In this episode of The Joe Rogan Experience, the comedian and actor talks about the 1994 earthquake that devastated the city of Los Angeles and the people who lived there at the time. He also talks about how he managed to survive one of the biggest earthquakes in history.
00:00:57.000Yeah, well, because, okay, I defend L.A. in a way where, first of all, if you got a handful of good people with you, you know, and your family, then it's so the fact that LA has all kinds of different things, you could be on a hiking trail in 20 minutes.
00:01:59.000I was reading this article about massive earthquakes in California and how often they're spread out and the possibility of one of them happening within the next decade.
00:05:24.000All she knows is that you jumped up and you ran out of, you ran out of the house and I heard the door slide and that was, and then the next thing you know, everything shook.
00:05:37.000She couldn't, she was trapped in there because there was a closet door that trapped her in the hallway.
00:05:47.000So when I got back in the place, me and a friend had to try to pry the door open because she couldn't get out.
00:05:53.000But I ran out of that place before the earthquake actually happened.
00:07:37.000I mean, I was, oh, I was, I was like always the junior of the group a lot of times because like I said, you know, I've been on my own since I was 14.
00:07:45.000I haven't grown an ant since I was 13, 14.
00:07:48.000I was, I looked like a grown-ass man, right?
00:07:51.000I was fighting in tournaments at 15 against Grown men, like you know, fighting heavyweight at that time.
00:08:00.000But I was always hanging with older people, uh, kind of, you know, kind of like I got away with kind of living as an adult early on.
00:08:13.000Because, like, you know, did you work?
00:08:16.000Yeah, well, I was teaching karate school, karate class.
00:08:19.000What was doing, what was, what was happening, see, I used to hang out at this community center in the hood.
00:08:26.000At this time, I moved from Brooklyn to Bridgeport, Connecticut, right?
00:09:24.000You know, which is one of the reasons why I was a father at 15.
00:09:28.000You know, because I had one of my students' older sister, you know, was like, had a crush on her, her, on his instructor.
00:09:40.000But I was kind of living the life of a grown-up, like early on.
00:09:46.000And so, you know, there's a faction of people in Bridgeport who think I'm Satan, I guess, because they think that I'm probably in my 70s now.
00:10:04.000But I mean, so, yeah, you know, one of the things I'm really grateful for is growing up that early and having to, you know, use my instincts.
00:10:16.000And being that, you know, street fighting and fighting was like my favorite thing to do, actually.
00:10:22.000And so with when I got into the martial arts deeper and everything else, you know, I just really, I really dug into it and wanted to learn style after style and this, you know, everything.
00:13:49.000I would train with him, Joe Gusen, early on.
00:13:55.000But Frankie, I mean, we really kind of combined a lot of things because I started kind of teaching him things with the jab, like the untelegraph type of stuff.
00:14:21.000But it was like this combination because, like, I don't know, I'm very analytical and I love technique, you know?
00:14:31.000And so I would just try to break things down.
00:14:34.000And my whole thing was always to pressure test things.
00:14:37.000You know, so if I could develop a tool or a skill and I, and you can't stop it, even if I tell you what I'm doing, then it's a really good technique.
00:15:28.000But like, but like a lot of people, like almost like street basketball, as opposed to professional, you miss out on certain techniques that you need when you're trying to step up.
00:16:10.000And I was like, try your best to touch me with the rubber knife.
00:16:15.000And so he would try, but before, but as soon as he would move, there'd be a little bit of an indication that I'd see.
00:16:23.000And then I throw the punch and it would go really close to him and I have him react to that.
00:16:28.000But he was going, wait a minute, how are you hitting me before I can get this knife out?
00:16:33.000And then I told him, you know, I'll show you what that is later.
00:16:37.000Because, you know, kind of like not to be real nerdish about it, but like, why are like 50 and 60 year old trainers meeting people's hands, like a 20-year-old guy's or contender's hands, like this?
00:16:52.000You see the person with the pad moving just as much as the other guy because there's an indication they do this beforehand.
00:17:01.000They're always kind of flexing and going in reverse before they go forward.
