER_05:And then we got Marlon Chito Vera versus uh Eamon Zahabi and uh Marlon Vera coming from a loss versus Davison Fridge Wardle, who's fighting in the card I speak uh I spoke about previously. Right. And Zahabi winning a controversial decision versus Joel Zi Aldo in his retirement fight, where I did think Joel Zialdo won in that one. So that's that should be very exciting, and we got Men and Fior versus Jasmine Jasdavitius, so that should be very exciting in that one. And then we have uh in October in the same month, we have finally finally that Tom Aspinall fight that he's been waiting years for. Although not John Jones, he is fighting the number one contender in Cyril Gone.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_05:Uh from my understanding, they've been trying to get these guys together to fight for years and years, and has never come to fruition. And now we'll see finally an undisputed fight for that heavyweight belt that we've been getting uh jerked around with for a long time. And uh that is the m pretty much the most exciting fight for that division, and we'll see what happens moving forward.
SPEAKER_01:Absolutely.
SPEAKER_05:Uh, in that same card, Verna Gendiroma versus Mackenzie Dern, and we have Umar coming off that Mirab loss versus Mario Bautista, who's been performing exceptionally in his fights. And I think this is also a contender fight for that belt, personally.
SPEAKER_00:Okay. I I I think it probably should be. I would like uh I'm interested to see how Umar comes back from that loss.
SPEAKER_05:Absolutely.
SPEAKER_00:He's not exactly experienced in the lost department.
SPEAKER_05:Not experienced in the lost department, and uh neither is Mario Bautista, who's who's been on a win streak, and afterward we have another, which I believe is another contender fight, is Alexander Volkov versus Jeltin Omida.
SPEAKER_00:That one should be great.
SPEAKER_05:That should be a great fight. Um both have very interesting styles, and like I said, I think this is a contender fight for that heavyweight belt. So that should be very exciting.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_05:And now we got our Reddit confessions for ya. Oh boy, oh boy.
SPEAKER_00:Alright, now for this first confession, it is weirdly enough, from R slash confession. I know. Wild, right? It is by Malachi underscore universe underscore twenty-three. Now, for this one I am not going to read the title because it gives away too much. I'll read it after I finish. Okay. High school. Senior year. I'm in a friend group of five. My best female friend since age twelve has a toxic boyfriend who is constantly controlling her. Senior year, she couldn't hang out with me or her bestie as much. Some days we saw him grabbing or squeezing her arm. So one day, me, her bestie, and another friend of ours go into the office and tell them that our friend's boyfriend has brought something to school in his bag. We think he might hurt someone. So his bag ended up being searched. It was a total lie, but it was revealed that an ounce of methamphetamine and some kind of pistol was in his bag.
SPEAKER_05:What the hell?
SPEAKER_00:We'll never know what he used that gun for or what he was going to use it for, but he was expelled. And since he was a minor, I'm not sure to what extent of the law that he faced, but he didn't see much time in jail. He bailed out, probation, summer school, and repeating the grade, all that. Subsequently, this same person went to jail five years later for armed robbery. That's what he was planning. It took five years. And now here's the title. Me and my friends lied to get a person expelled, and it ended up being the truth.
SPEAKER_05:What's your thoughts on this? That that is kind of crazy. I mean, uh very unfortunate for him. Um but meth and a gun should not be an high school. Unless you can be anywhere planning on something or I don't know. At least not those two together. That's pretty rough. Um but maybe they saved their class.
SPEAKER_04:Probably.
SPEAKER_05:Possible. Very possible. And that's kind of a confession that actually helped them, but I guess uh snitches get stitches, hopefully.
SPEAKER_00:In this situation, hope not. Hopefully not. He was clearly being a garbage human being.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, I agree.
SPEAKER_00:So kind of similarly as what you were saying, the top comment is I'll be the judge of that underscore. And they say, I feel like even if it was a lie, and I hope you did learn your lesson about lying, you pro you possibly saved people from being hurt at your school, and that is incredible. And they replied with I have learned to not lie as I got older, yes, haha. But I wouldn't take back my actions that day. I just wish I had a better reason than I'm in love with my best friend and that jerk is hurting her. I'm twenty seven and gay, finally came out, haha. And we're still best friends to this day. She's got a husband and two kids. We laugh and joke about how the friend group predicted what a monster he would turn out to be later in life. My reasons for doing the lie were purely out of jealousy and also of protection of our friend. But I wanted to be a hero, I guess.
