I took a drive down to San Jose today to sit down with "The New York Badass" Phil Baroni, and it was more than worth the trip. I walked into AKA as the pros were finishing their workout. Matt Major was mopping up the mats, Hershal Walker was walking out the door and about 10-15 other guys were either working on a few jits moves or coming out of the locker room to go on with their lives. Phil walked over to me, gave me a fist bump (we've met before) and said he was gonna shower real quick (I was a bit early). About five minutes later he walked out and we sat down. First thing I noticed was a little blood coming out of his nose and a small cut on the bridge of his nose. Most of my interviews have gone anywhere from 3-6 minutes, I sat with Phil for 35 minutes, 20 of which were on the record and recorded. I hope you guys enjoy it, I certainly did! it took me literally 3 hours to transcribe it, here's a question/answer I liked!:

MMBB: Also when I talked to Fitch, he talked about if Koscheck wins the championship, that he'd move up to 185 and wouldn't want to fight each other. Dana White had a video yesterday, he said he doesn't give a shit, teammates should fight, and I agree with you, the whole goal is to be a world champion, is there anybody that you're so close with that you wouldn't fight, or basically, my theory is if you're gonna pay me, I'll knock out my mother!

Baroni: (laughs) I'm not gonna beat up my mom but...(laughs some more), but um you know, I think if there's millions of dollars on the line, I wouldn't be your friend if I turned down that fight and you couldn't get paid that. What kind of person would I be, if you could make a million dollars fighting me, then lets fight dude and afterwards we'll be friends. I mean those guys have been training together for man 6 or 7 years, day in and day out. Fitch is the captain at AKA and that's his stance and I don't disagree with him at all but if it was me, I'd have to go somewhere else and train, to get that money,I want to get that payday and win that belt! You know, but I'm not the captain of the team and I'm not training with Koscheck every day for fucking 6 years so you know, it's a big difference. I'm not in that position, I don't have any friends really. Of course I do, Fitch and everyone here is my friend, and I feel comfortable here with this team, but I mean...like I said, you only live once and you got to take the opportunities and maybe a guy like Fitch can go up, he's as big as me, he can go up and do well at 185. Maybe just as well, maybe better because of his speed and athleticism. I'm not sure what that's about, but whatever he does he does, it's Jon Fitch.

read the full interview here