00:17:07.000So just for over years, I wouldn't do that and I would exploit that.
00:17:14.000You know, so it's kind of like a cheat code that I'm like, hell, what the hell am I going to do with it?
00:17:21.000So my thing is, just like yourself, when I see you, you know, with George St. Pierre and how we are always in the gym, we're, you know, we're kind of collaborating.
00:17:37.000It's just like, hey, man, we're like kind of, you know, kind of like jamming on technique and getting better.
00:17:44.000Well, especially to someone who has a different style to do because there's always something in different styles that you could take out of it.
00:17:54.000There's all these different martial artists that are entering into MMA that have these different techniques that people haven't seen before.
00:18:02.000And there's a lot of them that people dismiss that you're finding are very effective, especially if you don't know how to do them.
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00:19:15.000There's a move that still to this day people aren't doing effectively when someone loads up because you can see the load up and it's just a jam.
00:19:23.000It's just lifting your foot up and putting it on the hips.
00:19:26.000And it's super effective in Taekwondo because everybody's fast.
00:19:29.000Everybody's trying to do that technique.
00:19:31.000But that jam of just lifting your foot up and just not trying to hit them hard, just putting that foot on the hip, it fucks people up.
00:19:38.000And I don't see anybody using that right now.
00:19:40.000I tell you, man, like, I don't, like, as in life, there's always something that you can gain from the, you know, people want to, I don't know, people are in their own egos a lot of times.
00:19:51.000But like even Wu Shu, me is hard as hell for me doing Wu Shu against guys half my size.
00:19:58.000It's not against, but it's a performance thing.
00:23:58.000Because Blood and Bone, which is like actually Sony's most successful non-theatrical, that was basically a kind of a reimagining of hard times with Charles Bronson and James Colburn.
00:24:56.000And it will take away from other things you do.
00:25:00.000And I saw that with a lot of comics that they started doing acting, and it would take away from their act because they really couldn't go and do sets every night.
00:25:08.000They couldn't really polish their material.
00:25:10.000You could see stuff getting a little clunkier.
00:27:12.000Yeah, those are some great times because, I mean, I connect with Benny because when I was in Bridgeport, my instructor, Manny Malisi, went to California and started training with Benny.
00:29:10.000That cat was like, I always considered him like, pound for pound, the best, because he he, now he had this.
00:29:18.000Not only you know jiu-jitsu skills, but just his concentration yeah, and he was almost, like you know hypnotic right, you know what I mean the way.
00:29:28.000And just no waste of energy none, just unbelievable.
00:29:38.000Another great example of Goliath stuff.
00:29:40.000Oh yeah, another great example of cross training too, because Hickson got really into yoga and everybody's like, what the fuck are you doing yoga?
00:29:58.000Yeah, you saw him in that, in the Hulk.
00:30:00.000Oh yeah yeah yeah man, it's something, man that that's talk about a legend oh, real legend yeah yeah, man.
00:30:08.000Well Hickson, there's a video of him and he did this multiple times where he would go to these gyms and he would um, teach a seminar, like a long seminar, and then roll with all the black belts yeah, and just tap them one after the other.
00:30:22.000One world champions, guys that just didn't understand what was going on, like how is this happening?
00:30:28.000Oh yeah, like Paul Ophelio, when he was a WC world champion and he was uh, he had won the Mundials.
00:30:36.000I believe he'd won multiple jiu-jitsu championships and he he trained with Hickson and he's like man, it's true, because I can't believe it he goes.
00:30:44.000That guy treated me like I didn't even belong in there.
00:30:46.000It was crazy, and Hickson by that time was probably like 40.
00:30:51.000yeah you know and it's still just dominating guys on the map and effortless it wasn't strength it was it was just pure technique and basics and Just mastering of basics.
00:31:30.000So, you know, that's that really put, and I love jiu-jitsu because it, it's, it's, it's held up the tradition that martial arts, someone's karate lost because it became a business.
00:31:43.000And people would just, you know, put their time in and pay for their black belts.
00:33:28.000See, but kudos because a lot of people, because of if you got an egotistical thing going and you get that your little, I don't know, your comfort because you got your black belt and all that kind of stuff.