SPEAKER_05:And he did. He became a hero, an unexpected hero, an unsung hero. And uh I mean, at least they got to end up still being best friends and actually laugh about this whole scenario. Unfortunate for that gentleman, um, who wasn't able to get his life together, and that's a very unfortunate aspect. However, uh yeah, I think I do agree with the fact that they may have helped other people around this person. Including the friend who shouldn't be associating with someone who has a firearm and hardcore methamphetamine in their backpack. It's crazy.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. It was a lie for ostensibly good reasons, but not I it's a nine uh not an ideal basis to uh report someone, and I wouldn't suggest people do that without extreme extremely good reasoning. And to be fair, the fact that he was clearly being overly controlling and perhaps assaulting her that is a good reason, but to be fair, that is reason enough to go to a uh higher authority, if you will, within the school, you know. That's reason enough. You don't have to say, you don't have to lie. You can report things like that to school administration.
SPEAKER_05:Sure. And good on them for actually succeeding in that aspect. Uh and I have uh a pretty dark confession. Um and it's uh very intriguing, which we'll have some pretty good advice to give on this one, I'm sure. Oh, okay. And from true off my chest.
SPEAKER_00:That can get juicy there.
SPEAKER_05:By faking it but not making it.
SPEAKER_00:Nice name.
SPEAKER_05:Title is I ruined my life from cheating.
SPEAKER_00:Not to put too fine a point on it, but good.
SPEAKER_05:I'm going to try Yeah, no that's crazy. I'm going to try to keep this short and sweet. I cheated on my husband. I got pregnant within a year of us dating on accident. I love our child more than anything, but I never loved my husband. He is a good man, however, good dad, and he took care of me. I tried so hard to make myself love him, but it just wasn't there. We completely stopped having sex because I had absolutely no attraction to him. He loved me and I wish I felt the same. I confessed cheating on him. I hate myself for doing that to him, and I have no excuses as for why I cheated. We have been separated for over a year now. Our court date for the divorce is coming up. It got pushed back due to courthouse having issues. Our relationship is actually better than it has ever been. We co parent really well. We are on the same page and work together beautifully for our four year old kid. There isn't a day that goes by that I am not eaten up with guilt. For the last five years I won it out, and I still am confident that we are never meant to be. But I am heartbroken every day because we aren't a family. We have fifty fifty custody and we are both very involved in our kid. It tears me apart every second of the day not being a big happy family. I hurt our kid not having mommy and daddy every single day. Our kid has handled it well, but I can't help but feel like a failure. I feel like I ruined not only my life, but our kids' life. I would like to add I work two jobs, I'm in debt, and struggling extremely bad for money. I don't want my soon to be ex husband to pay me or any child support. I made this decision, and I don't want him to pay for what I did. Does it get better? I don't eat anymore. I am so depressed. I feel like I'm fighting for my life daily. I don't have any healthy habits, and I and I want to be a better person. I have learned my lesson the hard way. I want to pick up the pieces and grow from this. I want my soon-to-be ex husband to find someone who loves him in the way I never could. I want to find peace and and fifty-fifty custody. I want to survive. Sheesh. It's a lot. It's a lot to take in. Um this is a very unfortunate situation. Um whereas she says it doesn't just affect her, uh, her decision kind of affects everyone around. Um, I do want to give the advice that the depression is very concerning, and if you're depressed to the point where you're you feel debilitated, then yes, you need to talk to someone about that in particular. Um quick comment that I want to add is uh by 003402 Inco, a bit confusing at the start of your post. Is the kid his? It's promising you have recognized the impact that you have had on him and yourself, but sounds like you might need some help charting a way forward. That part I do agree with. If you have access to counseling, suggest pursuing it. You need to fully own breaking the biggest trust possible in marriage and figure out why you did this. Frankly, I am surprised he is as cooperative with you as he is. That has to be a bitter thing for him. And uh coming afterward kind of clears that up. If I understand correctly, she got pregnant with this child and married him because of that, even though she didn't love him to enough to actually be married like that. And then uh it's crazy scenario all around.
