what's up everyone and welcome back to the MMA Zone today let's get started with Charles Oliva almost scammed by a fan Charles Oliva has become one of the game's most popular fighters on account of his ridiculously aggressive style and his habit of finishing fights after all we're talking about a guy who holds the record for most finishes and Fight Night bonuses in the UFC but if for some reason you're not already a fan of du Bronx this story could change your mind and before we continue make sure to leave a like on the video to
help support the channel recently the former UFC lightweight champion spoke with Ali Mack of full violence ol was asked various questions during the interview and while discussing fans the Brazilian star revealed he almost fell for a scam Oliva reported that a fan dm' him and said that he'd been hit with various setbacks and needed help paying his rent du Bronx added that he felt bad for the person and wanted to help out but what held him back was that the sum that person asked for didn't add up with someone who was actually in trouble the
guy asked me for 10,000 hii and I was like damn bro I live at a really nice place and I don't pay this you know the charismatic fighter also added this before laughing I live in a good area we don't have a bill that spends this money it's an interesting story for sure not only because Oliva was initially willing to help but how the person clearly didn't do their research scams aside it remains to be seen who Oliva will battle next in the Octagon at UFC 309 last month he defeated Michael Chandler for the second
time and in doing so ensured he remained in the title shot hunt as it stands right now du Bronx is ranked number two in the UFC's lightweight division who do you want to see the former champion fight next the number one one ranked Armen cukin who defeated Olivera by Split Decision in August is expected to challenge the champion Islam magev in early 2025 up next Jon Jones is not the best heavyweight following Jon Jones's memorable win over Steppy mioi last month there are likely a lot fewer people who disagree that bones is the goat there's
likely less people who don't believe he's the best pound-for-pound fighter in the game right now although that remains a debate but has Jones proven that he's the best heavyweight on the planet Dan Hardy says no Jones faced the legendary heavyweight at UFC 309 and put miic away with a spinning back kick to the body and follow-up shots although Mio's best days were behind him and he retired afterward Jones was showered with praise for his performance well as the MMA World waits to see if Jones will fight interim Champion Tom Aspen Hardy spoke with MMA fighting
and while discussing Jones and who is the best heavyweight on the planet The Outlaw said the following I think Jon Jones is the pound-for-pound best I think he's the best representation of mixed martial arts generally that we've ever seen I think he's still evolving which is terrifying but is he the best current heavyweight on the planet I don't think so I think the winner of aspal versus enanu would be the answer and speed versus Power and I don't know if enanu would want to wrestle because Aspen has a fantastic ground game that really is the
question no disrespect in any way to Jon current heavyweight champion but not the current best heavyweight on the planet certainly not so Hardy's comments are likely raising eyebrows but he's not the only person who's opined that Aspen is a better fighter than Jones at heavyweight the same could be said for enanu in terms of how he matches up against bones all that aside at the end of the today unfortunately we likely won't see Aspen versus enanu or Jones versus enanu unless there's a massive shift in the promotional landscape of MMA but do you agree with
Dan Hardy here do you think a fight between aspan and enanu would determine who's the baddest heavyweight on the planet right now Alaine Sterling breaks silence on fight delay Alaine Sterling and moar IV are finally going to go after it at UFC 310 next weekend but recently aljo explained why he stuck to his guns and declined to fight evloev sooner for months Sterling and evv exchanged verbal Jabs on online about fighting and the fight was targeted for UFC 307 back in October ultimately however the fight was scheduled for UFC 310 in December well in a
recent video Sterling shared out he outlined why he decided against fighting evov in early fall I asked for ironically an extra month cuz mosar was trying to push me to come back sooner than I wanted to and I told him you know I'm not going to do that again I learned my lesson from the last fight which was my loss to a Mali and uh I told myself I'll never let somebody push me into a corner over money again you know so at the end of the day I've accomplished what I need to accomplish so
now when I compete it's on my terms it's when I feel like coming back and it's when I feel good mentally good cuz you have to want to be in there to compete if not the Octagon is a dangerous place to to be unsure if you really want to be in there if you need a refresher immediately after the UFC announced Sterling was going to fight om Ali at UFC 292 denied the fight was AO and reported he was still dealing with injuries Sterling did end up fighting and losing to om Ali at the event
but he repeatedly said that he was pressured to take that fight after footage from the series fight Inc inside the UFC was released which showed UFC Chief business officer Hunter Campbell asking Sterling to take the fight talk about whether he had returned too soon spiked again so do you think Sterling made the right decision to postpone the lloya fight and do you see aljo pulling off the upset win up next Leon Edwards reveals next UFC fight date we haven't seen Leon Edwards go to work in the Octagon since he lost the Welterweight Title to balal
Muhammad last July but it looks like we'll see Rocky back in the P before q1 of 2025 is up as Ariel helwani recently reported Edwards has informed to Zone boxing that he's going to headline the UFC's next card in London England Leon Edwards was just interviewed on the Zone boxing broadcast by Jamie Ward he revealed he's headlining the O2 card in London on March 22 2025 did not mention opponent not surprisingly the news quickly generated reactions online and who the former Champion could face next JDM or Brady makes sense the UFC fumbled it it should
have been Patty versus moano headlining this that's an exciting fight that deserves to be five rounds wonder who Lon will be fighting though could it be leyon versus JDM snoozefest incoming five rounds of pitter patter give it to protest if the other top guys decline I'm sure he'll take it it's going to be mazal so given Edwards has already fought kamaro Usman three times and because shabot rahmanov and Ian Gary are fighting next weekend Shawn Brady or Jack Dela Melena as an opponent makes sense both men are currently tied for fourth in the UFC's welterweight