00:33:45.000You know, to everybody I know who continues and really to learn real fighting knows when you had a boxer beat the hell out you and you go, oh wait, there's a lot of this stuff I got to toss out the window.
00:33:59.000And because I mean, I never forget like times where a wrestler gets to me or a boxer like pieces me up like early on.
00:34:14.000I went through one of them in high school because I had a friend in high school that was a wrestler and I didn't think anything of wrestling.
00:34:21.000I'm like, that's not even a martial art.
00:34:23.000And then we wrestled on the grass one day and he just took me down at will.
00:36:47.000Like, with martial arts, the Dundee Kruger effect in the largest way possible because everybody out there has an opinion of martial arts, though very few people really know what it is.
00:37:00.000You know, they want to look at the movies and everything, and they really want to believe that.
00:37:05.000They want to believe that this guy who kicks in the air and all that kind of stuff will be able to beat a champion.
00:37:13.000And in a way, hey, I benefit from that to some degree because they think that about me.
00:37:20.000But even though I'm comfortable fighting and I love to, I mean, I just love fighting against anybody.
00:37:29.000But you've had actual competition experience, like a lot of competitions.
00:37:32.000Yeah, but my best experiences is with like, I got a chance to train against champions at their place.
00:38:54.000And so, like, some of the best times for me is like, I know when I was, you know, Michael Bisbing was getting ready to fight George St. Pierre, and we were in Thailand.
00:39:06.000I was like, yeah, you know, let's mix it up.
00:39:57.000No matter what you think about watching his fights, you have to understand, not only did he accomplish so much, he accomplished a lot of it with one eye.
00:40:46.000And so whenever I have a chance, man, I always like to put them in movies and try to expose them to another kind of way of getting paid.
00:40:58.000Especially afterwards, because it breaks my heart that they're heroes and then they get discarded sometimes by not by the union that they're with, but just by the fans.
00:43:20.000The Mark Kerr, the Mark Coleman, and then Randy, a bunch of these guys got in there.
00:43:25.000And then they realized, like, if a guy could just take you down and beat the fuck out of you from the top, there's not a whole lot you could do about it.
00:43:31.000And then we realized, like, boy, that is the corner.
00:43:43.000And the best sport in the world to get your kids into at a young age because the discipline and the mental toughness that they get will carry them through for the rest of their life.
00:48:22.000And in the middle of him telling me like a third or fourth story, like back in the glory days of us or whatever, while he was in the middle of this story, I was kind of getting myself set to kind of set him straight because I don't know if you want to call this superstitious, but I won't lie.
00:50:41.000But I mean, but There was so much, there were so many events, things that would, I just call it on a Wednesday that I went through that it's like, I don't know, like, I think I wouldn't trade it because I continue to be the happiest guy I know because of, I think, some of that.
00:51:06.000Because you can appreciate the good times.
00:51:41.000That's definitely a lot of what we do.
00:51:43.000I mean, there's definitely a lot of it, right?
00:51:45.000You entertain, but I feel very blessed that I've been able to expose people to so many different ways of thinking, so much information, so many different human beings that have led completely different paths that can tell you about whatever discipline they're involved in, what they've learned, and what we're working on right now, and what you can learn about the human mind, the body, ancient history, fill-in-the-link, like whatever it is.
00:52:14.000And utmost honesty, I remember like when you had to kind of pull Shaab aside and tell, as a friend, some things that are hard for people, you know, other friends to tell him.
00:52:37.000I'd seen it too many times, but I hadn't seen it with someone I was that close with.
00:52:41.000I was like, you have to stop because not only that, you're in the heavyweight division, so the knockouts are brutal, and you're going to get three or four more in the next couple of years.
00:52:51.000And then you're not going to recover from those.
00:52:53.000Man, so many people, I hope they take a page out of that because it's so non-manly, I feel, to just not say anything.
00:55:35.000And anybody who was against me, I don't care if you were my cousin or whatever, you were going to pay for all the angst that I've had in my life.
00:55:45.000But until there was this one time, I swear, I ducked a technique.