SPEAKER_00:I know that were there no replies from the original poster that helped clarify anything.
SPEAKER_05:I would have loved for them to reply, but I'm sure it's a crazy scenario, I don't know. Yeah. And uh this was actually posted very recently. Okay. So that's probably why.
SPEAKER_00:That could yeah, that could could be uh just completely overwhelmed with the responses. So man, that's a deep, deep one to dig into. I will say broad strokes, first with the kid, the pregnancy, and subsequent marriage, that is unfortunately all too common, and all too often that does result in infidelity and or divorce. I understand in the moment especially, it's a very daunting thing to look forward into the future and realize like, oh my god, this is our kid. How are we ever gonna do this if we're not married? Overwhelming. But unfortunately way too often you enter in or I shouldn't say you, but it c it's entered into in such a rushed and or forced manner, mm-hmm, and then all too often only one party, in this case it would be the husband, puts in the work and decides to develop the love. Love isn't just a feeling that comes by and you're blessed with for the rest of eternity. Love is an emotion that is built.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, you work on it.
SPEAKER_00:And it's and is not built and then left alone. You need to build it and you need to maintain it.
SPEAKER_02:Mm-hmm.
SPEAKER_00:Unfortunately, it is all too common in today's society that that is not something that is taught from early. It's not a societal norm for that to be prevalent in our media and to be given it good examples of that throughout your life. So that's unfortunately, I think that was a huge aspect in this scenario because in the moment or before the cheating happened, I should say, it's pretty clear that OP could have had the eye-opening experience of building the love and appreciating the life she had. But as so many people do, she saw that I c I think I could just do so much better. I could have so much more excitement in my life, and it's his fault.
SPEAKER_05:Possibly.
SPEAKER_00:I'm not saying that's exactly word for word what she was thinking, but that's the gist I'm getting from the post. And it's just sad. It's just sad to see all around the the results of this uh absence of that know of the knowledge that you work at love. You can develop it. And she's learning a little too late, unfortunately, that you know, this guy is actually a really good guy.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, absolutely.
SPEAKER_00:And the basis for love was there. She just couldn't see it in the moment.
SPEAKER_05:And couldn't see it, yeah.
SPEAKER_00:And that's that's super sad. It's sad, however it doesn't excuse cheating.
SPEAKER_05:No. It doesn't excuse the cheating part, but she did not feel compatible with this gentleman. I do feel like this all could have been avoided had communication from the beginning started. She's been like, I don't love you and I don't foresee myself loving you, therefore we shouldn't get married. And this is an unfortunate scenario. And who knows the background information, who knows what arguments they had about it. Yeah. Um but it does kind of I get that from this text, like, Well shit, we're having a baby. We can't we can't have a baby and not be married. Mm-hmm. And I think that's kind of what forced the hand in this scenario. And uh no excuse for the cheating part. If you're just not happy, you communicate that and either you fix it or you move forward.
SPEAKER_00:As far as advice for OP, I would have to say that in the broad strokes of overview that I'm getting from this post, firstly, she needs to learn who she is and what she wants from life and to figure out how to work towards that.
SPEAKER_05:Yes.
SPEAKER_00:And to be true to that. Because as it's sitting right now, that I think that's a major source of the depression is she doesn't know where she's going from here. She doesn't see how life can get better from where it's been.
SPEAKER_02:Mm-hmm.
SPEAKER_00:And she doesn't see how her child can be have a happy, fulfilling life in the current circumstance.
SPEAKER_05:Feeling of defeat. She f uh stated eloquently that she feels like a failure. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:And I just want to say that the good times can be had.
SPEAKER_05:Mm-hmm. Absolutely.
SPEAKER_00:The fulfilling and healthy life can be had for the child. Yeah, absolutely. Is it gonna be the healthiest? Perhaps not. Perhaps not, right. But you can provide the happiest and healthiest life you can, and you might be surprised just how happy and healthy that kid can turn out if you work at it. Sure. But you have to be cognizant and you have to work at it. I agree. Life doesn't happen by mistake. Accept your actions, accept where you've chosen to take your life, apologize for the pain it has caused, be aware of it, and learn from it.
