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UFC 297 came and went, but we’re still here. Welcome to the mailbag, kids. After a UFC weekend that was eventful for strange happenings in and outside of fighting, we’re back to answering questions about what we saw and what’s up next.
Please remember that you (yes, you) can have your questions answered right here, whether they’re fight related or not. You know the drill by now. Hit us up at [email protected]. Substack members get priority, but you don’t have to be a subscriber to submit questions. Just include your handle if you do, you’ll get shouted out regardless. To set the tone, here’s this week’s recommended accompaniment.
UFC might be striking while the iron’s hot
Evan Zivin asks: Is Dana making a mistake by not pushing for Du Plessis vs. Strickland 2?
I’m a bit conflicted, here. I applaud his restraint for not immediately firing from the hip and matchmaking immediately after the fight. He says that’s his M.O., but we’ve seen him break that rule multiple times. Should Adesanya get the first crack at Dricus for the UFC middleweight belt? Off a loss? Probably not, especially as badly as he lost against Strickland in a fight that should have been a steamrolling on paper.
But then you look around and remember what a goddamned mess that division is. At the time of this writing, Strickland is #1 in the rankings, with Adesanya at #2. Robert Whittaker is at #3 and Jared Cannonier at #4, followed by Marvin Vettori at #5 and Paulo Costa at #6. Adesanya and du Plessis have some beef that’s been simmering for some time, and Adesanya is a known entity with an exciting style and mainstream appeal. He’s cool, he seems like he does good business, and he can fight his ass off. It’s an layup for the UFC, because that’s the only kind of matchup they know how to sell these days.
All of this leads me to believe he’ll likely get the next shot. It isn’t the most fair thing, but it makes sense on paper in a way. Because if we talk about who deserves what, then Cannonier’s back to back wins over Strickland and Vettori should have him up next. But unless his agent is some kind of mastermind or the takes the most insane lowball offer from the UFC for the fight, I don’t see him getting it.
Nothing against Jared, he’s just not a guy the UFC has put a lot of promotional muscle behind despite his successes. His losses to Whittaker and Adesanya weren’t the worst, he just probably wasn’t ready for those at the time. Then there’s also the fact that Cannonier hasn’t had a finish in a long time. The UFC’s own ineptitude at selling their fighters and their skills holds him back.
As for everyone else? Vettori’s been alternating wins and losses to go 3-3 since his breakthrough win against Jack Hermansson. Whittaker’s last outing was getting his lights shut off by du Plessis, and he’s slated to fight Costa in a few weeks. And that’s only if that fight comes to fruition, because Costa spent all of 2023 on the shelf.
Costa beat Yoel Romero in 2020, ate back to back losses to Adesanya and Vettori (which was its own small disaster) and earned a win over the ghost of Luke Rockhold in 2022. All of that had a handful of cancellations sandwiched in there. Maybe Costa’s proclivity to bowing out of fights is due to volunteering to be a guinea pig for scientific research aiming to finally cure Bolsonaro from that disease that afflicted Mr. Freeze’s wife.
Maybe there’s some horse trading that needs to happen behind the scenes before anything gets done. I have a hunch there’s probably some contractual business the UFC needs to sort out with Dricus before anything moves forwards, but that’s just a hunch with nothing scientific to go by. Either that or Strickland didn’t have some sort of automatic rematch clause in his deal. Otherwise, we’d have seen Dana declare an event in Joburg on the spot. It’s not like he can’t change his mind later on.
Oh, Canada…
Jack Wannan asks: Team Canada went 2 for 9. Do you think this says something about the state of MMA in the country, or just a bad night at the office?
That was a rough outing for the Canadians. Doesn’t help that a lot of those matchups seemed to favor the Canadians at UFC 297. Gillian Robertson and Jasmine Jasudavicius cleared their assignments against opponents that were susceptible to their ground games, and looked great in the process. I felt terrible for Yohan Lainesse, a talent I’d have hoped to have a better UFC run than he has thus far. You can tell he was crushed with that loss.