00:55:50.000I caught somebody with something that was kind of, you know, kind of cool.
00:55:55.000And I just remember the audience just cheering.
00:56:00.000And in that moment, I was like just angry.
00:56:05.000Kind of like, yo, this guy could really be messed up right now.
00:59:19.000That's the one thing that I realized, like, fuck, man, to be like, and I wasn't even a professional, really, but it was training like a professional.
00:59:25.000It's like, I can't believe how tired I am all the time.
00:59:29.000But, you know, I think Wesley had never really had a fight.
00:59:38.000I trained with Wesley's instructors, you know, Marcus Elgato, who's a good friend of mine, and also Lamar Thornton, who was Marcus Elgato's instructor.
00:59:49.000That's, I believe, that's the only, that's the lineage I believe that he's through.
00:59:56.000But I mean, I've never, I've known Wesley since way before he was kind of Wesley.
01:01:36.000And with Wesley, I was always like, my thing is he used to have people around him that I'm like, you know, we have little get-togethers at my house, whatever.
01:01:45.000I'm like, don't bring any of those motherfuckers or it's going to be a problem.
01:01:50.000You know, because there's just people that just I felt like were hangers on and, you know, that kind of a thing.
01:01:55.000And I was always like, yeah, man, you are you good?
01:01:58.000And, you know, are you staying healthy?
01:02:01.000I've always been that way because the way I look at it, he's a big brother.
01:02:06.000You know, he gave me some good advice early on.
01:02:09.000He always encouraged me that if I have a movie that's overseas, get there.
01:02:14.000You know, show up in those overseas markets and let them know that you're down, you know.
01:02:20.000And I took that to heart and that helped me out in my career a great deal.
01:02:25.000And so I, you know, I look at it like that.
01:02:27.000I've never, I'll never say anything derogatory about him or whatever.
01:02:31.000So, I mean, I'm always, I just recently tried to reach out to him like a couple days ago just to check in, man, because I, I, you know, I wish him the best.
01:02:41.000And, you know, I want to really, you know, start kicking ass again.
01:02:46.000I would love to see him return as Blade.
01:03:27.000Superhero movies are the biggest fucking movies in Hollywood right now.
01:03:31.000I mean, when they have a big budget movie, superhero movies are like the only movie that you can throw hundreds of millions of dollars and be sure it's going to kill it in the box office.
01:03:41.000Whether it's The Avengers or Spider-Man or Superman or whoever the fuck it is.
01:06:45.000Man, most people didn't see the first adaptation of it.
01:06:51.000The first, well, I saw a cut of the movie before it, I mean, at this time, it had like 71 special effects in it.
01:07:01.000But Bob Shea at the time that was running New Line liked that version.
01:07:09.000He just gave the director, Karn Botch, to just add whatever he wanted.
01:07:15.000And the director was a special effects guy.
01:07:19.000So he started throwing special effects in there that was really killing the story, which kind of drove me up a wall because then, like, you didn't even see why my character wanted to get back.
01:07:34.000You didn't even see the life that I wanted to get back to because there was so much special effects.
01:07:39.000And even when I saw the final version, I'm like, what the hell is going on?
01:07:43.000People that knew Spawn, they were fine with it because they understood the character.
01:07:48.000But for me, it was like the story got all convoluted.
01:07:52.000But like, you know, but I mean, people love it.
01:11:08.000And Tom McFarland is talking about doing another spawn, but I'm like, well, that would be the first time a person that created a comic book directed and produced a movie that I know of, right?
01:11:23.000Because even though he talks about he's going to do one, and he had this concept that he talked to me about, and then he said he wanted to, you know, I guess he wanted to use Jamie Fox.
01:11:33.000And he talked about this concept that spawn would be, you wouldn't see him.
01:12:06.000He's been saying that for a long time, but I'm going, hey, maybe somebody is going to give him that amount of money to do a movie when he's never directed anything before.
01:16:59.000Yeah, I played that over and over myself.
01:17:02.000The amount of times that he must have drilled that to get that, unholster the gun, pull it out, shoot him, shoot the other dude, so smooth.