SPEAKER_05:Absolutely.
SPEAKER_00:But this isn't the end of the road. It doesn't well, it doesn't need to be the end of the road. No, certainly not. You your absence complete absence would be much more painful and harmful to the child. And frankly, your soon-to-be ex-husband. Then you learning from this and growing as a human and as a mom to become the best that you can.
SPEAKER_05:I I definitely agree with that. Um to the point, I also want to add that the uh OP does not need to do this alone, and I encourage seeking counseling for that because uh getting the sense of failure and depression, it's gonna haunt them um constantly. It's gonna always haunt this person, and their actions are always gonna haunt this person, and the pain that they have uh i.e. caused and have gone through will haunt them. So they defin I just think they should seek some counseling for that and like you said, move forward because um it's impossible to swim in mud, and that's what this person's trying to do, is just trying to swim in mud and there's no there's no escaping it.
SPEAKER_00:There's a point to that, yeah.
SPEAKER_05:And they don't have to do this alone.
SPEAKER_00:They don't have to, no. It is possible to grow and to learn on your own, but I can't say that I recommend it because it is not the fastest route.
SPEAKER_02:Mm-hmm.
SPEAKER_00:It takes years to do it by yourself. I mean it can take years with therapy, but you can get a much more complete picture via therapy. Or or even joining a a group. There's there's various groups and some of them might be more tangential to it, not precisely in line with her situation, but they would still provide great help, I think.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, absolutely. Any pertinent comments that we should uh there's not that many comments, but they're basically a lot of people saying like don't be searching for sympathy and stuff like that. And uh that's kind of not that kind of gross.
SPEAKER_00:That's that's gross.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, that's not um This is a human being.
SPEAKER_00:They've made mistakes, they acknowledge it. Let's get them beyond beyond that, yeah.
SPEAKER_05:And it's not constructive, so we'll leave it at that. For sure.
SPEAKER_00:Alright. Now the final confession of the night will be also from R Confessions, and it is by Explorer Routine 9312. I've been secretly feeding my neighbor's cat for eight months, and now it lives at my place. This is probably gonna make me sound like a crazy cat dude, but I'm honestly losing sleep over this situation. Cat dude. So last winter this orange tabby started showing up on my back porch, looking absolutely miserable. Super skinny, matted fur the whole sad story. I felt bad, so I started leaving out some cheap cat food I grabbed from the dollar store. Turns out the cat belongs to my neighbors two houses down. But here's the thing these people are terrible pet owners. Just as an aside, obviously if the cat was in that condition.
SPEAKER_05:Right.
SPEAKER_00:They leave him outside in all weather. I've never seen them play with him or even pet him, and honestly I'm not even sure they feed him regularly because he was always starving when he came to my place. Fast forward to now, and this cat basically lives with me. He sleeps on my couch, follows me around the house, purrs constantly, and gets excited when I come home from work. Oh wow. My apartment feels like it's actually his place now. The problem is, the neighbors have started putting up missing cat flyers around the neighborhood with his picture. They're asking people to check their garages and sheds. Meanwhile, he's literally napping on my kitchen counter right now. I know I should probably just tell them where he is, but honestly, he is so much happier here. He was skin and bones before, and now he's this chunky content little guy who does this adorable thing where he brings me his toy mouse when I'm having a bad day.
SPEAKER_01:Oh wow.
SPEAKER_00:But I'm but I also feel like a complete psycho for basically stealing someone's pet. Basically. Even if they were neglecting him. What if they actually do care and just suck at showing it? What if they're what if they've been looking for him this whole time and I'm just some crazy person who kidnapped their cat? The worst part is I'm getting attached and now I don't want to give him back, even though I should. I've already spent like four hundred dollars on vet bills, good food, toys, a scratching post, and all that stuff. Which which honestly wasn't a big dent in my budget since I had some money aside for from a stake win, whatever that is. But I couldn't get I couldn't just watch him suffer. Am I a terrible person or are they terrible pet owners?
SPEAKER_05:Unfortunately.
SPEAKER_00:I have mildly strong opinions on this due to my past.
SPEAKER_05:Um but before I dig into that, throw in your Um I think there's a little bit of both. I mean who's to say whether these are bad cat owners or not? It kind of just all seems like from their perspective. So we can never actually know.
