Jorge Masvidal and Ben Askren had lunch together, and Masvidal filmed it. Masvidal posted a clip on X on Saturday with the caption “Lunch with Ben 5 years after our fight !” and sent fans to his YouTube channel for the full episode. Dovy Simuoli had already flagged the link-up on X a day earlier. MMA Fighting reported that Askren was a guest on Masvidal’s Death Row MMA show, where the two former rivals walked through the finish that tied their careers together.
One small correction to the caption. UFC 239 happened in July 2019, so the count is closer to seven years than five. Nobody is fact-checking the guy who threw the knee.
The fight lasted five seconds. Masvidal sprinted across the cage, left his feet, and put Askren out cold with a flying knee in Las Vegas. Before that night, Askren had never lost in MMA. He was a two-time NCAA Division I champion who started his pro career 21-0 with a smothering grappling game and won titles in Bellator and ONE Championship. He fought once more after UFC 239 and then retired. Masvidal went the other direction, turning the knockout into stardom and two UFC title shots.
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The interesting part of the episode is how honestly Askren scouted his own mistake. He told Masvidal that flying knees usually come straight up from a tighter range, and that Masvidal’s version came in on a running, jumping path. “I completely misjudge your trajectory because I’d never, ever seen anyone do it like that before,” Askren said. He also described his reaction in the moment as pure reflex: “So when I saw you, to your point, I probably said, ‘Shit, he’s getting close,’ drop, drop, takedown.”
Masvidal explained that the knee came out of film study. “So I just noticed in a lot of your fights, if all of a sudden you were in a range that you didn’t like, you would shoot or you would find a way to clinch,” he said. He told Askren he wanted no part of defending a single leg against a guy who had lived there his whole life, so the plan was a sudden change of speed that would make Askren hesitate to shoot even if it missed. The setup was the threat of a punch. “I wanted you to feel that I’m in right hand range and then bam.”
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Masvidal has been talking plenty this week. He backed Sean Strickland in his pay complaints, saying in a clip shared by Home of Fight, “Pay these guys more, UFC.” He also told MMA Full Mount that Ilia Topuria vs. Paddy Pimblett would be the biggest fight the UFC can make. His manager, Ali Abdelaziz, posted on X that Masvidal “has something very special coming up,” with no details attached, so treat that as a tease until something is announced. Askren, for his part, made seven figures boxing Jake Paul just months after hip replacement surgery, according to Yahoo Sports.
My take: this is the rare highlight-reel KO that holds up as a lesson. Masvidal didn’t get lucky against a wrestler. He saw that Askren crashed forward behind a punch exchange, sold him a right hand, and timed the knee into the exact level change Askren had made hundreds of times. Askren reading his own brain’s bad prediction on camera is the best part of the episode, and every young wrestler moving into MMA should watch it.
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