Musk vs. Zuckerberg Talk, Jake Paul’s Fighter Association & More: MMA News & Notes For 6/24/23

– Dricus Du Plessis says he beat Israel Adesanya in grappling sessions held several years ago:

“We trained in Thailand together,” Du Plessis told The Schmo (transcript via Farah Hannoun of MMA Junkie). “I think I was 19 years old at the time. He had quite a record in MMA already back then. I was 3-0, I think, when we trained together. He said I beat him in the grappling exchanges. He’s 100 percent correct in that. I did manhandle him in the grappling and wrestling exchanges.

“But we did not do a single round of striking together – not one. I mean, that was his way of saving himself saying, ‘No, but I beat him in the striking.’ We never did striking together – not one round. When we sparred, we grappled, and we wrestled. We never did one single round of striking together, not as far as I know, and that’s something you would remember.”

– Elon Musk has taken to Twitter to accept the offer from Georges St. Pierre to train him for a potential fight against Mark Zuckerberg.

– Michael Chandler says Conor McGregor would stain his legacy but not fighting him after TUF 31 concludes:

“I think Conor’s coming back,” Chandler said on Daniel Cormier’s YouTube channel (transcript via Farah Hannoun of MMA Junkie). “I don’t think he wants to stain his legacy by leading us all down this road of, ‘I’m doing the Ultimate Fighter, I’m fighting Michael Chandler – Oh, by the way, never mind. I’m not coming back.’”

– Michael Bisping says Jake Paul made the right choice by picking Nate Diaz as his next opponent:

“Jake’s the bigger, more explosive guy, and that’s why he’s picked this fight, you know what I mean?” Bisping said on his “Believe You Me” podcast (transcript via Farah Hannoun of MMA Junkie). “And I hope I eat my words. Of course I do. But it’s a very, very smart matchup. It’s a very smart pick.”

– USADA has announced that Braxton Smith has been suspended for two years following an in-competition drug test failure related to his bout against Parker Porter at UFC 288.

– Eurosport NL has reported that Tatsuro Taira will fight Edgar Chairez at UFC 290.

– MMA Junkie is reporting that Cub Swanson will face Hakeem Dawodu on the August 12 UFC Fight Night card.

– Justin Tafa has taken to Twitter to reveal that he has suffered no major damage to his eye after the eye poke from Austen Lane at UFC Fight Night Jacksonville:

“Cleared of any major damage to both eyes but both eyes did suffer some damage. Right eye still in some pain, sensitive to light and blurred vision on the (left) but I thank God nothing that was going to end my career or cause serious damage to my eye.”

– Matt Brown isn’t happy about a potential Elon Musk vs. Mark Zuckerberg fight:

“They’re not going to f****** fight,” Brown said on the new episode of The Fighter vs. The Writer.

“These motherf****** ain’t going to fight. What are you talking about? Everybody talks that s***. We’re talking about them right now. Twitter’s talking about them. Everybody’s forgetting about all the f****** garbage bulls*** that they’ve done in their lives. I don’t even know what they’ve done, but I know they’ve got a lot of haters. Like [Elon says] ‘why don’t you quit talking s*** about me buying Twitter cause I’m going to go cage fight’ and everybody is like OK, no problem, bro! That’s how these motherf****** operate.

“It’s a P.R. f****** scandal. I’m asking the MMA community to be more intelligent than this. Can we see through this?”

– Jake Paul says creating an MMA fighter’s association has been very difficult:

“We’ve been working nonstop on it behind the scenes,” Paul said to MMA Mania (transcript via Jed Meshew of MMA Fighting). “It’s just … damn near impossible to figure this one out [laughs]. It’s very difficult. Very, very difficult. We’re not shying away because of that, but it takes a lot of people, a lot of brains, a lot of money that we are funding, and a lot of time, a lot of thought. So, really, we’ve been chugging along in this whole entire time behind the scenes and making slow progress more and more every single day.”

– John Gotti III hints at a potential rematch with Floyd Mayweather:

“We’re in talks right now, actually, to do something,” he said on The MMA Hour. “So we’ll see where it goes. From what I understood, after the fight, it was the most Googled thing in the whole world.

“Floyd’s a businessman. Floyd wants to capitalize on that. He wants to make money. So if they want to do it again, I’m here, and I promise you this time, I’m going to come out guns blazing as soon as that bell rings, and we’re going to fight now.”

– Randy Brown hopes his father will be released from prison after being incarcerated for over 30 years:

“He has one more [hearing] coming up,” Brown said on The MMA Hour. “It’s coming up soon, I think it’s coming up this summer, and that’s it. He had a few already, he was denied before in the past, but he hasn’t had an incident in there in like 20 years. He’s involved in so many different programs and mentoring programs, and he’s accomplished so much while he’s in there and all the programs that they have. At this point, he’s no longer a threat to society.

“He’s a good guy, he’s completely changed. He’s devoted his life to god. I think that time is served. He did a lot of time. He’s been in there a long time and a lot of the laws have changed. A lot of the drug laws, movement of marijuana and movement of certain things, those things are not illegal anymore.

“I think a lot of his time is time served on the other things, and I think that he should be able to be free now, be with his family now, be with his grandchildren. Be able to see my son and my future children.”