SPEAKER_00:I mean, true. There's no way for us to try to verify it or whatever. Yeah, it's not like we have a perfect overview.
SPEAKER_05:Like what if they just feed the cat really healthy stuff and I don't know, who knows?
SPEAKER_00:Well, it's kind of impossible given the condition of the cat.
SPEAKER_05:Who knows? I feel like maybe the condition of the cat could also be embellished through this person's eyes. You know? Uh there's no way to like get evidence, like to get a picture of this cat or whatever.
SPEAKER_00:Skin and bones and mad it, it's kind of hard to mistake that.
SPEAKER_05:Who knows? Maybe this person wanted a cat so bad that they made that up. Look at me, skin and bones. You know how like when your grandma says that look at me, skin and bones, and you're really just chunky.
SPEAKER_00:They just they just say that. I'm not gonna say it's impossible, but from what I've read it doesn't sound like it.
SPEAKER_05:And uh who knows, but I mean, yeah, it's not good to take other people's pets. Um and I think this is a very interesting scenario. Yeah. And maybe the cat's living it up though, living a way better life. Um, but it's all kind of speculation. I mean, why would they if they were such bad owners, why would they put missing cat, you know? It's just uh But why would they wait almost eight months? It is kind of strange. It is kind of strange. However, people who own like I have friends who own cats and just let their cats be outside, and like they've told me like their cats leave for months and then come back. So I've heard that several times.
SPEAKER_00:Oh, don't get me wrong, some cats are built that way.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, cats are cats can be very resilient and stuff like that. Mm-hmm. Um I've seen stories where like they leave for like three months at a time and come back with a freaking dead bird and stuff, you know. And uh but yeah, this person is invested in this cat. Um and literally and uh figuratively they're invested in this cat, so I don't know what's the next step for them.
SPEAKER_00:Alright, so my point of view, I grew up in the country and we routinely had we routinely got strays, cats and dogs. Some of them were drop-offs, some of them potentially were escaped pets, but in one case for sure, we had a dog that would show up, and this dog was clearly unhealthy. Very similar to what I'm reading of this cat. Uh we literally did have to shave her because she literally did have mats. Madden. She wasn't she didn't have the condition called mats or whatever that terminology meant.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:But she had huge chunks of her fur that were super tightly bound because of like cockle bears, and they were digging into her skin and she had sores. That doesn't happen overnight.
SPEAKER_02:Mm-hmm.
SPEAKER_00:Especially to the extent that we saw when we uncovered it. No, I agree. This isn't something that just happens in a day or two. And we had the neighbor, not not next door neighbor, again, out in the country. This n this neighbor lived about half a mile away. More like three quarters, if you followed the road. Half a mile as the crow flew, if you will. And we we discovered that this dog belonged to them. And then we we gave the dog back after we had already treated it, because I mean, to be fair, that's just what you do with an animal that needs treatment. You treat it. Well only a few days later, the dog shows up again. And we're like, okay. Kind of kind of annoying at this point. Like, if this is really your dog and you want this dog, take care of it. Take care of it and keep it contained. I agree with that, yeah. We give it back, and this time it's like three months go by. The dog shows up in almost the exact same condition as the first time. Oh my god. And my parents were like, Nope, this is our dog now.
SPEAKER_02:Hmm.
SPEAKER_00:Because they clearly couldn't handle being good pet owners. And the neighbor did come and try to say that they wanted the dog back, but my parents were like, Look, this dog is not in good condition. You are clearly not treating it well. It clearly wants to be here. Just let us take care of this dog. The owner hemm and hawed, or hemmed and hawed, but eventually just said, fine, you keep the dog. It seems happy. And so, because of that experience, I do have uh a slight inclination to side on the poster's uh view of things, because I've I've literally experienced that just with a canine instead of a feline. And I'm I'm gonna give the poster the benefit of the doubt that they're not wildly exaggerating.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:And they're being as truthful as they reasonably can be. Will they have um I'm just gonna assume that they are slightly biased in their presentation, but it seems like they're genuinely trying to f figure out are they an asshole, and because of that, I'm gonna give them the benefit of the doubt that they're going to be as unbiased as they possibly can be. And if the cat really was skin and bones, if the cat really did keep coming back to their porch, I'm gonna say the cat chose you.
