If Israel Adesanya isn\u2019t ready to retire from MMA just yet, what should the UFC do with him next? Plus, a suggestion to bring viewers back to \u201cThe Ultimate Fighter,\u201d and a question from an actual pro fighter with big money to throw around.<\/p>\n
All that and more in this week\u2019s mailbag. To ask a question of your own, hit up @BenFowlkesMMA<\/a> on X or @Ben_Fowlkes<\/a> on Threads.<\/p>\n @nickj812: What are your hopes for Izzy’s next career move?.<\/p>\n Whilst a trilogy against AP might have previously worked , IMO that ship.has sailed.<\/p>\n Hope he retires & stays retired. Nothing left to prove.<\/p>\n All I ask is that it makes some kind of sense but does not make me sad when I watch it. I realize that\u2019s tougher to pull off than it sounds in this sport, but I think it\u2019s doable for Israel Adesanya right now.<\/p>\n Advertisement<\/p>\n Give me a fight that has some narrative behind it. Ideally, it would be against someone he has some kind of history with. I don\u2019t want to see him fighting another hungry young up-and-comer just to prove his career isn\u2019t over yet. Make it something meaningful, preferably against someone his age.<\/p>\n As for whether he should continue, I just hope he asks himself the right questions and makes his decisions on that basis. Are you still here only to be a UFC champ again? Because, brother, that just isn’t going to happen. Are you sticking around because you still love it and think you have a few good performances left in you? In that case, sure, I can see it. But don’t let the UFC rush you into something that only makes sense for everyone but you.<\/p>\n @jaypettry: Has April Fools’ Day lost its luster in the MMA community? Are all the jokes played out and expected to show up? Or are we just becoming jaded?<\/p>\n It\u2019s honestly for the best that MMA fighters don\u2019t try so hard with the April Fool\u2019s jokes these days. So few of them were any good at it. They always had the same two ideas: announce a fake fight, or announce a fake retirement.<\/p>\n Advertisement<\/p>\n The problem with the first one is that nobody likes an April Fool\u2019s joke that, when revealed, feels like you\u2019re taking something away from us. It\u2019s like telling your kids you\u2019re taking them to Disneyland and then telling them it was all a joke, now go get ready for school. They are not going to find the humor in that, man. You want the setup to be something bad or disappointing \u2014 though still lighthearted and harmless \u2014 so that the April Fool\u2019s part of the reveal feels like relief.<\/p>\n The problem with the fake retirement, as several fighters learned, is that you have a pretty good chance of accidentally hurting your own feelings. What if fans see that and are like, “Yeah good for you for knowing when it\u2019s time?” What if they seem totally ready to believe that you\u2019re done and apparently not even that sad about it? That won\u2019t be a great feeling. Then the only April fool is you.<\/p>\n @CrisCyborg: Should @Claressashields accept my $2,000,000 offer to fight boxing?<\/p>\n Is there a bigger fight in the sport for her than an mma crossover against me?<\/p>\n I\u2019d absolutely watch it, Cris. My question is: Are you personally offering her the $2 million? As in, that\u2019s coming out of your bank account as a guarantee for her as soon as she signs the contract and steps in the ring, win or lose?<\/p>\n Advertisement<\/p>\n Because if so, yeah, that sounds like a good offer for her, not to mention a legitimately promotable fight that I think a lot of us could get excited about. But also, wow, I didn\u2019t realize you had cash like that just sitting around. Now that I know, let me fill you in on an exciting investment opportunity in the sports podcasting space \u2026<\/p>\n @ihab23: Why\u2019d they do the homie Niko Price dirty?<\/p>\n That was rough. He was pretty much a sacrificial lamb for Michael Chiesa\u2019s retirement fight on home ground \u2014 why else would the UFC book Chiesa, on a three-fight winning streak, against Niko Price, on a three-fight losing streak? \u2014 and so his own retirement announcement became a complete afterthought.<\/p>\n I think he deserved at least a moment on the mic. That doesn\u2019t seem like too much to ask after nearly 10 years (!) with the UFC. But maybe it just goes to show that, if you want a share of the spotlight in your final fight, it helps to win.<\/p>\n @LukeSpier_: Not so much a question, more so throwing s*** at a wall with a questionable idea. With TUF being so a**, in conjunction with heavyweight being so a**, what about a TUF season that\u2019s entirely \u201cformer athletes from other sports try MMA\u201d<\/p>\n I would totally watch that. Nothing but former NFL\/NBA\/MLB\/rugby and whatever else athletes getting out there on the mats and figuring it out as they go? Hell yes. That\u2019s good TV right there. The only problem is, how do you get them to fight in a cage for the pitiful payouts that \u201cUltimate Fighter\u201d guys typically earn? Pro athletes from other sports are used to being paid like, well, pro athletes.