Kevin Holland on Upcoming Fight with Derek Brunson

So the Derek Brunson fight which is coming up soon. What is your thoughts on Derek Brunson? I mean we talked about it a little bit earlier but you know he's obviously a veteran, he's obviously a guy who's been around, who's fought stylebender. He's the Shabazzian fight and his last fight I thought he looked fucking fantastic. Yeah. And Shabazzian, that was an interesting situation right? He got this kid who's 21 years old, super dangerous, real fast hands, looked great, but never really been tested against a veteran and then you saw wasn't really ready for that yet. Yeah. Brent's this good, his wrestling is good, his stand-up's a little wild, he hits hard. It's gonna be a fun fight but the problem is it's like when he gets in there with the top level guys, he hasn't had a lot of success and we're just gonna find out if Kevin's top level is, I think he is. You see a new Jenga? Yeah. Yes. You know that part where he goes, you know Rube boy, there's only one out of ten thousand niggas and you'd had one out of ten thousand. I'm that one out of ten thousand. We're gonna find out, you know. It's closer to like one in a million. It's like, it's just different. Do you feel like this is like a pivotal moment in your career? It can be. It very much can be. But me and Derek Bronson, we have a lot of words back and forth. Do? Yeah. No, no, no, no, no. It's gonna be a night. Kevin fucks with Derek Bronson constantly. It's like, but Kevin does this to everybody. He's starting to be for. Everybody's, he's starting to be. He's starting to be. He's in style benders in the inbox. He's in everybody's inbox. He's fucking personal messes. Yeah, all the time. Do they go back and forth? Oh, yeah. Some of them do. All the time. Really? Some of them are nice. Who goes back and forth with you? Mike Perry is nice enough to go back and forth with me. Does he? I like that guy. He's fun to play with. He fucks with him. He fucks with him. And then, you know, Bronson, Bronson started it though. He told me he was gonna slam me on my head. So fuck him. And then, you know, there's just a few of them. That was what he opened with? Yeah. I'm gonna slam you on your head. Yeah. Chamayev doesn't go back and forth with me. So that hurts my feelings. No? How come? I don't know. He says he's about that life. That kid ain't about that life. I see him at the PI. He walked in. I was like, that's my best friend. He was like, you want to be friends now? I was like, fuck no. He's like, never. I was like, we're best friends without being friends. They were like, Kevin, there's a lot of them. They're gonna jump you. And I was like, no. I drove out here. I got dildos in the car. I was ready to fuck them, you know. So that boy's not about that life. Do you don't you think that I mean, it's it's it's very unfortunate that he's suffering from COVID that he's get this long-term situation where apparently when you when I've talked to doctors about this, I'm like, what is going on with that? And they said when you're training really hard and then you're breaking down your immune system and then you get COVID you can get it real bad. And when you get it really bad and then you don't take care of yourself in terms of like don't give yourself adequate time to recover you go back in before you're really fully recovered and also you're not taking care of all the inflammation issues that you have with your diet and with your supplements. Yeah, you hit a situation like him where he had to pull out of Leon Edwards fight. Imagine being fucking Leon Edwards one of the best fighters in the world can't get a fight can't get a fight. He's well, he's fighting below. Finally finally below. Blau steps up right after winning. I offered to step up the last time. I offered to Kevin. Kevin was in there. Kevin was in there. And it boxes again. Hell fighting. I sandbox Leon plenty of times. He doesn't respond. And then the thing about it is a lot of these guys can say before that I didn't have the followers. They didn't see the message now. I have the followers. So you're seeing the fucking message. You're just choosing not to respond. You know what I mean? It's like like for being real here. These guys half these guys who claim that they're fighters. They're fighters because it pays a bill and it looks good online. It looks good on TV. Is that the case or are they being calculated about what risks they take? You're not a fighter if you're calculating risk. Really though. Do you think that's true? I mean if you're a first-year fighter. They're martial arts. They're martial arts. He's talking about other kinds of fighting. He's talking about life and it's like you know, he's not talking about his career right now. He's talking about he's talking about and for Kevin. All that stuff kind of you know melts together a little bit. You know, it's like he's you know, it's like he's not necessarily, you know, saying that yeah, these guys are for sure fighters, but they're not real fighters in Kevin's mind. I understand what you're saying. Yeah, they won't you know, it's like I get happy when I see these guys step up last second for a fight like seeing Bilal step up