SPEAKER_05:Could be.
SPEAKER_00:He star this I'm gonna Yeah, I called himself a dude. I'm going to assume this guy Well I shouldn't say assume, because he stated it. He he started with just giving the cat shitty dollar store food. Some food, yeah. If the cat was getting good food, the cat wouldn't come back for that. You know, like you were suggesting maybe the owners do give him kid food. No. Who knows? If if the owners were giving him the cat sufficient good food, it wouldn't be going over to the neighbor's house for the shittiest cat food they can that can be found. I shouldn't say wouldn't for sure, but it's much less likely. Sure. And uh the the comment from the poster about never seeing them give the cat love or attention, that's kind of neither here nor there. I will definitely admit that. Because unless you're sitting at the window watching at all times, you're not going to have a good overview of what they do. Though to s to never see any interaction between them and the cat when it's an always an outside cat would be a little odd. Um either way, the fact that it's eight months in and the posters are only now going up, that's a pretty big indicator that they're not good pet owners.
SPEAKER_05:Could be, yeah. Very much could be.
SPEAKER_00:The cat's happy with you. Just accept it.
SPEAKER_05:I will say two things to that. Uh uh as it compared to your story where you gave the owner multiple chances. Uh for one, the OP hasn't gone to them and said, like, hey, your cat's over here skin and bones and all that. Very true. I was gonna mention that, yes. From what I understand. And two, if this is an all outside cat, will it be all that happy being coming an all-indoor cat after that?
SPEAKER_00:Well, it's clearly fully fun, fully having fun being an indoor cat.
SPEAKER_05:It's gonna have to become an indoor cat because uh if you're not gonna tell the owner, you're not gonna wanna you know, what if the owner does come by and you have the cat in your stoop and stuff like that? So I'm assuming that it's just gonna become an all indoor cat from this point forward.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. So in conjunction with what you were saying and what I was about to include on my own behalf, is and also it's in the type the top comment um by S or Small T Small Tim's. Uh was he chipped when you took him to the vet? Because if not, dot dot dot dot dot. Now, I will preface this by the OP posted this a month ago, and there is not a singular I even went to their page. They didn't reply to a single comment on here. So it's hard to get a truly great overview. But again, in in reply to that, is I mean they they weren't taking care of the cat. I'm just gonna believe that that he really was skin and bones, the cat and really was in poor condition. So previous owners not taking good care of the cat, not chipping the cat, taking eight months to put up posters. I'm I'm just gonna say you're fully vindicated in keeping the cat. As a good human, I would suggest calmly and politely talking to the previous owners. Yeah. And be like, look. Either I did or didn't know that this was your cat. Either way, it was in very poor condition. I have given it these these months of attention and care. It is clearly very happy in its situation. Yeah. I would like to keep it. And unless they're garbage humans, they're probably gonna say, fine. I'm not saying they will.
SPEAKER_05:Who knows?
SPEAKER_00:But it it's likely that they would be okay with it. But either way, it would be socially the better thing to do. I would say. I mean, eve you ca even if you feel extra strongly about it, you can just straight up go to them and say, look, this cat was in terrible condition, I've nursed it back to health, it is very happy with me, I'm going to keep it. That might potentially cause problems, but it is the better thing to do within normal human society. Either way, good on you. Yeah.
SPEAKER_05:Being a good human, yeah.
SPEAKER_00:For keep for I shouldn't say keeping the cat, but for nursing the cat. Nursing the cat into a better life.
SPEAKER_05:I completely agree.
SPEAKER_00:It's your choice on what to do after this.
SPEAKER_05:And I will add, if you do decide to uh talk to the uh previous owner of the cat, to uh keep those gloves up just in case because if they're bad owners, then that could mean that they're bad people. Uh and you never know what bad people are there. Yeah. And uh we'll go ahead and end the episode there, Harley. Uh amazing confessions and amazing UFC stuff going on. And uh we sincerely appreciate if you like and subscribe, uh, leave a comment, uh it all helps. And uh thank you guys for listening.
SPEAKER_00:Yes, thank you very much. Keep those gloves up, and we'll see you next time.
