Two legends of combat sports are set to put their physicality to the test in one of Netflix’s most popular shows.
Boxing great Manny Pacquiao and UFC star Robert Whittaker have just about seen and done it all in combat sports, with both headlining major pay-per-views, winning titles, and cementing themselves among the all-time best in their respective sports.
Now, both men are set for a different kind of challenge as contestants on Netflix’s Physical: Asia. The franchise has had two seasons of Physical: 100 to date, but the latest will mark the first-ever nation-vs-nation showdown.
Pacquiao, boxing’s first and only eight-division world champion, and ex-UFC middleweight king Whittaker will lead the Philippines and Australia teams, respectively. In addition to each other, those nations will be battling it out with Korea, Japan, Thailand, Mongolia, Turkey, and Indonesia.
Across the teams, ‘PacMan’ and ‘The Reaper’ are not the only faces that will be familiar to fight fans.
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UFC star Robert Whittaker and boxing legend Manny Pacquiao to feature on new Physical season
The Physical franchise features a high-stakes competition of strength, strategy, and teamwork, combining elite athleticism with cultural tradition. It features disciplines from combat sports and ball games to track and field, as well as ‘heritage events’ like Korean ssireum, Mongolian wrestling, Turkish oil wrestling, and Muay Thai.
Pacquiao and Whittaker would appear well-equipped given their fighting backgrounds, but they won’t be alone in that regard.
Joining them as national stars leading their country’s teams will be former UFC fighter Dong Hyun Kim for Korea, ONE Championship kickboxing titleholder Superbon for Thailand, ex-PRIDE and UFC star Yushin Okami for Japan, traditional wrestling star Orkhonbayar Bayarsaikhan for Mongolia, and four-time oil wrestling champion Recep Kara for Turkey.
Indonesia’s six-person team, meanwhile, will be led by bodybuilding champion Igedz ‘Executioner’.
The competition comes after Whittaker was defeated by Reinier de Ridder in their grueling five-round main event battle at UFC Abu Dhabi in the summer. The Filipino standout, on the other hand, just made his comeback after four years this past July. Pacquiao fought to a draw against Mario Barrios in competition for the WBC welterweight title.
Physical: Asia, which marks the franchise’s first battle for national pride, premieres worldwide this October on Netflix.
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Robert Whittaker has given up his pursuit of regaining the UFC middleweight title
Whittaker’s Netflix side quest comes soon after he confirmed what his future in the Octagon will entail.
After the loss to De Ridder in Abu Dhabi, ‘The Reaper’ admitted during an interview on Submission Radio that his longtime dream of recapturing the gold at 185 pounds is no longer on the cards.
And with that, Whittaker has a new motivation in the UFC as he approaches his final few UFC fights.
“The belt’s kind of a pipe dream at the moment after losing to ‘RDR’. It’s another loss, it pushes me back much further than I want to be from the title, to the pathway where I wanted to finish up. So, right now, my goals, my trajectory has kind of changed.
“I’ve worked out I want a few fights left, I want to enjoy the journey. I want to enjoy the fights. I want to enjoy the camp process. I want to enjoy fight week, I want to enjoy the fight itself. I want my family to be a part of that… That’s my biggest goal right now.”