Welcome to Midnight Mania!
Let’s start the night off by taking a look back over the three biggest stories of Monday, Sept. 22, 2025.
- Terence Crawford loses WBA title just one week after upset win over Canelo Alvarez: The way boxing regulates its titles will never be normal. I wonder how that investigation into Usyk’s dance moves is going …
- Jimmy Fallon’s UFC White House jokes are so bad they should probably cancel him too (Video): I love when non-UFC people make fun of our silly sport.
- Tom Aspinall fight ‘going to be easy’ for Ciryl Gane to prepare for thanks to Jon Jones spotlight | UFC 321: Regardless of who wins or loses, I would just love to see Aspinall forced to fight more than five minutes. Imagine if he’s still fast in the third round!
Insomnia
Charles Oliveira has a genuine reason to not want to go from fighting Rafael Fiziev to Mateusz Gamrot. His logic makes total sense. However, presenting this line of thinking while ripping other fighters like Benoit Saint Denis for not stepping up on short notice is pretty ridiculous.
Joel Alvarez vs. Vicente Luque is a b-b-banger first Welterweight booking for “El Fenomeno.”
This meme made me chuckle and inspired a bit of research: Kelvin Gastelum’s first UFC weight miss occurred on June 28, 2014.
The optics might be better here if Khamzat’s compilation video began with Bisping or Volkanovski.
Darren Till finds himself in a new beef every week.
Brendan Schaub would appear to be a land moonding denier.
Betting on fights is fun and all, but complaining to the defeated fighter about your busted parlay is absolute loser behavior.
Slips, rips, and KO clips
One of the best wins of Forrest Griffin’s career:
If you were only permitted to kickboxing with one hand throwing punches, would you choose your lead or power hand? I’d probably want to be able to jab personally.
Never in my life have I seen a scarf hold armbar attempt begin from bottom position. I’ve seen some arm entanglements started using gi grips that are somewhat similar, but this is wild to hit in MMA!
Random Land
A unique bow and arrow/slingshot contraption.
Midnight Music: Indie rock, 1999
Sleep well Maniacs! More martial arts madness is always on the way.
