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1 week ago | 
themmadrawpodcast.substack.com | Nate Wilcox
UFC 315 isn’t lighting the world on fire, but it’s not terrible either. On the positive side, we have two title fights and a terrific alternative stats sheet. On the negative side, you get insanely high ticket prices and a Bruno Silva that’s on one helluva losing streak. The featured prelim is pretty good too.
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1 week ago | 
themmadrawpodcast.substack.com | Nate Wilcox
Current time: 0:00 / Total time: -1:41:15Audio playback is not supported on your browser. Please upgrade. UFC 315 has great stats and two title fights, but the big PPV feel of it all is severely lacking. And if ticket sales are a true indicator, the Canadian fans aren’t feeling that big card vibe either.
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1 week ago | 
themmadraw.com | Nate Wilcox
Mid-day Wednesday, former UFC light heavyweight and middleweight champion Alex “Poatan” Pereira’s X.com account posted: “I always answered the UFC’s calls, but if they want to play with me, we can do that. I’ve never spoken poorly of the UFC but with what I’ve just heard I’m disheartened.
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1 week ago | 
themmadraw.com | Zach Arnold |Nate Wilcox
Current time: 0:00 / Total time: -15:04Audio playback is not supported on your browser. Please upgrade. After one of the darkest promotional weekends in the modern history of boxing, what’s next for the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia with their new TKO Boxing partners? We have questions. Lots of them. And we have a lot more questions after reading Thomas Hauser’s Guardian article detailing the politics behind the Times Square fiasco.
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1 week ago | 
open.substack.com | Nate Wilcox
Blaine Henry’s The Fight LibraryBlaine Henry | Fight Library
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1 week ago | 
themmadrawpodcast.substack.com | Nate Wilcox
UFC Des Moines looked like a glue factory convention on paper and it delivered that same energy in practice. Were there a few good fights? Sure, and we got a few finishes, but by and large, this was an Apex level event that the poor folks in Iowa paid prime rates for. Shameful promoting by UFC. There was a moment that brought almost all MMA fans together, though. That was when Reinier de Ridder stopped Bo Nickal with a vicious knee after softening him up for the entirety of the fight to that point.
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2 weeks ago | 
themmadraw.com | Nate Wilcox
TKO finds itself in an interesting position. They own UFC, which has an 80-90%+ market share in MMA. They own WWE, which has at least a 60% market share in the U.S.They’re launching TKO Boxing, which, with the generous backing of the Saudi Public Investment Fund and the eager bootlicking of many in the boxing world, seems poised to grab huge chunks of the boxing market. And yet, they can’t get The Rock to show up for WrestleMania, and they can’t get Jon Jones to defend his UFC heavyweight title.
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2 weeks ago | 
themmadrawpodcast.substack.com | Nate Wilcox
Current time: 0:00 / Total time: -1:43:14Audio playback is not supported on your browser. Please upgrade. UFC Des Moines is the ghost of Christmas past. They’ve gone and drafted Jeremy Stephens back into the comforting embrace of the octagon, fresh off his success at BKFC, but not very mindful of his MMA bouts outside the promotion where he went just 2-1 in the PFL.
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2 weeks ago | 
themmadraw.com | Zach Arnold |Nate Wilcox
Current time: 0:00 / Total time: -22:25Audio playback is not supported on your browser. Please upgrade. You didn’t think he was going away quietly, did you? The man who settled his high-profile investigation with the Securities & Exchange Commission after getting exiled from the kingdom he built? Ari Emanuel has extinguished many friends and foes but professional wrestling is a different animal altogether and future conditions may precipitate a return for one Vince Kennedy McMahon.
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2 weeks ago | 
themmadrawpodcast.substack.com | Nate Wilcox
Current time: 0:00 / Total time: -1:29:43Audio playback is not supported on your browser. Please upgrade. UFC Kansas City looked like a mixed bag on paper, but in practice, it ended up being a pretty good event. The card started off strong with several finishes right from Jump Street, but it would level out with some decisions, albeit good ones with the exception of Pereira-Magomedov.