<\/p>\n @NeedXtoseePosts: Surely The White House card can’t go ahead as things stand in the world?<\/p>\n It would be bread and circuses only the price of bread is also skyrocketing<\/p>\n I get what you\u2019re saying, but after all this build-up how could they not go ahead with it? The UFC White House event not only has to happen, it has to be really, really good. Anything less will be a colossal failure and disappointment.<\/p>\n @RealFakeSamDunn: If MVP were to hold one more MMA card this year, which main event could they at least *conceivably* book to keep the casuals curious?<\/p>\n And what if they held two more events?<\/p>\n Anatoly Malykhin is out there, sure, but only hardcores know him. How do you thread this needle?<\/p>\n If we\u2019re talking about real MMA fights, right now I\u2019d have to say something like Francis Ngannou vs. Gable Steveson would get a lot of people excited. If we\u2019re talking about just having fun in an attention-getting sort of way, then someone needs to get creative with Eddie Hall.<\/p>\n Advertisement<\/p>\n You know what would probably really work, though? Let\u2019s get Jake Paul into a pair of four-ounce gloves and see how he does. There\u2019s a genuine appetite among the public to see him get beat up, and the Anthony Joshua fight barely scratched the surface. If he fought someone like Nate Diaz in an actual MMA fight, you can\u2019t tell me it wouldn\u2019t do numbers.<\/p>\n @chasekeller54: What\u2019s going on with Gegard Mousasi? Did he demand his way out of PFL to never fight again? I feel like I haven\u2019t heard anything about him since PFL released him.<\/p>\n I reached out to Gegard Mousasi\u2019s longtime friend and manager, Nima Safapour, who said there\u2019s still ongoing litigation and they can\u2019t discuss anything publicly yet. When I asked if Mousasi is still interested in fighting (he\u2019ll be 41 in August), Safapour said Mousasi has been smart with his money and doesn\u2019t exactly need to fight, but \u201cif it\u2019s an interesting opportunity that adds to his legacy, he would consider it.\u201d<\/p>\n @jtbrinkman: As a Winnipeg resident who wouldn\u2019t even consider paying the prices UFC is asking for a forgettable card, I guess my question is \u2018wassup with dat?\u2019 (And I drove to Minneapolis for a fight night card back in the day)<\/p>\n I just looked up ticket prices for the UFC Fight Night event in Winnipeg this month and, first off, seems like there\u2019s still plenty of good seats available. The cheapest way in the door is a nosebleed seat for around $100, which honestly isn\u2019t bad for the direction UFC ticket prices have been headed lately. Obviously, any seat with an actual view of something other than the arena jumbotron is going to cost you more, but still, we\u2019ve seen worse lately.<\/p>\n Advertisement<\/p>\n If you\u2019re asking when we\u2019ll see UFC ticket prices in general come down, the answer is when TKO stops being able to sell them at these prices. We\u2019ve seen some events lately with empty seats visible. But clearly TKO is testing the waters with both UFC and WWE event pricing to find out the absolute limit of what the market will bear.<\/p>\n @LCombatsports: Do you have anything you would like to see from newcomers in the combat sports media space? If so, what are they?<\/p>\n Tell me something that I can only know by hearing it from you. By that I mean, go out and do some reporting. Dig into a story. Get yourself on the scene and in a place to see or hear or learn something new, then come back and tell me about it.<\/p>\n We\u2019re all stocked up on people who look at various fighters\u2019 social media and then tell us what\u2019s there. If I want to know what Alex Pereira is posting on Instagram, I\u2019ll just go follow him. Tell me a story or feed me some information or even just give me an interesting opinion of your own. That\u2019s what I\u2019d like to see more of.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"If Israel Adesanya isn\u2019t ready to retire from MMA just yet, what should the UFC do with him…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":578213,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[444],"tags":[49,48,641,43061,638,82,640],"class_list":{"0":"post-578212","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-mma","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-fighting","11":"tag-israel-adesanya","12":"tag-mma","13":"tag-sports","14":"tag-ufc"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/578212","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=578212"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/578212\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/578213"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=578212"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=578212"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=578212"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}