01:17:11.000And the way he did it, so professional.
01:18:00.000I actually visited that set when they were shooting that.
01:18:03.000Not that scene, but it was another, it was another day.
01:18:09.000And it was, I remember it was weird because they were shooting something and they were shooting Tom, behind Tom Cruise's head.
01:18:17.000And they had eight camera angles just behind his head.
01:18:22.000I'm like, and I'm looking at the, you know, the video village where They made sure they had a choice of whatever perfect thing that they want.
01:19:21.000Like something like that requires what he can do.
01:19:24.000And there's a lot of, you know, that's one of the things.
01:19:27.000Not a lot of things out there sometimes.
01:19:29.000You know, so, you know, he's been doing things that I think show, you know, certain parts, but like to where he was going in collateral and Ray, you know, it'd be nice to see that stuff again.
01:19:43.000It's got to be hard to find those roles, right?
01:19:46.000And when you find those roles, there's probably like six or seven A-list dudes that they have like on a board somewhere and they're trying to figure out who's the guy for this.
01:21:22.000And, you know, I started jotting stuff down because it occurred to me, man.
01:21:26.000Like, I just like, I mean, one day I was thinking like, wow, man, like, growing up, we had Shaft and well, we had Superfly and the Mac and all that posters like that that we idolized.
01:22:29.000It had the three predominant black exploitation stars, right?
01:22:33.000And the movie was about an evil Dr. Feather who had these leaders of liquid that he was going to put in the water systems of LA, Chicago, and New York that were going to kill all the black people.
01:22:56.000It was going to give sickle-cell anemia to all the black people.
01:23:00.000Now, the conspirator thing, I've been a black man for a long time, and it is really funny because in the community, conspiracy is a big thing, right?
01:23:12.000So that whole conspirator thing, oh, they trying to get you, that kind of a thing.
01:23:17.000It really, its engine was that, that paranoia that this leader of liquid was going to kill black people.
01:23:26.000Well, there was so much evidence that those conspiracies were real, like the Tuskegee.
01:23:30.000But of course, that's something that's like, it's on its feet, though.
01:23:35.000But come on, a leader, something this big in the water systems that was going to kill all the black people.
01:27:16.000I understand there's a lot of stories that I think could be told with fresh ways and with the action and martial arts that could be new and exciting.
01:27:28.000I'm getting to a place where I'm trying to make fight scenes look very real, including choreographing mistakes.
01:27:38.000I think people have become so much more sophisticated watching UFC fights and all that type of stuff.
01:27:45.000I think you got to raise the bar to make something look real.
01:27:50.000And there's a lot of this stuff that's in the, you know, the superhero movies and whatever that you just kind of go, okay, you're seeing choreography for choreography's sake.
01:28:02.000And you're not invested because you don't feel like you're looking at a real fight.
01:28:07.000And so I like to kind of, you know, use my platform to step that up a bit.
01:28:11.000Yeah, that's hard, especially as a person who is a martial artist to watch fight scenes and go, you have to kind of suspend disbelief and go, all right.
01:29:00.000So luckily, you know, I mean, I can put things on screen that kind of resemble what things might look like, you know, and you get the benefit of the doubt because, you know, you're in a heroic position.
01:29:33.000You did the right thing because what you're doing, you could not, you know, this could not be more, you know, up your alley doing the things that you're doing.
01:35:45.000Josh is one of the, he's like one of the best examples to me of when people think of a martial artist or think of a cage fighter, former UFC heavyweight champion.
01:35:56.000And you think of a guy like, oh, probably some brute, some dude.
01:38:08.000And that play sparring allows them to not get beat up by the time they get into the ring on Saturday because a lot of them are fighting every week.
01:40:31.000It's so fascinating to me how different parts of the world develop a different style of martial arts.
01:40:37.000And Thailand in particular, because of the fact that there was so much gambling and there were so many fights that they developed this very heavy leg kick, clinch, elbow, knee style.
01:40:49.000It was just very different than a lot of the other styles.
01:41:49.000It was the toughest thing I ever had to really face because you come to a point where you want to give up and you have to just kind of walk the burning sands.