rankings of course a lot of fans would be happy to see Edwards and hor him idal finally get after it in the Octagon on account of their famous threepiece in aota incident back in 2019 well a lot has happened since then including gamebred retiring from MMA in 2023 mazad doll has since announced he wants to return to the UFC but he has not competed and is not ranked in the top 15 so if the UFC wants to keep focusing on the title shot implications JDM or Brady could get the call okay now let's take a
look at Alexandre panoa talks about training for Kai asakura Kai asakura is a new face for many casual or UFC only fans but ahead of his scrap with the Japanese fighter Alexandre Pantoja has been training with someone who knows him very very well asakura has been tapped to fight the flyweight champion at UFC 310 next weekend and what will mark his octagon debut asakuta has been granted the opportunity in part because Pantoja has already defeated many of the UFC's top flyweights but because asakura has been regarded as one of Japan's top fighters for several years
now where he was rising's bantamweight champ well one man who fought asakura during his time with ryzen not once but twice was kyoji horiguchi asakura brutally knocked out horiguchi in 2019 in the opening round and in their rematch in 2020 horiguchi however returned the favor and ended asakura's reign as the bonwe champion well as it turns out Pantoja has been training with horiguchi to prepare for UFC 310 during the countdown episode for the December 7th card Pantoja had this to say about the former UFC title Challenger kyoji is one of the best partners that I've
had in my whole life I learn a lot he's a samurai an amazing guy and it's an amazing opportunity to train with him I've seen Ki fight Kai two times and in one of them he won he beat horiguchi that for me someone who can beat kyoji this guy is going to have a lot of power but in their next fight kyoji that guy that's some high and understandable praise for huchi Who currently holds ryzen's flyweight Crown speaking of the countdown Show the episode also documents asakura's fascinating rise to Combat Sports Fame in Japan Kai's
older brother mikuru was a feared Street Fighter but also transitioned into Pro fighting several of his fights were recorded as he ran out of opponents on the street he invited Kai to throw down and it was in that scrap that the latter realized he was a natural their scrap was also filmed and all this is covered in the countdown episode all this aside do you see asakura taking the flyweight belt from the renowned Brazilian fighter at UFC 310 and if Pantoja wins what could come next for the champion recently MMA junky reported that if sha
Ali had remained the abandon weight champ Pantoja was planning to move up to 135 to fight sugar the two have continued to trade verbal Jabs following their well documented sparring session and debate over who won it while a fight with om Ali now seems unlikely could Pantoja explore moving up sural Gan reflects on Jon Jones fight a lot of fans and observers piled on surreal Gan for how he performed against Jon Jones and some argued the bow proved the former interim champ was one-dimensional but according to the heavyweight it was not the real gone who
face bones at UFC 285 as you likely recall Jones needed just over 2 minutes to take gone down and submit him with a choke well it was an impressive outing for Jones who was making his heavyweight debut the fight was a huge let down for many well fast forward forward to today and gone is set to battle fellow Contender Alexander volov at UFC 310 this will be gon's second fight since his loss to Jones as he put away Sergey spivac last September in the countdown show that's just been released for UFC 310 Gan reflected on
His stunning loss to Jones here's some of what he had to say when I looked back at it it was obvious that I was not there I don't recognize myself in there it's something I've never done in my life I've never fought that way before my distance management my movement the alertness that I love to show I had none of that looking back I think that this experience has been beneficial for me personally it helped me to refocus on myself it gave me a spirit of Revenge a competitive Spirit it'll be interesting to see what
the reaction is to these comments from the MMA Community is gone pretty much admitting he choked against Jones no pun intended and do you see him challenging for the heavyweight Crown again speaking of Jones the MMA World continues to speculate about who bones will fight next for months fans have been clamoring for Jones to fight Tom Aspen but Jones has repeatedly argued he doesn't need that fight and he's talked about facing Alex padaa instead well gon's coach and Lopez recently weighed in on this debate while talking with inside fighting and while doing so Lopez had
this to say why do you want Jon Jones to look up and fight Tom aspal when Tom aspal is one dangerous two not valuable factor for legacy on the other hand you have P done everything Glory Champion double champion in the UFC why don't you go there and fight him and even on the money standpoint better seller on pay-per-view just think a little bit now one could argue that beating P wouldn't do much for Jones's Legacy either as P has not been fighting in heavyweight and he's only been competing exclusively in MMA for a few
years but what do you think and do you believe that ultimately Jones won't fight Aspen even if the UFC offers him keys to the company's bank vault to do so Hamza Chimay sends a message to draus dupy about a future fight for the title Hamza posted on Twitter showing a picture of the president while tagging driis in the post with eyeball emojis this indicates that Hamza is going to or is going to have someone ask the president for a visa to fight in the USA for the middleweight title this comes to just days after DDP
told his camp and his sparring partners to grow beards and scream i k everybody to him while they Spar furthering the speculation that Hamot versus drias is going to happen do you think the president will grant hamzat a visa to fight let us know what you think in the comments here's what the MMA Community had to say about the situation it's the fight to make in my opinion he Leap Frog Strickland after his finish over Rob Strickland's performance over Costa was boring and doesn't warrant a rematch Hamza did something nobody has done in the UFC
which is to submit Rob it's a fresh exciting matchup unlike Shawn versus ddp2 picking up losers now huh if this fight happens it's just another easy win for chamv oh man Sean Strickland get ready buddy you're fighting Kyo Balo in the Apex cry son of a Strickland no one cares about you you in an era of Mor robs we needed a champion like DDP who's willing to take the hard fights when he could easily take an easier option Strickland's going to need a Theo Von session after this [Music]
