Just another fun-filled day in the City of Brotherly Love.
Day 2 in Philly started off with a bang as I was a guest on The Fan 590's "Bullpen" show hosted by Mike Toth.
It's a pleasure to be on the air with Toth, who is the first to admit he may not be MMA's biggest fan, but is cordial enough to discuss it on his show.
After the interview we headed to the UFC 101 Press Conference where all the fighters as well as UFC President Dana White were in fine form.
UFC Lightweight Champion BJ Penn was very focused and intense. He is entering his typical "business-only" mode while his opponent, Kenny Florian was far looser, smiling throughout the presser. Florian was sitting next Forrest Griffin, who was his typical comedic self, insulting himself when discussing his intelligence inside and outside the octagon. Hopefully, he doesn't play the dummy on Saturday night.
Griffin's opponent Anderson Silva answered one question without any elaboration. When asked if he felt any different training and preparing to fight with the extra weight, his answer was a simple "no". That was it for the best pound-for-pound fighter today. When the fighters squared off, Silva was right in Griffin's face but the latter shrugged it off by simply smiling the whole time. It was interesting to note that both light heavyweights were very close in size, with Griffin only slightly bigger than the middleweight champ.
While they shook hands and bowed afterwards, the same cannot be said for Penn and Florian. They squared off with neither fighter moving or batting an eye lash. When they were done, they both exited in opposite directions.
Afterwards, we sat down with UFC President Dana White, who teed off on Strikeforce, calling them "Strikefarce" while belittling the promotion as a regional one that is destined for failure now that they have signed Fedor Emelianenko.
I chipped away at White who disagreed with me that Emelianenko not signing with the UFC was a personal decision and that he wasn't happy with White. White stated that Emelianenko doesn't make his own decisions but did agree with my assessment that there may be a cultural issue here and that certain barriers need to be broken down if Emelianenko is one day going to one day fight for the UFC.
There was much, much more from White but you'll have to tune into Monday's episode of MMA Connected to see and hear it all.
After the presser, we headed out to a special spot to record my stand-ups. When I say special, perhaps only for yours truly; we ventured out to the famous steps that Sylvester Stallone ran up in his Rocky movies. I couldn't help but feel a sense of nostalgia especially when we were recording with the famous statue of Balboa in the background.
Just another fun-filled day in the City of Brotherly Love.