01:42:15.000I did a 20-man one other time and made the mistake of having a, I had like a energy drink beforehand, which is stupid because now my heart is racing higher than normal.
01:44:08.000And it's like we'd have a training thing, and then you got a certain amount of time to go eat, but then people want to take pictures of me.
01:44:15.000And I'm the last guy to get into the lunch thing.
01:44:19.000And then I was like, oh, shit, I got 10 minutes to eat, and then I got to get back in the next training session.
01:46:14.000And I always like to, that's why I like to train with champions and stuff because, you know, that's you want you want to get through things.
01:46:26.000I mean, as a man, if I had a religion, a large part of it, if I was the head of my own religious cult, would be that men go through something.
01:50:17.000Well, I'll tell you what, man, that part of the world, Dagestan, you want to talk about a hard part of the world that is developing some of the baddest motherfuckers.
01:50:25.000Even in Muay Thai, there's this cat coming out of Muay Thai out of Dagestan right now, Azadullah Iman Gazaliev, who's like 22 years old, and he is fucking everybody up.
01:50:38.000A Dagestani Muay Thai fighter who has his own style.
01:50:42.000He's this tall, lanky dude who's one of the most terrifying strikers alive right now.
01:50:47.000A lot of people think he's the best striker alive.
01:55:08.000Well, Yuki Yoza, the Kyokushin guy that I was telling you, totally different.
01:55:11.000What this guy's doing is shelling up and getting in tight on guys and kicking the fuck out of their inner thigh, outer calf, lower, like he's chopping at their legs.
01:55:21.000So even Thai guys don't know what to do because they're not used to guys kicking their calves like this guy.
01:56:05.000I mean, especially for a Kyokushin guy to, I mean, the knock with Kyokushin, I've been doing it ever since I was a kid.
01:56:12.000It's just that not developing facial facial blocks.
01:56:19.000Well, this guy has incorporated Russian-style boxing.
01:56:24.000He's got Russian-style boxing with Kyokushin karate techniques.
01:56:27.000Well, yeah, but with that Russian-style boxing, they really kind of mastered the non-telegraph kind of because it looks like they're not going fast.
01:56:40.000There's a bunch of fights with him and Thai guys.
01:56:43.000And, you know, the first round, Thai guys are doing their thing, and it looks like a normal fight, but the Yuki Yoza just starts chopping at those calves inside.
01:56:52.000And he's like multiple kicks to the calf from in tight and close.
01:57:57.000And he comes out of a very high-level gym in Japan that's produced a lot of really Masasaki Nori, another guy who's like that, who's a very similar guy who beat Tawan Chai recently.
01:58:10.000Like these guys are just destroying people's legs.
01:58:14.000So they're utilizing a lot of the question mark kicks, a lot of the stuff that evolved in Kyokushin, but putting it into kickboxing also with the toughness that is in a lot of the Kyokushin fighters.
01:58:27.000Yeah, I see them slip into a Superman.
02:00:43.000Yeah, you know, that's why it's like a lot of times in these movies, if you have an alpha male, a lot of times that alpha male, that American alpha male is being played by an Australian or somebody from the Chris Entertainment.
02:00:56.000Yeah, it's so, you know, it's like it's very rarely an American.
02:01:02.000Well, masculinity is demonized here for some strange reason over the last couple of decades.
02:01:08.000Bro, I saw the beginning of a lot of it because, you know, like I say, I was a school teacher and I was right on the forefront saying, like, everybody gets a trophy.
02:01:17.000You know, these kids, you know, they're, you know, it's about their self-esteem and you got to protect that.
02:03:27.000Well, a lot of times I was competing against people that were ginormous and all they had to do is stick their arm out and their arc was going to be better than mine.
02:03:36.000Well, I had to generate enough power to go at a 45 degree angle and inertia and all that to get past them.
02:03:46.000And with running, of course, if you shoot the gun off, all your motion has to go forward.
02:03:53.000If you go backward, you're going to be a step behind everybody.
02:03:57.000So as far as efficiency of motion, all the things I had to do with track, I started applying and fighting.
