Free full-event replays: https://watch.mmafutures.com/yt/2794-full-cards

Tucker Eastwood headlines Crash Combat 8 for the second straight show, and he's doing it bare-knuckle. Saturday, September 5 in Overland Park, Kansas, he meets Thomas Thatcher, who stepped in on short notice fight week after Eastwood's original opponent fell out.

Eastwood is not a social-media fighter. He installs Google Fiber, trains at Rudy Bears Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu in downtown Kansas City, and got into the sport at 20 after a friend's uncle needled him into a Sunday sparring session. He got disqualified in his first fight, kept showing up, and now says he doesn't think anybody on the roster wants to fight him without gloves on.

In this episode:

• Why he moved to bare-knuckle MMA: teammate Zeb Vincent's BKFC run, and "finding out who's gonna be meaner"

• The Nico Hamilton fight at Crash Combat 7: stuffed the takedown, finished by neck crank

• "Be the first one to hit, be the last one to hit" – how his game changes when the gloves come off

• On Thatcher taking the fight on a week's notice: "I wouldn't want to fight me"

• "If you're not getting butterflies, you probably shouldn't be competing"

• Training with Rudy Bears and Zeb: "I'm training amongst other badasses"

• Three trucks, a horse, and Cane Corsos: what fighting pays for

• Why the fight is on the Kansas side (Missouri's commission won't sanction bare-knuckle)

• His grandma's first time watching him fight, live in the building Saturday

• BKFC ambitions after this one

• Fearless prediction: "I'm gonna kick his ass. I don't know how else to put it."

Shout-outs: Live to Ship (sponsor), Rudy Bears, Zeb Vincent, Tanner Bieber, his parents and grandma.

Watch Crash Combat 8 live Saturday, September 5 on MMA Futures: https://watch.mmafutures.com

Tucker's fighter profile: https://mmafutures.com

Interview by Nathan Rogers. Recorded fight week, August 2026.