for that fight. I'm like, okay, there you go. Don't fucking complain about how you're not getting upper fights when you don't really put yourself in that situation and get right, you know, when when Tamayev knocked out Mir shard. I was like, holy shit. Yeah knocked him out with one punch. I'm like, okay now I want to see if he can do that. I want to see like how does he fare against gollyq? How does he fare against other like Elite 170 or 185ers which which which is weird too, right? That he's just bouncing back and forth between those two weight class. He's bouncing back and forth to the to the fights that make the most sense. So he'll go to 70 for a fight that makes sense. He'll come back up to 85 for a fight that makes sense. You know, nothing wrong with it. Good management fighters who fight like that. Very smart fighters. I tip my hat off to them, you know, them and their management and their coaches. That's great. That's not me. I'd never be that so props to those guys, you know, but it's like if you know, you go to 70 because this fight makes sense for you smart move you go back to 85 because this fight makes sense to you smart move. I was impressed by the way. He knocked out Mir shard just because he he took the smartest route which was keeping it standing. And I thought the guy who liked the grapple was going to take it to the ground, you know, but knocking out Mir shard after Mir shard is coming off of losses. You know what I mean? And I know I smacked him a couple times. I know Duran wins smacked him a couple times. You know what I mean? And I know Ian Heinrich ultimately landed the last smacking and I think if you add up those three people who have decent power and have been smacked him at 85 the head is just not the same as it used to be. He's even fought the aguosantos, right? Yeah, you know, it's like you can't fight all these killers and take these type of headshots and think that you're going to be okay. If you might have a little bit of pop, of course, it's going to look good. I mean, smart props to him for taking the smart program every time you go out there and fight a guy, you know, it's like we both fought John Phillips. I went out there and stood in stood in bang with John Phillips coach told me in the second round go out. Okay, you already look good in the first round go out there in the second round. Take this guy down choke him out. He's obviously not trying to go away from Punchers. She might have went out there took him down punched on him punched on him punched on him sub done smart smart fighter props to him. But what happens when you can't go out there and take an easy smart route? I'm gonna fight is really fucking good. That's why I wanted like you said, I want to see the Leon fight. You know, I want to see that, you know, I was fascinated by that fight. I would have took the new man fight him versus no magnet. Yeah, I would have been happy with that. You can slowly work your way up. I think he you know, it's like after seeing Neil Magna be done the way he got done against you know, Michael Kiesta. I think that Chamaev could have got the job done, especially being a big 170 year, but it's like it's like, you know, it's I don't know. And then you sit up here and say it's sad because he has COVID and shit like that. But they said I had COVID, you know, and if we're supposed to be athletes, you know, it's like, yeah, but you obviously had a very mild. Oh, you know, I mean, he's he's had it for my girl had it pretty good months now. My girl had it pretty good. And I'll fuck her the whole time. You know, it's like so, you know, it's like we all take it different, you know, different fighters, different heart, you know, don't claim to have the heart if you ain't got it. Don't you think it's just like a disease though? I mean, I mean, shit, but the flu sucks. The flu sucks, you know, Michael Jordan still went out there and won. You know, it's difference. You know, I understand what you're saying. Yeah, it's a bummer. It's a bummer that we don't get it because it was so exciting. You watch him. He's fighting back to back. He's trying to fight. He's scheduling two fights at the same time. He's, you know, yeah, I'm just sad because I really wanted to see the guy fight again. Yeah, just also you wanted to fight him. No, not me. I don't fight that guy. He's a monster. Really is undefeated. Smashing everybody's many could be, but I don't want no problems with that guy. You know, that's not true. He's fucking with him all goddamn time over there. Yeah, you were asking for it when I interviewed you. I love it. I take it. Well, they had all right. They had Kevin Edwards with him too. You know, it's like Kevin Edwards with him and then they he said something to Kevin, pissed Kevin off. Then Kevin's, you know, angry. But the boss the boss has said on interview that we're in two different weight classes and that we'd probably never meet up. So I'm assuming that he's staying at a 70 and I'm staying at 85 and you know, it's like, you know, maybe one day when he, you know, gets over being a little tired, he can get back in there and get some fights in and we'll be okay. 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