02:04:05.000And that's what kind of gave me cheat codes into things to where being super efficient really helped, right?
02:04:13.000And so one thing would like kind of help the other.
02:04:18.000But like, yeah, a lot of my whole track thing was a great benefit.
02:04:25.000But I did learn that I was kind of in a way like the Bo Jacksons or the Herschel Walkers.
02:04:49.000But I learned that when I was as the celebrated fighter, that was less of a good martial artist because then I kind of would kind of flake off other things.
02:05:02.000Like I wasn't, I didn't try as hard as other people.
02:05:06.000And that's another thing I don't know if Khabib really said, but it was a thing that he said about those gifted people, a lot of people who are gifted were not the best fighters.
02:05:20.000And I took that, you know, that same thing because I realized, dude, you're doing it wrong.
02:05:27.000You're, I mean, my philosophy was like, I feel I adapted the philosophy of, okay, say this kid, Sean, is 140 pounds, and there's me, and it takes me a thousand kicks to become fatigued, and it takes him 100 kicks to become fatigued.
02:05:45.000And he pushes to 120, and I push to 1,001.
02:06:14.000I'm looking at it using the comparative method, saying, Well, you know, you know, I mean, at the end of the year, I used to kick a basketball rim.
02:06:24.000But when I started thinking about, well, what I compare myself to other people, that was the wrong thing.
02:06:31.000So I said, No, I'm going to be like Sean.
02:06:34.000I want to train to my ability, not in comparison to someone else.
02:06:42.000And that really taught me something as far as like, again, why I put myself through these things and the benefit of it by really like when what the martial arts really teaches is, you know, and the fact that, yeah, I had these gifts, but if I if I use those gifts as a crutch, I'm limiting what I can be.
02:08:30.000Because if you are gifted athletically, you have a responsibility of achieving the full potential because you've been given this thing by genetics, by life, by God, this thing where you are faster, you move quicker, you have more explosive power.
02:08:45.000But are you going to harness that gift and allow it to reach its full potential?
02:08:50.000And when you do that, then you get a Mike Tyson.
02:08:53.000When you do that, then you get a Michael Jordan.
02:08:55.000You do that, then you get an elite of the elite.
02:08:57.000You get what David Goggins always liked to call uncommon amongst uncommon men.
02:09:06.000Because so many of these really gifted guys in the gym, they always kind of peter off and disappear.
02:09:12.000And when they're in a fight where they fight another gifted guy that maybe trained a little harder than them, maybe he's got a little bit more experience, they realize, like, man, I don't want to struggle like that.
02:09:55.000You know, there's people I don't want, you know, sometimes you get in trouble pointing out people.
02:10:02.000Like, I don't want to say somebody like Izzy or whatever, but like you see the people who are used to having that ability over other people and when it gets hard.
02:10:48.000And so that's something that, you know, not to disparage him, but just as people are looking at life, we look at those things and we can take a lot of meaning from that and apply that and say, oh, wow, is, I mean, if that's on him to say, oh, was that the case?
02:11:08.000Or is it something that, I don't know.
02:11:12.000I think with Mike, it's a very special case because I think he had the elite coaching in the beginning with Customato and training.
02:11:21.000And then when Cuss died, he was kind of left with all this amazing ability that he had developed when he was young, but not with the elite coaching.
02:11:32.000Like, so if Mike had left when Customato died, if he had then went to Emmanuel Stewart, or if the, you know what I'm saying?
02:11:41.000Because he had then went to an elite boxing coach and had someone analyze his style and someone he really respected.
02:13:13.000Miles Tongue and he's got Arthur Ashe on another shoulder.
02:13:20.000And I would just notice that even speech patterns would change.
02:13:25.000And I looked at him as, wow, here's a guy that I felt like I identified with a great deal because coming from the same kind of place.
02:13:36.000But yeah, it's interesting because I think a lot of people don't know how much struggle he had to deal with because people think that Kevin Rooney was kind of a savior in that situation when he wasn't.
02:13:49.000Kevin Rooney explained to me directly that he says, if you ever see Mike, please apologize for me.