Then there’s the matter of Marc-Andre Barriault, Brad Katona and Charles Jourdain suffering decision losses and an epic fumble at the finish line from Mike Mallott. My man had Magny dead to rights and yet Magny tossed the Blue Shell at him to end up in the winner’s column yet again. That man is a professional prospect slayer.
Look man, it is what it is. You’re often gonna get a night where the favorites get the table flipped on them. It just happened to be mostly the hometown guys and gals getting thumped on or outworked. It was kind of sad, but maybe it was due. Canada hasn’t taken an L this big since they gave us that loser and stooge Gavin McInnes.
I wouldn’t take this to be a reflection of Canadian talent or anything, though. These fighters that lost? They’re all still really good and most were favored for very good reason. The UFC put on an event with some relatively favorable matches and some outright squashes (Robertson and Jasudavicius), and that’s fine. No reason to worry about the state of Canadian MMA whatsoever.
Let your hatred flow
Kid Nate asks: What is up with the F–k Trudeau chants at UFC 297?
Justin Trudeau is the worst kind of national leader, and the kind that we’re seeing with increasing frequency. Much like Joseph Robinette Biden, he manages to piss off everybody, albeit for wildly different reasons. The answer is simple: the chants themselves (as Tim Bissell has helpfully corroborated) have been a staple on the Canadian far-right for a while. That’s literally it.
Seeing as this is a sport that caters strongly to that demographic (and the UFC specifically leans harder than almost anyone), this isn’t surprising. It’s kind of like the whole “Let’s Go Brandon” thing that happened for like 20 minutes and everyone just dropped. I’ll at least give the Canadians this, they dropped the pretense about not cursing and couching their grievance behind a slogan born from a clear misunderstanding. Americans are the ones looking like prudes here.
Trudeau is an odious person for so many reasons. I often wonder how much shoe polish he keeps at home, or if he does the George Jefferson dance every time he sells weapons to horrible people knowing what they’re going to do with them. Unfortunately, the fans at UFC 297 were probably still mad at him for COVID measures like the Canadian trucker caravans were. Those folks were still out with their little pity parades after most restrictions had been lifted.
It ties in nicely with that weird rant Strickland went on about sexual minorities in Canada at the disaster of a press conference, the surreal phenomenon being mad at the wrong thing. You should hate Trudeau, but these people probably aren’t mad at him for the right reasons. These are people mad that the new Little Mermaid movie had a Black lead or that the green M&M is less sexually attractive to them now. It’s a result of so many people living in their own echochambers. But at least the right person is getting dumped on, and I can live with that.
Back to school
Bilal Yusuf asks: Do you think it’s time the UFC sent their commentators to learn the rules of MMA?
I don’t know that the UFC can make them. But if they can, good god, they absolutely should. There’s no excuse for these guys to not know how scoring works or what constitutes what in a fight. Especially a guy like Daniel Cormier, whom I’m still rather fond of most of the time.
He’s a former UFC dual champ, he should know better. Rogan’s been around the sport since the 90s and doing commentary for damn near 20 years. Even for a guy that admits he doesn’t do much or any prep, he should know better. It would be nice if everyone were on the same page as to what the hell they’re actually watching to properly convey this all to the audience.
Time for the funky beats
Substack member BearHands asks: Do you consider the 2001 world DMC championships to be the greatest world finals ever held? Do you think Plus one and Klever (who came first and second respectively) have the 2 best routines of all time, even taking into account the progression of the artform since then?
Here’s where I learn something new. I thought this was some regional or national thing. The Disco Mix Club Championships are in fact an international DJing competition, and it’s nuts. I haven’t thought about this since like 2004, and back then I just thought it was limited to a certain country or two. Check out the duel in the finals:
Then the other guys goes up, and goes hard.
I have to admit, I clearly haven’t kept up on this. I’m not in any position to tell you if it’s the best ever or not, but now I’m falling into the goddamned hole and watching all of these as soon as I can. I can’t express how happy I am to found a new thing to obsess over.
That’s it for this week. Join the fun, send your questions. Talk to you next time.