Welcome to Midnight Mania!
Let’s start the night off by taking look back over the three biggest stories of Monday, April 28, 2025.
- Anthony Smith hates getting flipped off by Nebraska fans: I’ve never gotten the impression that Smith is particularly adept at controlling his emotions in the cage, and this final incident didn’t prove otherwise.
- Daniel Dubois and Oleksandyr Usyk get physical during their latest staredown: What is the state of the world when the undisputed Heavyweight boxing champion is defending his title far more actively against worthy opposition than UFC’s big man king?
- Eddie Hall wants to fight freaks, not world-class foes: As he should! Getting paid well to face mediocre opposition is a damn good gig.
Insomnia
Important context: I cannot find confirmation of the date of these photos, though they just started circulating the web in the last 24 hours. I saw another clip of Figueiredo looking more cut a couple weeks ago, so it could simply be an unflattering angle as well.
In these stills, though … Deiveson Figueiredo appears to be MASSIVE ahead of UFC Des Moines this weekend! It is always very funny to me when a fighter moves up in weight and then misses the mark at their new class, but hopefully “Daico” doesn’t join that elite few.
Dustin Poirier walking out with Lil Wayne in NOLA would be an incredible moment if all the details can be worked out.
| Dustin Poirier says he would like to walk out to Lil Wayne’s ‘Drop the World’ for his retirement fight at #UFC318 in July if Lil Wayne agrees to be there to sing it live.
This was the song Poirier came out to in his UFC debut.
[via @arielhelwani] pic.twitter.com/A73ToIxBew
— MMA Orbit (@mma_orbit) April 28, 2025
Cory Sandhagen is far from the first UFC fighter to embrace magic mushrooms.
Cory Sandhagen on doing mushrooms before his UFC main event with Deiveson Figueiredo
“So I usually do a pretty heavy dose of mushrooms 2 weeks before the fight. I really like exploring the subconscious parts of my mind and expanding everything” pic.twitter.com/mIwhxNgTcF
— FULL SEND MMA (@full_send_mma) April 28, 2025
Khabib Nurmagomedov hopes to avoid another “incident” on airlines …
It’s a rare human being who can match the size of “Poatan.”
I don’t know that Jean Silva particularly enjoyed this ride.
Tyrone Spong can still crack pads!
Slips, rips, and KO clips
Simoes’ opponent was standing right in front of him (even after getting stunned) and paid the price.
Listen to that crowd! Between Oktagon, KSW, and Cage Warriors, MMA in Europe seems to be doing much better than MMA in the US.
Half chicken dance, half swan dive.
Random Land
Not your average home run.
Midnight Music: Soul, 1970
Sleep well Maniacs! More martial arts madness is always on the way.