02:13:58.000Because When Mike was married to Robin Gibbons, he didn't want to do this interview.
02:14:07.000And then turn around, Kevin Rooney did the interview.
02:14:10.000And Kevin Rooney is like, I really messed up when I did that.
02:14:14.000And Kevin Rooney even told me that when at the Spinx fight alone, Kevin made like over a million dollars.
02:17:53.000You know, it was deep down, like, he's got to fight this guy who's this, he's got this reputation as a holy man, and he's all this type of stuff.
02:18:03.000And then I remember being at that fight, and I remember the press conference, and Mike was like really manufacturing this hatred that I was like, that's not real.
02:18:15.000Like, he's trying to dig down to really get this edge to really hate Holyfield.
02:18:21.000And I was like, I thought that was a mistake.
02:18:25.000But, and I don't think psychologically, he was in his game.
02:18:38.000Like, Holyfield had this incredible belief in God, and he really believed that God was looking out for him and he was going to go in there.
02:23:27.000He's one of the most unique characters.
02:23:30.000I think we were robbed of one of the greatest heavyweight matchups of all time when they never figured out how to put Kane Velasquez versus Fedor when they were both in their primes.
02:27:17.000I think the best was when he fought Cleveland Big Cat Williams.
02:27:20.000To me, I always tell people, like, you want to know Ali before they took his title away, before they put him on the shelf for three years because he wouldn't fight in Vietnam?
02:27:28.000Watch Cleveland Big Cat Williams because Cleveland was a big, scary power puncher, and Muhammad Ali was just dancing around him, dancing around.
02:27:36.000But was he bigger than Muhammad Ali, though?
02:29:02.000So that's why it's interesting because Mike moved his head, and the people who did the best against Muhammad Ali was Joe Frazier and Ken Norton.
02:30:25.000If George Foreman of that time fought Cleveland, the Muhammad Ali that fought Cleveland Big Cat Williams, it's a completely different fight.
02:30:45.000But those three years when he had to take three years and he didn't train at all, and then he came back and now he's 30 and no strength and conditioning for three years, no running, no boxing.
02:32:50.000That's why, I mean, that's why when people talk about the greatest boxer, of course, he's one of the greatest human beings, greatest Americans ever.
02:33:50.000If anybody disrespected him, if anybody like if they wouldn't call him Muhammad Ali, if they were calling him Cassius Clay, he would them up.
02:36:09.000Yeah, and put his life on the line and just was so you know and a cautionary tale to fighters too about the end about fighting too long.
02:36:18.000Look, no one ever forgave Larry Holmes for beating him up.
02:36:21.000Larry Holmes, one of the greatest heavyweight champions of all time, never got his just due because people never forgave him for beating up Ali.
02:38:15.000It's a no, look, we're very fortunate that we can see all of these incredible human beings that have risked their life and their health and put it on the line so we could see true lessons about character and technique.
02:38:28.000Yeah, I just wish heavyweights would concentrate on technique a little bit more.
02:42:26.000And if you're experiencing brain damage now, I mean, without treatment, there's some treatments now that they're able to use to help regenerate some neural tissue.
02:42:37.000But there's a certain amount you never come back from.
02:43:13.000Yeah, he kind of was like, you know, getting high, doing it, kind of went that route for a minute.
02:43:19.000But it's, but he's gotten, I've just actually seen things turn around with this, I don't know why I can't remember, but it's this brain stimulation thing, and it kind of rewires you.
02:44:12.000It's this conglomerate of doctors all around the world that's dedicated to fixing causes of diseases, not just chasing around the symptoms and stuff.
02:44:25.000And so it's like very much in the face of the pharmaceutical companies, they are really dedicated to taking care of things from the source.
02:44:39.000And it's been going on for a while, man.
02:44:40.000It's like they have about six of these things a year.
02:45:13.000A4M, they have a lot of doctors who will be giving lectures on all the most innovative stuff.
02:45:21.000And they have all the newest equipment that's just like the biggest kind of, I don't know, like rooms, huge rooms full of all the most collaborating.
02:45:36.000It's a good time to be an older person.